AirNav Systems Forum
AirNav RadarBox and RadarBox24.com => AirNav RadarBox and RadarBox24.com Discussion => Topic started by: GlynH on August 27, 2009, 10:34:39 AM
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I just need to clarify something if I may please...
When running RB on my XP SP3, Asus Dual 3.2GHz Xeon, 4GB RAM, 2.5TB, NVidia Quadro powered Dual Eizo monitor beast of a PC that normally does not break a sweat even when heavily multi-tasking or editing RAW/video etc. am I the only one that by running ANRB causes my PC to slow to a crawl most of the time?
I mean even simple things like opening Notepad or web browsing is painfully slow unless I close down ANRB...without mentioning hanging menus and stuttering progress when trying to use MyLog etc.
Obviously something going on here which I would dearly like to get to the bottom of...
Some time ago I had a private Beta from Aleksey that seemed to cure these issues for me but somewhere along the way they seem to have crept back in.
I have over 16000 aircraft in MyLog.db3 which is some 120MB in size.
ANRB takes 2 mins 40 secs to load on a machine that can load MS Word in 0.8 secs and Adobe Photoshop CS2 and all of its plug-ins in under 6 secs.
I can't believe I am the only one who experiences a slow-down when using ANRB?
I'm going to use a virgin MyLog.db3 or /NOMYLOG and see if that improves things.
Regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Glyn,
I had the issue with the slow menu's on the old version and also tested the beta's from Alexsey.
My PC is quad core and I used to go mad with slow menu's, I dont have any problem with 3.02 and it would appear that it may be an isolated case with your PC setup. Have you another machine you could try it on ?
ANRB has always been slow to load for me on any version, as you say it may well be to do with the size of the database, mine is crica 12500 aircraft.
CAM
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Hi Glyn,
I run ANRB on a Dual Core 2.4 2 GB machine. I have had trouble with sluggish menu's etc, but after version 3.0 and testing with Aleksey, problems are (almost) over and acceptable for me. I have over 17000 aircraft in MyLog.db3 and it takes about 4 minutes(!) to get ANRB going.
Frank
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Glyn, can you see what process is using a lot of CPU, using Task Manager? Sort the list of processes by CPU.
(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2264/3861472561_ef22ca7a91_t.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/tarbat/3861472561/sizes/o/)
Given that it slows your whole PC to a crawl, there must be some process hogging the CPU.
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That's just it Chris...I see nothing out of the ordinary apart from the latest ANRB peaking @ 38% CPU time which is almost double that of previous versions.
Strange as it even takes Task Manager 5+ seconds to open when RB is running but opens instantaneously without...
I'm about ready to throw in the towel and build another PC but this one does everything else that I throw at it without breaking a sweat...
Thanks & regards,
-=Glyn=-
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GlynH,
How fast is your net speed? We have actually had a customer email us today saying he is using the beta 3.01 and having the same issues as you. He said the only thing weird with his setup is a very slow internet.
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Hi Glyn
On my Quad cores the CPU is peaking at 12% just running radarbox, the 38% you quote seems extremely high for your system given the power of the processor.
Like others I had the slow menu problem and that was fixed with beta 3.01 and version 3.02 seems to use less cpu for me.
Kevin
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Thanks for the replies guys,
AirNav: I have an up to 24MB ADSL package but generally see 7-8MB so hardly very slow...although I am currently seeing 6.68MB download at the moment with just under 1MB upload according to speedtest.net
EMA: Glad it has worked for you as believe me I know how frustrating it can be!
I saw this problem before I purchased ANRB, have always had it here to some extent and have seen it on other computers also. A friend of mine also has similar issues but seems to put up with it as following the 2.0 upgrade it did improve things for him a bit.
He did report that after the 2.0 upgrade it was 'perfect' but believe me it is far from perfect...maybe I have a lower tolerance than most? ;^)
Thanks & kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Glyn
Have you tried running ANRB.EXE on one or two cpu's? That did help for me before the fix.
Also I note you have Nvidia graphics and I use both ATI and Nvidia and the latter always had the worst menu performance prior to the fix so before building a new PC just try another graphics card.
Kevin
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That's just it Chris...I see nothing out of the ordinary apart from the latest ANRB peaking @ 38% CPU time which is almost double that of previous versions
I have a P4 3.2ghz with 3gb memory. RB idles along most of the time just under 4% CPU utilisation with peaks every 60 seconds to about 40%. The 60 second peaks coincide with disk writes of about 25mb.
(http://img198.imageshack.us/img198/3190/20090828183101.jpg)
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Thanks for the replies guys...
