New laptop, sounds "stutter" when multitasking

[tcthetank]

Hi, I recently just purchased an Acer 5601 as my first laptop. Previously I really havent used one too much, but this just doesnt seem right. The specs of the laptop are:

Intel Core Duo Processor T2050 1.66ghz (Thats what it should have, but me and other people reported to actually have a T2250 @ 1.73ghz)
1.66GHz, with Centrino Technology
512MB RAM, 100GB Hard

I recently added a 1gb stick of ram, because it has shared video memory, so I now have 1.5gb ram.

My problem is whenever I play a youtube video, I cannot stream it from the start, I have to stop it and let it finish downloading first, otherwise the music stutters and whatnot. Its not my internet connection, because the download bar on youtube finishes quickly, its just my laptop seems it cant handle it well enough to stream.

It also does it if I have winamp open and playing, and I then open a program or even internet explorer, or something small.

Any Ideas? Thanks!

 

[Slikkster]

If it's any consolation, you're not alone:

http://ask.metafilter.com/mefi/38852

 

[xgsound]

I've used this tool for similar problems in the past with VIA chipsets and Creative sound cards in particular. http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=951 It's a pci latency tool. Some rouge hardware drivers (they override bios settings) have a higher than 64 latency setting and hog the pci bus. This can show up as video stuttering, sound stuttering, or CD burn failures. The idea is to insure that settings are 64 or under and everything should run smoother. .(not faster) The mentioned CD problem was fixed by lowering the latency of the VIA PCI controller to 0. I was amazed, but it worked. The only reason I tried it was that George Breeze had a program to do this on an older Via chipset. These kinds of problems were understandable on 66Mhz machines running sound on the 8 Mhz ISA bus .. but it's ridiculous today.

This site http://soldcentralfl.com/flyingpenguin/penguin_blog.shtml (scroll to bottom) discribes how to apply at startup.

I would use winamp as your testing app along with a file transfer as it sounds easier to duplicate. When you find settings that help have the tool apply them at startup. There's a thread about the program at guru3d.com also.

Please verify results for people who check in here.


Jim

 

[tcthetank]

cool thanks, I will try that out for sure.

 

[tcthetank]

hmm, nothing came up for "quickset latency" so I couldnt change it on the fly, but even after saving, applying, and restarting, its the same.

http://img179.imageshack.us/my.php?image=untitledup9.jpg

There is a picture of what mine says, and on the readme it says something like "if it is set to 0, its possible it might not be adjustable"

 

[xgsound]

The settings I can read are all zero. This program wouldn't help in that case. I put it on my new machine and also get zero for everything but my dialup modem on the pci bus. The next things I would check are new drivers for the exact laptop you have, particularly for sound and video . Next prevent as many startup items as you can. Of course you have to be careful doing this. A good troubleshooting method is to use msconfig.exe and uncheck items after you check each one with google to see what might happen without it. I hope this is of some help. Anybody else have other ideas.


Jim