Safari stuttering

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Level 1

12 points

Safari stuttering

Hi everyone,

In the last couple days I've been noticing something wrong with Safari (I'm running all the latest software versions both for Safari and OSX). It keeps stuttering with almost any task, whether its watching a YouTube movie, scrolling a page or simply writing these lines. It kind of freezes for a second every 3 seconds or so, just as if its processing something.
I started noticing it while watching YouTube videos. Video would freeze for a bit every now and then, but not audio. Then I started noticing it would behave the same way when scrolling web pages, and it became quite annoying just trying to type a few words...
I already emptied Safari's cache, but that's as far as my "geeknowlege" goes, so any help is very welcome.

Thanks a lot!

iMac Intel Core Duo, Mac OS X (10.6.3), 1,83GHz; 2GB RAM

Posted on Apr 21, 2010 3:24 AM

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Answer 1

Apr 21, 2010 3:37 AM in response to anamorphis

HI,

I started noticing it while watching YouTube videos. Video would freeze for a bit every now and then

Uninstall then reinstall the latest version of the Flash Player plugin which is required to stream video content on YouTube.

Uninstall Flash

Install Flash

Adobe Flash prefers running in 32-bit mode instead of 64. Right or control click the Safari icon in the Applications folder, then click: Get Info In the Get Info window click the black disclosure triangle next to General so it faces down. Select 32 bit mode. Also, (in that same window) make sure Safari is NOT running in Rosetta.

Then repair disk permissions...

Quit any open applications/programs. Launch Disk Utility. (Applications/Utilities) Select MacintoshHD in the panel on the left, select the FirstAid tab. Click: Repair Disk Permissions. When it's finished from the Menu Bar, Quit Disk Utility and restart your Mac. If you see a long list of "messages" in the permissions window, it's ok. That can be ignored. As long as you see, "Permissions Repair Complete" when it's finished... you're done. Quit Disk Utility and *restart your Mac.*

Carolyn 🙂

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Answer 2

Steve M.

Level 5

4,758 points

Apr 21, 2010 9:43 AM in response to Carolyn Samit

I was going to post a similar question but I noticed this thread. I'm getting occasional beachballing in up to date Safari when I have several tabs open. I have pop ups blocked but I have not done anything to block Flash (I think you can only do that in Firefox?). Sometimes emptying Safari's cache helps but sometimes the slowdown and beachballing is so bad I have to just quit and restart Safari, then it's fine again.

I remember in the past we talked of "memory leaks" with Safari and things such as that. Now we always blame Flash. I agree that Flash can be a problem but do you think it is usually the cause of problems such as these? Do you think we should all run Safari in 32 bit mode (just for Flash's benefit) to prevent these slowdowns? I checked and I don't have either the 32 bit box or the Rosetta box checked when I get info on Safari. Do we give up anything (other than slowdowns presumably) by running Safari in 32 bit mode?

Appreciate the insight. Thanks.

Steve M.

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