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#21
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
"Mayayana" wrote:
As VanguardLH indicated, it's almost certainly shutting off after a period of inactivity. When you access it, it then has to start up again. That's a good thing, unless you use that disk constantly. I don't use external hard disks, but I do use two internally and set them in the Power Options to shut off after 20 minutes of inactivity. That saves on wear and tear with the second disk, which I often don't use as much. Thanks, agreed. See also my other replies. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK |
#22
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
In article , Terry Pinnell
wrote: BTW, there seems no general consensus that sleeping is 'a good thing'. yes there is. Arguably it causes more wear than permanent spinning. it *reduces* wear and tear unless it's constantly spinning up and down all day long. the general rule of thumb is if it's not going to be used for a few hours, it should spin down. |
#23
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
On Mon, 07 Sep 2015 14:00:26 +0100, Terry Pinnell wrote:
[Delayed loading of *.jpg in IrfanView when /another/ HDD is in sleep mode] After that, for subsequent JPGs, it's back to normal - until hours later when it happens again. It's as if the WD unit goes to sleep and IV has to wake it up for some reason - even though the JPG is not on that drive. IMHO, this behavior has nothing to do with IrfanView, itself. When loading an image into IrfanView, the file cache of the OS gets involved. If the OS considers this operation worthwhile a reorganization of the current cache content (either because it has been the only significant file operation, which has been occurring in a while, or because a large portion of the cache gets involved), then it will validate its contents to their equivalents on disk. Since not only files but also directory structures are stored, such a checking/reorganization will trigger access to /any/ HDD (sleeping or not). You will probably not see similar behavior when starting a small text file via double-click from Explorer. But starting huge text files most likely will. As probably also will loading video files and the like... To make things worse, any file operation will also trigger your A/V program. As long as this one isn't satisfied with the whole content of any file involved in the cache reorganization process (i.e. any file currently in cache, the file you are up to load, the program, that is called to load the file [= IrfanView], the current directory with all its files for /any/ drive currently connected and maybe the root directory of any drive connected, as well) it will prevent any access to your *.jpg. Reading all those files will take a while, especially, when drives have to wake up. But you may also notice (somewhat shorter, but still) delays, when you try to load huge files in IrfanView after the cache had most recently been used by other programs for data, which +/- completely filled - or worse - exceeded the amount of cache available. You see similar unwanted behavior when you try to shut down Windows with at least one drive sleeping. Although no file is considered open on that drive and nothing needs to be written (provided, it is not the drive containing the OS itself), Windows starts the shut-down process by powering /up/ the sleeping drive(s)... :-( F-Up2: acf BeAr -- ================================================== ========================= = What do you mean with: "Perfection is always an illusion"? = ================================================== =============--(Oops!)=== |
#24
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
On 08 Sep 2015, Terry Pinnell wrote in
alt.comp.freewa Thanks, appreciate your thorough reply. Not sure all of it is entirely relevant though. Buy as per my reply to Bill W, I think you're right about the sleeping. However, as I said in that post, why should it be accessed at all? I see several options in Irfanview that might cause it to access folders that it had previously been in. Things such as "Start in last used folder". Check through the program options and experiment turning some that appear to be relevant off and on. |
#25
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
| I think you're right
| about the sleeping. However, as I said in that post, why should it be | accessed at all? | The behavior can vary. If I open Explorer on C it doesn't affect my other disk, but if I open Power Archiver it will wake up. Presumably PA is doing something to check all drives. Similarly, if you're waking up the disk you *are* accessing that may wake them all up. |
#26
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
Terry Pinnell wrote:
