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K-Bat · Jul 21, 2004, 10:37 PM

Can somebody with a 1.5 ghz (or similar) PB test this and report it here for me? Open TextEdit, hold down a letter key (whichever, I used "n"), and time the number of seconds it took to fill the letter until the end of the first line. My window size setting is 75 characters across, by the way. It's taking about 12 seconds on my machine.

Why I'm asking this? I came home this evening and put down my shoulder bag in the living room to chat with my wife. A few minutes later my 4-year-old son called me from the study, "Daddy, look! I did this for you!!" He apparently took my bag to the study, unzipped the bag, took out my 1.5 ghz PB, put it on the desk, and opened the display. The PB was sleeping in the bag. I quickly inspected the scene (without letting him know my nervous state of mind), but everything looked all right, and thanked him. My son was so proud of what he did. Forward 2 hours. I started typing some documents after dinner, and I noticed something was strange. Everything worked fine (opening programs, copying and pasting, selecting menus, etc.) EXCEPT the typing and deleting speeds. It's considerably slower than what I remember prior to this evening. The issue seems to be basically related to cursor navigation. Moving the cursor position with arrow keys is also very slow now.

I repaired permission and restarted the computer a few times (one time with fsck -f), but typing, deleting and other cursor navigation issues persist. The processor speed is set to the highest. "About this Mac" correctly shows the memory (1.25G). What gives? I'm desperately looking for your insights and suggestions. Thanks!

K-Bat

Ryan1524 · Jul 21, 2004, 10:44 PM

5 sec here.

K-Bat · Jul 21, 2004, 11:18 PM

Tanks, Ryan. I guess I'm definitely having a problem.

I moved around the memory sticks between slots too see if the problem is memory related. Nothing changed so I'm ruling out the memory as the source of the problem.

I realized, however, that what's slowed down is not typing, deleting, moving cursor per se. Even now, I can still quickly type and move the cursor. Instead, things get slowed down whenever the keystroke involves hold-down. It takes 12 seconds to fill the first line in TextEdit if I keep pressing a key; it takes only 5 seconds to do the same IF I ACTUALLY KEEP TYPING. This pattern is consistent with the delete and arrow keys. I tested this with several different apps, but I experience the same issue in them all.

Anybody has any idea? Thanks.

K-Bat

Ω · Jul 21, 2004, 11:22 PM

Have you looked at your Keyboard and Mouse pane in Systems Prefs?

This has the key repeat rate inside it.

K-Bat · Jul 21, 2004, 11:35 PM

Ok, this is really embarrassing. I have to buy my son an icec ream tomorrow.

I was using an old Microsoft USB mouse that was lying in my office during the day. The mouse tracking speed was slower than my regular mouse at home, so I changed the mouse speed in System Preference. Back home, I noticed that the mouse was moving too fast this time, so I changed the mouse speed back to the original setting....I thought. What I did instead: I changed the setting in the "key repeat rate," thinking that I was adjusting mouse speed.

Lesson learned: Stay away from MS stuff. (I'm kidding)

K-Bat · Jul 21, 2004, 11:36 PM

Thanks _?_. That was the culprit.

Ω · Jul 21, 2004, 11:38 PM

Make sure it is good ice-cream!! (and while you are at it, have one for yourself)

nuggetman · Jul 22, 2004, 08:11 AM

LOL

ALWAYS check system preferences that may be related before swapping memory around

ryju · Jul 22, 2004, 08:38 AM

That's pretty funny, you are quite the worry-wart.

danbrew · Jul 22, 2004, 11:01 AM

good thing you didn't smack him around, huh?

K-Bat · Jul 23, 2004, 01:09 AM

no, not for *this* kind of thing

danbrew · Jul 23, 2004, 09:14 AM

ah... what kinds of things *do* you smack him for?

K-Bat · Jul 23, 2004, 10:34 PM

When he tries to put a Pentium sticker on my PB. Isn't this obvious?

danbrew · Jul 24, 2004, 12:57 AM

yeah, i can understand that. it would be false advertising - we wouldn't want anybody to think that the PB was capable of providing the same performance as a pentium, huh?

snicker snicker snicker.

Ω · Jul 24, 2004, 06:43 AM

I hope you have your flame-retardant suit on

Ryan1524 · Jul 24, 2004, 09:50 AM

sure it can. it's faster than my P3 700.

danbrew · Jul 24, 2004, 12:31 PM

yeah, but a p3 700 is about three times as fast as a G3 with the same clock speed. come now, let's compare the latest and greatest. you just can't get me to believe that a 1.5 ghz G4 is faster than a P4 3.2 ghz. No way.

snicker snicker snicker.

Eriamjh · Jul 25, 2004, 06:00 PM

I would think you would give him a good "icec ream-ing" if he DID screw up your powerbook.