Choppy Youtube Graphics And Ever Increasing Lag With Live Streams

System:
Nanosystems aftermarket build
Motherboard: GF 7050V-M7
4 GB RAM PC2 6400 (Single Channel as there are only 2 slots)
160 GB Western Digital IDE drive
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9400
Windows 7 Pro 64
HD 4550 (temporarily replacing HD 4350)

Updated the BIOS and then replaced E2160 processor dual core with the quad. System is running fine, but graphics are choppy with live streams and there are undesirable behaviors from standard video also. With the E2160 video too was choppy for the obvious reasons. The E2160 benches only around 1000 and doesn't handle 1080p very well. Quad is using only using about 25-30% at the most (fullscreen) when I can get video to run and usually around 20%.

Sequence of events:
1. Upgrade BIOS and processor
2. System boot ended up with a freezing event. Restored optimized defaults in BIOS and that was resolved.
3. Reboot and open browser and video is very choppy (low frames). At times, live video and standard video player (HTML 5) will catch and loop over a tenth of a second of video like watching the same tenth of a second over and over. No way out but to load another video. Reloading same video causes the issue to reoccur immediately. Audio contines to function when this happens. Starting a YouTube video from the beginning works fine even with 1440p (didn't try 2160p) as long as the quality has already been selected. If not, choosing any setting causes the tenth of a second loop or the video is super low frames and very choppy. Also, attempting to move forward in a video causes the same problem.
NOTE: processor is being used minimally for the most part...nothing unusual. It's using about 25-30% for HD video, which should be correct for this benchmark processor.

What I have tried:
1. I replaced the video card with a slightly better model (bench 174 v bench 246) to see if that was the problem. Graphics driver automatically updated in Windows 7. Same issues, especially with the tenth of a second loop. Otherwise video did seem a little bit better when it was running and system runs a little bit smoother. Weren't really any system problems before though.
2. Updated Java to see if Java controls might be causing the issues. No help.
3. Looked over settings in Chrome but found nothing.
4. Attempted to update the network driver but found I am using the most recent one.
5. Looked for a chipset driver but couldn't find one. Looks like the correct driver is there for the motherboard.

What I'm not sure about:
1. Old IDE drive which I will replace with a SATA one when I get the opportunity. Board will handle both. Not sure if video graphics use the hard drive or if it's purely a memory operation, so I don't know how that could affect this issue.
2. Not sure which BIOS settings could help with this if any.

Anyone have any idea what might cause this or how to fix this kind of issue? Seems that clicking on any control will send the video into the tenth of a second loop. Skipping ahead causes the issue too, and right clicking on the video can lead to the same outcome.

I have a second system with the same graphics card and uses the same driver, and it's not having the issue. It does have a 6MB hard drive, which I know is a big difference and also dual channel memory and 8GB. However, this issue is crazy. BTW, getting 30 frames on 1080p on Youtube. The biggest problem is with live streaming video like on Twitch and Youtube. It's super choppy and getting like 5-8 frames.

Like to see if I can get this resolved, but I am stumped. The obvious answer seems the IDE drive, but I would like to hear from you guys about your experiences and all the possiblities.

 

Almost forgot. Had a couple of blue screens associated with this event. Each time this happened when clicking to change the video resolution on Youtube. Here is the boot pop up for the most recent one. Minidumps are attached:

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: BlueScreen
OS Version: 6.1.7601.2.1.0.256.48
Locale ID: 1033

Additional information about the problem:
BCCode: 116
BCP1: FFFFFA80094534E0
BCP2: FFFFF88004C7ED9C
BCP3: 0000000000000000
BCP4: 0000000000000002
OS Version: 6_1_7601
Service Pack: 1_0
Product: 256_1

 

Think I have solved this. Imaged the system to a SATA drive, and video seems much better. Before, Twitch video stats said I was getting a 60 fps connection, but I was dropping between 30 and 45 fps with the IDE drive. Now it's still dropping some but more like 4-6 fps. I guess I shouldn't expect better from DDR 2 RAM in single channel. Maybe I'll get a chance to upgrade the mb on this machine, but it's running much better.

