Computer stutter / lag every 4 seconds

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domauron

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let me post my computer specs first:
Processor: AMD Athlon 64 Processor 3800+ 2.41Ghz
RAM: 2x1G sticks bought from ebuyer
Motherboard: WinFast 6150K8MD - GeForce 6150 chipset
Master Harddrive:SEAGATE ST380011A 80GB
Slave Harddrive: Western Digital WD1200JB 120GB
PSU: (updated) 530W Hyper PSU - {35A on 12V rail and 30A on 5V rail}
Gfx card: Sapphire X1950 PRO 256MB PCI-e
Keyboard/Mouse: Wireless Logitech MX3000
Operating System: XP Professonal SP2

anyway, yeah i bought the x1950 gfx card yesterday and installed it and the ATI catalyst drivers that came with the cd, everything was fine to begin with, but then i noticed that after about 5-10 minutes of playing a game the computer will stutter/lag pretty much exactly every 4 seconds!

The lag/stutter will stop the game in its tracks for about 0.5 of a second and then will continue, it also mucks up the audio, makes it jutter (if thats a word)

The lag will continue after ive left the game as well, onto my desktop, and doesnt show any signs of stopping, for example, now just movinhg my mouse around, the mouse will stop every 4 seconds etc

rebooting my computer has ocasionally fixed the problem, but sometime it boots up with the lag - the only thing which seems to bring on the lag however, is by playing a game (in my example i tried it out on GTR2 and Guildwars - got lag in both)

I have tried various things to solve this already - all of the test preformed had the X1950 gfx card in apart from test 4, i will list them here:

1. everytime i get lag i checked task manager to see if any processes were spiking and using the cpu - NO CPU SPIKAGE DURING LAG
2. Uninstalling drivers (running with default) - STILL GET LAG
3. Reinstalling ATI up to date cat drivers -STILL GET LAG
4. Taking graphics card out and using motherboard Nvidia 6150 - ***DO NOT GET LAG***
5. Running MEMtest on my memory - NO PROBLEMS WITH MEMORY
6. Checking core temperature - DOESNT SEEM TO GO ABOVE 59C UNDER INTENSE GAMING (not ideal but shuddnt cause problems)
7. Disabled all antivirus - STILL GET LAG
8. Booted into safe mode - STILL GET LAG
9. Turned off indexing service/system restore - STILL GET LAG
10. Tried taking the side off my case and letting cool air in - STILL GET LAG
11. Tried graphics in both of the two DVI connections in my gfx card - STILL GET LAG ON BOTH

Think ive done a few more things but cant remember:

A few observations ive made as well:

1. My PSU is clearly not very good, only 305W and my gfx card recommends 450W - however I know that PSU tend to be overrated and that u normally dont need as high W as they recommend, and in the BIOS my V settings look alrite - also because of the periodical nature of the lags (every 4 seconds pretty precisely) It leads me to believe that this is probably not PSU problem - even tho i cud clearly use a new one - maybe you know different from me im no expert?

2. Also, because of lagging in safe mode it leads me to beleive that its probably a hardware issue not a software (I also fresh installed windows XP the day before)

3. Maybe my graphics card is overheatting? Im not sure if you can monitor the temperature of the X1950, however i doubt it would be this anyway, as im still lagging about 30 minutes after playing a game, and all ive been doing is writing on this forum! so nothing intensive, the temp shud have come down

4. Every time it lag, somthing from the inside of my computer makes a very light scratching noise for the duration of the lag - im pretty sure its from the graphics card, but might be from the harddrive in which case might mean a harddrive problem?

I have also attached my dxdiag.txt file for anyone who wants the details

Thanks a lot and sorry about the essay! thought it best to provide you with a lot of info!

