On 07/02/13 11:11, Simon Greenwood wrote:
On 7 February 2013 10:43, Colin Law <clan...@googlemail.com
<mailto:clan...@googlemail.com>> wrote:
On 7 February 2013 10:31, Simon Greenwood <sfgreenw...@gmail.com
<mailto:sfgreenw...@gmail.com>> wrote:
> ..
> On 7 February 2013 10:17, Gareth France <gareth.fra...@gmail.com
<mailto:gareth.fra...@gmail.com>> wrote:
> ..
>> Thanks Alan. I think the thing that gets to me is that aside
from whatever
>> I may choose to run on it I expect a machine I paid £300 for to
run properly
>> to begin with. None of these solutions address the problem.
They more sort
>> of side step it. I doubt I'm going to find the problem, I'll
just have to
>> avoid Packard Bell next time I upgrade.
>>
>
> In all honesty, that is the place to start. Packard Bell
machines are built
> to a price, and it's fairly likely that they need OS-based
accelerators to
> work properly. I'm not familiar with that processor but there
are probably
> features that aren't supported by Linux and require
Windows-native software,
> and the GPU will be integrated and underpowered. I've had
similar problems
> in the past with more expensive machines and have since learned
my lesson.
The guy is not talking about just not getting the ultimate out of the
machine, he has problems such as "tonight it ground to a halt, the
hard drive access light went mad and the mouse stopped moving. Then it
moved in jerks and a variety of windows greyed out and came back again
over and over." That is a software problem of some sort. Something
is gobbling up his processor or/and his RAM.
Yes, I agree, and as previously described, I have seen exactly this
problem, and on what would seem to be a more powerful machine. In the
first instance, disable Flash and see if that stops or reduces the CPU
load. In my experience it will. However, it doesn't solve the problem,
and this is where I came to a halt with trying to analyse it. It is
likely to be a combination of the Flash plugin, Compiz and the
physical hardware, possibly one that hasn't been identified before, so
to get some progress, it needs to be documented.
However, I believe my point still stands: for all the work done to
maximise compatibility, there are always going to be machines that
don't play for less obvious reasons, especially at the low cost end of
the market, and the rule still should be that if you want to use a
Linux desktop of any kind do a little bit of homework. There is the
official compatibility wiki but if you get the model number of any
laptop and put it into Google, someone will have attempted to run
Linux on it and reported on it.
s/
--
Twitter: @sfgreenwood
"TBA are particularly glib"
Just to update everyone flash blocker didn't manage 5 minutes before
both Firefox and system monitor greyed out simply because I tried to
close the monitor. As I'm typing this email Thunderbird keeps greying
out and the text appears on the screen up to 45 seconds after I typed
it. (So apologies for any spelling mistakes.) Rhythmbox is playing, well
stuttering. That seems to be the biggest problem, I have noticed flash
can be a drain but any media playing and it greatly increases the chance
that the system will halt.
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