MetaChat - Stuttering audio and movie loading

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06 March 2008

Stuttering audio and movie loading →[More:]
Recently, whenever I load a movie or any audio, whether it be flash based or an mp3 or mpeg or what have you, instead of streaming smoothly the audio st-st-st-st-ut-ut-ut-ters-ters and my mouse does the same (moves in very slow jerky motions). It's like my computer is completely drained by the process of loading any media.

Do I need to update something or shut something down or restart or consult a priest? Any ideas?

post by: CitrusFreak12 at: 11:26 | 7 comments

Which OS?

posted by chrismear 06 March | 11:35

Windows XP sp2.
FWIW I'm updating iTunes and quicktime now and it's doing the same thing. HORRIBLE LAG in my computer. It's all very strange. I'll let you know if things change after I download the update and restart.

posted by CitrusFreak12 06 March | 11:37

If this wasn't happening before, but is happening now, there are a few possibilities (in order of fixability):

1) Virus.
2) Some other process you've installed recently is hogging CPU cycles.
3) RAM went bad.

Are you having problems with other programs? Like Word or Excel, etc? Have you been installing things recently? It's hard to say what it is without being able to futz around with the machine.

posted by muddgirl 06 March | 11:45

I've actually spent a goodly bit of time learning how to write patches in Max/MSP that do just what you're experiencing, only to find out that all I had to do was borrow your computer!

Which app do you use for multimedia? I've found that good ol' Winamp runs much more efficiently than something like iTunes or WMP.

posted by syntax 06 March | 11:52

When I load things in the browser it's either flash-based or using quicktime.

Positive note: Either the restart or the update fixed it! For now.

posted by CitrusFreak12 06 March | 12:10

I was going to suggest checking that you have DMA transfer enabled for your hard drive, but that might be completely old-school advice that is entirely inappropriate now.

posted by chrismear 06 March | 13:34

I've had iTunes react similarly when I have Photoshop open, and it drives me batty. I upgraded my RAM, sure it was a memory issue, but it still does it once in a while.

posted by rhapsodie 06 March | 18:56

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