[mythtv-users] Slightly OT: Dothan Centrino M unbelievably slow?

[Brian Wood]

Steven Adeff wrote:
> My friend had a laptop he bought last year (Acer Aspire 3620) and the
> screen died on him, so he let me have it and I'm trying to turn it
> into a frontend for my bedroom but I'm finding that it seems to be
> really slow.
> 
> Now, I can't get speedstep-centrino working on it because I guess its
> really buggy or something, what I'm finding on google is everyone has
> to recompile their kernel after modifying the speedstep-centrino file.
> BUT, x86info -mhz is showing the laptop is running at 1.6Ghz.
> 
> But when I try and playback a simple AVI (downloaded Top Gear for
> instance) its too slow to handle it. As well, running top it shows
> that top itself is taking about 10-20% CPU%?!!

Top often shows as a lot of CPU at first, then settles down after a few
seconds.

> 
> So I think something seriously wrong is going on here but I can't
> figure out what. Anyone have any idea or is this processor just
> rediculously slow?

"Centrino" is not a CPU, it just means that the laptop maker bought the
CPU, main mobo logic and WiFi radio all from Intel. It is a trademark,
not hardware.

If what you have is a Celeron, which is very likely, you may well run
into trouble with CPU capability, and laptop mobos and harddrives are
not at the top of the performance heap.

Make sure everything not really needed is not running. Try using a
lightweight desktop. Make sure you have sufficient RAM.

beww