I'm using a GTX 1650m with the Nvidia 570 driver and I'm currently on GNOME 48 with Ubuntu 25.04. I also tried KDE, but the same issues persist. When I'm on X11, games run perfectly, but most applications just display a frozen image of my wallpaper or whatever window is behind them, and they end up crashing. However, on Wayland, applications work fine, but games are nearly unplayable. Is there any fix for this? Just to update, something I did bricked the entire install, and I'm not interested in spending more time on this, so I've switched back to Windows.
3 Answers
Have you tried switching to a different Nvidia driver? Sometimes, driver issues can cause these types of problems, and a different version might help.
You can actually use Wayland and force your dedicated GPU in game launchers like Heroic and Steam. This could help get your games to run better without switching back to X11.
The dedicated GPU isn’t the issue, my games do use it but still struggle.
It sounds like you might have hybrid graphics going on, which is common with many laptop GPUs. Have you checked if your laptop has a dedicated GPU and integrated graphics? Sometimes these setups can cause issues with driver compatibility.
Yeah, it's definitely a laptop. I noticed that when I have an external monitor plugged in, X11 seems to perform better.
That makes sense! Switching to X11 through hybrid setups can clear up a lot of issues.
I had the 570 and 570-open drivers, but they didn't help. Anyway, I accidentally bricked my install, so I'm going to try Mint since it prioritizes X11.