I have finally sorted the slow menu issue...if I delete MyLog.db3 & NavData.db3 the program loads in under 3 seconds and the menus really fly!
Of course I can see no aircraft because the hardware is not connected (why not?) but it behaves like the rest of the 'proper' programs on my PC and runs like lightning...;^)
I hear what you say about NVidia vs. ATI Kevin but I have always used NVidia on all my machines here - keeps driver updates clean & simple when rolling out upgrades etc.
This particular graphics card is getting long in the tooth now being a PNY Quadro4 980XGL AGP card with 128MB RAM which cost @ $1500 in its day!
The thing is it is rock solid & fast on every other application I have here including video overlay in Premiere CS3 & After Effects CS3, batch processing of RAW inages in DxO, editing RAW images in Photoshop CS3 & Lightroom and 3D rendering etc. and as such I am loathe to change it.
I am not a games player and if it has the horespower to drive the above applications surely it can be used with ANRB?
Last year I did take the Quadro out and put in the fastest AGP graphics card I could find - a Gainward Bliss 7800GS+ 512MB - again another NVidia card but to no avail.
I did install ANRB on my Media Centre PC yesterday which is a moderately powered PC with a Pentium 4 running at 3.0GHz and 4GB RAM and another NVidia card - this time a 7300LE
This PC can transcode video while it records TV and I can still browse the web etc. but still gives me the same ANRB problems with sluggish menus, MyLog etc.
I use Avast! AntiVirus on all of my machines but not only have I set an exception to ignore C:\Program Files\AirNav Systems\AirNav RadarBox 2009 - 3.0 Beta but I have tried disabling it altogether with no joy.
As I said if I want to use my RB I am going to have to build a new PC :-(
I can only hope I don't get the same issues with that one...
Regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Perhaps a fresh install to a new directory is the way to go Glyn, I also use Avast on one PC with no problems.
I understand your reasons for staying with Nvidia it should not make any difference we are just clutching at straws in the hope your issue gets resolved.
cheers
Kevin
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Hello again Kevin,
Already tried that...three times on this machine and once on the MediaPC.
Out of desperation I have even installed it on an old TabletPC I have lying around here but that was never the fastest kid on the block when it was new so I am not holding my breath.
As I said during one of the private Betas from Aleksey the issue almost went away but has returned with Beta 3.x
Clutching at straws indeed...:-/
Enjoy your weekend!
Kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
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An update on this (for me) long standing slow menu issue that has plagued me ever since I first purchased my first RadarBox over a year ago.
I have just come back from my mate Terry and I have to say that his PC is worse than mine for slow/hanging menus. difficulty navigating MyLog and generally doing anything within the application...well it should be as it is alower spec machine running a Pentium D 2.80GHz, 2GB RAM on Vista Home Premium SP2.
ANRB consumes between 20-70% of his CPU and causes everythng else on his PC to slow down much like my own.
Again like me he has well over 10,000 aircraft in his MyLog (where exactly is this kept on Vista?) and again, like mine it would appear that the slowdown *might* be tied into when the database is being written to because if I set the timeout to 5000ms I can get a 5 second window in which everything seems normal but as soon as the database is being written menus hang, MyLog will not scroll and his PC slows down and shows the sleepy pointer.
I have seen this on every PC I have ever seen RB running on including 4 of my own here (1.6GHz TabletPC, 2.2GHz W2K/XP, 3.0GHz MCE and Dual 3.2GHz Xeon XP)
I am guessing this might be a wider problem than anyone dared fear as some people will live with this and not mention anything.
IMHO it might only affect *some* of those who record a large number of aircraft & flights - like me Terry will see up to nearly 3,000 unique Mode-S aircraft a day - God only knows how many flights that equates to. Is there a connection do you think?
There was talk some time ago about it only affecting high-spec PC's but I feel it may probably be more like those who see large numbers of aircraft possibly?
Obviously this will not affect everybody as Frank has over 17,000 aircraft and does not suffer this slow-down apparently.
Thinking about it when Tery upgraded one time he lost his database and so started from scratch and he was amazed at the speed increase which he put down to the newer version.
Having played on his system earlier today though it really is like wading through treacle...
Would it not be possible for Aleksey to author a private Beta that utilises a single core/thread to write to the database leaving everything else free to run the system for me to test the theory or something?
He very nearly cracked it in an earlier Beta but for me anyway I was back to square one when v3.0 Beta came out...
You guys (especially AirNav) must be sick to death of me bleating on about the slowdowns but it makes the program (and the rest of my PC) almost totally unusable...obviously I wouldn't want this to delay releasing 3.02 to the rest of the users but when that is out of the door I would be glad to help in any way I can?
