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| RJW | 08/12/2011 09:51:55 |
| 343 forum posts 36 photos | I used to have big issues with M.E. pages loading, especially at our property in SW France, where, like other posters here, we have to use dial-up. The problem was so bad, I would never visit the site at all unless I disabled images loading in Firefox first. FF8 update was supposed to have improved large memory useage by the programme, but I've seen little evidence of it, my CPU can still hit 60% - 75% useage when opening or page loading, but flash and GIFF animations do have a big effect on that. Poor page loading can also be caused by a browser cache that's nearly full, so try clearing cookies, temp files and history too, general housekeeping really. We're also on the final stretch to Christmas, and people are doing a lot of on-line shopping, which is gobbling up bandwidth and slowing things down generally - I couldn't get into PayPal at all yesterday, and if the home page did load, it was text only, no graphics! eBay is also getting hit, as images won't load even on a sale item preview on listing pages. The erratic scrolling of pages and especially the animated giff's on here got so bloody annoying, I rarely had more than a quick flip through the new posts on the front page, then scarper, which I'm sure is not what the creators of the site ultimately intended - no visitors, no sales, but I suppose they have to make a trade off somewhere, as the adsvertising pays for the site, we don't! I was just pleased I didn't suffer epilepsy, as I've often wondered if they could have an adverse effect on anyone afflicted with the condittion! So! and to emphasise to the moderators and advertisers who may throw a wobbly over the following tips and think about removing my post - the Adverts remain, they just don't p*ss people off enormously with their incessant blinking and other faffings around! Follow the routines to the letter and you'll be ok, it's made my life a damned sight more pleasant when browsing this site for sure, and no more jerky page scrolling! People may even Read the adverts instead of doing anything But, just to avoid them! Hope it hits the spot for some of you! John. To disable animated
GIF's in Firefox:
1) Open firefox Browser
2a) In address bar (Type: about:config) 2b) If you are running FF3, (or see the dialogue box 'Here there be Dragons', click ok to the message. 3) Find: image.animation_mode 4) Change the value to none To disable Flash
animations:
Flashblock for
Google Chrome:
Flashblock for
Firefox:
Edited By RJW on 08/12/2011 09:54:01 Edited By RJW on 08/12/2011 09:54:21 Edited By RJW on 08/12/2011 09:59:59 |
| RJW | 08/12/2011 10:18:25 |
| 343 forum posts 36 photos | An additional note about Flashblock if you use Photobucket or similar sites as image storage for websites etc! Where the flash images were operating, all you'll see is a blank grey box with the letter 'F' in a circle at the centre, if you hover the mouse cursor over it, it will change to an arrow, clicking the arrow will cause the flash animation or browser plug-in to run. What Flashblock will also do on Photobucket and similar sites which use Flash browser plug-ins for uploading images, or copy / pasting url's to them into a forum or web page, is also disable the photo upload and url generator dialogue boxes, so you'll need to hover the cursor over the 'F' then click the arrow and your photo upload / url generation dialogue boxes will open! John |
| ady | 08/12/2011 10:18:53 |
| 612 forum posts 50 photos | 1) Open firefox Browser 2a) In address bar Type: about:config 3) Find: image.animation_mode 4) Change the value to
none Woah! Even more improvement for me, well worth a shot this one chaps. |
| Les Jones 1 | 08/12/2011 11:04:22 |
| 2292 forum posts 159 photos | Hi ady, Thanks for that excellent tip. Just one point to add for others is that the change only takes effect next time Firefox is started, Les. |
| Billy Mills | 08/12/2011 11:13:49 |
| 377 forum posts | Normally get 17M from BT copper, use Firefox and Chrome mainly on Ubuntu or Mint ( no AV needed) or XP if I want to run slowly. This site has been very slow lately -even late at night. Have given up posting at some times when things crawl along. No slow down on any other site in UK, EU or USA. The animations are stored on your machine so after the initial download they run without a bandwidth hit, turning them off will not make much difference unless speeds are very low. Time of year when cellular phones run very slowly as well. Billy. |
| Billy Mills | 08/12/2011 12:45:16 |
| 377 forum posts | One other little point, when you compose a post it looks like a "Cloud" application, every letter typed seems to go to the server which then echo's back to show you what the server has to date. Sometimes you type away and then nothing comes back when things are slow. So Cloud users beware, you are placing reliance upon the link being fast and there. I will stick to local software applications wherever I can! Billy Canute. |
| RJW | 08/12/2011 14:28:53 |