Buy as per my reply to Bill W, ... Bill? ... I think you're right about the sleeping. However, as I said in that post, why should it be accessed at all? You mean why is it getting accessed all the time (and you don't think it is going to sleep)? Or you mean why is it sleeping at all? Does not look like you are continually accessing the external HDD. That means it will eventually go to sleep either due to settings in your power scheme configured in Windows or due to the HDD's own firmware code making the device go to sleep. You can change the power options to not have drives go to sleep but that will not affect the firmware code inside the drive making it go to sleep. Did you try the keep-alive utilities that I mentioned (after making sure your power scheme does NOT spin down the drives after they have been idle for awhile)? BTW, there seems no general consensus that sleeping is 'a good thing'. Some will argue that there is less wear on the spindle along with reduced heat. However, the other side of the argument is that spin up generates a surge current to all components and the motor has to begin cranking at full torque for the heads to take flight. I don't bother to put my computer to sleep. I used to enable the "Turn off display" option at 1 or 2 hours but have long left it disabled. Way too many times something hung but a blank screen makes it impossible to see what was running (had windows) and if there was an error message. Besides, I like using the text screen saver to use my monitor as a big clock. Might as well as use it for something when the computer is idle. The "put computer to sleep" is disabled only because if there is a program that interferes with coming out of sleep than I'm screwed again with no screen to what windows were open and possible an error message. This is for my desktop where I couldn't give a gnat's fart about saving a few pennies per month on the cost of extra electricity. Because surge current and motor torque is far less an issue with HDDs for maybe a decade, I don't worry about having it spin cycling (well, as long as the cycle is an hour, or more). So in my power scheme under "Hard Disk - Turn off disk after", I set it for 4 hours. Many times I may leave the computer but then come back to it to do more stuff and I don't want the disk having to spin up every time I come back to the computer along with having to wait for the delay to spin up. I have several scheduled tasks that run during the night so the disk does not often spin down even then. Only when I'm off to work, on a trip, or otherwise away from home for awhile do the disks manage to get a long enough idle time to spin down. Arguably it causes more wear than permanent spinning. Hmm, I haven't seen any failure benchmarks for a l-o-n-g time to support always spinning is worse or better than spin cycling but then I'm talking about long spin cycles: hours, not minutes. I know a lot of folks are used to powering down the computers when they leave work but that's really the company worrying about the cost in extra electricity while the employees are gone considering they often leave on a ton of lights and the A/C may cut back but it's still on. It's really about not leaving any Windows sessions open. Having a sneaksie require to login is still a value security measure. That' why they push out domain policies to enforce use of a screen saver with the password lock enabled. So how employees are trained to handle their workstations taints how users handle their home PCs. What's good for a company doesn't necessarily apply to your personal use at home. Some external drives make a feature of that. That's typically for other reasons. Reduction of heat because a crappy enclosure was used. They want their customers to awe in the tiny size of a laptop drive sitting in a skin-tight case. They want it small for portability and because that's want customers like. Enclosures lots of case ventilation, heavy case metal (not plastic) to act as a heatsink, aluminum instead of steel for the case material (aluminum transfers heat faster), and even small fans to force air through the case don't need HDDs that spin down. I can put a WD black drive in a good case and have a backup job run for hours without the case becoming more than warm; however, because I knew I was putting a higher RPM disk in the case and that it would be constantly accessed meant getting a good case so the desktop disk inside an enclosure wouldn't get hotter than it does when sitting inside a desktop tower. Another problem with USB-attached drives is that they are often connected to computers with limited power. A desktop plugged into the wall outlet (with or without a UPS) is not as limited as a notebook running off a small battery and then having external devices suck their power off that same battery. For example, you can get gas-powered lawn mowers that are self-propelled but the battery-powered electric lawn mowers are not self-propelled. The load for cranking the wheels would so severely drain the battery that run time to cut the grass would be way too short. Need to save power when running off a battery. Mobile computers are only mobile when they are running off a battery but users still want to connect their USB drives to it. Not everyone with a laptop or notebook wants to tote around a spare charged battery. The one I've just ordered (as a precaution), a Seagate Expansion 2 TB, appears to be one such example. I also run my XP PC 24/7 except for holidays, partly for that same reason but also to allow for extensive nightly backups and defragging. I