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OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 13, 2004, 06:11 PM

While I do for the most part like Safari, I have had the same problem with it over and over and it is driving me nuts.

As a side note, anyone know when the next upgrade/fix to Safari will be? I am really hoping that they resolve whatever this issue is - if you do a search, there are other posts about Safari using up too much CPU as well (for varied cases too).

When I first was using Safari (this is all v1.1.1 on Panther 10.3.2 on a new 1.25ghz Powerbook), I would open up new windows to go to multiple pages at the same time.

My day of computer usage for this laptop means I wake up, then I go to a discussion board very similar to this one (running vBulletin). I also go to Etrade. I also go to Stockwatch.com. Then I usually visit 3 blogs on and off, and I check Slashdot periodically throughout the day. Etrade and the discussion board get reloaded many times throughout the day, as does Stockwatch. The other stuff is all loaded once, read, and then something else is loaded or it is closed.

I was noticing that the pages were slowing down my machine - even though the pages were doing nothing at all - just web content.
Safari would frequently just freeze up and would need to be force quit.
I installed PithHelmet and use that to block ads - I had this problem far before installing that.

I thought maybe the animated icons on the chat board were part of it, so I disabled animated gifs (well, they run once) via PithHelmet.
Still had the freezes.

When I try to close out windows, especially the discussion board one, it will take a long time (well over 20 minutes) to close and during that time would take 100% CPU (or try - other processes would fight for it too).

I read that upgrading to the pre-release Java (1.4.2) would help out, so I tried that. While that did break some of my other apps, it didn't really help this problem.

I then tried using tabs in Safari instead of spawning new windows, and that actually helped a bit, but it just delayed the issue. Eventually it would still do it, just later in the day.

Today I tried to close the discussion board tab since it was taking far too long to load, and it took over 30 mins to close.

I ran Activity Monitor and it said that Safari was taking anywhere from 66-75% CPU.

Other apps that I also run, but never really show up on Activity Monitor (and this problem occurs even if I don't have any other apps running): Mail, iChat, iTunes (but not playing most of the time), Terminal, TextEdit, and Preview.

People have suggested that I need to delete the preferences - tried that, still have the problem.
I tried the various disk repair suggestions as well - still no help.

At this point, I am just really annoyed.

I have tried other browsers and in the end prefer Safari - but then I get aggravated with this issue - I wish Apple would just step up and resolve this.
Maybe once OmniWeb 5 comes out, that will be my new browser.

Mastrap · Jan 13, 2004, 06:16 PM

I don't think it's Apple, it does sound like there's something up with your system.

Love Calm Quiet · Jan 13, 2004, 06:24 PM

I found that Safari was slowing down over time and then started noticing that pages with FORMS were where it was really hurting. By going to preferences and UNchecking "Other forms" under AutoFill that my performance is again excellent.

PS: I'm not sure, but it seems that opening of new pages may actually have slowed since installing PithHelmet (although Safari does not seem less stable with PH installed as some have complained). Does PH impose some overhead as it does its blocking thing?

OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 13, 2004, 06:26 PM

I find it amusing that it would be my system.

I bought the Powerbook from Apple. They delivered it, and I booted it up and typed enough that it would let me put in CDs (registration stuff). I took out the Panther CDs, put those in, and installed it.

I downloaded the updates and started using it.

I had the problem starting that day.

I'm not exactly sure what would go wrong with a brand new install on a brand new machine.

Also, if there is something wrong with my system, why does a search on here turn up many complaints of Safari taking up the CPU?

OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 13, 2004, 06:32 PM

Originally posted by Love Calm Quiet:
I found that Safari was slowing down over time and then started noticing that pages with FORMS were where it was really hurting. By going to preferences and UNchecking "Other forms" under AutoFill that my performance is again excellent.

PS: I'm not sure, but it seems that opening of new pages may actually have slowed since installing PithHelmet (although Safari does not seem less stable with PH installed as some have complained). Does PH impose some overhead as it does its blocking thing?

I don't use any of the AutoFill stuff, so all of that is unchecked anyway.

I had the problem prior to even knowing that PithHelmet existed.