 

Ummm, only 2 slots has nothing to do with it. There are 100s, if not 1000s of motherboards with only 2 slots that support dual channel. The reason you are running in single channel is simply because your older motherboard does not support dual-channel. If it did, it would say so in the specs.

Note it really takes very little graphics horsepower to display HD resilutions from streams. It does not have to "process" the data like the graphics solution must do with games for example. This is why many HTPCs (home theater PCs) use the simple graphics solutions that come integrated on many micro and mini-ITX motherboards.

So my guess would be the bandwidth of the video being delivered. The older IDE drive could certainly be a bottleneck, especially if running low of free space and/or if heavily fragmented. If the Page File is improperly configured too (I recommend just letting Windows manage it).

Network bandwidth can be a factor, but if your other system works fine, it is probably not the network. So I'm leaning towards the fact this is just legacy hardware with low amounts of RAM - assuming it is all working properly.

Do you really need Java? I dumped Java a couple years ago out of security concerns and have not missed it. Check what other programs are consuming your RAM too. Consider MSE is not using it. It works just fine and is a smaller resource hog than most security apps.

 

Thanks Digerati. I suspected dual channeling was available on some 2 slot boards of the time or thereabouts (and in general), but I was hoping I could bait out confirmation. Thanks for the information on that topic.

This is a strange board I have to say. Dual channeling was a few years the standard before dual core processors came to the scene. No idea why Biostar went the route they went. At any rate, it's the board that was in the PC when I purchased the unit on ebay in 2013. I've picked up alot from working with it and on it.

Turns out this is 100% hardware. I hadn't worked with an IDE hard drive that was coupled with this powerful of a processor before, so changing the processor really brought to the front all the hardware deficiencies there and with the single channel limitation. PC is tremendously better with the SATA drive, but I suspect the single channel memory will ultimately lead to me replacing the board down the road sometime. I'm looking forward to getting into that project when I can find some time. Think I'll look around for a board that will support DDR 3 and the Q9400 and see where that goes.

This is one of those PCs that is alot of fun to work with, since the legacy processor will actually do work on today's internet and with today's programs. I really do learn alot from working on older PCs that can be upgraded like
this one.

Probably not. Just something I decided to try, since the player controls seemed at least superficially to possibly be associated with the instability of video playback.

Appreciate your input.

 

You are confusing apples with Buicks. Dual channel memory and dual core processors are two totally different concepts and technologies. The number of cores in a processor has absolutely nothing to do with the number of channels the memory runs on.

And BTW, the performance advantage dual channel memory architecture promised over single channel did not pan out as expected (or I should say as "marketed"). There are performance gains, but they turned out to be marginal, at best. More RAM trumps faster RAM every time.

DDR3 has been superseded. If you are going to buy new, it makes no sense not to buy a platform that supports DDR4.

 

No, what I meant Digerati is that the PC came equipped with a Dual Core processor. By the time that processor was being sold, dual channel memory was already a few years on the market. It was strange that Biostar coupled that gen of processors on a single channel board, since single channel was long gone by that time.

If I can find one that will support the Q9400, I will go that way. Wasn't anticipating that I would be able to find one, but I haven't looked around yet.

Well, yes, it's only one element of PC performance. It is better. I do wish I could add more RAM to the system, but I'm good with it for now.

 

Java is your main problem if you are using firefox.

I disable java and use the OpenH264 Video Codec provided by Cisco Systems, Inc 1.6 for firefox and don't have any issues with it.Except when i go to a java page.

 

i'm glad you got it figured out to your satisfaction. this is just my personal experience viewing a twitch live stream.

i've been streaming a live twitch channel ( saltybet ) pretty much 24/7 365 since jan 2014. i have comcast internet for my home business which was used very little, so i got a second hand dell optiflex 755 tower, with onboard everything, with win7 pro, and started viewing the stream 24/7 just so i can rationalize paying comcast their monthly cost. the video content that the MUGEN game engine outputs is flash, and for a full 2 years, all of 2014 and 2015, i had zero issues viewing the live stream. i used either chrome or firefox as the browser, and i have always chosen "source" as the video quality.

