GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 551275
Rhythmbox search very slow - 100% CPU
Last modified: 2008-09-15 21:32:45 UTC
Please describe the problem: Using the search dialog in Rhythmbox results in very slow response (sometimes complete hang), and 100% CPU utilisation. I have approx 9000 tracks (60GB) of mp3 registered. The problem is the same whether you search by All, Artists or Albums. I am using Hardy (8.04) fully patched to latest level. Steps to reproduce: 1. Open Rhythmbox 2. Register several thousand mp3's 3. Use the search dialog to find a track Actual results: Rhythmbox takes between 30s to many minutes to return from search. During this time it unresponsive, although will continue to play a track, generally without drops. Expected results: Search returns much faster. Does this happen every time? Yes. Other information: Machine is Sempron 3000+, 2GB RAM, generally runs at a decent speed.
Of course it uses 100% cpu. You expect it to use less and take longer? It takes about a second to search 15000+ tracks here on a comparable system.
I'm experiencing this slowness when I have the virtual keyboard Florence (http://florence.sourceforge.net) running. Rhythmbox appears to be the only application affected by it (so far). I need the virtual keyboard because this is in a car PC, and Rhythmbox is the music player I'd like to use.
Accessibility apps make rhythmbox's track lists much slower. I don't think anyone has really looked into this much. See bug 419383. Russell, do you have any accessibility apps running?
I do not think I have any accessibility apps running. It is a pretty standard install of Hardy. Can you explain how I check? My machine takes 30s+ to search just under 9000 tracks, so it is way slower than your benchmark quoted. As you mention the 100% CPU usage is not an issue- it's the response time. It didn't do this by the way, on earlier Ubuntu versions.
P.S. I mention the 100% CPU so you know that the program is actively doing something, not hung in a wait state. Cheers, Russ.
I have a little more info for my setup. First off, this is a standard install of Ubuntu 8.04. The slowness I'm seeing is only for the first character typed into the search box (~30+ secs) when the Accessibility feature is turned on. Additional characters don't have the delay. If I clear the box and type a single character, I see the delay again. I'm working around this by turning off the Accessibility feature and using xvkbd for my virtual keyboard.
(In reply to comment #4) > I do not think I have any accessibility apps running. It is a pretty standard > install of Hardy. Can you explain how I check? I'm not sure if there's an easy way to check this exactly, but disabling assistive technologies (under system->preferences->assistive technologies) is enough to see if that's the issue. Of course, if you already have assistive technologies disabled, that's obviously not the cause.
Jonathan- that's solved the problem! Nice and speedy again now. I went to the dialog you suggested and disabled the "enable assistive technologies" checkbox, logged out and back in and the search speed is now in line with the benchmarks you stated. Curious now as to why that caused the problem in the first place? Is this an Ubuntu issue that I need to go back and report? Thanks, Russ.
There's some interaction between the rhythmbox track list widget (or the model backing it) and the accessibility interfaces that seems to be unusually slow. I don't think anyone has really looked into it much. *** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 419383 ***