Adobe Flash plugin's high CPU usage

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satyr
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Adobe Flash plugin's high CPU usage

Post by satyr »

As a result of many threads regarding the new "plugin-container.exe" component (for instance "How to disable plugin-container.exe" and "plugin-container.exe internet access") and the confusion over what's consuming the CPU % (btw. it's not Firefox itself, but one of its plugins that now runs inside "plugin-container.exe" process) I've decided to create this thread that you're reading right now.

So anyway, no mather what, one thing is true though - and as you'll see I am not blaming neither Firefox, neither plugin-container.exe - Adobe Flash itself is a huge resource hog (of course, I'm talking strictly about CPU time consumed).

For example, viewing a movie in full screen in VLC Media Player (and pretty much any other media player) consumes only 15-20 % of CPU, while a short video clip on YouTube (or some ad on some website) consumes up to 90 % of CPU.

And this is especially troublesome for me (i.e. in my particular case), since I am using a single CPU/core AMD Athlon XP2000+ processor, which is on top of that overheating for no apparent reason (i.e. I tried lowering the Vcore voltage to 1.75 - even manually by reordering DPI switches - lowering CPU/bus speeds in BIOS, I even installed an additional fan etc., but none helped).

P.S. Again, I've created this thread only to the benefit of users (new visitors) that would get one more chance to understand (i.e. one more post explaining/mentioning this) that the high CPU usage is not Firefox's but Flash plugin's fault.

Best regards, satyr
Last edited by satyr on July 25th, 2010, 2:06 pm, edited 2 times in total.
If you want to, please check out my site: tadej-ivan.50webs.com, and enjoy reading my computing-related discoveries, hints, principles, and rules.
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rob64rock
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Re: Adobe Flash plugin's high CPU usage

Post by rob64rock »

I agree with you that Mozilla does point the finger at Adobe systems when there's a problem between Firefox and Adobe Flash Player or Shockwave Player. Because majority(95%) of Firefox crashes are plugin related. That's why they started using OOPP(Out of Process Plugins) process(plugin-container.exe), so if that Flash or Shockwave or any plugin crash it wouldn't take down Firefox with it. So Mozilla's goal was to lower the number of Firefox crashes caused by plugins, which is good for all Firefox users.(except for some experiencing problems)

The only negative things(some users have mentioned) I have seen so far with the (plugin-container.exe):
1.It uses about 3 to 5% more memory than before when everything was processed under firefox.exe
2.Some are seeing Higher CPU usage with both firefox and plugin process combined.(Users see slight and extreme increases, may be due to system hardware)
3.Firefox freezes on certain flash content, Flash Player or Shockwave player aren't totally compatible with Firefox(plugin-container.exe) Problem goes away if OOPP is disabled.

But the main problem with Adobe and Firefox is compatibility not being the best it can be, compared to IE and Flash, has to do with both of them pointing there fingers at each other when problems arise. If they would have reps from both sides get together they could solve the majority the problems that Firefox users experience that IE users don't.
Last edited by rob64rock on July 31st, 2010, 10:16 am, edited 2 times in total.
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satyr
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Re: Adobe Flash plugin's high CPU usage

Post by satyr »

rob64rock wrote:I agree with you that Mozilla does point the finger at Abode systems when there's a problem between Firefox and Abode Flash Player or Shockwave Player. Because majority(95%) of Firefox crashes are plugin related. That's why they started using OOPP(Out of Process Plugins) process(plugin-container.exe), so if that Flash or Shockwave or any plugin crash it wouldn't take down Firefox with it. So Mozilla's goal was to lower the number of Firefox crashes caused by plugins, which is good for all Firefox users.(except for some experiencing problems)


Apart from a few grammatical/spelling mistakes: nicely said! And by the way, it's "Adobe", not "Abode" (the firm behind Flash/Shockwave Players)

satyr
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tpackert
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Re: Adobe Flash plugin's high CPU usage

Post by tpackert »

Hello,

I spent the day debugging HIGH 100% CPU usage by systems runinng our rather rich Flash UI. The High CPU was specific to certain machines. This started happening with the 3.6.4, 3.6.6, 3.6.8 versions of Firefox.
After eliminating networks issues, service pack issues. I am pretty certain it is related to the Video Cards.