| 343 forum posts 36 photos | Les, thanks for crediting Ady with my tip, I'm sure he appreciated it  Whether or not Firefox stores animations in the browser cache is a moot point, as the browser refreshes the page everytime you change it, even on many occasions when you hit the 'back' buton. The main reason I posted the tips was to point people to fixes to get rid of damned annoying distractions when trying to view pages here rather than save on bandwidth, although I can state from personal experience, that when using a very slow dial-up account, those animations Do slow page loading to a crawl!. Not everyone has a superfast connection - or even a fast connection, and many are on a very limited monthly download allowance as well - and if you're having to use a PAYG wireless broadband dongle to get on-line, that stuff eats up your limits Very quickly. If webmasters want to pay me for downloading and viewing their fancy web crappery and graphics, fine, but if not, spare a thought for those of us that do have to pay for it. |
| RJW | 08/12/2011 14:42:41 |
| 343 forum posts 36 photos | What some of you also may not be aware of, is that your computers
are probably set up for networking by default even if you don't have a
network at home - this has been the case since XP was a sprog, The result of that can be several hundred in and outbound web
connections live at any one time without you being aware of it, all of
which is eating up your bandwidth. Almost all the
software you have installed on your pc's - even when not running, will
be 'calling home' to the programme originator regularly to check for
everything from updates to tracking your web useage. (how often do you see programme update notifications or 'special offers' that you never signed up for? If you don't believe me, check the inbound and outbound
traffic stat's on your firewall programme ...........you do Have
firewalls ................ don't you..................! Google is one of the worst and most intrusive
offenders ever for tracking your web movements, and their services are
installed by stealth default if you installed Google Chrome, or Comodo
Dragon, you'll also find it's loaded into your pc's registry and
services! Go to > Run, Type 'services.msc' (without quotes) and take a look - (Google updater) you can disable it from there! I usually delete all Google entries directly from the registry to make sure! Having
just checked the outgoing connections in my firewall using Comodo
dragon as the only live connection to this site using that browser,
there is a continous data transmission of 1B/s which shows that those
animations do use bandwidth, and the connection IP of 74.125.79.101 is
registered to Google! Whilst typing this post, it's so far used 4.5Kb and that's just my browser sitting on a page with the animations running! OK, it's damn all if you're on broadband, but try waiting for 4.5KB to download as an Email for instance, and you'll sit waiting a while I can tell you. And, what data is Google sucking from my pc that I don't know about! Not for nothing did they get a whigging for 'accidentally' recording wireless transmissions during their streetmap fisco! Another huge factor affecting how fast a connection ran that I became aware of fairly quickly, followed the introduction of BBC I-Player,
anyone downloading programmes using that medium, is downloading several Gigabytes of data for just one programme down the very same phone lines
we all use for our ADSL connections, and it all hits the available bandwidth from your local
exchange. How many TV's are now hooked up directly to an ADSL connection for All viewing! As far as I can see, everytime a service provider
updates systems and spouts about how fast we'll be able to use the web,
some bright spark comes up with a way to exploit it and destroy any advantages very quickly. Anyone remember when Broadband first hit the streets! how soon will fibre optic go the same way! My
broadband connection is all too often little better than my old dial-up, and my 3G
PAYG dongle is so much quicker than my BT ADSL line these days, I'm
thinking of ditching BT's onerous miserable 18 month 10 gig/month
contracts and jumping ship. I've not used my
wireless dongle since getting back from France, is anyone finding
problams with wireless broadband, or is it just an ADSL issue? John. |
| Gordon W | 08/12/2011 15:04:50 |
| 2011 forum posts | Well, I don't know anything about these mysteries, it's all greek to me. We have given up on BT and wires, the broadband connection was hopeless. We now have satellite connection, and it is good, can even see videos now. |
| Les Jones 1 | 08/12/2011 17:40:04 |
| 2292 forum posts 159 photos | Apologies John (RJW), I have not been not been following this thread from the start I just saw ady's message with the information in it. On the original topic I did have problems early evening one day this week which I am convinced was due to this website. Loading pages just timed out. No other site gave any problem at the time and my connection speed was showing as about 7 mbps. (BroadbandMax.co.uk speed test.) Les. |
| Clive Hartland | 08/12/2011 17:50:22 |
 2929 forum posts 41 photos | Today the connection to the Forum is very slow and takes agaes to cnnect and load, this coincides with the schools shutting for the day!
Must be all the kids hogging whats left of the bandwidth.
Also late at night the big shops locally download their data and it is hard to get a connection again.
We are 7 km from the exchange and its never been any different.