leave my home desktop PC running all the time. No sleep mode for the computer. I didn't buy the desktop so it could sleep. For me, the extra pennies per month for electricity are not an issue. For my notebook, I either shutdown (power off) which is most of the time or I go into standby if I know that I'll be frequently accessing it many times during the day; however, I don't connect anything to it, not even USB-attached drives (that's for when it is home on the A/C adapter to run a backup). Excluding why companies want you to power down their workstations, your own personal use should be your guide as to whether you want to power cycling your computer or devices and whether you bother employing low-power (standby) power modes. Just because they're available does not mandate you must use them. |
#27
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
On 9/8/2015 11:02 PM, VanguardLH wrote:
Terry Pinnell wrote: Buy as per my reply to Bill W, ... Bill? ... I think you're right about the sleeping. However, as I said in that post, why should it be accessed at all? You mean why is it getting accessed all the time (and you don't think it is going to sleep)? Or you mean why is it sleeping at all? Does not look like you are continually accessing the external HDD. That means it will eventually go to sleep either due to settings in your power scheme configured in Windows or due to the HDD's own firmware code making the device go to sleep. You can change the power options to not have drives go to sleep but that will not affect the firmware code inside the drive making it go to sleep. Did you try the keep-alive utilities that I mentioned (after making sure your power scheme does NOT spin down the drives after they have been idle for awhile)? BTW, there seems no general consensus that sleeping is 'a good thing'. Some will argue that there is less wear on the spindle along with reduced heat. However, the other side of the argument is that spin up generates a surge current to all components and the motor has to begin cranking at full torque for the heads to take flight. I don't bother to put my computer to sleep. I used to enable the "Turn off display" option at 1 or 2 hours but have long left it disabled. Way too many times something hung but a blank screen makes it impossible to see what was running (had windows) and if there was an error message. Besides, I like using the text screen saver to use my monitor as a big clock. Might as well as use it for something when the computer is idle. The "put computer to sleep" is disabled only because if there is a program that interferes with coming out of sleep than I'm screwed again with no screen to what windows were open and possible an error message. This is for my desktop where I couldn't give a gnat's fart about saving a few pennies per month on the cost of extra electricity. Because surge current and motor torque is far less an issue with HDDs for maybe a decade, I don't worry about having it spin cycling (well, as long as the cycle is an hour, or more). So in my power scheme under "Hard Disk - Turn off disk after", I set it for 4 hours. Many times I may leave the computer but then come back to it to do more stuff and I don't want the disk having to spin up every time I come back to the computer along with having to wait for the delay to spin up. I have several scheduled tasks that run during the night so the disk does not often spin down even then. Only when I'm off to work, on a trip, or otherwise away from home for awhile do the disks manage to get a long enough idle time to spin down. Arguably it causes more wear than permanent spinning. Hmm, I haven't seen any failure benchmarks for a l-o-n-g time to support always spinning is worse or better than spin cycling but then I'm talking about long spin cycles: hours, not minutes. I know a lot of folks are used to powering down the computers when they leave work but that's really the company worrying about the cost in extra electricity while the employees are gone considering they often leave on a ton of lights and the A/C may cut back but it's still on. It's really about not leaving any Windows sessions open. Having a sneaksie require to login is still a value security measure. That' why they push out domain policies to enforce use of a screen saver with the password lock enabled. So how employees are trained to handle their workstations taints how users handle their home PCs. What's good for a company doesn't necessarily apply to your personal use at home. Some external drives make a feature of that. That's typically for other reasons. Reduction of heat because a crappy enclosure was used. They want their customers to awe in the tiny size of a laptop drive sitting in a skin-tight case. They want it small for portability and because that's want customers like. Enclosures lots of case ventilation, heavy case metal (not plastic) to act as a heatsink, aluminum instead of steel for the case material (aluminum transfers heat faster), and even small fans to force air through the case don't need HDDs that spin down. I can put a WD black drive in a good case and have a backup job run for hours without the case becoming more