PH can run a css over the page and reshape it and I guess that can slow the loading of a page - but that means that it might take a second or fraction of a second.

When this slows - it will take over a minute to load and freeze the entire app with the spinning rainbow icon.

Sure, I can kill the process - but that means I lose all of the pages and sessions that I am in - which is very frustrating/annoying.

OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 13, 2004, 06:36 PM

On a side note, it seemed to be worse prior to the Java upgrade that I did - worse in the cases when pages had a Java applet in them.

If I was surfing, I knew eventually that the app was going to crap out. But if I hit a page that happened to have a Java applet on it, I could be assured that it was going to crap out on me and soon.

With the Java upgrade (1.4.2 - developer preview), it no longer craps out immediately like that and instead waits like it did prior to that for "normal" pages.

Cadaver · Jan 13, 2004, 10:53 PM

Silly question, but how much RAM do you have?
What does 'top' from the terminal report your pageouts to be after a while of typical use?

OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 13, 2004, 11:12 PM

Originally posted by Cadaver:
Silly question, but how much RAM do you have?
What does 'top' from the terminal report your pageouts to be after a while of typical use?

This is just the default new Alum Powerbook with the 1.25Ghz processor and the SuperDrive in it - 512MB RAM.

I had to kill Safari earlier so it is actually running fine now (it will be bad tomorrow by noon to 2:30pm or so - I will run top tomorrow to see (I know that when Safari is acting up, the uptime/w commands will show that more than 100% is being used (1.xx 1.xx .9x) where x is non-zero.

King Bob On The Cob · Jan 15, 2004, 12:41 AM

Safari has a small memory leak apparently, I wonder if it's fixed in the latest version?

Grrr · Jan 15, 2004, 05:08 AM

Some websites are simply crap. And they will use a lot of CPU for apparently little reason.
One site that springs to mind is... www.pcworld.co.uk
(they happen to sell mac stuff too)

On my 1ghz 12" pb, that site will cause the CPU to be almost completely maxed out. If I tried that same website on my old iBook 600, it pretty much crippled it.
A lot of gifs don't help the situation at all. But this definitely is not the main cause.

Love Calm Quiet · Jan 15, 2004, 07:04 AM

OMGWTFBBQ: Yes, you might want to install Memory Monitor (fast graphical indications RAM usage) and Menu Meters ( showing CPU usage) to see if specific web pages are the trigger and be alerted immediately whether you are having PageOuts.

Grrr... you're right about the nastiness of that pcworld.co.uk memory usage -- probably has to do with their dynamic ads (ones that PithHelmet doesn't block for me).

I notice a big chunk of CPU usage when I have the MacNN "Add a Reply" page open (like now while I type this). Is that just those little animated GIF examples? If so, that probably is what's going on with that pcworld.co.uk page -- the REALLY aggravating thing is that having the page in the background (or even having Safari HID) does NOT reduce CPU usage. Not something to encourage return to pages like that

Love Calm Quiet · Jan 15, 2004, 07:06 AM

In fact it just seems to make a few dynamic "Instant Smilies" to slow down a thread page.

*** Edit to remove dynamic smilies ***

Love Calm Quiet · Jan 15, 2004, 07:17 AM

In fact this raises a question whether Safari is strangely inefficient processing dynamic GIFs (if that's what those are). After I posted one of each of the dynamic smilies (rolleyes, etc.) in the previous post, viewing this thread in Safari caused Menu Meters total CPU usage (all apps) to go from about 10% to about 30%.

Try it yourself by looking at top in Terminal or watching Menu Meters after you've clicked on MacNN "Post Reply" and have all the example "Instant Smilies" dancing in the lower left corner of the screen (and maybe a dynamic ad at top of page). Isn't CPU being sucked up considerably?

Ooops! Correction to previous observation: although clicking on a different Safari window to obscure the dynamic-GIF page does NOT reduce CPU usage (nor does bringing another App to the front), HIDING Safari or moving to a different TAB in Safari window DOES cease the CPU-hogging.

Hope that identifies some possible strategies for Safari usability.

Grrr · Jan 15, 2004, 07:18 AM

Originally posted by Love Calm Quiet:

Grrr... you're right about the nastiness of that pcworld.co.uk memory usage -- probably has to do with their dynamic ads (ones that PithHelmet doesn't block for me).

