Is this forum terribly laggy for you?

[lookingforward]

I'm running Windows 10 with the Edge browser. I haven't visited this site much before, so I can't compare it to Windows 8.1, but the keyboard lag on this site is atrocious with the Edge browser. I can type just fine in Mail and MS Word, so I'm not sure why this for, or perhaps Edge, is so bad.

 

[Zachary Boddy]

This website is notoriously bad for browsers because of all the rendering a browser has to do. Edge is actually very fast at loading but it has trouble with rendering, so this site gives it some issues. There's a simple trick to make Edge ridiculously fast but it requires that you know your way around your computer and aren't afraid to get down into your hard drive.

 

[Ashwani Kumar Singh]

This website is notoriously bad for browsers because of all the rendering a browser has to do. Edge is actually very fast at loading but it has trouble with rendering, so this site gives it some issues. There's a simple trick to make Edge ridiculously fast but it requires that you know your way around your computer and aren't afraid to get down into your hard drive.

Buddy why don't you mention that way to run Edge faster?

 

[Zachary Boddy]

Buddy why don't you mention that way to run Edge faster?

Okay I'm going to post a readme file that I wrote myself so I always have these instructions on hand. Then I will post a link that will give you the appropriate files, and detail further.

 

[Zachary Boddy]

The way to make Edge run way faster is to edit your hosts file. This is a neat, simple trick I recently learned that I've successfully accomplished with no issues whatsoever on two machines. As long as you follow the instructions there won't be any issues. Below these instructions is a link, which will automatically download a community hosts file to your Downloads folder. You could write your own hosts file, but this is very time consuming and this community hosts file is well know and is constantly updated.

To put it really basically, websites have to go through your hosts file before they're presented on your PC. I won't go through it all, but if you add a website's or ad-server's URL to your hosts file with your local IP address in front of it (this is always 127.0.0.1) then instead of connecting to the website or ad-server your computer attempts to connect to itself and thus shows nothing at all. This is different from an ad-block because it is system wide, meaning it affects all browsers, applications, and programs. It's also faster and more secure because the websites or ad-servers never actually reach your browser. You can also customize it and add any URL's you want. With this community hosts file installed (the link below) Edge is actually faster than either Chrome or Firefox. Make sure to follow all of these instructions, as if you're not careful, you can do some serious damage to your system. Never edit your default hosts file.

[To backup the default hosts file]
Run Command Prompt as Administrator (Click Start Menu, go to All Apps, go to Windows System, right click on Command Prompt, select Run as Administrator)
Type "cd\"
Type "cd Windows\System32\drivers\etc"
Type "dir"
Type "Copy hosts c:\temp"

[NOTE: Do not type the quotations marks]

[To view and/or edit hosts files]
Run Notepad as Administrator (Click Start Menu, go to All Apps, go to Windows Accessories, right click on Notepad, select Run as Administrator)
Select File>Open
Navigate to hosts file (default is found in C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc)
Select All Files (hosts files aren't text files)
Open the correct hosts file
Make necessary changes
Save (do not press Save As, as this will save it as a text document instead of a file)

[Note: The default IP Address is 127.0.0.1]
[Note: To add websites to your hosts file, simply type your default IP Address followed by the website URL]
[Note: Make sure to backup your default hosts file before making any changes]

[To replace the default hosts file with the new hosts file]
Navigate to the new hosts file
Copy new hosts file to desktop
Navigate to C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc
Rename hosts to hostsOLD
Copy the new hosts file from desktop to the hosts folder
Restart browsers

[Note: You could use the .bat in the community hosts folder (that you downloaded) but it's not necessary as you can just do the way depicted above]
[Note: You do not have to reboot your computer, as any changes to the hosts file are immediate changes]
[Note: If you do need to force your computer to read your hosts file, simply navigate to the Command Prompt as Administrator (as depicted above) and type "ipconfig /flushdns" without the quotation marks]

[To shutdown DNS Client (mandatory with hosts files larger than 135 kilobytes)]
Win+R to open Run
Type services.msc
Scroll down to DNS Client, right click, and select Properties
Select Stop
Click the drop-down arrow for Startup type
Select Manual
Click Apply/OK and restart

