If you own or are considering owning a 1201HA, there is a good chance that you will not be able to stream YouTube HD movies out of the box.  The GMA500 graphics were just not meant to handle that kind of content.  There are several suggestions you can take which may help improve performance, but there are no guarantees.

1. Increase the memory – it’s true that having more memory may not guarantee smoother video play but having more system resources means that you’ll be able to do more and do it easier.  The 1201HA only comes with 1GB of RAM.  Upgrading to 2GB should help.

2. Upgrading to Windows 7 – many people have reported that upgrading their netbook to Windows 7 helped with the ability to play online video.  This isn’t a cheap upgrade but if you already have a license for Windows 7 laying around, don’t be afraid to take the leap.

3. Overclock your processor – this is not something I’d recommend for just anyone to do but taking your 1.33GHz Z520 Atom processor to 1.4 or 1.5GHz may give you the extra power you need to help video play smoother.  If you don’t want to go through the work of overclocking your processor make sure that your netbook is in Super Performance mode.

4. CoreAVC – playing online video comes down to two things; hardware and codecs.  The codecs are what help decide how the video content is going to be decoded and played.  CoreAVC is one of the best options for playing online video and is priced at $9.99 for a limited time.

5. Remove extra programs – it isn’t a great option but having other programs running is taking away from the netbook’s ability to play online video.  Try to close everything else running on your 1201HA before you fire up YouTube.

Have any tips or tricks?  Feel free to share them in the comments.

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