FireFox problem on T23

Message

Cuda · #1 Post by **Cuda** » Fri May 04, 2007 8:15 am

I've already checked the Firefox web site and didn't see this bug reported but on my T23 when I pull up a graphic intensive webpage it gets VERY slow at scrolling down or up the page even after the page has completly loaded, it's also very jerky, I can pull the slider down with the mouse and it may move quite a bit before the page does and then it jumps all at once, it also takes a while to save a picture if I want too, it's real slow at pulling up the save box and may take 3 or 4 seconds to actually save the file, I have the current version and have tried changing the browsing options on scrolling with no difference. Any ideas? None of these issues exist with IE.

x3ss · #2 Post by **x3ss** » Fri May 04, 2007 9:40 am

same here...
i have 1200 cpu and 384mb of ram but firefox is still jerky when a web page has many images or few big unoptimised images.
one other thing is that when selecting multiple icons in an explorer window and the translucent selection rectangle gets bigger the mouse cursor starts to move like crap jumping all over the screen in frames... not a pretty site for a simple task

i do belive that the video drivers are the problem or some setting that is made to them by default...
the thing that bothers me is that a friend has a similar t23 but with silghtly lower specs that doesn't have this problem, everything works great on his laptop

and this takes me to another speculation: i have SXGA+ screen while he has an XGA one...maybe the video chip is too dum/slow to handle the SXGA+ res when is filled with images.

i'll post more soon, gotta run now.

cheers!

#3 Post by **rkawakami** » Fri May 04, 2007 9:44 am

Yes, I have noticed this, along with dsigma6 in this thread. I'm normally running Firefox 1.5.0.11 on a 2647-HNU (1.2Ghz, with 1GB of memory, SXGA+ at 32-bit color depth) and I also see a slight hesitation when a new page is being open in another tab or if there are some graphics-heavy pages already open.

Some of the delay can be reduced (but maybe not totally eliminated) if you change the color depth of your display. The S3 graphics chip is not the greatest performer and Firefox seems to use more than its fair share of CPU cycles.

Cuda · #4 Post by **Cuda** » Fri May 04, 2007 10:11 am

I forgot to mention I have a 2647-MU8 model with 384 MB memory and running Windows 2000 Pro, I don't know the display type, how do you tell that? Another problem I have is when I open a folder with lots of pictures and choose the thumbnail view it takes a pretty long time to load all the pics, is this because of the tiny 16MB video card or is it a memory problem? I've been thinking of getting more memory.

Purcy · #5 Post by **Purcy** » Fri May 04, 2007 10:24 am

I have 512MB of RAM and use Firefox 2.0 on Windows XP, I have no problem with my scrolling mouse and pages usually load very quickly and I have do lag time or drag. You would really benefit from an up in RAM, You're lucky, you can go to 1GB I think. Firefox is a memory hog.

#6 Post by **RealBlackStuff** » Fri May 04, 2007 12:21 pm

Firefox takes about 55MB. IE7 about 30MB.
All T20/21/22 can go to 512MB (max. 2x 256MB) memory.
T23s can go to 1GB (max. 2x 512MB).
T30s can go to 2GB (max. 2x 1GB) provided both slots are OK.

TonyJZX · #7 Post by **TonyJZX** » Sun May 06, 2007 11:47 pm

I use that chrometal driver on a 512Mb t23 under XP - I see that Firefox screen lag problem. I do run 1,280 x 1,024 @ 24-bit on a 19" LCD.

I do not know if it affect IE - I don't use it.

I think it's the video card - not much you can do there.

It's also fairly useless on playing back video as well.

Ah well.. IBM is a business laptop I guess.

ludox · #8 Post by **ludox** » Mon May 07, 2007 10:41 am

For information, all software may have bugs but keep in mind that Microsoft is know for insert code in their OS to make competitor's soft bug or slow.

I don't think it is the problem here cause it seems attached to a Thinkpad serie.

But it is interesting to know it.

Ex : IIS that serve slowly requests of other than IE, Wordperfect it was a time.

dsigma6 · #9 Post by **dsigma6** » Mon May 07, 2007 1:03 pm

I'm still going through the same thing above, as the thread Ray linked to says. Same experience on XP and Vista (didn't expect it to go away or anything), and I've tried about 4 different drivers.

I have NOT tried IE7, which would be the smart thing to do.