then in jan 2016, twitch implemented their HTML5 web player, and i have had nothing but problems since then. i have tried IE, chrome, firefox, opera, and they all choke and die trying to use twitch's HTML5 player. i even went out and got a discrete video card, and that did not solve anything. in the options of twitch's HTML5 player, you can choose to turn off the HTML5 player and go back to using the flash player, which i have done, but both chrome and firefox still choke and die after a few hours of streaming. IE is better in that i can go almost a full day before IE chokes and dies. the opera browser actually works pretty well and is the best at handling and dealing with a stream crash and thankfully, with cpu usage. i run process explorer, minimized, so i have cpu usage in the system tray, firefox and chrome are horrendous as far as cpu usage goes when viewing the live stream. IE is ok, but opera is beautiful for cpu usage, maybe 11% viewing the live steam. the ads twitch shows are horrendous and will spike cpu usage close to 100%. after a day or so of live streaming with opera, i can see that cpu usage is creeping up and up, so i just reload the page and it goes back down to normal.

i personally blame the switch to HTML5 web players as the problem, and short of dropping a 1000 bucks on a brand new beefy computer, that can handle twitch's HTML5 web player, opera is my solution. anyway... good luck with it.

 

Few computers need java. None of the four Windows 7 computers in our house has Java installed.

 

Yeah, the last holdout I had was on an extra computer my grandson used to play Minecraft. But Minecraft was recoded well over a year ago to not need Java anymore. US-CERT still recommends disabling it. I say disable it and if nothing breaks, uninstall it.

 

I prefer flash too harmless, and I could see how it might be a factor with this problem. Here is the way I see things, based on the fact that I run an extension called Youtube Flash Video Player:

Some facts
1. Youtube is more or less the only site where the Youtube Flash Video Player (YFVB) will run videos in the flash format and using the Flash Player. 1080p on Youtube running running flash runs perfectly at about 25-30 frames. This seems low to me for a processor that benches at 3300 though.
2. I can run Twitch streams with about a third of the processor benchmark of the troubled PC on a core 2 duo PC, but it is similarly choppy, and the processor is used to about 100%
3. Changing the IDE drive to a SATA drive improved performance. The processor is only being used between 20-30%, but the dropped frames went down. Btw, the board does support 3.0 GB/sec data with the SATA connectors on the board, so the drive is now using all possible bandwidth for a drive with this board.
4. Single channel memory is the only difference between this board and the core 2 duo PC that gets similar performance.
5. Just like you, my experience is that source video (1080p) used to run better off of Twitch than it does now. At any rate, maybe Twitch servers are not as responsive as previously, since Amazon took over.

My best conclusion
I am convinced at this point that DDR2 memory in single channel array just cannot handle the bandwidth required for 1080p. Maybe I am wrong about this. I have PC 6400 in the computer, which is the best memory the board will support. It only operates at 400 MHz instead of 800 MHz, however, because of the single channel output.

With the output of this processor and with an HD 4550 graphics card in the PC, I feel 1080p should stream with no problem. I also wonder about the ethernet adapter, which I believe is 10/100 (I attempted to install the latest driver for this but it said it was already installed). All of this leading me to a socket 775 motherboard that will support DDR 3 at a much higher frequency. I found one I like from Asus that will support 1333 MHz in dual channel. I'll also be able to go up to 8 GB from the 4 max with the current board. The higher memory frequency combined with dual channel and more memory will I believe solve the problem. Pretty sure that most video operations run from RAM, so it seems logical that improving the RAM should bring the performance this processor can obviously easily handle.

Enjoying this project. I spent $85 on the computer with W7, and I have added a $8 graphics card, $16 quad core processor, $12 worth of RAM, and a $5 160 GB SATA drive so far. I've learned alot, so I figure why not go all the way and finish the job. When I get a chance I'll get the board and some memory. I guess that will be about $200 all together for a nice cracking little PC. Not too bad.

 

JavaScript is badly coded any way.How many people have been hacked many times.

 

Java and Javscript are two completely different things.
Javascript is everywhere, you can't browse fully without it mostly. All script is potentially dangerous on an unprotected or not sufficiently protected system.

 

Agreed. JavaScript is good. Java is bad. And neither are Flash.

 

My bad i mixed them up lol.