Chrome uses more power than it needs to

[Enderman]

My chrome runs perfectly on my 16GB of ram and 8 thread 3770k. Extremely fast at loading browsing, I love it. I don't give a crap how many resources it uses.

[StingBull]

My chrome runs perfectly on my 16GB of ram and 8 thread 3770k. Extremely fast at loading browsing, I love it. I don't give a crap how many resources it uses.

 

You felt like you needed to point that out why? This issue is of no concern to desktop users, especially if their machine is high-end. This is bad for laptop users, especially for those in the lower end bracket.

[ragedev]

I had 70 Chrome tabs open at one point using about 10GB of RAM (Just chrome)

[Enderman]

You felt like you needed to point that out why? This issue is of no concern to desktop users, especially if their machine is high-end. This is bad for laptop users, especially for those in the lower end bracket.

Did you not read the OP's post?

 

Even on a desktop computer, electricity wasting aside, this might noticeably slow down the computer.

[Sidiox]

This certainly is bad new for laptop users, I love Chrome but I already was aware that it takes huge amounts of ram and takes quite a bit of CPU power, so I wont use it on my portables but on my desktop I don't mind

[Accursed Entity]

Currently using Chrome on a Intel Atom with 1gb of RAM mini netbook... not a single crash, so I'm still trying to figure out the hate. 

 

I have FireFox installed(don't know why), I've used it like 8 times and it looks pretty but gosh I hate it... I hate the bookmarks manager, the options...

 

One account in Chrome and I have every page sign in set up, history and 400+ bookmarks synced, with an easy manager.

[Linus_torvalds]

I use chrome, on ubuntu

[Nuds]

I would use Firefox more often but like others have said, it keeps crashing. I do hate the resource drain in Chrome, Watching twitch in chrome = 80% load on the cpu.

[deviant88]

Lol @ all the chrome haters gathered on this thread rofl.

 

Ive used all,firefox,waterfox,chrome canary,chrome beta,chrome stable and honestly they kinda all suck,especially firefox/waterfox, i make my judgement from youtube experience,i watch a looot of content and chrome is the least worst browser for that plus its really easy to sync settings.

 

But chrome does suck trying to watch 4K video sample on youtube chrome canary goes 80% on i5 while waterfox stays under 20% so waterfox is a true 64 bit high speed browser optimized imo.

I guess there none king atm they all have problems.Waterfox is really low on loading pages and starting up even on a ssd its broken.Firefox on the other hand is not 64 bit,loads stuff fast but still far from good in my book.

[Scionyde]

Didn't we already know this? I think there was some article released not too long ago where they benchmarked different browsers and found that IE was best when it came to battery life, and Chrome was the worst.

[totjup5]

I use Opera because of  issues with chrome. This is yet another thing that reminds me how good a choice it was to switch.

[SKOONJar]

This isnt news anyone who uses chrome knows that.

[Vash_327]

Chrome sucks "huevos" lol

[ijKs Snow]

Original post on Forbes

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ianmorris/2014/07/14/googles-chrome-web-browser-is-killing-your-laptop-battery/

 

Many people will swear to Chrome, and call it the best browser currently out in the market. Surely, I do agree.. Chrome has always been fast and responsive and it left us tech geeks scratching our heads to why there really isn't any alternate browser that can keep up with Chrome except for maybe Firefox.

 

The answer is out. Well, it's BEEN out since 2010, but Google totally dismissed it. They ignored it till recently when they were getting called out for it.

 

Chrome, my good friends, has been auto upticking your processor without your consent.

 

A quick run down.

 

Windows automatically idles at 15.625ms per system clock tick. It's internally built in. What is a tick rate you ask? It's the rate at which your computer runs its' events/commands at a set time interval. 15.625ms means that Windows will detect what you are doing 64 times per second. It's a power-saving measure so when you aren't doing anything on your computer, your processor will power down, until you give it the command to wake it back up.

 

Guess what?

