You know, it's funny. We went to war never looking to come back, but it's the real world I couldn't survive.

Tracy ,'The Message'


Buffistechnology 3: "Press Some Buttons, See What Happens."

Got a question about technology? Ask it here. Discussion of hardware, software, TiVos, multi-region DVDs, Windows, Macs, LINUX, hand-helds, iPods, anything tech related. Better than any helpdesk!


tommyrot - Sep 15, 2010 9:18:47 am PDT #14882 of 25501
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

Firefox (like most browsers) will use a lot of memory. it's CPU usage I'm interested in. a browser may use a lot of cpu while a page loads, but the cpu % should drop to near 0 after that (unless there' Flash, animation, etc.)


Liese S. - Sep 15, 2010 9:19:43 am PDT #14883 of 25501
"Faded like the lilac, he thought."

It looks like other users have had similar problems; the program in question hangs up when it's looking for a particular file and can't find it. But the solution may be beyond your purview; i.e., registry edits. You may consider asking your IT to look at this.

[link]


Typo Boy - Sep 15, 2010 9:20:55 am PDT #14884 of 25501
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

Hmm Norton can be very aggressive about running what it calls "idle time" scans. "Idle Time" apparently being nortonspeak for "because I want to."


flea - Sep 15, 2010 9:21:38 am PDT #14885 of 25501
information libertarian

I can open up the Symantec program, but it doesn't show me any scheduled scans and doesn't appear to be running, from that viewpoint. I can't terminate that process from the task manager (tried and it would not let me) so maybe it is an IT behind the scenes thing?


Liese S. - Sep 15, 2010 9:23:12 am PDT #14886 of 25501
"Faded like the lilac, he thought."

Ok, go back and answer tommy's question about CPU usage; he's correct in that stuff that just takes up a lot of memory isn't necessarily bogging you down. He wants to see what is actually using the cpu.


flea - Sep 15, 2010 9:23:27 am PDT #14887 of 25501
information libertarian

Thanks, Liese, I will show that page to the IT guy. (Gee, wouldn't it be nice if they could diagnose this and not just tell me I have "too many tabs open"?)


flea - Sep 15, 2010 9:25:53 am PDT #14888 of 25501
information libertarian

Opening the NYTimes web site made CPU of Firefox go from 1 to (briefly) 48, and then back down to 2. Is that bad? (I didn't install the Flashblock yet.)


tommyrot - Sep 15, 2010 9:26:36 am PDT #14889 of 25501
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

I think 'too many tabs open' is the new 'did you try rebooting it?'


flea - Sep 15, 2010 9:27:08 am PDT #14890 of 25501
information libertarian

Currently I can't get gmail chat to open - but trying to doesn't spike the CPU at all.


Typo Boy - Sep 15, 2010 9:27:28 am PDT #14891 of 25501
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

Well you definitely want flashblock. Flash ads will kill your bandwidth. Don't know if that is the cause of your problem. But if you don't block flash ads, and the problem is something else it will be tough to diagnose.