I notice a big chunk of CPU usage when I have the MacNN "Add a Reply" page open (like now while I type this). Is that just those little animated GIF examples?

Yep, to a certain extent, this site does it too when replying to a message. And yes, cos of the smilies/gifs all bunched up in the bottom left corner.. As soon as you scroll them off the screen, or finish entering your reply, the cpu usage drops again. But it still isnt anything like as extreme as on that pcworld website. No idea what is going on there.. Some sites are actually significantly worse than the pcworld one.. And it takes me ages to even get rid of the site cos my Mac becomes so slow. Click, wait.. wait some more.. A minute or 2 later, the window finally closes and cpu levels drop to normal once more.
It's a Safari oddity..

suthercd · 06:38 PM

I've been able to relate this problem to pages with poorly written javascript embedded in pages. Turn off Jvavascript in Safari's Prefs and head to the porblematic sites.

Craig

OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 15, 2004, 04:01 PM

Sorry I didn't put this up earlier - got busy here (we are upgrading from Exchange 2K to 2K3).

With top up, Safari goes all over the place - it will spend a lot of time at 70%, and then down to 20%, and then back up along the way (which looks like where this capture snagged it).

Reloads of pages are always done via OpenApple-R and they are slow - but hard to say since we have a very slow connection here at work.
I have 6 tabs open right now.
One tab is this page of course.
Another tab is a static page on chaotic motion that has just text and links.
Another tab is another vBulletin site.
I have two blog pages open, one from TypePad and one from Livejournal.
And then I have Stockwatch.com open.

I have PithHelmet setup to stop animated gifs after one cycle, so on any page they aren't running until I scroll to that part of the page, then I get one cycle and then the stop.

Regardless of which tab I try to switch to up there, it will take well over 1 minute to switch tabs, and if I close one, it might take as long as 30 mins for it to close (it has taken longer before, and that is at the point when I force quit the app, which takes about 20 seconds in itself) - which means that I can't use Safari at all until it is done (color wheel spinner is all that I get). Ideally it is on a page that has some text so that I can read that during that time.
Those are the only pages I have been at continually all day - I have opened and closed new tabs briefly for Slashdot, ETrade, and a Bermuda newspaper page a few times.
None of these have any sort of fancy processor intensive java/flash things on them.
I can't speak for the quality of javascript on these pages - but I can't disable that entirely because I need it for some sites. I know that in IE on Windows, if you have javascript that is using too much processor time, you will get a pop-up telling you that and then it will ask if you want to cancel it. Not sure if Safari does that and too lazy to test it right now.

Whatever it is, I hope they fix it soon - oor I hope OmniWeb 5.0 comes out soon - I have 4.5 and I have been too much of a Sissy to switch over and I am hoping 5.0 will get me to do it (OW 4.5 doesn't quite match the experience of Safari that I like).

Code:
Processes:  59 total, 2 running, 57 sleeping... 163 threads            15:47:55
Load Avg:  0.79, 0.37, 0.26     CPU usage:  16.1% user, 48.4% sys, 35.5% idle
SharedLibs: num =  125, resident = 15.6M code, 1.15M data, 3.73M LinkEdit
MemRegions: num = 14641, resident =  369M + 3.46M private, 50.3M shared
PhysMem:  68.5M wired,  292M active,  146M inactive,  506M used, 5.43M free
VM: 4.75G + 90.6M   4394931(142) pageins, 4292048(51) pageouts