Any help would be very very very appreciated im going crazy!!!!
Cheers
Dom
 
oh also should add i had installed Realtek High Definition audio drivers, it lagged with them and also lagged without them which probably means its not a audio conflict or whatever

cheers
 
The X1950 PRO requires 450 watts with at least 30 amps on the 12 volt rail. I think that's your problem since the Nvidia 6150 does work with the PSU. Buy a PSU that has (at least) 30 amps on 12v. It's mando to have reserve power. Good Luck.
 
well like i said i think thats unlikely seen as it stops pretty much every 4 seconds, but im going to try the card in my friends computer later on today and tell you the results!!

cheers for reply
Dom
 
Be sure that the pc you try it in has 450 watts and 30 amps (at least) on the 12 volt rail. I'm telling you that if your PSU isn't the entire problem, it's still a huge issue. I have fired up a lot of high power GPU's lately and theymust
 
(sorry about the link)...MUST have the mimimum system requirements. The every 4 second thing is probably the PSU really pushing, then fading, over and over. Finally I think it would eventually give up working at all. The high power GPU's usually need the PSU upgraded along with it.
 
hePLPP MEE

heya, i upgraded my power pack its now 520W with 38A on the 12V rail and 30A on the 5V rail.

Unfortuantly Im still having the same problem with the lag so Please any more comments suggestions or ideas would be very welcome as im at a complete loss =(

cheers
Dom
 
Did you uninstall the drivers for the GeForce 6150 and disable the same in the BIOS? Have you overclocked anything?
 
heya, thanks for replys, i dont think its a driver problem.

yeh got all the latest drivers, disabled in bios and tried in safemode which use generic drivers - still lags

Ive also booted into ubantu off a live CD and it also lagged which rules out the operating system, and probably the drivers.

Anyway, Ive done a bit more experimenting, I was playing a game and played until it started lagging, and then I turned off the power switch and booted back up - it was lagging

this suggests to me that heat might be the problem.

im not sure if theres a temperature control on my gfx card - Radeon ATI X1950 Pro PCI-e

how can i check the temp?
 
All MoBos come with a temp sensor for at least he CPU, often another one for the MoBo itself. As for testing the GPU temp, don't know.

Install Lavalys EVEREST Home Edition (free). It will give you the temp sensor readings.

How many fans are in your system?
 
i dont have any case fans in my computer, theres a heatsink fan for the cpu obviously, and theres one attached to the card as well, obviously,

no extra fans tho, I dont have any case fans.

I have tried running the game with the side off my case (surely thats better than any fan) and it still lags...

I installed SpeedFan and got the readings i could off it, they were as follows:

Temp1:40C
Temp2: 44C
Temp3: 10C
Local: 46C
Remote: 51C
HD0: 48C
HD1: 38C
Core:48C

None of them really mean anything to me apart from the bottom 3, which from what i cant see while not perfect shouldnt cause any problems
 
Temps are look decent but I don't trust these cheap temp sensors on MoBos anyway. Did you monitor the temps as you played games?

I'd still install a system fan to help vent air out of the chassis. It makes a big difference.

Any suggestions by the video card manufacturer at their web site?
 
similar

not sure how helpful this will be but i had a very similar problem except it only came up when i played warcraft but it did persist to the desktop for a few mind then dissapeard, in the end it was a driver problem.
have you tried just taking out the graphics card and running it on intergrated graphics to see if it persists? always good to rule out your mobo or narrow it down to the card.
also i i cant stress how important a good PSU is enough, fried quite a few over the years.

Hope i was a little help at least.
 
I'd try replacing the thermal grease on the X1950 Pro with Artic Silver. I had an X1900XTX at one point and the heat sink had a huge (about the size of a pencil and a few mm deep) hole in the middle of the contact area that had been filled with thermal grease. Maybe you have a similar situation and need to replace the card.
 
I had a similar problem to with a fairly new dell and a five month old Geforce fx 5200 grahics card. My comp would stutter at least every two seconds when playing games. I didn't even play any hard core games (not like that card could play them anyway). I conversed with PNY techs for a very long time about it and they told my it was probally a software issue, which I found it probably wasn't. I eventually turned on my Hyperthreading for my dell and it solved my problem, not sure why but it did. Don't now if this helps any but I thought I would tell you anyway.

later and good luck
 
It's your psu. 1st what psu do you have? Hiper 530 or 520?

http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=205763

I do not see any 520's.
The 530's
Type M v2 is 30amps
Type M v3 is 32amps
Type R is 28amps
Which is yours?
The X1950Pro needs 30amps
You have 2 hard-drives, how about any DVD/CD drives?

