Synaptic operations ridiculously slow

[terauck]

Hello. I know there have been other threads but none quite fits my issue. I have 3 issues relating to Synaptic but this one is a killer.

Any (ANY) operation in Synaptic takes far too long. This list is not necessarily complete:

1. Selecting a package in the 'upgradeable' list;
2. Right-clicking to get the context menu;
3. Scrolling through the list;
4. The 'apply' icon becoming active.

There is also a malfunction occasionally with the context menu and I am unable to increase the font size (both in the interface and in the lists) but those issues can wait until I find a fix for this one.

[karlchen]

Hello, terauck.

Any (ANY) operation in Synaptic takes far too long.

Can you quantify this perhaps by giving seconds for each of the 4 items in your list? - "far too slow" is a subjective term. What you consider "far too slow" might be acceptible to me.
Could you please post the output of the commandline

Code: Select all

inxi -Fx

This should give us a basic idea of your hardware and your Mint environment.

Kind regards,
Karl

[terauck]

OK. I will log in to that partition on the weekend and run that command.

I use Synaptic in another distro. It is fast. That is the benchmark I am using. I could do in that distro what I achieve in Mint in a fraction (seriously) of the time. It is so bad that I did not finish updating before posting here. It is so bad that I consider the system unusable except in a dire emergency.

[terauck]

The following is the output of the command inxi - Fx (after removing an emblem which appeared amongst the recorded text). I replaced my user name with <user name>

[1;34mSystem: [0;37m [1;34mHost:[0;37m <user name>-mint [1;34mKernel:[0;37m 3.5.0-25-generic x86_64 (64 bit, [1;34mgcc:[0;37m 4.7.2) [1;34mDesktop:[0;37m N/A [1;34mDistro:[0;37m Linux Mint 14 Nadia
[1;34mMachine: [0;37m [1;34mMobo:[0;37m WinFast [1;34mmodel:[0;37m C51MCP51 [1;34mversion:[0;37m FAB1.0 [1;34mserial:[0;37m WLWV54404716 [1;34mBios:[0;37m Phoenix [1;34mversion:[0;37m 6.00 PG [1;34mdate:[0;37m 09/16/2005
[1;34mCPU: [0;37m [1;34mSingle core[0;37m AMD Athlon 64 3200+ (-UP-)[0;37m [1;34mcache:[0;37m 512 KB [1;34mflags:[0;37m (lm nx sse sse2 sse3) [1;34mbmips:[0;37m 2009.4[0;37m [1;34mclocked at[0;37m 1000.00 MHz[0;37m
[1;34mGraphics: [0;37m [1;34mCard:[0;37m NVIDIA C51G [GeForce 6100] [1;34mbus-ID:[0;37m 00:05.0
[1;34m [0;37m [1;34mX.org:[0;37m 1.13.0 [1;34mdrivers:[0;37m (unloaded: fbdev,vesa,nouveau) [1;31mFAILED:[0;37m nvidia [1;34mtty size:[0;37m 131x37 [1;34mAdvanced Data:[0;37m N/A for root
[1;34mAudio: [0;37m [1;34mCard:[0;37m NVIDIA MCP51 AC97 Audio Controller [1;34mdriver:[0;37m snd_intel8x0 [1;34mports:[0;37m dc00 d800 [1;34mbus-ID:[0;37m 00:10.2
[1;34m [0;37m [1;34mSound:[0;37m Advanced Linux Sound Architecture [1;34mver:[0;37m 1.0.25
[1;34mNetwork: [0;37m [1;34mCard:[0;37m NVIDIA MCP51 Ethernet Controller [1;34mdriver:[0;37m forcedeth [1;34mport:[0;37m d400 [1;34mbus-ID:[0;37m 00:14.0
[1;34m [0;37m [1;34mIF:[0;37m eth0 [1;34mstate:[0;37m up [1;34mspeed:[0;37m 100 Mbps [1;34mduplex:[0;37m full [1;34mmac:[0;37m 00:01:6c:e4:02:f6
[1;34mDrives: [0;37m [1;34mHDD Total Size:[0;37m 120.0GB (21.8% used) [1;34m1:[0;37m [1;34mid:[0;37m /dev/sda [1;34mmodel:[0;37m SAMSUNG_HD120IJ [1;34msize:[0;37m 120.0GB
[1;34mPartition:[0;37m [1;34mID:[0;37m / [1;34msize:[0;37m 9.9G [1;34mused:[0;37m 4.8G (52%) [1;34mfs:[0;37m ext3 [1;34mID:[0;37m swap-1 [1;34msize:[0;37m 1.08GB [1;34mused:[0;37m 0.00GB (0%) [1;34mfs:[0;37m swap
[1;34m [0;37m [1;34mID:[0;37m swap-2 [1;34msize:[0;37m 1.08GB [1;34mused:[0;37m 0.00GB (0%) [1;34mfs:[0;37m swap
[1;34mRAID: [0;37m No RAID devices detected - /proc/mdstat and md_mod kernel raid module present
[1;34mSensors: [0;37m None detected - is lm-sensors installed and configured?
[1;34mInfo: [0;37m [1;34mProcesses:[0;37m 127 [1;34mUptime:[0;37m 5 min [1;34mMemory:[0;37m 447.6/1938.2MB[0;37m [1;34mRunlevel:[0;37m 2 [1;34mGcc sys:[0;37m 4.7.2 [1;34mClient:[0;37m Shell [1;34minxi:[0;37m 1.8.4[0;37m [0;37m
[0m

This is what happens when I use Synaptic to upgrade:

1. I select only a small group of packages because, the first time I updated, the system crashed after I had selected numerous packages.

2. The first selection and installation of packages proceeds as expected. Subsequent operations are as follows:

3. I click on a package. Several seconds pass before the blue line indicating selection appears. The same is true when I attempt to select more than one package.

4. I right-click on the package(s) selected. Several seconds pass before the context message appears.

5. After several packages or a package have (has) been selected, several more seconds pass before the 'Apply' button becomes active.

6. Downloading and installation proceed as expected.

7. I intended to mention the following as a separate issue but it may help to mention it now. Occasionally when I select a number of packages, the context menu gives me the options unmark, remove, remove completely even though none of the packages has been marked. I have to remove the selection and select and mark one package at a time.