  PID COMMAND      %CPU   TIME   #TH #PRTS #MREGS RPRVT  RSHRD  RSIZE  VSIZE
 3477 top         17.5%  0:07.58   1    16    26   452K   416K   828K  27.1M 
 3466 bash         0.0%  0:00.04   1    12    18   176K   856K   816K  18.2M
 3465 login        0.0%  0:00.08   1    13    37   132K   408K   504K  26.9M
 3421 iChat        0.0%  0:23.10   5   202   200  1.30M  3.77M- 2.67M   161M
 3409 lookupd      0.0%  0:07.75   2    34    63   628K   832K   984K  28.5M 
 3379 Mail         0.0%  1:34.57   7   159   324  3.19M  2.69M- 4.99M   171M 
 3319 nmbd         0.0%  0:01.89   1    12    26   144K   580K   496K  27.8M
 3161 CalcEngine   0.0%  0:00.02   1    11    16     0K   304K    48K  17.7M
 3145 Safari      42.3%  2:39:12  18   559  2695   340M+ 22.1M-  132M- 1.01G 
 2668 bash         0.0%  0:00.35   1    12    20     0K   856K    48K  18.2M
 2667 login        0.0%  0:00.03   1    13    37     0K   408K    16K  26.9M
 2522 emacs        0.0%  1:10.87   1    12    32     0K   304K     8K  38.2M
 2464 CalcEngine   0.0%  0:00.06   1    11    16     0K   304K     8K  17.7M
 2463 Calculator   0.0%  0:16.21   5    69   157     0K  2.17M-  832K   142M
 2349 bash         0.0%  0:00.30   1    12    20     0K   856K     8K  18.2M
 2348 login        0.0%  0:00.06   1    13    37     0K   408K    16K  26.9M
 2347 Terminal     0.7% 11:33.84   5    72   207  2.93M  9.47M- 5.78M   151M 
 1635 SecurityAg   0.0%  0:01.58   1    54   106     0K  1.62M- 2.75M   137M
 1634 iChatAgent   0.0%  0:49.68   4    67    93   732K  1.34M  3.25M   102M
  853 tail         0.0%  0:00.01   1    11    15     0K   304K   180K  17.6M
  738 tail         0.0%  0:00.02   1    11    15     0K   304K   180K  17.6M
  630 TextEdit     0.0%  0:56.83   2   112   144     4K  2.99M- 5.89M   140M
  405 Preview      0.0%  0:12.15   1    64   147     0K  3.84M- 3.04M   150M
  402 Finder       0.0%  1:57.27   2   115   654   200K  4.10M-  592K   212M
  386 AppleSpell   0.0%  1:42.63   1    64    37   244K   824K  1.52M  36.3M
  350 automount    0.0%  0:00.17   2    25    27     0K   748K    24K  28.3M
  347 automount    0.0%  0:00.73   2    27    27   112K   748K   660K  28.3M
  342 rpc.lockd    0.0%  0:00.00   1     9    16     0K   304K   168K  17.7M
  333 nfsiod       0.0%  0:00.00   5    29    23     0K   304K   148K  19.6M
  327 xinetd       0.0%  0:00.21   1    13    20     0K   308K   264K  26.8M
  314 ntpd         0.0%  1:02.16   1    10    18    44K   392K   384K  17.9M
  268 cupsd        0.0%  0:45.33   1    11    25    28K   336K   340K  27.9M

Cadaver · Jan 15, 2004, 04:55 PM

Animated GIFs, including those here, do cause Safari to begin to use up CPU cycles on my 900MHz Blue & White G3, sometimes going above 90%. On my Dual 2.0 G5, on the other hand, I can't even detect any substatial increase in CPU usage (on either processor), even looking directly at a CPU cycle monitor.

awaspaas · Jan 16, 2004, 12:14 AM

Any minneapolis people here notice that startribune.com causes safari to hang for like 15 seconds before the page appears, with 100% cpu usage? The problem goes away if I delete startribune's cookies, but steadily gets worse again over time.

Mike Pither · Jan 16, 2004, 05:47 PM

Same here the smillies send my PB (1 gig ram) CPU meter upto 95/100%

Love Calm Quiet · Jan 16, 2004, 06:26 PM

Thanks to OMGWTFBBQ for the note about PithHelmet - I had not even looked at Safari prefs since installing it - and it's nice to see the option to let animated gifs play just once.
There's lots more cool options to PithHelmet than I had guessed.

Also interesting may be to try turning off javascript in Safari prefs for some really aggravating pages. As bad as some commercial pages get with the ads it might be useful to have a pref but in the top Safari bar to click Javascript on & off. (sign of the times

)

Love Calm Quiet · Jan 16, 2004, 06:31 PM

FWIW:
Using the outrageously cpu-sucking http://www.pcworld.co.uk as a test case, I tried turning off javascript and (after reloading their home page) cpu usage went from 90% to 5%.