Thanks & regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Glyn,
Have you made any changes to your database using external programmes?
Have you tried backing up your MyLog database (MyLog.db3) then using MyLog to delete all the data and see what that does - MyLog > Tools > Empy MyLog Tables
I've used all the versions of RadarBox on my AMD64 3200+ 2.GHz desktop that must be 3 years old now, my 2 year old Pentium M laptop and even my eeePC Netbook - and I haven't suffered the problems that you are having.
I've got just under 10,000 records in MyLog, but I only run Windows XP - I've never used Vista.
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Try as Allocator suggested. Also try the method to get RB to run on one CPU only and see whether improves anything.
We did have a user a few days complaining of the same issue though it was caused by his very slow internet and he had all the pictures, sharing, network on. Have a go at unticking all that and see whether that helps.
Finally the 5seconds you have set is when the screen update not the database write which happens at a different interval.
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Thanks for the reply AirNav,
How best to get RB to run on just the one CPU? Right-click on the process and select Set Affinity?
How often does the app write to the database then and is there a way to change the interval?
Oh and Allocator - I never use Vista either!
Thanks & regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Glyn,
Sorry, I must have been reading somebody else's post about Vista :-)
I know that this doesn't actually help you, but here are links to 2 YouTube videos I've just uploaded. They show the processes running in Windows Task Manager - the first one has the processes listed in alphabetical order and the second in processor loading order. I've got a whole bunch of stuff running on 2 monitors and it's the fscapture screen capture that seems to be hogging the processor! You can read the numbers if you watch it in HQ.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWOluneQKuQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-gNj0Sd-Is
Edit: The first one is processor loading order, and the second is alphabetical.
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Thanks for the reply AirNav,
How best to get RB to run on just the one CPU?
-=Glyn=-
In task manager right click on anrb.exe and select the cpu you wish to use.
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Got it EMA...thanks...just amended my post for clarification and you had replied. Thanks.
Regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Thanks for the reply AirNav,
How best to get RB to run on just the one CPU? Right-click on the process and select Set Affinity?
How often does the app write to the database then and is there a way to change the interval?
Oh and Allocator - I never use Vista either!
Thanks & regards,
-=Glyn=-
The affinity is perfect and the database is written to every 10-15 seconds. (Actual hard write to disk) and can't be changed.
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Glyn,
Sorry, I must have been reading somebody else's post about Vista :-)
No it was probably mine but I was referring to Terry's machine running Vista and not mine.
I wouldn't touch Vista with a bargepole...I sold my Vaio because I couldn't 'downgrade' (shouldn't that be upgrade?:-) to XP! ;^)
Kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Hi Glyn
As I stated earlier when I had the slow menu problem running on one CPU made a major difference.
Kevin
PS, I run vista and have never had any issues but my systems where supplied with a vista os as standard.
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I use Avast! AntiVirus on all of my machines but not only have I set an exception to ignore C:\Program Files\AirNav Systems\AirNav RadarBox 2009 - 3.0 Beta but I have tried disabling it altogether with no joy.
Are you running Vista? If so, you need an anti-virus exception for the Virtual Store as well - that's where Vista stores MyLog and Navdata. Even better, if you're using Vista, don't install RB in C:\Program Files, it causes no end of problems.
Again like me he has well over 10,000 aircraft in his MyLog (where exactly is this kept on Vista?)
In the Vista virtual store.
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Thanks for the reply Chris,
NO! I DON'T LIKE VISTA!
I REFUSE TO RUN VISTA!
I WON'T EVEN HAVE VISTA IN THIS HOUSE!
I'VE SOLD A PERFECTLY EQUIPPED, HIGH-END LAPTOP BECAUSE IT RAN VISTA!
See above... ;^)
I was asking where Vista stores the data so my mate Terry could find his database.
He uses Vista - how I hate that OS - I tried a search on his PC for MyLog & MyLog.db3 and it couldn't find anything anywhere at anytime...bloody Vista...
Did I say I don't use Vista here? ;^)
OK...I have emptied MyLog tables and irrespective of whether running on one or both Xeons - ie. '2' or all '4' CPU's the utilization is back down to its usual 4-14% and I have a grand total of 209 aircraft in MyLog!
My menus are quick and using MyLog is a dream.
I can even drag the Alert box around without it stopping for a p*ss like an incontinent dog on a lead every second or so...
I can multi-task as I am used to with no slow-down.
This is more like it...I have my PC back!