[Note: Make sure to turn DNS Client back on if you revert to default hosts by following the above steps and changing the startup type to automatic]
[Note: You will have to shut down the DNS Client with this community hosts file]

http://winhelp2002.mvps.org/hosts.zip

[Note: The hosts file that your system recognizes is the one called "hosts" or "HOSTS" without the quotation marks. You can keep all your hosts files (you can have more than one, but only one active hosts file) in the same folder, as long as only one is called "hosts" without the quotation marks. For example, you can a hosts file that blocks Facebook and a hosts file that doesn't. The hosts file that's active (let's say the one that blocks Facebook) will be called "hosts" without the quotation marks and the hosts file that's not active can be called anything else like "hostsFB" without the quotation marks]

I believe that's everything you need to know.

 

[michail71]

Actually, I have seen Edge have issue on a few different sites in their text editors. The typing gets laggy or misses keys presses altogether. This is also on the phone too. I find it happens if the browser or tab has been open for a while and a restart of the browser fixes it.

Another weird observation is Edge and Windowscentral.com is fast and smooth with a touch screen but feels like it is in its death throes when using a mouse.

Sometimes the cursor and keyboard become out of sync but I think that happens on the phone.

 

[Zachary Boddy]

Actually, I have seen Edge have issue on a few different sites in their text editors. The typing gets laggy or misses keys presses altogether. This is also on the phone too. I find it happens if the browser or tab has been open for a while and a restart of the browser fixes it.

Another weird observation is Edge and Windowscentral.com is fast and smooth with a touch screen but feels like it is in its death throes when using a mouse.

Sometimes the cursor and keyboard become out of sync but I think that happens on the phone.

All I know is that Edge was just "decent" before I edited my hosts file, but now it's the best browser over there performance-wise. It's still short on features, and it still has a few bugs and weird behaviors (moving tabs around is still horrid) but for straight out performance nothing beats it.

 

[Rose640]

Honestly I don't think it's up to browser, guess this site is simply laggy, it lagged on my computer on chrome, it lags on IE on my phone. Widows central app was my solution.

 

[Zachary Boddy]

Honestly I don't think it's up to browser, guess this site is simply laggy, it lagged on my computer on chrome, it lags on IE on my phone. Widows central app was my solution.

It is, actually, up to the browser. The problem with this website isn't down to just the website, but the amount of ads present on this site. Browsers like Chrome and Edge have trouble rendering all these ads. Although you can tell how fast Edge is by how fast it loads a site, Edge seriously stutters on trying to render pages. You can't even interact with a page until it's been completely rendered.
However, if you remove those ads, then Edge becomes drastically faster, even compared to tried and tested, mature browsers like Chrome or Firefox. The reason being that Edge doesn't have to render all those ads anymore. Without them in the way, Edge is quicker than Chrome.

 

[Laura Knotek]

I've moved this thread to the Site News, Feedback, Help forum since this is an issue related to this website rather than a particular device.

 

[TheJackah]

The forums and main site are terribly coded and optimised for browsers. They need to be improved.

Posted via the Windows Central App

 

[michail71]

The way to make Edge run way faster is to edit your hosts file. This is a neat, simple trick I recently learned that I've successfully accomplished with no issues whatsoever on two machines. As long as you follow the instructions there won't be any issues. Below these instructions is a link, which will automatically download a community hosts file to your Downloads folder. You could write your own hosts file, but this is very time consuming and this community hosts file is well know and is constantly updated.

To put it really basically, websites have to go through your hosts file before they're presented on your PC. I won't go through it all, but if you add a website's or ad-server's URL to your hosts file with your local IP address in front of it (this is always 127.0.0.1) then instead of connecting to the website or ad-server your computer attempts to connect to itself and thus shows nothing at all. This is different from an ad-block because it is system wide, meaning it affects all browsers, applications, and programs. It's also faster and more secure because the websites or ad-servers never actually reach your browser. You can also customize it and add any URL's you want. With this community hosts file installed (the link below) Edge is actually faster than either Chrome or Firefox. Make sure to follow all of these instructions, as if you're not careful, you can do some serious damage to your system. Never edit your default hosts file.