Some online stores care as little about customer discomfort as some brick-n-mortar stores

EDIT:
Oh, but even something as minor as selecting a "thumbsdown" smilie in the Forum post process requires turning javascript back on.

Guess I'll leave it on and eschew http://www.pcworld.co.uk and their ilk.

Mike Pither · Jan 17, 2004, 07:15 PM

I have now noticed that while Safari seems to suffer worst on my computer it is not a lot better in either Omniweb or Explorer. Both have the cpu usage around 80/90 % on the smileys.

CIA · Jan 17, 2004, 08:58 PM

I run Safari in stock tab mode (pop ups blocked) and never notice a slowdown. Using the latest version and X.3.2, DP800 and 1.5GB ram. Start it up morning and load up about 10 sites in tabs. (love the autoload function) leave it open and reload all of 'em a few times over the course of the day.
Never had a glitch or slowdown.....

qnxde · Jan 18, 2004, 03:52 PM

https kills safari also, makes it VERY slow.

coolmacdude · Jan 18, 2004, 05:47 PM

4292048(51) pageouts

That's probably your problem. I don't think I've ever had > 4 million pageouts.

Pretty much all activity further activity you do is going to the swap file. Try restarting, but if you always have that many you might have to upgrade your RAM.

OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 28, 2004, 05:04 PM

I hope that I am not too hasty in posting this - but prior to the recent security update (which I installed last night), I was seeing 70% or more CPU usage by Safari and the RAM usage (this is in that menu bar tool that shows RAM and CPU, etc) was at U: 350MB and F: 150MB. (I know those don't add up to 512, but that was just a rough estimate of what it was usually at)

Safari was painfully slow and closing out of it took well over 10 minutes if I didn't force quit it from Activity Monitor.

After the security update, I am now seeing that my CPU usage is much lower - around 4-18% and the RAM is now U: 190MB and F: 322MB under the same conditions as before.

Pages close instantly and I have yet to try to close out of Safari after having it open for a few days.

It is also faster in general in Safari (now it is only limited to the speed at which the connection allows it to load).

If it matters, like I mentioned before, I updated to the preview release of Java to see if that would remedy the issue.
So I don't know if the security fix cures all, or if it is the combination of the two.

I am quite happy and will remain that way if this thing stays like this for several days now.

OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 28, 2004, 05:08 PM

Originally posted by coolmacdude:
4292048(51) pageouts

That's probably your problem. I don't think I've ever had > 4 million pageouts.

Pretty much all activity further activity you do is going to the swap file. Try restarting, but if you always have that many you might have to upgrade your RAM.

Incidentally that now reads (post update and reboot) as:

VM: 3.53G + 79.7M 31125(0) pageins, 85(0) pageouts

Now, this is still fairly soon after that update/restart, and there are slightly fewer programs open right now.

A better test will be at the end of this week or start of next week.

so far so good though - not sure what they fixed, but it is good for me.

RayK · Jan 29, 2004, 12:26 AM

My new 15" Al has been dreadfully slow compared to my old powerbook G4 in everything except editing in FCP 4. I have the same model as you with the Superdrive and I know my other powerbook has a bit more ram (256 more), but its still shouldn't be this much faster. It its an 867 for crying out loud. Maybe the L3 cache has something to do with it.... I know how you feel and If I wasn't still trying to make sure the top of my old powerbook didn't pop up anymore I'd have taken this one back, well, I do like the Superdrive... Good luck man! Hope someone can fix the problem! Also, a program I found to tune things... um Panther Cache Cleaner from Versiontracker. I just ran all the things on the first tab. It made my system a bit faster. Hope that helps!

OMGWTFBBQ · Jan 29, 2004, 08:36 AM

This morning, after having played iTunes (ripped a CD and then randomly played songs off of a playlist) for a few hours last night - which I guess I hadn't had on since the restart - the RAM is now sitting at 334/178, which is very similar to what it did in the past.

iTunes is closed, when it was first opened, that was when that RAM was grabbed, then when quite it doesn't look like it released it?

