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[Areyar]

It has been awfully slow the last week or so.
Even the windows sound on startup sounds like it is suffering doppler effects.
When typing in word or a webpage such as this forum, the text lags behind sometimes for seconds.

All my drivers are updated and recent, windowsXP is updated, I regularly run CCleaner. My HDD is a SS so no fragmentation.
I've scanned with consequtive virus and malwarescanners.
started with AGV and adAware, after deinstalling using removal tool ran several online scanners, currently have Avast! and trendmicro RUbotted.
Nothing found in any scan.


Windows task manager:
My CPU is constantly at 50% even without anything running in the foreground, with a browser (firefox or safari doesn't matter) open, viewing a youtube movie is  impossible to make out the sound as CPU100% is dopplering the sound again.

Plenty of memory and pagefile. It is just my CPU that is being overloaded.
Each time I let the youtube video (or any other video/media file) run, CPU load increases by 40-60%, with a base of 30% and 30% for the browser this totals at more than 100%, causing stuttering and general laggyness.

I feel like I've tried everything (short of rolling back to a restore point of a month back)...
do any of you bay12-ers know anything else I can try?

Yours slowly,
Areyar

[Sensei]

Run some tests in safe mode. Is the stress there similar?

If not, you can probably delete a specific file related to the problem. Remember to check your list of processes (not applications) and see if you can find any obvious system hog. And run your antiviruses in safe mode too, of course.

[Areyar]

'll try safemode.

Switching to avast has improved things alot, previously bootup would take more than ten minutes!

[Jay]

I have to push this idea.  Have to.
It could be a dead heatsink fan.
Pretty much any small formfactor computer will have heat troubles unless the CPU is clocked back severely.  Losing your heatsink fan will obliterate what little cooling you had.
And because it's a laptop variant, there's no way for you to fix that yourself.
With reduced airspace, you get increased heat.  Short of watercooling, which would be unfeasible in such a small space, nothing's going to change that.
Heat causes the mobo to throttle back the core clock, which would result in your usage percentages increasing severely (as the denominator of the fraction is decreasing).
Hopefully that's not the case, but I'm a big proponent of the "LAPTOP (or similar) HEAT DISPERSION SUCKS" theory, as it is very very true.

[Areyar]

I just watched a Youtube video, which caused 100%ish CPU usage for about half an hour or so. My keyboard and backside of netbook were HOT.

Now I have rebooted in safe mode.
ran hitman pro, no problems found.
CPU is now at about 3%.casing feels cool as well.
I was suspecting a heatsink problem myself, but this safemode solution suggests a software problem is more likely.

I'll try another youtube video...
increases to 60% with only firefox/youtube.

I'll have to DL a benchmark proggy...got cpu burn101
Haven't got a CPU temperature sensor though.
ed: ah so that util only places a burden on the CPU, doesnt measure anything. :duh:
cpuspoeed: 1596.1 pretty close for an Atom.

your cooling problemm sounds likely..I still got waranty service IIRC. You sure there is nothing I can do personally?

[Sensei]

immerse your computer in water to keep it cool I think that sounds like a software deal if it doesn't have problems in safemode, like you said. I doubt faulty cooling systems enter into it (they're just crappy cooling systems).

[cganya]

you can try getting a usb powered lap fan. those work well sometimes. laptop design is usually really bad when it comes to venting heat but it's hard to get pissed about it, so little room to work with.

you likely do have a heat censor in your computer otherwise the computer would not know when to throttle down your CPU speed. off the top of my head i don't remember the name but there's a handy CPU fan controlling program that doubles as a heat monitor. think it might be something like CPUfan but i could be completely wrong.

[Blacken]

Check the BIOS for voltage draw readings.

[Areyar]

CPUID HWmonitor ?
CPU temp and ACPI temp are normal, 31 and 48C resp

I'm going to disable most of my startup progs and see.

[Vicomt]

Speedfan is what I use, shows everything it can find, with nice graphs.

[cganya]

Speedfan is what I use, shows everything it can find, with nice graphs.

thats the one

[Areyar]

Have that DLed as well, not installed though, no need:

The fan is working and component temp is within range,
it did heat up when run at 100% for extended periods, but that is rather a symptom of CPU overuse than lack of cooling.

The only recent changes I made to software before this started happening were:
-removed expired McAffee software,
-installed trial AGV by mistake,
-overwrote with AGV9Free.
-installed AdAware (IIRC)
-installed autoupdated drivers
 -Realtek Audio driver (yesterday installed a new update)
 -something else
The updater program still has an entry in startup that has parameters (eg besides the actual updateprog)
LGHWUpdate.exe
This may be related.
EDIT: but isn't deactivated all startup processes, but still get the stuttering win-logon music.

Currently doing a full system scan, will reboot with most of the startup stuff disabled ASAP.
Avast only came up with the 'digital freedom' specified path not being correct, this is the default screensaver AFAIK.

Meanwhile, I'll install drivermax to check on what drivers I have installed. (see post below)

[Areyar]

Hey! Cool avatar.
I liked the cartoon artstyle of the X-com cutscenes.

[Areyar]

DriverMax listed drivers (those that mention newer versions):

IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers
Intel(R) 82801GBM/GHM (ICH7-M Family) Serial ATA Storage Controller - 27C4      
8.2.0.1011   > 9.1.1.1016
Network adapters
Marvell Yukon 88E8040 PCI-E Fast Ethernet Controller      10.69.2.3 -> 11.22.3.3   
Atheros AR5007EG Wireless Network Adapter      7.6.1.160 -> 7.7.0.466
Sound, video and game controllers
Realtek High Definition Audio      5.10.0.5859 ->   5.10.0.5928
System devices
Intel(R) 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Root Port - 27D0      7.0.0.1020   -> 9.1.1.1020
Intel(R) 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Root Port - 27D4      7.0.0.1020   -> 9.1.1.1020
Intel(R) 82801G (ICH7 Family) SMBus Controller - 27DA      7.0.0.1020 ->   9.1.1.1020
Microsoft UAA Bus Driver for High Definition Audio      5.10.0.5010 latest
Intel(R) 82801 PCI Bridge - 2448      5.1.2600.5512 ->   9.1.1.1012
Intel(R) 82801GBM (ICH7-M) LPC Interface Controller - 27B9      7.0.0.1020   ->9.1.1.1020
PCI standard host CPU bridge      5.1.2600.5512 ->   9.1.1.1004

Oddly the Samsung (and LG) updaters did not install these...
I had hoped that with a nofrills netbook, the firmware update software would take care of this stuff by itself.
should I get these and install them?

[ChairmanPoo]

        Which antivirus do you have? The same thing used to happen to me. Restoring the system to an earlier version fixed the problems but they surged again after a while. Eventually, I installed avast, and after finding that I had virut (a nasty virus that infects many files in your HD), I had to format.
     After this I've been a while without having any slowdown problems. Thus, I attribute it to virut, but I don't really know this for certain (it took four months for the problems to appear in the first place. For all I know they might appear again). So, I am interested in learning if you have Virut as well.