Random thoughts.... [Tech Edition]

RAM might help a little. SSD some more. But one bottleneck is the Atom processor. You can check if the hyperthreading is enabled, that can help, but not much.
 
Hulu is hampered by flash mostly. What version are you running, because newer versions should be able to use the ION for hw accel. RAM upgrade is not possible, since 2GB is the limit for the first gen Atom processor. Try disabling a lot of the crud that came with it, perhaps run a fresh install on it. OEMs are notorious for shipping literally DOZENS of crappy tools you really don't need with their PCs, and im my experience Acer is one of the worst offenders. Reinstalling it with 32 bit win7 should also inprover performance, because I see no reason to run 64 bit on that machine. It cannot make use of more than 2GB of ram, and I doubt you'll be doing any complex floating point calculations on it.
 
I built an HTPC with the same internals, and another 2GB of RAM will help for sure, and overclocking to 2GHz helps a lot as well. Adu, I don't think the 2GB limit applied to the desktop versions, as mine at home reports the 3.25GB(of 4) that 32bit Windows can make use of. Oh, make sure video memory is set to 512, which will help with HA flash.
 
I must say the latest Flash versions have made a tremendous difference for an Atom+ION setup, when ION can handle decoding flash the Atom gets time to do other things. Browsing is actually pretty snappy now.

However, against my better judgement I upgraded to FF4 on my main computer. Bad idea. Fuzzy text! I go to the Firefox help site, most popular issue, fuzzy text. Solution: turn off hardware acceleration! That's not a solution!

Hello Chrome.
 
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Has anybody tried the Top Gear high definition episodes on the G4 powered mac's? I've got an iBook G4 just dying to do something and I'm tired of having to plug in my vaio and unplug it every time I want to watch top gear on the big tv.
 
Woo hoo!

Windows 7 Pro is taking me back to those good old "unknown update error" days of Windows XP Home! I hadn't seen that since trying to install some stupid .NET framework update went wrong all the time, nows it's the entire Service Pack. Oh, the hours of joy that I remember! :mrgreen:

farken' idiots in Redmond have done it again...
 
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So, I have this.

It's really very sluggish.

Based on the specs, and the fact that it has Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit...

What should I be doing to it to make it more "snappy"? What settings should I be changing? Is a ram upgrade possible? Would that even help it?

Hulu is the WORST on it, for some reason.

I echo the other posters and suggest making sure flash is up to date, and (if possible) recommend performing a clean install of the operating system to get rid of all the junk software Acer inevitably preloaded onto it.

Woo hoo!

Windows 7 Pro is taking me back to those good old "unknown update error" days of Windows XP Home! I hadn't seen that since trying to install some stupid .NET framework update went wrong all the time, nows it's the entire Service Pack. Oh, the hours of joy that I remember! :mrgreen:

farken' idiots in Redmond have done it again...

Heads up to anyone else going ahead with SP1 for Windows 7. I did it today and although it went well, it will also reset your sound settings if you're using the default Microsoft audio driver (which I do due to the way it keeps track of the volume when your headphones are plugged in vs. when not and adjusts accordingly- handy to prevent you from blowing out your headphones/being blasted to death accidently...) so you'll have to go into the audio mixer and mute any apps you muted from there before, as well as re-enable any sound enhancements like Bass Boost, which took me a good 10 min of tweaking until I made it sound as good as I had it before. <_<
 
I echo the other posters and suggest making sure flash is up to date, and (if possible) recommend performing a clean install of the operating system to get rid of all the junk software Acer inevitably preloaded onto it.

Thanks for the tips everyone. Doesn't seem to have helped any. It boots faster because I turned off a whole bunch of shit, but it doesn't actually seem to run any quicker...and Hulu is no faster. Right now it's wireles G. Looking at the status bar, do you think the issue would be solved be wireless N? Is it the computer or the connection?


edit: The music is "Mmm, Nice" from Bob Thompson. I was introduced to him by a musician who said "This is what is playing on a constant loop in my cat's head, all day."
 
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Thanks for the tips everyone. Doesn't seem to have helped any. It boots faster because I turned off a whole bunch of shit, but it doesn't actually seem to run any quicker...and Hulu is no faster. Right now it's wireles G. Looking at the status bar, do you think the issue would be solved be wireless N? Is it the computer or the connection?