Purcy · #10 Post by **Purcy** » Mon May 07, 2007 1:10 pm

Dan, slightly OT, but have you tried the Opera browser for PC, it is a freebie; not sure how it compares to Firefox; I only use it on my PDA.

dsigma6 · #11 Post by **dsigma6** » Mon May 07, 2007 2:36 pm

Purcy wrote:have you tried the Opera browser for PC

I've not done so on my T23, only on my desktop. I'll give it a whirl.

I remember there being so many customization options it kinda discouraged me (though they weren't required for basic usage).

I like using Opera Mini on my Dash, so maybe that's good sign.

Cuda · #12 Post by **Cuda** » Mon May 14, 2007 9:49 pm

TonyJZX wrote: I think it's the video card - not much you can do there.

It's also fairly useless on playing back video as well.

Ah well.. IBM is a business laptop I guess.

Funny, my T-23 plays DVD movies just fine, except for the lousy speakers.

cparker · #13 Post by **cparker** » Tue May 15, 2007 12:17 pm

I would definitely try Opera. If the current version (9.x I believe) is relatively bloated compared to earlier versions and seems a bit slow; search the archives on the opera site for earlier versions. Then try opera 6.x -- I tried 6.06 on an ancient 1997 Micron Transport (166mhz P1) laptop with only 64mb of ram running windows 98SE. I was astounded by the performance. The browser flies and is about as fast on the Micron as IE or Firefox on a more modern machine with lots of ram and lots of cpu speed (say 1ghz). What seems to make it fast is that it doesn't download pictures. I realized I wasn't missing much, if anything, other than the ads that plaster the web pages. What a pleasant surprise! I also have firefox 1.5 on the same machine and it works, although not nearly as fast. IE also works but is also less than speedy and is probably much less secure. So I'm sticking with Opera.

jimmy274 · #14 Post by **jimmy274** » Thu May 17, 2007 11:56 am

Ok boys, I'm having the exact same problem with my 2647-4RG. I've changed display to SXGA+, and the problems started... Didn't have it before.
The thing is that S3 Savage in these laptops is sometimes faulty. I've read on several sites that the chip itself has a hardware flaw in 10% cases. The flaw directly affects the 2D performance (I have it in firefox, while maximizing things like uTorrent, and so on). It has something to do with an overflow due to incapability to process data that's being sent to the core...
Sorry guys...

x3ss · #15 Post by **x3ss** » Fri May 18, 2007 1:35 pm

what was IBMs logic to put the crappyest video chip of the era in their best laptop of the time???

a geforce2 with 32mb of vram would have been xxxtra nice

mala · #16 Post by **mala** » Sun May 20, 2007 4:29 pm

Same problem here.

Flashblock for Firefox is a nice solution. Pages don't scroll as slow and you can choose which animations (read: ads) to allow.

x3ss · #17 Post by **x3ss** » Tue May 22, 2007 3:43 pm

yeph...flashblock is good but you must use Adblock plus too for better control of ads...

WarMachine · #18 Post by **WarMachine** » Wed May 23, 2007 12:44 pm

x3ss wrote:what was IBMs logic to put the crappyest video chip of the era in their best laptop of the time???

a geforce2 with 32mb of vram would have been xxxtra nice

I suppose the Savage Chipset was not as power hungry as the GeForce, and that it was cooler. I don't see another explication.

A Radeon M6 would have been nice too.

I have the same problem with Google, images, and Firefox.

I have deactivated hardware acceleration. It seems a little better, but only a little.

I've tried in 16-bits mode, but nothing changes (plus I don't want to keep 16-bits mode !

).

Drivers are IBM ones, I haven't tried other ones.

My solution : Using IE when browsing Google Images...

W.

WarMachine · #19 Post by **WarMachine** » Thu May 31, 2007 6:33 am

Hello,

Has someone seen the difference between 512 and 1 GB RAM ?

Have you tried to tweak Firefox (the cache options, particularly) ?

Is the loading speed increased ?

Thx.

W.

Purcy · #20 Post by **Purcy** » Thu May 31, 2007 7:27 am

Hi, I only have 512MB RAM and have tweaked my cache size in Firefox vers 2.0 to make the cache smaller. I truly didn't notice any speed increase in loading pages, but then I haven't really had any problems with slow scrolling. There sure are a lot of things to play with on that configuration page:

type in your address bar -----
about:config

FireFox problem on T23

FireFox problem on T23

using opera

Who is online