But surely the point of being a 'spotter' is to record all the aircraft I see and not throw away 16,000+ contacts just because my PC turns into treacle? ;^)
I'll tell you what...if someone wants to give it a try I will post them my 120MB MyLog on a flash drive (they can keep the flash drive) so they can see if it turns their Pentium 4 into a Sinclair Spectrum? ;^)
Kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
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I installed Airnav on my d drive and in it's own directory. I have around 180-220 in mylog and have not cleared the database since last November.
Did I say I use Vista :-)
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I installed Airnav on my d drive and in it's own directory. I have around 180-220 in mylog and have not cleared the database since last November.
Did I say I use Vista :-)
You must have more than 180-220 aircraft in MyLog?
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But surely the point of being a 'spotter' is to record all the aircraft I see and not throw away 16,000+ contacts just because my PC turns into treacle? ;^)
Maybe you damaged your MyLog database in some way?
Copied that you don't run Vista - lol
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But surely the point of being a 'spotter' is to record all the aircraft I see and not throw away 16,000+ contacts just because my PC turns into treacle? ;^)
Maybe you damaged your MyLog database in some way?
Copied that you don't run Vista - lol
The only thing that touches MyLog is ANRB - although I bought & paid for SQLMaestro recently I haven't used the damn thing...
And in any case this sloooowness has plagued me since I first installed it when MyLog was just a baby...but that was a couple or three revisions of software ago.
Did I say I don't run V....OK...you get the message...;^)
Kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Just making sure you were awake,
I meant myflights indicating how busy the system is on a daily basis.
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Ah, right :-)
I though that maybe you were running RB using the standard antenna in the basement - lol
Still seems a bit low - I'm running at 965 aircraft today so far.
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I think Glyn needs to downgrade to vista......................
His problem might just go away.
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Well I might have to downgrade to SBS-1 as the menu issue has reared its ugly head again.
I really am sick of it...
What do you guys use to capture screen video and post to YouTube?
-=Glyn=-
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Okay, I saw you ask about Vista, so thought I'd mention the more obvious cause for slow performance in Vista.
Some other thoughts:
1. What File System is the drive/partition where RB is installed formatted as (NTFS, FAT32, etc.)?
2. Do you have the Indexing Service turned on for that drive?
3. Is the drive or RB folder compressed and/or encrypted?
4. Is the drive or RB folder shared on your network?
It does sound more like an I/O rather than a CPU bottleneck. What's the disk drive? How is it formatted/partitiioned?
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What do you guys use to capture screen video and post to YouTube?
I use FastStone Capture, a shareware screen capture and recording program.
http://www.faststone.org/FSCaptureDetail.htm
Then I just use YouTube's 'upload' function.
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I use FastStone Capture, a shareware screen capture and recording program.
I've been using FastStone capture for years, never knew it recorded video as well!
Maybe time for an upgrade :)
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OK...trying out Camtasia as a fully featured screen capture program...oh the price...
My menus are now worse than ever...from looking at the video my gut feel would be graphics card driver corruption or similar.
However out of the hundreds of programs I have on my PC ANRB is the *ONLY* one that exhibits such behaviour.
You can see what I am up against here;
http://www.screencast.com/t/LMsV31EAcd
As I said this is particularly bad tonight - why I don't know as I have just binned 16,000 aircraft and am now using a clean database with only 771 contacts in it.
The sleepy pointer I see a lot in ANRB (along with delayed reaction highlighting & opening) but rarely do I see such corruption as I am seeing tonight.
I can however navigate MyLog with no stuttering and after a reboot even the menus are as they should be for the time being...
Regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Glyn,
Looks like you have a lot of stuff going on in the System Tray at the bottom right of the screen. Do you really need all these running - each one will slow down Windows a little bit.
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That takes me back to my slow menu issue but for some reason I no longer have that problem.
Can you try zooming in a little closer on the map so fewer aircraft are visible, then see if the menu performance improves. I know my issue was linked to the map re-drawing when lots of aircraft were visible.
Also switch the map off and see what happens.
Kevin
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Thanks for the replies guys,
Allocator: If my CPU was an Intel Atom I could understand maybe if some tasks were slowing it down. If I quit ANRB then I have 99% idle time on the CPU. None of those are resource monsters and although I don't really need all those running I would like them running! When I finish building my new 1U rack machine then one or two may migrate to the new machine...compared to most machines I see my tool tray is modest ;^)
From left to right;
Screen capture software
Mailwasher.. Does nothing apart from check for mail once every 10 minutes
Cumulus weather program. Reads console every 50 seconds. Uploads once every 5 or 15 minutes.