The pageouts line from top now reads:

VM: 4.02G + 79.7M 65323(0) pageins, 38717(0) pageouts

I had Excel open and just quit out of that and it looks like that brought the RAM down to 291/221

Pages from Safari are still behaving well and it can close a page in under 10 seconds, so hopefully it will stay this way.

It looks as if it could be Excel or iTunes or some combination thereon that causes this.

Graymalkin · Jan 29, 2004, 08:50 AM

Javascript and Flash ads are definite Safari killers. As is the auto-fill forms and active spell check. I keep Javascript, Flash, and Java disabled because I can't stand the crap people use them for on web pages. I don't want things to fly across my screen or do a backflip when my cursor rolls over them. I also don't want small control-less windows popping up when I click links. Javascript has to be the most abused web technology to date. Luckily a good portion of the sites I frequent don't absolutely require Javascript or Flash to work properly.

Safari has been acting up on my girlfriend's Lombard. I tracked it down to auto-fill "Other" forms and the active spell check. Once I got her to remember ?; to check spelling she didn't have any problems. I'm really hoping the next Safari update fixes these problems, if not OmniWeb is going to find itself with a much larger user base.

Xeo · Jan 29, 2004, 11:16 AM

Originally posted by OMGWTFBBQ:
VM: 4.02G + 79.7M 65323(0) pageins, 38717(0) pageouts

My uptime is 1 day and 5 hours. Here are my pageins and pagouts:
45263(1) pageins, 948(0) pageouts

Depending on how fast your pageouts grow, you could be due for some additional RAM. I am maxed in my iBook so this is as good as it gets for me. But you could definitely go higher being at only 512. I'd get another 512 if I were in your shoes.

rambo47 · Jan 29, 2004, 02:17 PM

While this is certainly no fix for Safari, which I love, I just installed Mozilla Firebird. All I can say is HOLY SIHT! This thing is like greased lightening, plus it does tabs like Safari (Netscape Navigator does them as well but it sucks ass). This browser could easily become my default choice unless some problem crops up. Oh yeah, I'm lovin' the Moz!

brutal · Jan 30, 2004, 07:39 AM

Originally posted by rambo47:
While this is certainly no fix for Safari, which I love, I just installed Mozilla Firebird. All I can say is HOLY SIHT! This thing is like greased lightening, plus it does tabs like Safari (Netscape Navigator does them as well but it sucks ass). This browser could easily become my default choice unless some problem crops up. Oh yeah, I'm lovin' the Moz!

I would use it too if it used native widgets..

Anderton · Jan 30, 2004, 09:12 PM

Originally posted by rambo47:
While this is certainly no fix for Safari, which I love, I just installed Mozilla Firebird. All I can say is HOLY SIHT! This thing is like greased lightening, plus it does tabs like Safari (Netscape Navigator does them as well but it sucks ass). This browser could easily become my default choice unless some problem crops up. Oh yeah, I'm lovin' the Moz!

Welcome to the beautiful future of Mozilla Firebird - The browser for power users.

And of course nowadays my default browser.

Well, on my sys Safari runs very slow when having more than 5 tabs at once. It becomes slow in response when clicking on links, and i must wait(!) to a page to load before i can click anything on the page. Just like in the pre OS X days..

Moonray · Feb 1, 2004, 04:34 PM

There's nothing to wonder when people open 100 web pages, many of them with animations, javascript and whatever crap that a browser has a CPU usage of some percent. That's what CPUs are supposed to do, work on all this stuff.

-

OMGWTFBBQ · Feb 1, 2004, 05:11 PM

Safari is pretty good about not processing things that aren't seen. When you scroll down the page, then it processes the animations. Things that are in other tabs are ignored until they are viewed.

My issue seems to actually be less of the CPU of Safari, but the problem is that even though there are 158MB of free RAM that show up on my monitor, it is still paging in and out so much that it is having an effect on performance.

Perhaps it is no matter since MacRumors has a note up saying that OS 10.3.3 and Safari 1.2 updates have been released to developers, which means soon enough they will be out to us in the unwashed masses.
One of the issues addressed according to that is "performance issues" - sounds good to me.