than warm; however, because I knew I was putting a higher RPM disk in the case and that it would be constantly accessed meant getting a good case so the desktop disk inside an enclosure wouldn't get hotter than it does when sitting inside a desktop tower. Another problem with USB-attached drives is that they are often connected to computers with limited power. A desktop plugged into the wall outlet (with or without a UPS) is not as limited as a notebook running off a small battery and then having external devices suck their power off that same battery. For example, you can get gas-powered lawn mowers that are self-propelled but the battery-powered electric lawn mowers are not self-propelled. The load for cranking the wheels would so severely drain the battery that run time to cut the grass would be way too short. Need to save power when running off a battery. Mobile computers are only mobile when they are running off a battery but users still want to connect their USB drives to it. Not everyone with a laptop or notebook wants to tote around a spare charged battery. The one I've just ordered (as a precaution), a Seagate Expansion 2 TB, appears to be one such example. I also run my XP PC 24/7 except for holidays, partly for that same reason but also to allow for extensive nightly backups and defragging. I leave my home desktop PC running all the time. No sleep mode for the computer. I didn't buy the desktop so it could sleep. For me, the extra pennies per month for electricity are not an issue. I have three computers here doing different things. But the number of active computer hours per day is around 7 instead of 72. I figure that sleeping them saves me about $343 per year in electricity. Yes, in deep winter, the heat offsets the gas furnace and in deep summer, it costs 30% more for the air conditioner to carry it away, but the saving is still significant. Stated another way, I use about 16 kWh/day. Not sleeping the computers would add about 50% to that. Depending on how you value your time, there's another more significant benefit. If your computer is asleep, people who feel compelled to tell you about everything that happened them in the last 15 minutes have to waste someone else's time. For my notebook, I either shutdown (power off) which is most of the time or I go into standby if I know that I'll be frequently accessing it many times during the day; however, I don't connect anything to it, not even USB-attached drives (that's for when it is home on the A/C adapter to run a backup). Excluding why companies want you to power down their workstations, your own personal use should be your guide as to whether you want to power cycling your computer or devices and whether you bother employing low-power (standby) power modes. Just because they're available does not mandate you must use them. |
#28
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
nospam wrote:
In article , Terry Pinnell wrote: I'm almost sure it's something to do with its firmware putting it to sleep. (Or software. I recall I could not avoid it installing some unwanted stuff. This was a few years ago so I'm vague.) your observation is correct. it's spinning down when idle. Why does the WD drive get into the equation at all? As you've reminded some other posters (who seem to have missed that crucial point), the JPGs are not on this drive. where the jpeg is makes no difference. the app could be enumerating all drives because it doesn't know which photos you will be viewing or working with. it may also be a limitation of windows where any drive access causes all drives to spin up. Are you an actual user of the latest version of IrfanView (the 'app' under discussion)? I don't believe it "...doesn't know which photos you will be viewing...". It's the one I've d-clicked. As for "...or working with" I'm not sure what you mean? Like any program, IrfanView certainly can't predict what I'm going to do next. -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK |
#29
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
On 09/09/2015 08:44, Terry Pinnell wrote:
[] Are you an actual user of the latest version of IrfanView (the 'app' under discussion)? I don't believe it "...doesn't know which photos you will be viewing...". It's the one I've d-clicked. As for "...or working with" I'm not sure what you mean? Like any program, IrfanView certainly can't predict what I'm going to do next. Terry, If you take a look at the settings for IrfanView - they are in the file: i_view32.ini you'll see several saved paths and several saved file names. At least some of these may be scanned when the program starts. -- Cheers, David Web: http://www.satsignal.eu |
#30
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IrfanView: sometimes very slow loading
Bill W wrote:
