# Prevent Screen Tearing out of the Gate on Intel, AMD & Nvidia GPUs?

**URL:** <https://discourse.ubuntubudgie.org/t/prevent-screen-tearing-out-of-the-gate-on-intel-amd-nvidia-gpus/5520>\
**Category:** Development\
**Created:** [December 5, 2021, 6:33am UTC](https://discourse.ubuntubudgie.org/t/prevent-screen-tearing-out-of-the-gate-on-intel-amd-nvidia-gpus/5520 "2021-12-05T06:33:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![rbreaves](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/discourse.ubuntubudgie.org/rbreaves/32/3871_2.png) [@rbreaves](https://discourse.ubuntubudgie.org/u/rbreaves)\
**Post date:** [December 5, 2021, 6:33am UTC](https://discourse.ubuntubudgie.org/t/prevent-screen-tearing-out-of-the-gate-on-intel-amd-nvidia-gpus/5520/1 "2021-12-05T06:33:10Z")

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I am kinda surprised that Linux distros don’t do a better job with this, as I think I often have to configure additional settings for Intel GPUs to avoid screen tearing. This appears to work for me with my Intel CPU/GPUs, but could we detect certain GPUs and apply the proper screen tearing fixes to them from the start?

Can test against this video.

[![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/0RvIbVmCOxg/maxresdefault.jpg "Tearing test @60fps") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RvIbVmCOxg)

Intel® HD Graphics 500  
/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-intel.conf

```auto
Section "Module"
    Load "dri3"
EndSection

Section "Device"
    Identifier "Intel Graphics"
    Driver "intel"
    Option "DRI" "3"
EndSection

```

> <https://askubuntu.com/questions/1234026/screen-tearing-on-ubuntu-xorg-20-04-with-intel-graphics>

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**Author:** ![fossfreedom](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/discourse.ubuntubudgie.org/fossfreedom/32/1405_2.png) [@fossfreedom](https://discourse.ubuntubudgie.org/u/fossfreedom)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2021, 5:02pm UTC](https://discourse.ubuntubudgie.org/t/prevent-screen-tearing-out-of-the-gate-on-intel-amd-nvidia-gpus/5520/2 "2021-12-07T17:02:48Z")

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This is a difficult one. There are a number of areas that impact screen tearing which make packaging nigh on impossible.

1. Window Manager - some window managers have more screen tearing issues than others - so how should a package cater for this?
2. Kernel - mesa updates - this area is frequently updated by kernel updates and kernel releases. So a mesa update in a kernel can make things worse or better - so a workaround like you described could make things difficult to diagnose/make things better or worse to understand.  
2.5 worse - when moving to a new release (e.g. 21.10 to 22.04) will involve a biggish jump of mesa / kernel - so a config file manually applied at 21.10 probably will impact (and hang around) after the upgrade.
3. Apps themselves - some apps have screen tearing themselves - so - for example - vlc may behave better on some scenarios … celluloid better in others. So again what are we trying to target here?
4. Graphics drivers themselves - do have a direct impact on stuff - so - as the example given - using the older intel driver in a xorg.conf can appear to make things better for you - for others who have a similar but not identical intel card will behave oddly.

All in all - I don’t know of a straightforward answer here.