Is it me or is Google Chrome slow in Ubuntu

[abhiroopb]

I use Chrome at home on my laptop on Ubuntu 9.10 (specs in my signature).

At work I also use Chrome on a desktop with the following specs:

2.6 Ghz Core Duo, 2GB RAM.

Obviously the processor at work is MUCH faster. However, at home whenever I open more than 5-6 tabs the browser slows down a LOT. Happens with firefox as well.

Is this a settings issue or is it merely because of the slow CPU?

[SymphonicNerd]

Im not the authority on this by any means, but it seems that if it only happens when you have 5-6 tabs open and in firefox or chrome then I would have to imagine its processor speed. On an old dell desktop I had a similar problem and i solved it by opening different instances of firefox and limiting each one to 2 tabs, so try fiddling. But i imagine that your problem lies with your hardware and not your software

[abhiroopb]

Thanks, and you don't think it may be OS related? I guess I could check out how Chrome works on Windows on my laptop.

methinks it's time to upgrade!

[lovinglinux]

I don't think it is your processor speed. I had a Pentium 4 single core that could do better than that.

Nevertheless, since the problem can be replicated on both Firefox and Chromium, it suggests it's a system issue. It could be a hardware problem too, but your processor is fast enough to deal with five browser tabs.

[abhiroopb]

To be honest I haven't used firefox for a while so I'm not totally sure whether it is exactly the same.

In Chrome if I go into google reader, and start opening new tabs with feeds after about 5 tabs google reader becomes unresponsive and I have to wait a bit before I can continue opening tabs.

I can also hear my computer making a lot of noise.

My laptop is about 3.5 years old, so I'm not expect anything magical. But, it's great at work where I can open up 20 tabs without any problem at all.

Any ideas on what system issues it could be? Naturally if it's hardware not much I can do, but, anything Ubuntu 9.10 specific?

[lovinglinux]

To be honest I haven't used firefox for a while so I'm not totally sure whether it is exactly the same.

In Chrome if I go into google reader, and start opening new tabs with feeds after about 5 tabs google reader becomes unresponsive and I have to wait a bit before I can continue opening tabs.

I can also hear my computer making a lot of noise.

My laptop is about 3.5 years old, so I'm not expect anything magical. But, it's great at work where I can open up 20 tabs without any problem at all.

Any ideas on what system issues it could be? Naturally if it's hardware not much I can do, but, anything Ubuntu 9.10 specific?

Does it happen with any site? Some sites have some weird javascript code that causes high CPU usage. It could also be flash content.

[Soul-Sing]

I can also hear my computer making a lot of noise.

cpu isn't noisy, maybe it is your harddisk....

[ikt]

cpu isn't noisy, maybe it is your harddisk....

Indeed, very rarely do I have less than 10 tabs open and chrome is extremely quick, so it does seem to be a hard drive issue.

[abhiroopb]

Very good chance it is the HD actually.

Actually it happened just now.

I went into google reader, opened up about ten tabs in one go and the HD started spinning really fast and made a lot of noise. Then suddenly I got this message on the NEWLY opened tabs:

Aw Snap!
Something went wrong while displaying this webpage. To Continue, press Reload or go to another page.

This seems to happen quite a bit in Chrome when I try and launch a number of tabs.

Could it be the HD? Or something on the page itself that's messing it up?

Thanks!

[311005901]

I use Chrome at home on my laptop on Ubuntu 9.10 (specs in my signature).

At work I also use Chrome on a desktop with the following specs:

2.6 Ghz Core Duo, 2GB RAM.

Obviously the processor at work is MUCH faster. However, at home whenever I open more than 5-6 tabs the browser slows down a LOT. Happens with firefox as well.

Is this a settings issue or is it merely because of the slow CPU?

Your problem may simply be with flash. Have you tried disabling it?