pooter question
 

so... I'm liking my mac but....

Video playback sucks. Especially youtube. Even if I let it completely "buffer" the video is notchy and not fluid.

Is this just a function of my internet speed? I get only 1.48mbps when I speed test.

Or is it a hardware or software problem?:neutral:

I hate seeing youtube links on reddit and not being able to watch them.

I'm no expert, but if the video is completely buffered/loaded it may be something with your computer, possibly your browser and or version of Adobe Flash Player. Should just be a software problem, can't see it being a hardware problem unless you have a 15 year old computer.

What browser are you using? You may want to go to http://www.adobe.com/support/flashplayer/downloads.html and get the newest version of Adobe Flash Player.

It's a mac. Whatever browser apple uses. Opera..

I think you may have hit the nail on the head. When I click vids on facebook it tells me to update adobe. So I follow the prompts and it tells me powerpc processors cannot get the update, to use an archived version. I follow the prompts to get an archived version and nothing happens. I hate not understanding computers.

Did you go to the link I posted? It takes you to Adobe's update site and it should find the correct version and all you should have to do is install it. If that doesn't work, you could try installing a new web browser. I'd recommend Google Chrome, but it's only for PC, so I'd suggest Firefox which can be found here: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/

I'd try to update Adobe Flash first though, much easier/quicker fix.

I followed the link, it tells me it is not available for powerpc processors. That leads me to believe a different browser won't fix it.

Ahh so it isn't compatible with your processor? That's odd.
I looked it up and yeah, unfortunately Adobe stopped supporting Power PC processors (older macs) in 2010. So I guess you're stuck with bad video playback, I'm sorry. :(

well crap. Thanks for checking into it.

That sucks.
 

Well that sucks Harold. I think for your birthday someone should help you trade up on your Macbook so you can overcome this problem. All three of our kids were issued new Macbooks for school when we arrived here two weeks ago. They all use firefox and they love the new Macs. Unfortunately for us the boys are moving up to the high school level next year and we are required to purcahse brand new Macbook Pros for both of them. It is manditory or they have to go to school elsewhere. Our 15 year old turned us on to a website where you can purchase used Macbook Pros for reasonable pricing. They start at around $700. We loaded them up with more RAMM and a few other goodies to help them grow through the year and even if you load them up with a three year warranty, insurance, and require a new battery be installed they come out to about $1200. The site is Gainsaver.com. I do hope there is some way for you to overcome this whimpy laptop problem. Try writing to a local college for assitance for higher learning. Maybe they will have a grant system in place to help a person like yourself with special challenges. Good luck with that young man.

My older mac book has the same problems. Glad to have a reason behind it now.

My new Imac does wonders.

I do not like Firefox for the Mac, it lags in some areas, I still prefer the good old Safari since it seems to work the best for what I do.

Chrome FTW! :smile:

x2

all other browsers:whip:chrome

A little off-topic here, but has anyone tried IE9 yet? I am using the release candidate at work and it is better than IE8, but still not there yet. It's funny, but it looks and acts a lot more like chrome now. It is faster and does allow your GPU to do some of the work for Flash and stuff. So, IE9 is better, but still not as good as Chrome IMO. Of course, this has nothing to do with Mac since IE stopped supporting Mac as of IE5 or something.

Harold, since your mac is obviously long in the tooth, and probably can't/don't want to buy a brand new mac, have you thought about maybe getting a PC that is ~1-2 years old (but still far newer than your mac) and installing Linux on it (I personally like Kubuntu)? The PC would be pretty cheap and the OS is free. If all you're going is internet stuff, that'll work fine. And it comes with OpenOffice so you can still open documents. The only downside to Linux I've found is gaming support (unless you have decent hardware and want to virtualize windows) and Netflix (if you use it) doesn't work yet.

Really???
 

Really??? Ah BS lets just get him an old Selectric typewriter and put some kind of one way radio system on it. We can even give him a new handle like the truckers did in the 70's. "Muff Diver on Wheels" or something like that.

I can't believe there isn't some sort of patch or fix for this?

The problem is that the processor is not an Intel or AMD and has very little support now, since programmers would have to write and compile their programs specifically for those PowerPC CPUs, which aren't being sold anymore. And there is no way to replace it with an Intel CPU since the architecture and sockets are different.

Since adobe flash player has become so large and complex, it would take a lot of effort to rewrite it for a PowerPC processor, so it is highly unlikely that anyone has taken the time to do it. And flash player is updated so often that you would just be out of date in a few months again.

What you might try doing is downloading the video from youtube (put 'link' in front of the URL (but after the www.) so http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opRg7OHufxQ would become http://www.linkyoutube.com/watch?v=opRg7OHufxQ and that should let you download it, tho I'm not completely sure on a PowerPC) and then play the video with VLC media player or something. It's a lot of work, but it should smooth things out.

Good luck!
Brijar