diff --git a/src/backends/x11/meta-backend-x11.c b/src/backends/x11/meta-backend-x11.c
index 233532435..c7602cc70 100644
--- a/src/backends/x11/meta-backend-x11.c
+++ b/src/backends/x11/meta-backend-x11.c
@@ -705,8 +705,6 @@ meta_backend_x11_init (MetaBackendX11 *x11)
    */
   XInitThreads();
 
-  clutter_x11_request_reset_on_video_memory_purge ();
-
   /* We do X11 event retrieval ourselves */
   clutter_x11_disable_event_retrieval ();
 }
diff --git a/src/backends/x11/meta-renderer-x11.c b/src/backends/x11/meta-renderer-x11.c
index 90924e038..003211d85 100644
--- a/src/backends/x11/meta-renderer-x11.c
+++ b/src/backends/x11/meta-renderer-x11.c
@@ -73,6 +73,7 @@ meta_renderer_x11_create_cogl_renderer (MetaRenderer *renderer)
   cogl_renderer = cogl_renderer_new ();
   cogl_renderer_set_custom_winsys (cogl_renderer, get_x11_cogl_winsys_vtable);
   cogl_xlib_renderer_set_foreign_display (cogl_renderer, xdisplay);
+  cogl_xlib_renderer_request_reset_on_video_memory_purge (cogl_renderer, TRUE);
 
   /* Set up things so that if the INTEL_swap_event extension is not present,
    * but the driver is known to have good thread support, we use an extra