 

The moment you open Chrome browser on any Windows PC, Chrome will automatically set your system clock tick @ 1.000ms. Yes, you read it right. JUST BY OPENING UP A BROWSER, your processor suddenly wakes up 1000 times per second to detect what you are doing. Compare that for a second. 64 times VS 1000 times.

 

What does this mean? It means up to 25% power consumption vs other browsers that keep the interval the same at 15.625ms. 25 WHOPPING PERCENT!

 

Ian Morris @ Forbes did a quick and dirty test to see for his own eyes if this claim was true.

 

His desktop @ idle with Chrome open, his computer was using between 15-20watts. Soon as he shut Chrome and went back to idle it dipped as low as 12watts and never over 15watts.

 

Many of you might say.. so what? My computer uses a whopping 3-5watts more. I don't care. The fact is, this is a bigger problem on devices with batteries running windows, like Laptops and Ultra books. If you use a Laptop and have noticed your battery draining faster then you think, then you should check to see if you have Chrome open and running in the background.

[Yoinkerman]

Yeah it does

 

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/181580-chrome-uses-more-power-than-it-needs-to/

[That Norwegian Guy]

And it didn't even beat the speed of Opera before Opera became a chromeclone.

[Misanthrope]

I see a good 3 to 5 degrees difference between idling with Chrome doing absolutely nothing, just sitting minimized and closing chrome and the computer sitting on idle but on, so I believe this is plausible. I also believe that the alternative to closing chrome when not in use is to use Firefox which will leak memory and cause worst system instability when on idle doing nothing, so really like I said and ranted before, there seems to be no decent fucking choice of browser for windows now.

[Yoinkerman]

Is this why my idle temps are high?  :concerndoge

 

I see a good 3 to 5 degrees difference between idling with Chrome doing absolutely nothing, just sitting minimized and chrome closing and the computer on idle but on, so I believe this is plausible. I also believe that the alternative to closing chrome when not in use is to use Firefox which will leak memory and cause worst system instability when on idle doing nothing, so really like I said and ranted before, there seems to be no decent fucking choice of browser for windows now.

[ijKs Snow]

Yeah it does

 

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/181580-chrome-uses-more-power-than-it-needs-to/

Ah. my mistake, the article was already posted.

 

I shall call upon the power of mods to erase this one!

[JoshM]

Lol i don't care, as long as it's fast, I haven't had some massive temp increase lolz. It probably chews battery when I use it on my laptop but using the internet does in general. 

[Misanthrope]

Is this why my idle temps are high?  :concerndoge

 

Could be, start killing processes until you get the temps down to find the culprits.

[CatCloud]

Won't make me change browser, But nice to know.

[ijKs Snow]

Lol i don't care, as long as it's fast, I haven't had some massive temp increase lolz. It probably chews battery when I use it on my laptop but using the internet does in general. 

Yes, most power-users won't care. But the fact is, Google can make Chrome even better then now.

 

For example, IE also upticks to 1.000ms, but only when you are doing something heavy like streaming a video on Youtube or Netflix. As soon as you close it and go back to light tasking like browsing and reading e-mail, it will auto downtick back to 15.625ms.

 

Now I'm not saying I want Google to drop back down to 15.625ms when browsing and stuff, but if they can downtick it when your computer goes idle with no commands, it will create an even better browser then current conditions.

[ericlee30]

One of the many reasons, i am proud to say I love Firefox and  have been a faithful user since 1.1.

[JoshM]

Yes, most power-users won't care. But the fact is, Google can make Chrome even better then now.

 

For example, IE also upticks to 1.000ms, but only when you are doing something heavy like streaming a video on Youtube or Netflix. As soon as you close it and go back to light tasking like browsing and reading e-mail, it will auto downtick back to 15.625ms.

 

Now I'm not saying I want Google to drop back down to 15.625ms when browsing and stuff, but if they can downtick it when your computer goes idle with no commands, it will create an even better browser then current conditions.

Fair enough, but it would only benefit my laptops battery life for me.

I do understand and agree what you are saying too btw, but unless you are running a potato it doesn't make a huge difference. 

But improvements are improvements haha