Noticed a few things.

1. You opened IE and that seemed to launch very quickly. However, it's IE (and IE 8 at that...) so it's not the fastest browser around the block. Have you looked into something like Chrome, Firefox 4 or IE 9. All three of those support hardware acceleration that can tap further into that ION gpu to speed things up/make things run smoother. Even without hardware acceleration, all 3 would run better.

2. Have you tried Hulu Desktop to see if it would run better? (http://www.hulu.com/labs/hulu-desktop) I haven't played with it but it's worth a shot. Also, your computer has Windows Media Center and by integrating Hulu Desktop within WMC, (you can run Hulu Desktop separate from WMC... this is just a suggestion) it's a great way to be able to access hulu w/out having to fire up a browser if you use WMC for watching other content: http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/10613/integrate-hulu-desktop-and-windows-media-center-in-windows-7/

3. How far away are you from the router in question?

4. Is it just hulu that loads slowly? Have you tried loading other websites in IE and in another browser to try and isolate the issue?
 
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1) It is IE. I haven't "upgraded" to 9 yet. I need to use IE for certain things that it's what I'm used to. And since I have to use it anyways for some things, I just use it for everything. Besides...FF3 started acting up on me, then I tried FF4 and I didn't want to bother to learn ANOTHER GUI. Same with Chrome. I'll try bumping up to IE9, though.

2) I have not tried Hulu Desktop. I didn't know what that was. It says minimum is 1.8gha Core 2 Duo...would my Atom 330 be enough? I didn't know about this program, so I haven't tried it with WMC. I'll try that, though, since as soon as I get a NAS going (job first, then guitar amp, then NAS), we'll be using it more anyways.

3) It's about 8ft away, in the next room, close between (so two walls).

4) Other sites do tend to move quicker. I never really use it much for anything but Hulu and playing video files. I just always grabbed my laptop for anything else. :p
 
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Just installed Hulu Desktop. Seems much snappier. Wish it didn't have to load a random video upon opening, and it seems more sleek (read: more limited, not as flexible) in it's search results.

I haven't found a way to get Hulu Desktop and WMC to play together, though...

edit: (because I didn't follow the link telling me how to integrate Hulu Desktop with WMC. *facepalm*)
 
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If you're worried about the connection, rewind the video or pause it for a bit. If it plays smoothly until it gets to the end of the buffering, then the connection is the issue. But G is plenty for Hulu as long as the signal isn't weak. More important is your bandwidth from your ISP.

Also, it's worth a shot to try another browser, you say IE works fine for you except here is a case where it clearly doesn't...
 
And three other browsers have the ietab addon, which will use the ie engine for whatever sites you specify.
 
Firefox 4.0! :eek: So far I like it better than the old version. It seems faster and more compact but everything is still easy to get to unlike some other shiny metal browser out there. I approve.

*I'm also fairly drunk so this opinion might change in a few hours.
 
Firefox 4.0! :eek: So far I like it better than the old version. It seems faster and more compact but everything is still easy to get to unlike some other shiny metal browser out there. I approve.

*I'm also fairly drunk so this opinion might change in a few hours.

slowly getting used to Firefox 4.0 took me a while to figure out how to get chatzilla working as well as where the refresh button went. probably just takes a bit to get used to it. does feel like they've given me a lot bigger window browser to use.
 
And here is said sober opinion change: Firefox just crashed while trying to navigate to espn.com. :confused:
 
I didn't really like FF4 when I first installed it, but now, as I'm getting used to it, I like all the little additions I'm noticing.

I guess it's just like when this forum was upgraded, I didn't really like the new look because I was so used to the old one, but as time goes by, you get used to it and get to like it. :)
 
slowly getting used to Firefox 4.0 took me a while to figure out how to get chatzilla working as well as where the refresh button went. probably just takes a bit to get used to it. does feel like they've given me a lot bigger window browser to use.
This is being a huge problem for me, which makes no sense because they just moved it to where it is on safari, which I can use without getting lost. Also I keep loosing the tabs because they are up high now.
 
This is being a huge problem for me, which makes no sense because they just moved it to where it is on safari, which I can use without getting lost. Also I keep loosing the tabs because they are up high now.

You could just move the refresh button to whereever you want it to be :nod:

Also, you could just move the tab bar to below the address bar :nod:
 
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