Sluggish/slow performance of Storyline (lags and freezes)

So I have tried:

/ importing it into a new project

/ working on the scene in a completely isolated articulate project (where only that single scene, composed of single slide is)

/ reinstalling the storyline (according to troubleshooting, with the usage of slCleanup)

however, to no avail.Do anyone have any other suggestions or I just should try to reinstall Windows?

Hi Michal! If you do not get any answers here, you can work with our support team. I apologize for not including this in my previous link.

I have recently begun to experience this problem as well, and I too have exhausted all prescribed solutions to no avail.

Greg! Sorry to hear that you are having difficulty as well. I tried to check for a support case with Michal to see if I could offer you some additional insight other than what is already here, but I cannot locate a case. If you would like to reach out to our support team for assistance, you may do so here.

Michal, I can completely sympathize.  I have nearly the exact same issue.  And I've tried every solution you've tried to no avail. 

My issue has not gotten nearly as bad as yours.  But I've lost hours and hours of work waiting on the program to be responsive. 

The thing that kind of irks me is that most of these big issues are redirected to the support team by moderators and staff.   And  that's usually where the threads about problems end.  We in the forums never actually get to hear if the issue was solved or not by the support team and if it was solved, how it was solved.  And if it couldn't be solved, what they think the underlying issue is so that maybe the more technically apt among us could try their hand at solving the issue.

Hello Michal;

I am working with large (multi-gig) story files and have had some run in with perf issues but things are good now.

Have you looked at your perf counters when you are experiencing the lags?  Disk/Mem/CPU?

Hi Kevin! That's not where we want the conversation to end. We try to update the threads when resolution is reached if it is a solution that may help the community. I will admit, sometimes we miss that follow up as we are going through hundreds of threads a day, but all it takes is a community member like you to pop back in a thread that you come across and ask if there was a resolution. I'm always happy to check back in on cases, etc to see if there is a solution that may benefit the thread at that point.

As an example, there is nothing that I can provide as an update in this thread as none of the users have submitted a support case.

Hi Todd and welcome to E-Learning Heroes! Thanks for popping in to offer your solution

Hi Just submitting a case on this, think it is the same issue. It has been driving me bonkers all day! 

Hope you can help 

JB

Hi James,

I see the case you submitted, and that John replied with the following troubleshooting steps:

I understand that you are seeing a delay when working with images in your file. I did not experience the issue when I tried to move your images around. I would suggest the following to better troubleshoot the issue: 

1) Work on a local drive. 

When creating, editing, and publishing Articulate Storyline courses, be sure you're working on your local hard drive (typically your C: drive). Working on a network drive or a USB drive can cause erratic behavior, such as file corruption, an inability to save changes, and loss of resources. See this article for more information.

2) Check the Windows DPI setting. 

Storyline will function as expected when Windows is set to 96 DPI (dots per inch).   Storyline doesn't currently support 120 DPI. If your system is set to 120 DPI, you may experience erratic behavior, such as:   
*  Elements of the application are misplaced or distorted. 
*  Objects are misplaced or distorted when previewed or published. 
*  Zoomed images don't work as expected. 
*  Font sizes are incorrect after using the translation features.   Here's how you can switch to 96 DPI.

3) Re-install Articulate Storyline. 

Please follow the troubleshooting steps in this article to fix unexpected or erratic behavior in Articulate Storyline.

We are having similar problems in published versions. One person can be using it and it is fine and another user is having serious lag issues. We have installed custom next buttons and they show up for some people and not others.

Hi Melanie,

The majority of this thread deals with issue when creating the course, not running the published version of the course. Have you looked into what browsers, flash versions you're users are accessing the course through? Could there be an overall bandwidth issue associated with the site/LMS that is hosting your content or if all the users are in one location an overall limit or issue with internet speed? You'll want to make sure they're accessing the course using one of the supported browsers here.

For anyone looking for the article to adjust your DPI, I think the new link is: http://www.articulate.com/support/storyline/articulate-storyline-dpi-support

I am sure that everyone has tried this but since it is not mentioned in this thread... If you are sure there is no file corruption issue, I would advise updating your Graphics Driver.  It has fixed this issue for me. :)  I am running both SL 1 & SL 2 on a Windows 10 PC with Dual AMD HD 7770 in crossfire mode. Updating to the Beta driver 15.4 fixed the lag issue last time. :)

Good Luck

Thanks Thomas for that update and I'm happy to hear it's helped resolve the issues for you. 

Like everyone here, this slow response in going to the next slide was driving me crazy. The first course I loaded into Storyline 2 was an existing course created in Storyline 1. Client was very angry with delay caused by the new software. Had to regenerate it in Storyline 1 to keep the client happy. Followed all the threads, talked to everyone, to no avail. THEN THE ANSWER came when I looked at the Timeline for a basic slide. It is set for 5 seconds universally by Storyline 2. It delays Next Slide navigation even when the slide is set to advance manually by the user.  Drag this thing back to 1 second everywhere (there is no universal setting for this) except where you have duration-dependent items like narration or video and VOILA. Quick as a bunny. Don't know about any other hardware or Windows related issues reported here, but this has solved the problem for me (running Windows 7 Professional btw).

Thanks for popping in to share Jason :)

Hi Jason,

I did also want to check that you weren't using restricted or locked menu navigation in Storyline 2 - if so, that'll also impact your navigation with the next button. It won't allow the user to navigate forward until the timeline has ended if you have used either of those menu navigation methods. 

Thank you Jason! Changing the slide duration fixed all of my Next Slide navigation woes!

Glad to here Jason's suggestion helped you out Victoria! 

Beauty, Jason! Nailed it. This was driving me nuts. I was working with an embedded web object (HTML5 animation) and was pulling my hair out, as I thought the lag was a result of the object code....instead, when it was added it inserted another 250 frames into the timeline.

Thanks James for the update and glad this older thread helped you out! If you need anything else please feel free to let us know. 

Hi Ashley - I am in same boat as others in this thread and getting no where.

I have done all steps - reduced dpi to 96, reinstalled (twice), etc. and still taking 10-15 lags in getting to different parts of my video (let alone edit or do any changes).  The video is only 3 minutes long!

I am working locally.  The video file is not that big.  In fact, I took some sample videos at lowest video capture size (and  less than 15 seconds long) and STILL experience incredibly slow response trying to edit/work on a video.  I have no other applications open beyond the Storyline file.  The other rub, is that my computer has the same CPU (2.6 gig) and RAM (8 gig) as some of my colleagues and they are not having any issues.

There has to be fix to the very obvious issue others are experiencing.  

Please advise any clear cut resolutions I can try.

Thanks!

Tom

Hi Tom,

Thanks for reaching out here. I  think we'd want to take a look at your file to see what you're experiencing as this thread spans more than just Storyline 2 and a few different issues - some of which were resolved by the user such as Jason's last post. If you'd like you can attach the .story file here using the "add attachment" button or if you'd prefer to share it privately you can also send along here.