On Tue, 08 Sep 2015 20:29:20 +0100, Terry Pinnell wrote: Bill W wrote: On Mon, 07 Sep 2015 14:00:26 +0100, Terry Pinnell wrote: This occurs usually at the start of a session or after a long gap. I double-click a JPG in Explorer and instead of loading with the usual speed that's one of IrfanView's impressive features, it takes 10-15 secs. During this time the LED flashes on one of my external WD hard drives. After that, for subsequent JPGs, it's back to normal - until hours later when it happens again. It's as if the WD unit goes to sleep and IV has to wake it up for some reason - even though the JPG is not on that drive. I'm using the latest version, 4.4.0 (32 bit) on an XP PC. Anyone seen anything similar or have any insight into the likely cause - and a suggested possible fix please? You're likely catching your computer when it's doing something else, and you had to wait for it to finish. That external drive was probably active before you clicked on the photo - just a coincidence. File indexing was always one of the big culprits with XP, but there's many other thing it could be doing. Thanks, but I don't really follow that. When the WD 2TB drive is active, its LED always flashes. The occasional very slow opening of a double-clicked JPG in IrfanView arises when the drive is not already flashing, i.e. not already active. I'm almost sure it's something to do with its firmware putting it to sleep. (Or software. I recall I could not avoid it installing some unwanted stuff. This was a few years ago so I'm vague.) The fact that this long delay only arises hours after the last JPG opening reinforces my opinion about the sleeping. When I open a JPG the WD flashes: 1. For 10-15 s (only after a long gap), before IV displays the JPG. 2. For 1 s or less, if another JPG is opened shortly after the above first attempt eventually succeeds. 3. Not at all. This is the state for a long period after the above. JPGs open immediately, with no apparent involvement of the WD HD. Which is what I would *always* expect. Why does the WD drive get into the equation at all? As you've reminded some other posters (who seem to have missed that crucial point), the JPGs are not on this drive. Disconnect it, and see what happens. What do you use it for? It's possible that IV is using it for something. And is this the only program that this sort of thing happens with? I have 3 external drives on one PC, and none of them wake up, or do anything, when I open any files of any sort, unless the files are on that drive, of course. Do you use backup software that is set to back up continuously, in real time as files change? If so, that might be the issue. After long inactivity on the PC, try opening any file with another app (not on that drive), and see if that drive acts the same way, whether it causes a delay or not. And I assume that there are file preferences in IV. Maybe you set something to use that drive. In fact, if you've disconnected and reconnected any drives, the drive letters might have changed, but I'd think you would have seen other problems related to that. (Drive letters could also change just from rebooting the PC, under some conditions.) Anyway, disconnect the drive, and then try to duplicate the problem. You might get an error message from some app that will lead you to the problem. Finally, as others have said, it's time to move on from XP, and that PC that uses it. I'm not saying it has anything to do with your problem, but you are going to end up with more and more issues as time passes. Thanks for the follow-up. I will try the disconnection suggestion. But the inconsistency of the behaviour is making isolation elusive. For example, I sat down at the PC a few minutes ago for the first time today . The LED of the 1 TB, 3.5", WD HD was steady, and had presumably been so for many hours. Stop watch in hand, I d-clicked an arbitrary JPG on C:, expecting to record 10-15 s before IV displayed it. It took maybe 1-2 s to start flashing and the image came up after a total of 4 s. Not 'normal', but much faster than the 10-15 s that prompted my post. Subsequent JPGs (and BMPs, also IV-associated) came up at normal high speed. BTW, the 2 TB, 3.5" WD unit standing next to the 1 TB showed no change in its light indicator, as usual. Both are on the same 8-port US bus. Re your backup suggestion: I use SecondCopy for many scheduled backups, including to K: (the drive under discussion). But no real-time stuff, and of course there is no imminent b/u to K: at the time I open the JPG. I also use PerfectDisk for intelligent de-fragging, but there too I see no likely issue. I had checked IV Preferences for possible culprits. Prompted by your post I just stepped through them again, but can't see any clear suspects. These two looked possibilities at first sight - Show "Recent files" in File menu (max. 15 most recently used files) - Show "Recent folders" in Open/Save dialog (max. 20 most recently used folders) but *at present* K: appears in neither of their lists. Of course, maybe they *did* at the time of the 10-15 s behaviour... I've been putting off the daunting task of upgrading OS and PC for at least 3 years. I have a very heavily customised system, riddled with tweaks and macros (Macro Express Pro). With occasional exceptions this PC (MESH 'Xtreme', 2008, Quad Core 2.66 GHz, 4 GB, 512 MB nVIDIA GeoForce 8800GT) is running sweetly. And performance is still acceptable, even for my video and DVD-making. Maybe when I see resounding praise for Win 10... -- Terry, East Grinstead, UK |
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