Hi all, I'm fairly new to configuring ubuntu but not new in using it. I introduced my mother to ubuntu 10.04 which works much much better then windows XP that came on her computer.
The problem we are having is that the videos on youtube and other sites play but they are taking up all the cpu, it shows 100% in system moniter and is very choppy and the sound isn't accurate.
I disabled the visual effects and that helped a little but still taking up 96% of cpu in the system moniter and having the above problems.
I switched to opera browser and it now plays better but still not good enough.
The specs of the desktop is as follows..
brand: Gateway desktop (not sure of the exact model)
Memory: 2 gigs
processor speed: 2 ghz
not sure about the video, I do know that it's integrated on the mother board.
I was thinking about doing the following..
Either add more memory (I think 2 gigs is all it will hold)
or trying xubuntu or other linux distro to see if that will run smoother. I would like for her to have the visual effects to enjoy and play the videos. I would hate to have to go back to using xp again. Which I don't believe I will.
Please spare us! Thank you.

You can find your video card with:

If your video card is not up to the task of streaming flash video (Adobe recommends a dedicated graphics card with at least 128mb) then your two options as I see them are:

a) watch the video with your favorite movie player (totem, mplayer, vlc, minitube, etc) instead of streaming flash in the browser (which is known to have higher system requirements in Linux than Windows)

or

b) buy an inexpensive video card such as nvidia to greatly improve your graphics performance by taking the load off the CPU

watch the video with your favorite movie player

How do I do that when the video is in a website? The main website we are experiencing trouble is http://www.joycemeyer.org/BroadcastH...%E2%80%93_Pt_1.
I noticed that when I right click the link to open the video it has "save linked content as..." but that just opens as a htm file and it's a mess. So how can she play these videos until I can get her a video card and/or memory installed?

Open a terminal.

With 10.04, its-
Applications menu -> Accessories -> Terminal.

You can also get a terminal up other ways, like the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + Alt + T.

Just type (or even copy and paste) the command that snowpine gave you, then copy and paste the results here.

BTW, its normally best to post things like lspci output in 'code' tags (you can use the # symbol found above the posting area to get the code tags). It wont matter much in this case, you'll only get 1 line.

Please identify your video card using the following command so I can assist you:

Regarding how to save the video to your hard drive, there is a list of suggestions here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1701771

Ok, here is the results..

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 82915G/GV/910GL Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 04)

I hope that will help you resolve this issue or what I need to resolve it. thank you.

Intel video drivers are installed by default in Ubuntu (no action necessary on your part).
Your hardware does not meet the minimum hardware requirements according to: http://www.adobe.com/products/flashp...ech-specs.html

Try visiting http://ubuntuforums.org and doing a search for your specific card, you might get some tips/tricks.

Ok, let's close this and get on to helping others. Do I need a video card or should I just get more memory (cheaper)?
I need both I know that but I'm going to get one or the other right now. If it's a video card, what specs and brand do you recommend to run with ubuntu 10.04 32bit?

thank you so much for your help.

Comon, you should know how 'fuzzy' those hardware requirements pages are. At best they are a rough guide.

More memory will only help if you are running low on or out of memory.

If flash is bad when you only have 1 browser open, with 1 tab running 1 video (and if you havent tested like this, then try it) then I would really doubt you are anywhere near running out of memory with 2GB. So it probably wouldnt help at all.

A video card may help....or it might not. Part of why your video performance is so bad is because the intel GMA 900 onboard video chip is pretty awful. But I cant even remeber now if flash is using video acceleration with linux now. If it is, adding a video card would help a fair bit, if its not then adding a video card will only help a little bit.

Your real problem might be your 2GHz CPU. You cant really measure performance by GHz alone (which is why the hardware requirement pages are 'fuzzy'). I've got 1.8GHz CPUs that are faster tha 2.8GHz CPUs. That is only counting single core CPUs as well, there are lots of 1.something GHz dual core CPPUs that can be faster than 3GHz+ single core CPUs.

A few things that might help-
Go into yoru BIOS and make sure that yoru video RAM is 128MB+ (and if its max size is smaller than 128MB, use the max size).
Try installing the Xfce or Lxde desktop and logging into that.

http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/xfce

Without knowing what motherboard you have and what avaible slots you have, we cant know what to suggest.

It might be best to get your hardware specs and post them here. Use 'sudo lshw' the same way you did with 'lspci | grep VGA' and then post the results here (please use code tags for that one, it will be big).

*edit-

You have to download the videos to the HDD. Knowing the way that this site works, its possible that some member/mod/admin will have problems with any directions on how to do that, as it could be considered piracy.

All I will say is that its easy using the most common browser with linux distros and one of several addons for that browser.

Consider also Ubuntu is about to release the 12.04 version which will have long term support, system upgrade is also an good idea, and for a lightweight system look for Lubuntu.
About Lubuntu release versions: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Lubuntu/GetLubuntu

Regards

I had to open this thread back up because I just installed the nvidia 256 mb card and installed the addtitional drivers and restarted the computer. I go to that website to play video and it's still choppy?
Here is the output for... lspci | grep VGA

05:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV44A [GeForce 6200] (rev a1)

What is the flash plugin version you have installed?

Regards

You're probably using all your CPU cycles for displaying the flash video then.

Check htop, or system monitor, to see your CPU use.