Bad image quality in Firefox & Safari

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Level 1

5 points

Bad image quality in Firefox & Safari

At some point today Firefox decided to degrade the quality of every picture. They looked compressed, blocky and seemed to be in thousands-of-colours-mode. I reinstalled Firefox, repaired my permisions, restarted, cheched that my iMac is actually on millions of colours which it was but with no change to the picture quality. The Apple site looks the worst: all the buttons at the top of the page which should have a gradient now are just made of two colours. And a thumbnail of a Power Mac G5 had a wedge missing!

I later deleted Firefox and its library support folder and used Safari. Exact same problem.

Reinstalling OS X doesn't solve the problem. On further inspection it all the computers on my network are affected. It might therefore be a router problem. Coincidentally at the same time QuickTime stopped being able to play video streams and tells me that it timed out error -5408 thus proving it is probably either a router or network preferences problem.

If you can help please do.

iMac G5, Mac OS X (10.4.7), 1.5GB of RAM

Posted on Aug 8, 2006 7:48 AM

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Answer 1

iBod

Level 7

29,351 points

Aug 8, 2006 12:05 PM in response to Geza Vermes

Hi,

Are you using a dial-up accelerator program to speed up your internet connection? These often have preferences for degrading the quality of your images for the benefit of improving downloading speed. They often configure a special proxy to route these requests through which may be why your QuickTime is now timing out.

Check your Network preferences to see if any new proxies have been added and if you have such an accelerator program, check it's preferences for the level of image compression being performed.

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Answer 2

Geza Vermes Author

Level 1

5 points

Aug 8, 2006 2:52 PM in response to iBod

Unfortunately none of the proxies are active. I have broadband so I have DSL or ADSL (I dont know the difference). I am almost certain that I dont have a download manager/accelerator.

Do you know anything about routers? If its not a network problem then I don't know.

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Answer 3

iBod

Level 7

29,351 points

Aug 8, 2006 11:33 PM in response to Geza Vermes

Hi,

One quick test you can do to help narrow down things is to try Safari/Firefox in another user account.

This will help us to know whether your problem is local to your account or system wide. If you don't have another account you can use System Preferences -> Accounts -> [+] to create a test one (and [-] to remove it if needed)

Who is your ISP also?

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Answer 4

Geza Vermes Author

Level 1

5 points

Aug 9, 2006 3:03 AM in response to iBod

Nope, its the same in another account. My ISP is BT (British Telecoms)
I found someone else in the Safari forum who had a similar problem: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=983188&#983188

iBod you also helped them. Do you know how I could contact LOOP LIGHT apart from posting in a topic/string of his.

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Answer 5

iBod

Level 7

29,351 points

Aug 9, 2006 9:59 AM in response to Geza Vermes

Hi,

There's no way to contact loop light other than replying to their thread and hoping they check discussions from time to time.

Are you able to hook your Mac upto a dial-up connection as a test? There are several free ISPs that only charge a local rate phone call - if that loads good quality images we know the problem is not your Mac.

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Answer 6

l.e.o

Level 1

0 points

Aug 9, 2006 10:44 AM in response to iBod

I'm also on BT broadband, and am having exactly the same problem.

Suggests to me that it's something happening on their servers that's causing it, but I'm hardly an expert.

iBook G4 800 Mac OS X (10.4.6)

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Answer 7

Eme

Level 5

5,636 points

Aug 9, 2006 12:24 PM in response to Geza Vermes

Hello ~ a few of thoughts here, to add to all of iBod's ; ) excellent advice regarding trying dial up, my ISP gives me 20 hours free, along with the ADSL .
•----------------•
Perhaps these links below apply or can help you ?

BT Voyager modem

Do you use this modem, which router do you use ?

•--------------------------------•
This may also apply->from a google search on BT ISP
http://www.boffgroup.com/index.php?id=45

"The Solution: Manually change your Network settings
"Go to System Preferences and select...
Network > Configure... > Ethernet > Configure: Manually (Advanced)
...and enter 1458 as the MTU

The Reason: BT have changed their infrastructure
Since most ISPs in the UK are customers of BT Wholesale, this potentially affects most people."
~•~

I have broadband so I have DSL or ADSL (I dont know the difference).

BT

How it works

There is a difference, For me a phone call on the same line will knock my service off [ disconnect ] the 2 wireless machine. The filters seem to degrade and do not work. The ethernet connection on the flat panel however remains unaffected.

Support

Knowledge base

Do you use BT Yahoo? or Total Broadband

I think it is your ISP, some support from them would probably be helpful .
I would call them 😟 not fun ) see what they have to say.

Eme

edited by: Eme~

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Answer 8

Geza Vermes Author

Level 1

5 points

Aug 9, 2006 3:25 PM in response to Eme

BT Voyager modem
Do you use this modem, which router do you use

No longer, it did not have enough ethernet ports. I now have the DSL-G604T for DLinks.

Thank you, you solved it instantly with the MTU change (I assume it means maximum transfer unit). I had talked to Dlinks they told me the same thing but they told me to try 1454 first then go up in increments of ten! Don't know how to say thank you enough. By the way, I can now watch the key not and other streams no problems 🙂.
Thank you very much Eme. And thanks for the help iBod.

So...
--- BT CUSTOMERS AFFECTED BY POOR BROWSER IMAGE QUALITY SWITCH TO AN MTU (PACKET SIZE) OF 1458, READ ABOVE---

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Answer 9

l.e.o

Level 1

0 points

Aug 10, 2006 9:46 AM in response to Geza Vermes

This MTU thing sounds great, but I use airport to connect to the internet.

I can't see any similar option in the airport section - any suggestions?

Thanks

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Answer 10

Geza Vermes Author

Level 1

5 points

Aug 11, 2006 5:15 AM in response to l.e.o

I don't have an Apple Airport base station but my ADSL router does have a wireless connection which works with my iMac's airport card and a few years ago I did have an airport extreme base station. I can change the routers wireless MTU without much difficulty. So I am pretty sure that you could change the MTU of your base station.

I would post this question in a more appropriate forum. But try poking about the airport base stations configuration software first and try looking in all the preferences or option windows for your particular network. Also look in the airport base stations help window and search for MTU or maximum packet size.

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Answer 11

Aug 13, 2006 6:11 AM in response to Geza Vermes

You know, I nearly posted that I could kiss you as..

I too am suffering from this problem, it suddenly started on friday, I too am a bt broadband user, and it is affecting both macs on my network.

Only problem is... when I went to check the MTU it was already set to 1458 😟

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Answer 12

Eme

Level 5

5,636 points

Aug 13, 2006 8:55 AM in response to rootofsilence

Hello rootofsilence, Welcome To Apple Discussion

Only problem is... when I went to check the MTU it was already set to 1458 😟

Shows all problems have a different root / cause: )

Post your own topic here in Safari is the only problem.
What & how is your network set up. Do you use a router firewall, accelerator..
when it started, as many details about the issue and what steps you have taken to troubleshoot etc...

Eme ;~[)

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