Processor intensive ads...

[Snowy_River]

I used to leave MR open most of the time. But lately, I've noticed that certain ads that appear on MR main pages seem to eat a lot of processor cycles. The biggest, though I don't think it's the only, culprit seems to be the banners from Crucial. When one of these is left open, I see Safari's processor use sit at about 20%. This has lead me to change some of my patterns, as this can be enough to cause hiccups in other processor intensive tasks.

Is there any chance that some kind of guideline can be implemented with advertisers to keep them from using ad banners that chew up so many resources?

[Eidorian]

They're using Flash.

[Snowy_River]

Clearly. But that doesn't answer my actual question.

I can understand the desirability of using Flash for banners, but there are better practices than just leaving the Flash running non-stop. I've seen plenty of Flash that might spike my processor use to 100% briefly, but then drops down to almost nothing.

[Doctor Q]

We can sometimes arrange that particular ads be excluded. It usually helps to have a screenshot and to know what URL the ad links to if clicked.

[Snowy_River]

Okay. When such ads appear I'll grab pertinent information. Thanks!

[Snowy_River]

Okay, so here's one. In the attached screen shot, you can see the ad in question, and the level of processor use that's being driven. This one seems to be particularly bad, as you can see, pushing processor use up to 35%. As soon as I refreshed to change the ads, the processor use dropped down to about 6%. So this ad alone was using 19% of my computer's processor.

[Snowy_River]

So, here's another one. This one isn't quite as bad, as it will drop to nothing if you wait for a minute or so. The load shown here is actually part way through its decent. At the beginning of the run, it actually max'd out my processor.

[Snowy_River]

Okay, I may have spoken too soon. Either that or there is a different version of this ad. This one sits at using 40% of my processor, and never seems to stop.

[Drumjim85]

you could become a demi-god and pay to have to ads removed ....

[dsnort]

you could become a demi-god and pay to have to ads removed ....

To clarify, you become a demi-god by contributing financially to MacRumors, after which you don't see any ads. A great way to support a great site, plus has "other" benefits.