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September 1, 2009 12:26 PM PDT

Issues with Front Row in Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard

by Joe Aimonetti
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Several users have noticed a significant performance issue while using Apple's Front Row after upgrading to Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard.

Affected systems exhibit jerky video playback and overall slow and buggy performance. Most users in this Apple Support Discussions thread are reporting the issue on Mac Minis and older generation MacBooks with shared graphics processors. ASD user "Watchful" reports:

So I just installed Snow Leopard on my Mac Mini which I use as a media center in my living room. So obviously I use Front Row extensively. Imagine my dismay to find out that front row is now jerky, sometimes won't respond, and in general *****. Videos play back jerky, and steppy as well while the same videos play find through Quicktime X or Quicktime 7, and iTunes full screen.

Several suggestions have been made throughout the growing thread, though none have seemed to create a solution. The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) has written this article about the Front Row issues. The best guess TUAW, the forums, and I could make would be an underlying issue with the way Front Row is accessing the QuickTime X resources.

Be sure to stay tuned to MacFixIt as more on this issue unfolds. If you have experienced this issue, or found a workaround for it, let us know in the comments!

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  • Joe is a seasoned Mac veteran with years of experience on the platform. He reports on Macs, iPods, iPhones and anything else Apple sells. Before joining CNET, he even worked in Apple's retail stores. He's also a creative professional who knows how to use a Mac to get the job done.
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    by alexcutter September 2, 2009 11:54 AM PDT
    Good thing you recommended that "the sooner the better" in terms of updating.
    Reply to this comment
    by greenmanwest1 September 7, 2009 9:52 AM PDT
    I was actually pleasantly surprised when I used Front row after upgrading to Snow Leopard on my Mac Mini. I'd been having problems with Front Row when using my Apple remote - the program was very hard to launch with the remote. I had to press the menu button repeatedly, before, finally, getting the program to launch. After that, all the other commands worked fine inside Front Row but the difficulty in launching the program had stopped me from using it altogether. After the Snow Leopard upgrade, the remote launches Front Row instantly. So far everything I've watched in Front Row has played back smoothly!
    Reply to this comment
    by jbsientz September 11, 2009 10:16 AM PDT
    I'm having the opposite problem. Front Row takes about 10 seconds to launch when using the menu button on the Remote. Audio programs take 2-3 seconds, video takes about 5 seconds to start playing. I've also noticed that the "played" or "watched" status for Podcasts is not updating properly in iTunes 9. Any content played in Front Row gets a half-filled dot in iTunes but the "play count" does not increment, so any podcasts I have flagged to sync with my iPod based on play status do not work properly. I noticed the delay after the Snow Leopard upgrade, but the play status is new to iTunes 9. The half-filled dot suggests this is a new "feature" but I can't find any documentation on it and the default behavior is not acceptable. I have to manually mark anything played through Front Row as not new for proper syncs.
    Reply to this comment
    by jbsientz September 11, 2009 10:17 AM PDT
    I'm having the opposite problem. Front Row takes about 10 seconds to launch when using the menu button on the Remote. Audio programs take 2-3 seconds, video takes about 5 seconds to start playing. I've also noticed that the "played" or "watched" status for Podcasts is not updating properly in iTunes 9. Any content played in Front Row gets a half-filled dot in iTunes but the "play count" does not increment, so any podcasts I have flagged to sync with my iPod based on play status do not work properly. I noticed the delay after the Snow Leopard upgrade, but the play status is new to iTunes 9. The half-filled dot suggests this is a new "feature" but I can't find any documentation on it and the default behavior is not acceptable. I have to manually mark anything played through Front Row as not new for proper syncs.
    Reply to this comment
    by September 14, 2009 7:06 AM PDT
    I cannot get rid of annoying Sprint popup commercials, so I just might tag all your emails as "junk".
    Reply to this comment
    by jlyonsmith September 20, 2009 12:18 AM PDT
    Add me to the list of folks seeing jerky video in FrontRow on their Mac Mini. It's happening for both iTunes content and DVD's. Both seem to play better in the iTunes or the DVD player, but still not great. Given the number of people using Mac Mini's for digital TV, this is annoying.
    Reply to this comment
    by jimtac_dotmac September 21, 2009 3:42 PM PDT
    I 'm also experiencing this same slow/jerky/unsynced audio & video in Front Row on my mini. I noticed that iTunes 9 was not the issue [at least in my case] as I upgraded to 9, before upgrading to Snow Leopard as I was awaiting an update to my media streaming software.

    There is an enormous delay in opening FR under SL, that I thought it may have been my drive sleeping too often. I moved my iTunes library to an external SSD, which provided a small improvement, but nothing compared to any of the other content on the drive, which launches virtually instantly, not to mention that all of the same content loads and plays in Quicktime Player 7/X just fine, just not Front Row. I even notice that scrolling up and down in the menu has jitter, even when running the old Leopard version of the Front Row app in SL.
    Reply to this comment
    by c4rlob October 8, 2009 1:55 PM PDT
    My problem is that I can't even launch Front Row on my MacBook since upgrading to Snow Leopard. Everything else launches fine, including iTunes and QuickTime. Why does Apple always struggle with getting Front Row to work seamlessly with itunes and QuickTime?
    Reply to this comment
    by maneeshpan October 14, 2009 11:09 PM PDT
    I have a 2nd generation based Apple Mac Mini from September 2006 with the Intel Core Duo 1 processor that has the GMA 950 graphic chip which I hear most Mac Mini and MacBook Pros with this problem after upgrading to Snow Leopard have.

    My Mac Mini is still running Tiger -- was considering updating it to Leopard or even Snow Leopard but with this issue now reported at least till a fix is available will not be getting Snow Leopard for the Mac Mini.
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