Constraints of i5-3320M for playing 1080p60 on Linux
Constraints of i5-3320M for playing 1080p60 on Linux
Attempting to watch Twitch or YouTube in 1080p60 with Firefox or Chromium on your Ubuntu ThinkPad feels like pushing too hard on a powerful i5-3320M with 16GB RAM. The four cores seem maxed out, which could point to driver problems, hardware encoding issues, or simply the CPU’s limits with its built-in GPU. Lowering the resolution to 720p60 eases the load while still providing smooth performance, though it may reduce quality. Your sensor data shows temperatures are moderate but not extreme, suggesting the system is handling heat well. If you need more details, feel free to share.
The package manager in Ubuntu includes various firmware packages that might not be present on your system. Most of these are available in the free repository, though some non-free versions could be missing. Try locating them, verify their installation status (and install if needed), and observe any changes. Useful logs can be found in dmesg and top tools. Running sudo top followed by 'q' will display the final 20 lines of the dmesg log. Keep in mind this method doesn't apply to top.
Video speedup challenges persist due to evolving codecs. Modern GPUs support built-in decoding, but older models lack compatibility. YouTube adopted VP9, which requires Kaby Lake Apollo Lake iGPUs or newer for hardware processing. This forces CPU-only decoding, causing stutter and high load. A browser extension named h264ify can revert videos to H.264, which works on most systems. Check your extension store for Chrome and Firefox options. Codec details are available via YouTube video stats. Updated June 5, 2020 by redteam4ever – clarity with corrections.
Top result for 1080p60 scenario
Total tasks: 387, 5 running, 300 sleeping, no stops, 3 zombies detected
CPU usage: 48.2% usage, 37.2% memory, 0% network, idle time 12.4 seconds
RAM available: 12,4 GB, free: 1,111,824 MB
Storage: 16,198,064 KB free, 6,783,752 KB used, 65,412 used
Available memory: 7,998,064 KB
Swap space: 16,494,588 KB total, 16,291,776 free, 64,512 used
GPU utilization: 20.6% CPU, 3.7% memory, 49.4% time
Processes: 49 tasks running, 11 processes waiting
Memory consumption: 49,000 MB, 30 minutes runtime
Disk usage: 15.3 MB, 2.1 MB free, 759 KB used
Kernel stats: 43.33 seconds, 7.23% CPU, 49.4% memory
Software: Xorg, compiz, snapd, gnome-system-mo, Discord, unity, web content
User activity: 2,000 commands executed, 1,500 per second
Network: 15.3 KB/s download, 2.1 KB/s upload
GPU performance: 20325 frames per second
Firefox: 20.0 MB used, 30.54 MB per second
PulseAudio: 32.7 KB/s
WebExtensions: 3,000 enabled, 300,0628 total
SignalDesktop: 2.9 MB, 1.7 MB per second
Spotify: 0.6 MB used, 0.03 MB/s
DMCrypt_write: 30,686 bytes written
Overall performance remains stable with minimal resource spikes
Thank you for the clarification on the codecs—your explanation is clear and makes sense. The h264ify addon helps but isn’t sufficient alone; it seems the CPU load limits smooth playback. I’m exploring non-free driver alternatives now. Regarding the "kidle_inj" process and the dmesg messages about idle injection, I’d like to understand more about that.
It looks like the issue is connected to temperature. I’ll work on enhancing the cooling for the closed laptop in the docking station, which seems to be hindering the fan’s exhaust. I’ll follow up soon.
They connect in some way. I don’t know their origin, sorry. (kidle_inj should be read as k-idle-inject, meaning the kernel gets a piece of code that does nothing except consuming time. There are methods to track this, like strace, and you can check the man pages on how it functions)
It appears removing the ThinkPad X230 from its docking station helps reduce temperatures by about 10°C and stops the idle injection control from activating. This allows most CPU resources to focus on video processing, keeping 1080p60 playback smooth. No need to upgrade yet. Your advice about running as root and checking dmesg was useful—I hadn’t found proof before. If problems persist, I’ll rely on the plugins suggested by @redteam4ever. Thanks!
I've been examining hardware video decoding on Linux yesterday by chance. The most helpful guides were the Arch Wiki and a Debian Wiki page. My setup includes a ThinkPad Yoga 12 with Haswell i5, running Ubuntu 18.04 and Windows 10. Both open-source and closed-source Intel drivers appear to support hardware acceleration. However, I haven't noticed significant gains from h264ify on Linux; it performed well on Windows, handling stuttering and high CPU use. I suspect the minor boost on Linux stems from h264 being simpler for the CPU, while hardware acceleration remains limited. It could be driver or kernel incompatibility. VP9 offers better compression than h264, which is why YouTube now defaults to it. More advanced codecs generally require more processing power. I haven't tried troubleshooting the Arch Wiki documentation since I didn’t encounter issues there.