View Full Version : What is the cause of this slowdown?
OK, here is my problem. From time to time, I get some serious slowdown. Like when playing the game Roller Coaster Tycoon (yes, I like that game). The game will just stop, I will be scrolling the accross the screen, and it will just stop dead in its tracks for up to 5 seconds, then go like it should. It does it in Tiger Woods 2001, and some other games. Is this a video card problem? Or a memory problem? It does this wrether I am overclocked or not too. Actually it seems worse without an overclock. A couple of pointers will be appreciated. By the way, I dont hear the hd when this happens either, I know that if a game is hitting the swap file it has a tendency to slow down like this.
does it happen only playing that game? ever on the desktop?
Yeah, sometimes I get slowdown from the desktop, or just surfing the net.
My friend is having exactly the same problem on his P4 1.6G + DDR system....initially I thought it was overclocking but turned out to be not....still haven't found out what the problem is.....but I am thinking it's the DDR RAM....
It looks to me there is problem when computer was in process of copying data from HDD to RAM, it was not done properly....
TUK101, would be interested to know your system spec....see if we can find something similiar
The system my friend has:
Pentium 4 1.6G Northwood
ASUS P4S333 motherboard
256 2700PC DDR RAM
GeForce2 MX
Wireless Logitech Mouse and Keyboard
Evilsizer
07-17-02, 12:38 PM
I Have the same problem to TUK101 and i have the same mobo and my cpu is running at stock speeds. I dont remember exactly what happened but one time it stopped doing it it was something in the bios i changed. I for the life of me cant remember. I have gone back and looked the bios over several times and still cannot figure it out. I wonder if OL man has had that problem too! I will keep looking and changing stuff in the bios. I'll let you know if something works to correct the problem.
Check out your HD...maybe it's not optimized or it's a slow model
It could also be a ram problem.....
Originally posted by Evilsizer
I Have the same problem to TUK101 and i have the same mobo and my cpu is running at stock speeds. I dont remember exactly what happened but one time it stopped doing it it was something in the bios i changed. I for the life of me cant remember. I have gone back and looked the bios over several times and still cannot figure it out. I wonder if OL man has had that problem too! I will keep looking and changing stuff in the bios. I'll let you know if something works to correct the problem.
Hi Evilsizer,
thanks for the help.
Just wondering, have you tried RAM's CAS options?
OK guys. I have tried setting the ram to cas 2, and no change, cas 3 no change. The only thing that I havent tried yet for the ram is setting it back from 5/7 to 6/8 (or from turbo to fast). My hard drive is a 7200 rpm 30 gig. As for my system specs I guess that some of you dont look at the sig. Anyways, I have an ABIT ST6 mobo (non raid version), 1.1 gig Celeron, 256 mb of Crucial CAS 2 ram, 128 mb of PC150 RAM, and Windows XP. I also have the chip clocked at 1460@133 fsb. But like I said, I am haveing this problem even more so without an overclock. It sounds like I am not the only one with this problem, so hopefully we can figure this out.
i agree with TASOS, that sounds like a hard disk related issue.
Evilsizer
07-18-02, 12:29 AM
hey otto it cant be im using (1) ata 66 (1)ata 100 and it can not be a ram problem using same cas2 timeings and ram from my 933 overclock and that machine never had this problem. The options in the bios for the st6 i think it has to due with the USB support by OS or Bios try switching them. Or my theroy is it may have to due with the vid mod. After undueing it the problem went away. but since i neve tried the machine before the mod im not 100% sure. I only ran the machine once with out the mod. Since i dont need the extra voltage since my 1.2ghz will do 1.5ghz @ 1.55v so i will be undueing shortly after the replacement of the poorly desinged hsf i got even after switching to a higher cfm fan.
Iamghey
07-18-02, 09:32 AM
During a "slow down", does your CPU usage jump up a lot? (Say... from 2% to 58%?) My brand new system does that...
Well, the problem has diminished some since I put in a TI200 vid card last night. Another thing too, playing around with the CAS does seem to affect how much it does this. Both of my sticks of ram are capable of running at CAS 2, since both are rated for it. But it seems that if I set the timings to CAS 2 on this board that it causes the slowdown when overclocked. I definately cannot set the ras timings to 2 either, as the machine then has problems loading programs.
I too get this annoying "feature"...... :mad:
But this on an AMD based system with Windows 2000Pro....and yeah......, I know this at strictly Intel, but I thougth that it might be interesting trying to find out what causes it.
Everything freezes about 5. sec. specially when surfing the net.
I dont think it could be the HD because I have just changed this from a IBM 60GXP to WD800JB and this annoying "thing" didnt change at all.....
I suspect IE 6.0 :confused: to be the big bad wolf here (can't remember to have had this problem prior to upgrading.....).
LYRA
I just installed the RIVA tuner for the vid card, and found a refresh rate fix for the nvidia cards within this program. It seems to have helped this problem out too, so maybe it is an Nvidia problem combined with windows xp/2000. Idunno, just a thought.
just a thought, may you would like to try disabling the nvidia helper service from running in the background, which must be one of the common thigs between you ppl getting the same problem.
somone posted about this service in the video and sound cards forum once and there was a link to somewhere on internet recommending the service to be disabled under WXP.
just a thought...
Evilsizer
07-20-02, 12:19 AM
sorry i was not reading carefully in this thread... my slow down or problem i have is with the usb mouse not responding for a few secs.
HaywirE
07-20-02, 03:13 PM
Poor Power, or you may be just need to format.
Evilsizer, what OS are you running? I know that whenever I have ahd the problem that you are having with the mouse freezing up, it was almost always a program confilcting with another. Check your startup programs and see if you have a few that do not need to be activated.
Evilsizer
07-21-02, 12:37 AM
i have no programs starting up and for power issues im using a antec true 380 watt psu. I think it has to do with the usb hub and my sound card using the same irq but i can not change it so i have to move the sound card to another slot....'
Well there you go. Hopefully you get your problems fixed. As for mine, I think that I have pretty much fixed it. Changing the CAS speed back to "2" and fsb to 133 seemed to help, and the TI200 vid card really seems to speed things up too. I really just think that the problem is mainly in some of my games and trying to run them within Windows XP. Love the OS now that I have worked some of the bugs out, but some of my games really do not seem to play well with it. Good luck to all of you who say that you share the same problem as I have had.
for anyone with periodic lag> try disabling norton auto-protect when you play a game. also microsoft office likes to install that fast find thing, it lags your system up periodically for its own amusement. just delete it out of your start up folder in start menu > programs.
Originally posted by Evilsizer
i have no programs starting up and for power issues im using a antec true 380 watt psu. I think it has to do with the usb hub and my sound card using the same irq but i can not change it so i have to move the sound card to another slot....'
Evilizer,
that's an interesting finding...it might also well be the cause on my friend's PC....I'll try that tomorrow.
TUK101, looks like to be RAM-related problem as well hey? The thing is my friend has DDR RAM running at CAS3....well, maybe I should either try 2 or lower other speed ratings for the memory.
Originally posted by JBatOC
Evilizer,
that's an interesting finding...it might also well be the cause on my friend's PC....I'll try that tomorrow.
TUK101, looks like to be RAM-related problem as well hey? The thing is my friend has DDR RAM running at CAS3....well, maybe I should either try 2 or lower other speed ratings for the memory.
ddr ram can only run at 2 or 2.5, normal sdram can run at 2 or 3
Originally posted by Demont
ddr ram can only run at 2 or 2.5, normal sdram can run at 2 or 3
yup. Sorry, I remember wrong. It's actually set to 2.5 as default in BIOS. Myave I should try to change to 2 then.
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