I think something is screwy about a sponsor Ad

[the Nightbreeze]

Hey guys.

I hate to complain about a sponsor ad, since I know the site depends on them,  but one seems to be giving me a little trouble.

The Disney Virtual Magic Kingdom banner ad with the Pirate ships -- When it displays in my Netscape 8.0 browser (which uses a Mozilla Firefox rendering engine)  the up/down scrolling in the window I am in goes all wonky, and gets more sluggish than if I wadded bubblegum on my mouse scroll wheel.  

No other banner ad seems to have this effect,  on your site or any other site I visit that uses banner ads.

I hate to ask you to do anything about it, and I really have no clue what you could do about it, but I figured I ought to say something.

Thanks for your attention to this matter.

[Knightshade Dragon]

Let me see if I can replicate it...

[DarkEL]

a few quick questions to see if it could be something simple we could troubleshoot.

 - Have you tried switching between rendering engines in NS8? From what I've read you can select either firefox or IE rendering within NS8 - so it would be useful to know if the performance hit only occurs on one or both engines

- Do you have the latest flash player installed?

- What kind of hardware are you experiencing this error on. i.e. how fast a processor, how much RAM, what OS, etc.

[stiffler]

I have no problem replicating it on my machine:
WinXP Pro, Opera v8.01, Flash Player v7,0,19,0 and 1GB RAM.

When the VMK.com ad displays I my processor usage bounces around between 85-100%.  Other ads cause no noticable spike.

Edit to add: I have the same issue with the ad in IE.  Again, only with the VMK ad.

[the Nightbreeze]

I'm running a

Win XP Pro Sp2 updated OS
on a  (Don't laugh)  Pentium 3 800 Mhz, 256 MB RAM, and Whatever Flash player is default to the browser, or Internet Explorer, or Windows XP.  never sought out and installed a specific one

On Netscape 8.0, the ad reacts a little better to the IE rendering than he Firefox rendering, but only as much as a gunshot to the upper arm is  better than it would be to the groin.

[Calvin]

Something on CG-probably this ad, is causing my computer to have 99 or 100% CPU usage and bringing everything to an absolute crawl. I will have to only visit CG long enough to check new posts until you guys get a new banner or figure this out Sorry, but I wanted to let you know that at least one other person is having this problem.

And seriously, I keep this site going!! RESPEK!!!

 

[CeeKay]

hmm.. My CPU usuage spiked to 30% max and my commit charge  went to 200M/2460M, but all I run while surfing is a couple of IE windows open and Trillian.  Not a problem for me but maybe something that can help.  I'm using Flash 7,0,19,0 with IE 6 that comes with Windows Media Center 2005 on a 3.2 gig P4 w/1 gig ram.

[Knightshade Dragon]

I'll investigate with the sponsor.   If I can't resolve it, the ad goes.

I narrowed it down - it is the ad with the two ships in it.  Spikes my processor to 85%.

[Gedd]

I've noticed ever since I started using Firefox last year that certain Flash elements, typically ads, and almost all of Gamespot's default page, have a tendency to really spike my CPU and bring scrolling to a crawl in Firefox. I'm not sure if it's Firefox's fault, or Macromedia though.  I've gotten in the habit of blocking elements that cause it though.

[mytocles]

Something on CG-probably this ad, is causing my computer to have 99 or 100% CPU usage and bringing everything to an absolute crawl.

Yeah, sorry to report - me too!  I was having no problem before the update (or the coincidence of that ad?)...  I only use Firefox, and I can sometimes get by with only one window open, but with two - one of them CG - my machine just crawls.  I first noticed it when i happened to have two CG windows open - everything showed as "running", but the machine may as well have been frozen, everything was so slow.  Bear in mind that i'm more than an end user, but not a heck of a lot more.  A more knowledgeable person than I am said that Firefox was at 100% CPU usage, or words that were similar.

[Graham]

The ad is having an affect on me using IE at home too.  I have been having issues with it, but I didn't notice it until someone pointed it out here.

[Knightshade Dragon]

I have contacted the ad agency.  Pending their response this ad will either be removed or replaced tomorrow.

Thank you for bringing it to my attention!

[stiffler]

Any update on the status of the ad, Ron?

[Knightshade Dragon]

No not yet.  I'm going to call them tomorrow.  If I'm not satisfied with the answer, it comes off tomorrow.

[whiteboyskim]

Everyone, it's time to say "thank you" to the people who developed AdBlock for Firefox. Takes care of the problem with two clicks of a mouse button.

[the Nightbreeze]

Heck, I'll even thank the staff.

can't wait for the ad to go far away.  If only I had a cannon, I'd get rid of the ad myself.  You might need a new advertiser, though, but at this point, i could live with that.  

[Knightshade Dragon]

The ad has been removed.  I just didn't get what I needed from the ad sponsor, so we'll have to pass it up.

[the Nightbreeze]

Thank you! I hope you find a suitable replacement in time.  

If stopgap support needs to come from users, I for one will surely answer the call.

[CrayolaSmoker]

I concur.  Thank you!  I can use Firefox with CG again.  YAY!