U-Tube

[swissie]

My 6 year old Acer Laptop can't handle u-tube HD contents while using big screen. I have to go to the next lower pixel level.

Was told, a "cleaning or system-care" program might help. But I rather ask here first.

Cheers.

[Pib]

Do you mean it just will not display a HD video or the HD video runs slow/pauses/etc? If the latter, then it's just a slow internet connection.

[KhunBENQ]

How does "can not handle" look like?

What do you see?

If it's just stopping, spinning wheel... then it has nothing to to with your laptop but with internet speed/problems.

"cleaning or system care", forget it, will do nothing.

Pib was faster

Edited March 17, 2016 by KhunBENQ

[Rob13]

If it's 6 years old you can probably do some cheap upgrades that will help. New RAM cards,and an SSD would be help alot. Also clearing your browser history and cookies before watching a video will help.

[Pib]

Heck, I've got a 10 year Toshiba laptop with only 2GB RAM and a single core Celeron...it runs Youtube HD videos just fine because I have a good internet connection.

[Rob13]

Yes, a strong internet connection can do alot to make up for the outdated equipment.

[Myran]

"Hi, I'm having problems with my car. Would an oil change fix it?"

Absolutely impossible to say what will help and what won't when you're this unclear about the issue.

[KhunBENQ]

Waiting for feedback from the OP otherwise it's useless.

[katana]

Youtube now routinely has >1920x1080. Anything above 1920x1080 could cause a stuttering problem on an old computer, even with a good connection.

[KhunBENQ]

Youtube now routinely has >1920x1080. Anything above 1920x1080 could cause a stuttering problem on an old computer, even with a good connection.

Where do you have that from?

Over simplified and not true (first sentence).

Bigger than 1920*1080 ("1080p") is still the exception and not the rule.

4k ("2160p") videos are avaiable but drive most internet connections in Thailand to the limit.

And what sense makes it for the majority of screens on the market?

(and for the dulled eyesight of the retirees )

Youtube automatically adapts the resolution to your internet connection.

You can manually force it to a higher resolution and then likely experience freeze and buffering.

Currently this plays with interruptions in "2160p", netspeed meter shows double digit Mbit/s numbers.

Edited March 18, 2016 by KhunBENQ

[KhunBENQ]

Youtube detects the interruptions and will show you a "video quality report" for your connection and location.

I cropped it down to the graph:

dark blue is the percentage of videos that could be played as "HD streams".

light blue is the added percentage of videos that could be played as "SD streams" only.

Also a nice graph over time that is comparable to another one I just showed in another thread about data volume over time in Germany.

It's the same everywhere, videos make up the huge part of volume, after work is peak usage.

A cropped screenshot from the 4k video:

(playing on my old screen is just a waste of bandwidth and even my 40" TV is "only" full HD, 1080p)

Edited March 18, 2016 by KhunBENQ

[katana]

Where do you have that from?

What I'm saying is that Youtube has the ability to upload footage greater than 1920x1080. Of course, if you don't have a camera capable of that, the uploaded video won't appear with that playback option.

I regularly see videos with greater than 1920x1080 on Youtube eg a search for Phantom 3 on Youtube yields such results and so do searches for cameras with 2.7K.

Here's one at 4K

[taotoo]

If it's 6 years old you can probably do some cheap upgrades that will help. New RAM cards,and an SSD would be help alot. Also clearing your browser history and cookies before watching a video will help.

LOL x4

[swissie]

Do you mean it just will not display a HD video or the HD video runs slow/pauses/etc? If the latter, then it's just a slow internet connection.

Sorry folks, could not respond immediately. I spent the last 2 days in Hospital.

Yes it runs slow and pauses. If it's a slow internet connection, it makes me an unhappy camper, because I pay 1166 Bht every month for my fiberglass-wire connection. (I live in the sticks). Provider is CAT.

Cheers.

[KhunBENQ]

See second picture in post #11.

Play the video in full screen mode and hover with the mouse over the lower edge of the screen.

Watch the "indicator line" (marked with the arrow).

What do you see? Is the indicator to the right (light gray) shrinking and caught up by the red indicator ?

Then it is definitely a problem with the internet speed/connection.

runs slow and pauses

"Runs slow" should not happen? Video runs in normal speed and then stops, spinning wheel, then continues.

Runs siow is indeed a different problem.

Edited March 19, 2016 by KhunBENQ

[swissie]

See second picture in post #11.

Play the video in full screen mode and hover with the mouse over the lower edge of the screen.

Watch the "indicator line" (marked with the arrow).