Read the link posted above, I don't know where you got your amp figures from but 12vA+12vB= amps is incorrect
 
Hey Dom, did you solve your problem?

I have exactly the same issue - the lag every 4 seconds. Seems to start if I've been playing a game for a while or if I render videos (that seems to max the CPU put for a period of time).

A Warm-boot / "Restart" of Windows doesn't get rid of it. I have to shut the machine down for a minute or so and then start it again - this works almost all of the time except 1 instance where it didn't (to resolve, I just shut the machine down again, left it a minute, started up again and OK).

A couple of interesting observations though:

(1) I have the same MoBo and Processor as you
(2) I don't get the problem with the onboard graphics
(3) I can't be 100% but I'm pretty sure that the problem started when I put a new graphics card in (NVIDIA GeForce 8500GT)

My processor does run quite hot (60 degs C) but that's the same whether running with Graphics card or onboard video (and as I mentioned, I don't get the problem with onboard).

Be interested to know if you resolved your issue and what you did - it's driving me mad.

Cheers
 
Hi,

I'm another person with exactly the same problem.

My configuration:
6150K8MD-8EKRSH Athlon 64 3200+
2 x 512 MB RAM
HDD Samsung SATA SP2504C
PSU: Modecom 300W

I'm using onboard VGA and audio and mouse stops like in your case. First I was using MS Vista Home Premium, then installed MS Windows XP. Still the same problem, maybe not so often. It is even not required to run a game, it's enough to reload page in internet explorer.
First I thought it was a problem with hard disk. I started some benchmarks, and some of them showed that file transfer speed is too slow on some files. So I decided to move the partition out of the "slow area". Didn't help either. I tested Microsoft HD audio drivers, drivers from foxconnchannel site, drivers from Realtek site. No success.
What we have common in configuration is MB, so it's 90 % the problem.
I found out that many people all over the world have the same problem with this mb. We should ask directly foxconn.

best regards
Peter
 
Make sure that onboard graphics are disabled in your bois and that all drivers and software for the onboard are uninstalled also.

It may be necessary to boot into safe mode, then remove all devices in device manager/ display adapters. Then reboot into normal mode and run the install for your new card.
 
"Partial" Solution

Thanks for the reply Rik - unfortunately, already tried all that - no difference. Even went back to the onboard graphics. Still got the problem.

The problem only seemed to happen when playing games or doing stuff with video - things that max'd the CPU out for a period of time, so I ran a couple of stress tests for several hours over a couple of weeks:

Prime95's Torture Test from mersenne.org/freesoft.htm and
Jam-Software's HeavyLoad from jam-software.com/freeware/index.shtml

This didn't repro the problem, so I sort of ruled out temperature and the CPU being max'd over long periods.

Then I found somebody who had the same problem (same mobo) but running Ubuntu. So I ruled a Windows driver problem out - concentrated on hardware / Bios problems.

Put a new PSU in - Jeantech Storm 700w - still got the problem.

So then I tried a few things in the Bios and stumbled on a "partial" solution. I say "partial" as I still get a lag once in a while - perhaps 4 or 5 times a day but certainly not every 4 seconds constantly and not enough to really p!ss me off anymore.

Still can't work out why it helped (if anybody has any suggestions I'd be glad to hear them), but here's what I did:

(1) In the BIOS select the "PC HEALTH STATUS" menu
(2) Change the "Smart Fan Control" from "Disabled" to "Enabled"
(3) Leave all of the temperature settings as default
(4) Save changes, exit and re-boot.

So that's where I am now. Thought about upgrading the BIOS, but I can live with it as it is now and I don't really want to rock the boat.

Hope this helps.
 
I had that problem for ages. I tried testing the memory and kept getting mixed results and i also thought it might be the graphics card so i used the onboard but it still didn't fix it.

I kept getting the problem when using Azureus and anything else. The CPU was running at around 60c.

In the end i cleaned off the thermal paste from the cpu, gpu and heatsinks (think i put too much on previously anyway) and re-applied some more (correctly this time) and i havn't had the problem since. CPU runs at about 40c now.

6150K8MD-8EKRSH Athlon 64 4000+
3 x 512mb DDR333
ATI X600 256MB
 
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