Clive |
| RJW | 08/12/2011 19:08:49 |
| 343 forum posts 36 photos | No worries Les, I did plonk a winking smiley on the line  I must confess that this week has been particularly bad for connections speeds, and totally forgot about kids bailing out of school and onto their pc's, usually 4.00pm onwards for a couple of hours at least here! I also got the 'connecting to model engineer' loading warning on the page for quite a while just now. We're only 3 miles from the exchange here, but you'd think we were in the outer hebredes some days. I did a speed test yesterday in fact, and are getting 2.3 meg's upload, and 300KB down! BT says that's satisfactory, which says it all as far as their 'Up to' claims go, should be a 10 meg connection ...............if only! I'll hook up my 'T-Mobile' dongle when I hit a bad speed patch and see how wireless goes - I binned BT's wireless connection when even after resetting the modem password, some varmint locally kept hacking into my network and robbing the bandwidth. Fact is, there's so much stuff being rammed down BT's antiquated old wires, they're completely overloaded and can't cope anymore. I don't think the problem is totally down to Model Engineer's site. John |
| Les Jones 1 | 08/12/2011 19:47:52 |
| 2292 forum posts 159 photos | Hi John, The problem is probably a bandwidth problem at the MEW site rather than a problem with the site itself. I was thinking of moving to BT next time I have a line or exchange problem. I am with Talktalk at present. The download speed is almost always about 7 meg. The problem with Talktalk is that reporting a fault is almost impossible. There is nowhere on their site to log a fault.. Les. |
| Stub Mandrel | 08/12/2011 20:09:58 |
 4318 forum posts 291 photos 1 articles | We have cripplingly slow internet speeds here. Use Firefox with the adblock plug in, and block the ads and pictures that re-load for each new page... Neil |
| RJW | 08/12/2011 20:18:01 |
| 343 forum posts 36 photos | Hi Les, You're probably right, although I am experiencing delays across the board getting pages to load on most of those I visit, which include eBay and PayPal, plus a couple of horology and ex-pat forums. I wouldn't hope for much in the way of an improvement with BT over TalkTalk ......unless you've got the patience of Job and can decipher Indilish, their call centres are in India somehwere, and the operators treat you like a numbskull, leading you through all manner of scripted inane checks on equipment that you know are working fine,when all you want to know is if the engineer with the guts ripped out of a local box, has cut the line! You can't log a problem on BT's website either as it happens. My connection was so bad yesterday, I went to check my broadband useage in case I'd gone over their miserbale 10 gig limit, and were choking my connection .......... the meter had been removed, and links to dialogue boxes had been greyed out, no way to contact anyone. If you try calling them on the phone about a BB problem, you're lead through a nausiating rigmarole of button pushing and infuriating verbal menu's that almost make you lose the will to live. I suppose all phone providers are as bad, but BT have turned crap customer service into an art form! Is anyone using SKY, their deals look Very enticing! John |
| Gordon W | 09/12/2011 09:57:20 |
| 2011 forum posts | As far as I understand it, it matters not which service you use if it comes down a BT wire. We used to get reasonable speeds, but now there are so many new houses, all full of kids, our service just about disappeared. Hence the satellite system. BTW I've tried just about all available providers and BT were the best, doesn't say much for the rest does it? |
| PETER AYERS | 09/12/2011 11:47:54 |
 25 forum posts | Seems to work ok here in Normandy although at odd timmes when the net is really busy it can drag it's feet a bit
Peter |
| mick H | 09/12/2011 14:42:38 |
| 795 forum posts 34 photos | Gordon /RJW.........we are with BT but all of our neighbours who use different providers only get the same rubbish broadband speeds of about 1.7Mb/s. I have actually found the BT servic line quite helpful and I have no problem being treated as a numbskull because as far as computers are concerned I am one. At least the service calls are free. Having said that I object being charged top dollar for rubbish broadband speed. This site very very slow today. |
| Clive Hartland | 09/12/2011 14:53:19 |
2929 forum posts 41 photos | Les, you say there is no way you can report a fault on Talktalk. Yes, there is.
Go to:- TalkTalk Members Forum and log in and become a member (No cost). They are the best bunch of guys you ever want to meet.#
They do not stop at the end of a problem and will re-contact you as often as you need them, please try it.
Clive |
| Versaboss | 09/12/2011 23:11:28 |
| 512 forum posts 77 photos | Reading the stuff above about stopping these flashing adverts, I searched around in my browser (Opera) for similar settings. I found that in Opera I can adjust settings individually for websites, and so I disabled 'animation of pictures' for this site. That worked, but now it wasn't possible to log in! The e-mail/password entry just went blank again after a second. Enabling the animation brought back the flashing ads, but not the login. Only after the deletion of the model-engineer entry in that (very large) file list brought it back. The effect is repeatable; I did it twice yesterday and today, and in between Opera made an update. It is strange that this does not happen with other browsers...? Don't say use another, I like Opera! Greetings, Hansrudolf |
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