What do you see? Is the indicator to the right (light gray) shrinking and caught up by the red indicator ?

Then it is definitely a problem with the internet speed/connection.

runs slow and pauses

"Runs slow" should not happen? Video runs in normal speed and then stops, spinning wheel, then continues.

Runs siow is indeed a different problem.

Light grey indicator is always ahead of the red indicator. Sometimes grey indicator is ahead of the red indicator by 1 to 1 1/2 centimeters. Red indicator never catches up to grey indicator.

Cheers.

[Pib]

Do you mean it just will not display a HD video or the HD video runs slow/pauses/etc? If the latter, then it's just a slow internet connection.

Sorry folks, could not respond immediately. I spent the last 2 days in Hospital.

Yes it runs slow and pauses. If it's a slow internet connection, it makes me an unhappy camper, because I pay 1166 Bht every month for my fiberglass-wire connection. (I live in the sticks). Provider is CAT.

Cheers.

Just because you have a fiber connection (or fiberglass in your case ) that does not guarantee fast "international speeds...speeds to outside of Thailand. Fiber, DOCIS, or xDSL is just the "last mile" so to speak of your connection...then it hooks into the ISP's backbone and then reaching out to an international sites through the ISP's "international gateway" servers that are often the chokepoint in the ISP's international connections.

And I expect the youtube server is outside of Thailand/maybe in Singapore. With your connection going through the ISP "international" gateway just like all the xDSL, DOCSIS, and fiber connection throughout Thailand then you connection gets a much lower speed for that international connection. The speed you buy/advertised by the ISP is "in-Thailand/your local connection" speed and not international speed.

And another thing about streaming video it requires a "steady, consistent" flow of data versus a herky-jerky flow that would be not noticed in typical browsing, emailing, or even speedtesting unless the speedtester also has a display showing how smooth the data flow is or isn't. Keep in mind that speedtesting is basically an "average" of the speeds during a test period of say 15-30 seconds...during that 15-30 seconds the speed could have ranged from 1Mb to 30Mb and you would probably end up with an average speed test result of 15Mb...but that 15Mb connection would probably be terrible for streaming video since it dropped so low in speed during that time frame...herky-jerky, slow down-speedup...stop & go type speed.

Use CAT's speedtester to test your "local connection"...the CAT server is in Bangkok. Also give the TOT speedtester a try...its server is in Bangkok. If you get download/uploads speeds that you are paying for (i..e., your local connection) then you are getting everything you pay for. However, CAT's international gateway is probably knocking your international connections way down...chocking the connection.

CAT Speedtester

http://www.catspeedtest.net/

TOT Speedtester

http://speedtest1.totbb.net/

[Rob13]

Light grey indicator is always ahead of the red indicator. Sometimes grey indicator is ahead of the red indicator by 1 to 1 1/2 centimeters. Red indicator never catches up to grey indicator.

Doesn't sound like a connection problem. Most likely something is using too much memory, you can go into services and disable any programs you don't use, also run some anti-malware programs.

[KhunBENQ]

Start Taskmanager: right-click on the taskbar, and then click "Start Task Manager".

Click on the "Performance" tab.

Watch the CPU percentage and memory usage.

If both are hitting the ceiling then you have indeed a general performance problem.

In the "Processes" tab (display processes of all users) you can see what services and programs use the memory and CPU.

It requires some insight to draw the right conclusions.

You laptop is 6 years old.

Have you ever reinstalled the operating system?

It's a strenuous path and requires some planning and backup.

But usually the only way to get back full performance.

I do it at least after two years of usage.

Edited March 21, 2016 by KhunBENQ

[swissie]

Start Taskmanager: right-click on the taskbar, and then click "Start Task Manager".

Click on the "Performance" tab.

Watch the CPU percentage and memory usage.

If both are hitting the ceiling then you have indeed a general performance problem.

In the "Processes" tab (display processes of all users) you can see what services and programs use the memory and CPU.

It requires some insight to draw the right conclusions.

You laptop is 6 years old.

Have you ever reinstalled the operating system?

It's a strenuous path and requires some planning and backup.

But usually the only way to get back full performance.

I do it at least after two years of usage.

Thanks Ben. Done it, including Disk Monitor/Disk Activity. = All well. Nothing that would indicate "something wrong".

But then, strange things are happening with Mozilla. Ever since I installed an ad blocker, Mozilla refuses to clear my "cache".

Never mind, I will be living in Europe again soon and I will buy a new "Apparatus", hoping that I will not be stuck with a fake China-Import.

Again, thanks for your help. Cheers.