constant lagging on netbook

[adventure_of_link]

the specs:

intel atom n270 1.6GHz (or so at this point this is what CPU-Z and the docs are telling me )
1GB RAM
Windows XP SP3

the problem:

any time I use my netbook, I notice this constant... lag then everything comes back. I've downloaded speedswitch xp and cpu-z to try and discover this problem, and apparently my CPU likes to go from 1.6GHz down to 800MHz, even at some points at odd numbers reported by speedswitch like 400MHz, 500MHz, 1100MHz, even 1300MHz!!! it's so bad that sometimes when I even type in a text box (as I'm doing for this post) all my words that I type won't show up, but after a few seconds it will. I notice too much lag/slowdown when I play movies, do some light gaming, watch youtube, etc. It does this regardless if the thing is running off the wall outlet or the battery.

I understand netbooks were meant for web browsing, but my god even a 1.6GHz 1GB RAM system should NOT be exhibiting the symptoms I am describing, especially during light web browsing.

can anyone help? thanks.

[spiller]

That's odd. The changing CPU speed sounds perfectly normal, but it should be nearly unnoticeable. It certainly shouldn't cause lag.

Check the system tray and control panel for utilities that might be trying to enforce different speeds or power levels, and fiddle with the Speedswitch policies. There could be relevant BIOS settings too.

(Or maybe the switching is working fine, but some particular program is reacting badly to it, getting confused and consequently eating CPU time, causing lag?)

[odditude]

Some netbooks have truly crap SSDs which can cause the aforementioned issues.

[adventure_of_link]

Spiller: I just took out that Live! Power application, it didn't seem to help.. I've been trying various utilities (notebook hardware control, speedswitch xp, etc) to restore harmony, and nothing. I guess I'll have to comb my installed programs for more things. AFAIK when the lag spikes hit nothing else is using the CPU. I also tried combing through my BIOS settings, and I didn't find anything related to power or speed stepping.

odditude: iirc the hdd in this thing is a SATA drive. it's 160GB, and I didn't know that SSD's can screw with the lag, sorry. I've been out of the PC loop for so long...

[adventure_of_link]

**update**

found out that part (if not most) of my problem is actually due to Firefox... tried watching a netflix movie in Interweb Exploder (yeah yeah I know, it's the only other thing that's installed), I got ZERO lag. Played bejeweled blitz on facebook, there was a little lag, but not as bad as FF. tried typing a post there, barely noticeable lag. FWIW, cpu-z kept reporting a stable and solid 1600MHz while watching netflix in IE, but would switch over to 800MHz when using x-chat (despite running netflix at the same time).

Any way to tune up the FF? I HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE using IE with a burning HOT passion.

[kick]

Ditch the Roasted Fox / Interweb Exploder and upgrade to a real browser.

You have the choice of:

- Opera 11.10 "Barracuda" :

http://my.opera.com/desktopteam/blog/20 ... -barracuda

or

- a bleeding-edge build of Chromium 11:

http://build.chromium.org/f/chromium/sn ... um-rel-xp/


Pick your poison

[Gil_Hamilton]

Chrome's UI is even worse than Firefox's.
I have no opinion on Opera, from either a resource or UI standpoint.


I'd pimp Seamonkey again, but odds are it's a Gecko issue ass opposed to something Firefox-specific.

[Rashidi]

was there particular version of FF that causing it?
would downgrading helps somehow?

[odditude]

...or it's an issue with the flash plugin (ie uses the activex control).

[grinvader]

I'd pimp Seamonkey again, but odds are it's a Gecko issue ass opposed to something Firefox-specific.

blasphemy !

pimping seamonkey doesn't suffer any excuse

[adventure_of_link]

was there particular version of FF that causing it?
would downgrading helps somehow?

as far as I know, nearly all FF builds from december 2009-now were causing the lag thing.

kick: will try chrome, thanks.

odditude: keep in mind that even typing in facebook, here on the zboard, or other forums got the lag spike.. but I wouldn't be surprised if half my woes were related to the flash plugin (I didn't think FF used activex, I thought that was IE only ). fwiw I disabled that stupid plugin-container.exe and it didn't really help much.

[kode54]

Disable the hardware acceleration in Firefox, maybe it's not working nicely with whatever crap GPU your netbook has?