Electron CPU usage

Mykle1

I’ve just downgrade to the electron@1.4.15 version : no more high CPU usage !
Thanks

That’s fantastic! I’m really happy with the results of this topic. We put our heads together and came up with a workaround that works for most people. Kudos to everyone that participated and continues to participate.

I only cooked one Pi3 during my testing. Can anyone help me to reflash a Pi3 B to a firmware version dated about January, 2017?

Mr.Sponti

I also did a downgrade from MagicMirror 2.1.1 and electron@1.7 as proposed
to MagicMirror 2.1.0 and electron@1.4.15. and see a significant lower CPU usage. Formerly CPU usage was most of the time over 100% up to 200%. Now, top shows a CPU usage of electron between 2 to 3 %.

I hope that the electron dev team will take a look to fix that problem in a future release!

Mykle1

@Mr.Sponti said in Electron CPU usage:

Now, top shows a CPU usage of electron between 2 to 3 %.

Yeah boy! :^)

Mykle1

@wtidwell said in Electron CPU usage:

Hey all, new user here.

You see what you started? :^)

Reotch2

@loctruong96 said in Electron CPU usage:

sudo npm install electron@1.4.15 -g

WAIT PATIENTLY FOR ELECTRON TO LOAD IN THE BACKGROUND

a new line appear indicate electron has finished installing

Go to your download folder, exact Magic Mirror 2.1.0

Go to the newly exacted forlder, open another folder named config

Change the file name Config.js.example to Config.js inside the config folder

@Mykle1

I keep getting the same issue as @EventHorizon but none of his fixes seem to work (sudo npm install -g electron --unsafe-perm=true) or (nom @latest -g).

I’m starting with a fresh STRETCH install, and get to step 9 (npm install && npm start) where I get the (types/node) fault.

Any ideas?

Thanks all.

loctruong96

@Reotch2 Hello I think this happened because electron was not successfully installed using npm as a global variable. It happened to me too and i had to reinstall electron as a global variable which is the -g at the end is for. Can you confirm that you have successfully install electron ?

Reotch2

@loctruong96 Still no luck. I ran (sudo npm install electron@1.4.15 -g) after the clean install, triple verifying that I had the (-g) on there, and no luck.

-Raspberry Pi 3
-Raspbian Stretch
-Definitely ran (sudo apt-get update)
-Full error listed below:

npm ERR! 404 Not Found
npm ERR! 404 
npm ERR! 404 'types/node' is not in the npm registry.
npm ERR! 404 You should bug the author to publish it
npm ERR! 404 It was specified as a dependency of 'electron'
npm ERR! 404 
npm ERR! 404 Note that you can also install from a
npm ERR! 404 tarball, folder, or http url, or git url.

npm ERR! System Linux 4.9.41-v7+
npm ERR! command "/usr/bin/nodejs" "/usr/bin/npm" "install"
npm ERR! cwd /home/pi/MagicMirror
npm ERR! node -v v4.8.2
npm ERR! npm -v 1.4.21
npm ERR! code E404
npm ERR! 
npm ERR! Additional logging details can be found in:
npm ERR!     /home/pi/MagicMirror/npm-debug.log
npm ERR! not ok code 0

loctruong96

@Reotch2 hmmm can you try this: npm install npm@latest -g

Reotch2

@loctruong96 Yup… that did the trick. odd… seems like I’ve done the same steps 10 times, but it worked on the 11th.

I can’t seem to find electron under MagicMirror/node_modules/ to verify the version. Where else can I look?

-Rich

loctruong96

@Reotch2 wow… it seems different people have different version of npm installed and you need the latest one. I will add that into the steps. Thank you for verifying. Good luck on your project!
As for electron version you can confirm by trying “npm list -g” or “npm list” depend on global variable settings of your packages.

Mykle1

@Reotch2 said in Electron CPU usage:

I keep getting the same issue as @EventHorizon but none of his fixes seem to work (sudo npm install -g electron --unsafe-perm=true) or (nom @latest -g).
I’m starting with a fresh STRETCH install, and get to step 9 (npm install && npm start) where I get the (types/node) fault.
Any ideas?

Personally, I had some troubles with Stretch, so I went back to Jessie, July release I believe. I’m guessing that most are using Jessie as well. Also, I think that with an installation of MM 2.1.0 you get Electron 1.4.15 by default. That combination is what we have found to work best regarding the CPU usage issue. sudo npm install electron@1.4.15 has worked for everyone. I don’t know why it wasn’t working for you. Perhaps there is something else going on there

Mykle1

@loctruong96 said in Electron CPU usage:

it seems different people have different version of npm installed and you need the latest one.

With regards to this topic only, you do NOT need or want the latest version of npm.

You can also find the version of npm here MagicMirror/node_modules/electron/dist/version

cowboysdude

This post is deleted!

loctruong96

@Mykle1 Agree, i was thinking the same thing. But some users are experiencing the problem where their npm failed to run install and start which i can only think of updating it which turned out to get it to work so far. I have also indicated a note in the install guide to have people aware of it.

cowboysdude

This post is deleted!

Mykle1

@cowboysdude said in Electron CPU usage:

my bathroom mirror is a pi and it’s updated and I’m not having any of these issues…

Would you please post your results, as everyone has above, for comparison? Raspbian version, MM version, Electron version and Pi version, and your nmon results

loctruong96

Yeah, many didn’t update npm and have no problem whatsoever, only two users reported having 404 problem and only 1 user tried to npm install npm@latest -g and it worked for him. I made a note in my guide up in the thread in regard of this issue.

cowboysdude

This post is deleted!

Mykle1

@loctruong96 said in Electron CPU usage:

I have also indicated a note in the install guide to have people aware of it.

Very good! Thanks!

Mr.Sponti

Hello, here are some details on my configuration and the steps I’ve made to downgrade from 2.1.1 to MM 2.1.0 & electron 1.4.15. First, I use the following PI and OS

Pi 3 Model B, 1024MB RAM
Raspbian Stretch

pi@Infoboard:~ $ uname -a
Linux Infoboard 4.9.41-v7+ #1023 SMP Tue Aug 8 16:00:15 BST 2017 armv7l GNU/Linux

Downgrade MagicMirror from 2.1.1 to 2.1.0:
-rename of my MagicMirror folder to MagicMirrorSAVE
-download and unzip MM 2.1.0
-rename dir MagicMirror-2.1.0 to MagicMirror
-cd to MagicMirror
-npm install electron@1.4.15 # I didn’t install electron as a global package
-nano package.json
–> change electron version under dependencies to electron 1.4.15

{
  "name": "magicmirror",
  "version": "2.1.0",
  "description": "A modular interface for smart mirrors.",
  "main": "js/electron.js",
  "scripts": {
    "start": "electron js/electron.js"
  },
  "repository": {
    "type": "git",
 ...
 "dependencies": {
    "electron": "1.4.15",
    "express": "^4.14.0",
    "express-ipfilter": "latest",
    "feedme": "latest",
....

now, install MagicMirror

-npm install
-copy your own modules from the MagicMirrorSAVE to the respective MM2.1.0 directory
-install necessary node modules for your own modules
done
Check the installed version of electron

pi@Infoboard:~ $ more MagicMirror/node_modules/electron/dist/version
v1.4.15

run MM with ‘npm start’ and monitor the CPU usage with ‘top’
and the magic is there: 2 to 3 % CPU usage in case you are not running newsfeed or other modules with a lot of rendering stuff. If I include the newfeed modul CPU usage will increase up to 30%. So, I go without newsfeed!

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I hope that help some or the other.