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View Full Version : [ubuntu] Problems after the Install; Sluggish, Preferences->Sessions Missing



wizarddrummer
January 22nd, 2010, 08:01 PM
Hi,

I started using Ubuntu a week ago using the CD (make no changes) version. The system ran predictably slow (doing everything from CD) so I decided to do the full install.

The install was uneventful and smooth. After the installation I installed all of the recommended updates.

I was truly dismayed at the results.

For those of you that have played Second Life; your the last person to get onto a crowded sim and your playing on a machine that has a slower than average connection.

The machine is now running about 1/10 as fast as it did when in CD mode. Lots of grey spells. Very slow response.

The lag is ferocious.

This is completely contrary to what I thought should happen because the OS is now reading from a hard drive and has a swap area.

I was expecting a vast improvement, not the other way around.

I installed this on a Dell Optiplex system with a dual processor.

What I do not understand is that when I look at the process table with the top command there's not much going on. gnome-system-mo, Xorg, firefox, gedit, compiz.real is about it. When using Firefox the condition seems to worsen.

The system monitor shows (rough average)
CPU1 @ 9.0% | CPU2 @ 7%
Memory: 79.2%
Swap: 11.4%
Network is almost a flat line.

All acceptable performance numbers and yet the system runs like molasses.

In Firefox just switching a tab is painful.

Any installed application I open seems to take an enormous time to open and I even get a little bit of a typematic lag in gedit.

As I was reading I saw some suggestions. Specifically something called Tracker, I tried to investigate this and turn if off if necessary.

When I went to open the System->Preferences "Sessions" was not in the Preferences list. Nor was it on the list in the Administration list.

The missing Sessions along with the lag and my unfamiliarity with this OS prompted me to ask some questions.

Any ideas as to why I am getting such a degrading performance going from the version run entirely on CD to the installed version?

thanks,

new edit.
There was a couple of hours between the install and the updates. I have now determined that the huge lag that i am experiencing was part of that update process.

there were so many items in the update that I could not even begin to roll them back.