Windows wired network icon
Panasonic PhotoFun. Does nothing unless camera is connected.
Logitech Setpoint for keyboard/mouse. I have had problems with this in the past.
Windows Home Server Connector. Does nothing unless backing up or logging on.
Apple MobileMe.
MSSQL Server. Used to monitor telephone system but not being used currently.
Logitech QuickCam. AGain like most Logitech software I have had problems in the past.
Lantronix UBox. Used to connect RB in the past and also for WiNRADiO
MS ActiveSync. No longer used to connect iPAQ so could go but does nothing unless iPAQ connected.
Avast! AntiVirus. Have set exclude for RadarBox folder.
Two Epson printer monitoring apps. Printers rarely turned on these days but do little unless printer active.
I have tried disabling all of these in the past for RB (not that I should need to) but in any case as I said every other program on my PC - including some heavyweight & well-known resource monsters give no adverse effects whatsoever.
EMA: Memories...:-/
OK...I have zoomed in to England and opened Task Manager to show activity while flicking around the menus.
http://www.screencast.com/t/nHQG1TMpYUNE
Just so you know I don't spend my time w*nking my mouse pointer up & down menus but it is a good example of what I mean when I talk about slow menus.
Here is a another screen capture of me scrolling in MyLog. Please bear in mind this is faster than what I am used to as I am now minus some 16,000 aircraft having started from scratch again.
I have kept the left mouse button held down continuously to show how jerky the scrolling is both when scrolling a page at a time, manually dragging the slider and finally line by line.
http://www.screencast.com/t/hcDfxTz5T
Was this what you used to see Kevin?
I won't mention at this stage the strange things ANRB does with windows, requestors etc. but just so you know TaskManager is set to always stay on top which it does everywhere else but not when using MyLog!
Regards,
-Glyn=-
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It is noticable that when you zoomed in the menus were slow but at least filled in, can you switch your map off and see what happens?
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I still think it's worth investigating your I/O subsystem. Check file system, indexing, etc. Do you run any other applications that are I/O intensive (ie constantly writing to disk with logs, etc.)?
On the odd occasion that I've seen menus freezing like this, there's also a lot of disk activity going on.
If CPU is not maxing out, then it might be I/O.
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When I did testing with Aleksey we found switching the map off stopped the slow menu issue so I am interested to know if the same happens for you.
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Perhaps a fresh install to a new directory is the way to go Glyn, I also use Avast on one PC with no problems.
I understand your reasons for staying with Nvidia it should not make any difference we are just clutching at straws in the hope your issue gets resolved.
cheers
Kevin
Looks like I am not the only one who is suffering from slowdown...just received auto-notification from AirNav servers that Kevin had posted this reply made 3 days ago - it's 2nd September now!
Even my PC is not that slow...;^)
Regards,
-=Glyn=-
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I still think it's worth investigating your I/O subsystem. Check file system, indexing, etc. Do you run any other applications that are I/O intensive (ie constantly writing to disk with logs, etc.)?
On the odd occasion that I've seen menus freezing like this, there's also a lot of disk activity going on.
If CPU is not maxing out, then it might be I/O.
I am not ignoring your suggestion Chris...I just have not got round to trying it yet...work getting in the way...
I do find it hard to believe that a system that can capture live video from DVCam through the firewire port with no dropped frames, edit the same video with frame accuracy, record live audio while playing a stack of MIDI instruments and generally do what it does can run into I/O issues but I will keep an open mind...I don't know what is gping on when ANRB runs on here.
Any suggestions as to the best way to investigate I/O would be much appreciated.
Thanks & regards,
-=Glyn=-
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When I did testing with Aleksey we found switching the map off stopped the slow menu issue so I am interested to know if the same happens for you.
Hi Kevin,
I tried this the other day and posted the result here;
http://www.screencast.com/t/XatRkoG9BGm
Better as in no menu tearing/visible redrawing but still slow to respond and then the damn sleepy pointer rears its ugly head again...
Thanks all for your suggestions & continued patience.
Kind regards,
-=Glyn=-
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Any suggestions as to the best way to investigate I/O would be much appreciated.
Perhaps someone with XP can suggest the best way. In Vista (yes, I know you hate Vista, I find it works great), I use the Reliability & Performance tab in Computer Management. Here's a typical disk-churning episode, where the MyLog journal is having a series of large re-writes. Whilst this is happening, my PC becomes slow to respond as well.
(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2526/3880800434_3544e91a62_o.jpg)
A good place to start is right-click the drive that RB is installed on, and select Properties. Check whether the drive is compressed or indexed - indexing can be a real I/O hog.