The worst offender was a 2.4ghx single core system with an ATI Rage 128 Video card with only 32GB ram - this would peg the CPU at 100% for 60 seconds.
    Adapter Type RAGE128 PRO II, (AGP 4X/PCI), ATI Technologies Inc. compatible
    Adapter Description 32MB ATI Rage 128 Ultra
    Adapter RAM 32.00 MB (33,554,432 bytes)
    Installed Drivers ati2dvaa.dll
    Driver Version 6.13.10.5004

The next worst was an Intel card with 100MB video card
    Adapter Type Intel(R) 82845G Graphics Controller, Intel Corporation compatible
    Adapter Description Intel(R) 82845G/GL/GE/PE/GV Graphics Controller
    Adapter RAM 64.00 MB (67,108,864 bytes)
    Installed Drivers ialmrnt5.dll
    Driver Version Not Available

The system that had the least problems was a
    Adapter Type Intel(R) 82865G Graphics Controller, Intel Corporation compatible
    Adapter Description Intel(R) 82865G Graphics Controller
    Adapter RAM 96.00 MB (100,663,296 bytes)
    Installed Drivers ialmrnt5.dll
    Driver Version Not Available
    INF File oem6.inf (i865G section)

The system that had no problems with CPU usage was
    Adapter Type Intel(R) 4 Series Express Chipset Family, Intel Corporation compatible
    Adapter Description Intel(R) G41 Express Chipset
    Adapter RAM 1.00 GB (1,073,741,824 bytes)
    Installed Drivers igxprd32.dll
    Driver Version 6.14.10.5082

This HIGH CPU happens with Firefox, using plugin-container.exe and running in intense Flash application.
However switching to Chrome does not incur the same HIGH CPU demonstrated by the Firefox 3.6.8 on the worst hardware. So there seems to be something with the way the Graphic processor is being utilized or NOT in the case of crappy GPUs.

Hopefully my day of debugging will be of benefit to others...
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kindofabuzz
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Re: Adobe Flash plugin's high CPU usage

Post by kindofabuzz »

I agree, it's all got to do with your video card and system RAM. I have an old GeForce ti4400 with a non-working fan on it and Flash just runs like crap.
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satyr
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Re: Adobe Flash plugin's high CPU usage

Post by satyr »

tpackert wrote:I spent the day debugging HIGH 100% CPU usage by systems runinng our rather rich Flash UI. The High CPU was specific to certain machines. This started happening with the 3.6.4, 3.6.6, 3.6.8 versions of Firefox.


Well, that's not my experience, I mean, websites rich with Flash content were consuming high amounts of CPU (up to 100%) as far as I remember (and in both: IE and Firefox) from the very beginning. Maybe it's rather that this has started occurring from a certain Flash version/upgrade onwards, rather than being browser related.

tpackert wrote:The worst offender was a 2.4ghx single core system with an ATI Rage 128 Video card with only 32GB ram - this would peg the CPU at 100% for 60 seconds.


Hihi, ATI Rage 128 graphic card? Does any computer actually still use it?! It's true that it was my first card on my old 1.4 GHz Intel Celeron (Pentium III class) computer, but that was like 10 years ago! :)

Btw. I remember the same problem (Flash on websites causing high CPU usage) back when I was still using on my old NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 (ASUS V8170 DDR video adapter/chip type), AGP 4x, with 64 MBs of RAM, while now/currently I am using ATI RADEON 9600 SERIES, AGP 4x, with 128 MBs of RAM (DDR SGRAM/SDRAM) on my desktop computer, and it's pretty much the same.

Thanks for the replies, satyr
If you want to, please check out my site: tadej-ivan.50webs.com, and enjoy reading my computing-related discoveries, hints, principles, and rules.
Alan Baxter
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Re: Adobe Flash plugin's high CPU usage

Post by Alan Baxter »

satyr wrote:Hihi, ATI Rage 128 graphic card? Does any computer actually still use it?! It's true that it was my first card on my old 1.4 GHz Intel Celeron (Pentium III class) computer, but that was like 10 years ago! :)

That's what's installed in my main browsing computer: a ten year old, 600 MHz dual CPU desktop. Firefox 3.6.8 and Flash 10.1.82.76 work great on this system. Moving Flash into a separate process actually speeds things up.
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