[To backup the default hosts file]
Run Command Prompt as Administrator (Click Start Menu, go to All Apps, go to Windows System, right click on Command Prompt, select Run as Administrator)
Type "cd\"
Type "cd Windows\System32\drivers\etc"
Type "dir"
Type "Copy hosts c:\temp"

[NOTE: Do not type the quotations marks]

[To view and/or edit hosts files]
Run Notepad as Administrator (Click Start Menu, go to All Apps, go to Windows Accessories, right click on Notepad, select Run as Administrator)
Select File>Open
Navigate to hosts file (default is found in C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc)
Select All Files (hosts files aren't text files)
Open the correct hosts file
Make necessary changes
Save (do not press Save As, as this will save it as a text document instead of a file)

[Note: The default IP Address is 127.0.0.1]
[Note: To add websites to your hosts file, simply type your default IP Address followed by the website URL]
[Note: Make sure to backup your default hosts file before making any changes]

[To replace the default hosts file with the new hosts file]
Navigate to the new hosts file
Copy new hosts file to desktop
Navigate to C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc
Rename hosts to hostsOLD
Copy the new hosts file from desktop to the hosts folder
Restart browsers

[Note: You could use the .bat in the community hosts folder (that you downloaded) but it's not necessary as you can just do the way depicted above]
[Note: You do not have to reboot your computer, as any changes to the hosts file are immediate changes]
[Note: If you do need to force your computer to read your hosts file, simply navigate to the Command Prompt as Administrator (as depicted above) and type "ipconfig /flushdns" without the quotation marks]

[To shutdown DNS Client (mandatory with hosts files larger than 135 kilobytes)]
Win+R to open Run
Type services.msc
Scroll down to DNS Client, right click, and select Properties
Select Stop
Click the drop-down arrow for Startup type
Select Manual
Click Apply/OK and restart

[Note: Make sure to turn DNS Client back on if you revert to default hosts by following the above steps and changing the startup type to automatic]
[Note: You will have to shut down the DNS Client with this community hosts file]

http://winhelp2002.mvps.org/hosts.zip

[Note: The hosts file that your system recognizes is the one called "hosts" or "HOSTS" without the quotation marks. You can keep all your hosts files (you can have more than one, but only one active hosts file) in the same folder, as long as only one is called "hosts" without the quotation marks. For example, you can a hosts file that blocks Facebook and a hosts file that doesn't. The hosts file that's active (let's say the one that blocks Facebook) will be called "hosts" without the quotation marks and the hosts file that's not active can be called anything else like "hostsFB" without the quotation marks]

I believe that's everything you need to know.

That hosts file makes windowscentral perform great on Edge with mouse scrolling. No stutters or lag.

 

[Zachary Boddy]

It's great, isn't it? This is a very hands-on approach, and it's high-maintenance. It's not like an ad-block that updates itself. If you want to update your hosts file you have to do it yourself.
On the other hand, it's both faster and more secure than an ad-block.
When Edge gets full extension support I plan to have an ad-block and then continue to update my hosts file for security purposes.

 

[michail71]

Yes, astounding what it does for this site.

In a way I feel bad but these ad companies are going to do themselves in if they don't figure out how to do things better.

 

[Zachary Boddy]

It's not just ad companies. WindowsCentral gave the OK for every single one.

 

[yanpaulo]

Yes, it is terribly laggy on Internet Explorer 11 in my computer (actually, Windows Central forum is the only site which lags so much at IE).
Using only 4 tabs, it made IE11 use 1GB of memory somehow! In Firefox it performs better, but it's still painfully slow.
Thought it happened only to me, but now I see it isn't.

 

[michail71]

The adblocking really makes a huge difference. The UI no longer locks up. Still one off thing that I'm surprised I don't see mentioned more is that the performance issues don't impact touch screen to the degree they do mouse. I've seen it on several different touch screen systems.

 

[Panathas]

You know the scene from star trek 7 when the enterprise crushed on the planet? It happened when the ship's main computer tried to render the windowscentral site without ad block.