Game Microstutter/lag/freeze possible cause my HDD ?

Mr D

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i upgraded from:
4gb ram ddr2
core 2 quad
gts 250 1gb

to:
8 gb ddr3
i5 3.4ghz
r9 290 tri x oc
mobo = asus z97A

basically upgraded everything , EXCEPT my hdds ( 5yr old 2tb wdc cavier green wd20earx ) and an hp one (which i just trashed recently ~super old like 7-8 yrs 500 gb-did nothing but slowed down program load ups).

the problem: before upgrading , i had started noticing uncanny freezes in games (which i ignored as i was upgrading soon). after upgrading , i started having high latency problems which took a lot of time to pin point.right now that 'seems' to be solved.

now , for the most part i dont see much stuttering (games rarely go below 45fps on ultra) , but sometimes the game just freeses like 1-2 sec even when going 40+. is this normal? or am i demanding too much from the rig?game i was playing : dragon age inquisition.
the HDD speed is below 7200rpm. is that a possible cause?
shud i get a higher rpm drive ? or what is the problem exactly?
in case you guys tell me to get a new hdd , shud i reinstall entire OS on the new HDD or keeping it secondary will work too ?
 

mamasan2000

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If the game is loading textures etc, could possibly be HDD. I have 2 old HDDS from 2006 but they are 7200 RPM, never noticed any slowdowns like you describe. I moved the game to SSD later tho, loading times are much shorter now when transitioning to other maps.

Whats the latency you talk about? "...high latency problems...".
Could be its not solved.
 

Mr D

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umm its the thing which u pin point with latency monitor. was getting super buffer underruns , poppy sounds , low performance etc. i got multiple driver issues with lantency mon, finally came down to hdd lag. the older one was 3gbps 500gig old drive. removed that and i am no longer expiriencing super lags i was before.

the last issue i got was this :
http://s12.postimg.org/w2eafbvyl/Untitled.png

after i resolved it , the only thing that pops up now while gaming/lagging is 'highest measured interrupt to process latency'

 

mamasan2000

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Yeah but that app only measures audio,right? Think I ran it once because I play music instruments on my PC sometimes.

I would look at soundcards, definately not use onboard stuff.
Turn off all autostart-stuff that aren't ABSOLUTELY ABSOLUTELY necessary. Turn off (disabled or manual, manual is generally a better option) services that aren't ABSOLUTELY necessary. Like Superfetch etc.
http://www.7tutorials.com/which-windows-services-are-safe-disable-when
Check for malware and viruses.

Plenty of stuff that can slow down computer for audio-stuff. I have an ASUS motherboard and their Tools Suite is just the worst if you want any performance out of your computer. So just because it's "official" doesn't make it any good.

 

Mr D

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i agree. i have the asus z97 a mobo . and most of the utilities . just ....suck.
audio problem is fixed for now . will try the process thingy and tell you tomorrow.
 

Mr D

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stoppping services didnt give me much of a boost.
how ever i did uninstall most of my monitoring softwares and found significantly reduced microstutter.
things i removed: tune up utilities, razor cortex (for some reason it increased lag after boosting) ,
things i disable before gaming: keyscrambler and antivirus
keeping softwares entirely manual startup sucks . but i wont be upgrading just at the moment so this fix is reasonably within acceptable range and also makes system stable.
 
Hi there Mr D,

WD Green is not really the best choice for a primary gaming drive. It is possible that the issue you are facing are drive related. I would advise you to test the drive with WD's Data Lifeguard Diagnostic tool. The test results will show you the overall health status of the drive.
Even if the drive is healthy, you will get performance improvement if you get a 7200 RPM drive(or even an SSD).
Also, if you get a new HDD, you can just put the more demanding programs and games on it. You can also clone your current drive to the new one and use it just for secondary storage afterwards.

WD's DLG tool: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=YWF94K


Cheers,
D_Know_WD
 

Mr D

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i did a check on it . had recently run a detailed analysis for bad sectors.no hits.
considering upgrade.

EDIT: upgraded to wd purple.now i dont have to stop all the processes to get max fps, but i could hear some mild stuttering in tbe background sometimes. still that 'highest measured interrupt to process latency" gives high reading when that happenes.
 

Mr D

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_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CONCLUSION
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Your system seems to have difficulty handling real-time audio and other tasks. You may experience drop outs, clicks or pops due to buffer underruns. One problem may be related to power management, disable CPU throttling settings in Control Panel and BIOS setup. Check for BIOS updates.
LatencyMon has been analyzing your system for 0:29:06 (h:mm:ss) on all processors.


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
SYSTEM INFORMATION
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Computer name: D-PC
OS version: Windows 7 Service Pack 1, 6.1, build: 7601 (x64)
Hardware: All Series, ASUS, ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC., Z97-A
CPU: GenuineIntel Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4670 CPU @ 3.40GHz
Logical processors: 4
Processor groups: 1
RAM: 8135 MB total


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU SPEED
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Reported CPU speed: 3398.0 MHz
Measured CPU speed: 3979.0 MHz (approx.)

Note: reported execution times may be calculated based on a fixed reported CPU speed. Disable variable speed settings like Intel Speed Step and AMD Cool N Quiet in the BIOS setup for more accurate results.


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
MEASURED INTERRUPT TO USER PROCESS LATENCIES
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The interrupt to process latency reflects the measured interval that a usermode process needed to respond to a hardware request from the moment the interrupt service routine started execution. This includes the scheduling and execution of a DPC routine, the signaling of an event and the waking up of a usermode thread from an idle wait state in response to that event.

Highest measured interrupt to process latency (µs): 1877.685556
Average measured interrupt to process latency (µs): 1.949859

Highest measured interrupt to DPC latency (µs): 260.362754
Average measured interrupt to DPC latency (µs): 0.479334


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
REPORTED ISRs
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Interrupt service routines are routines installed by the OS and device drivers that execute in response to a hardware interrupt signal.

Highest ISR routine execution time (µs): 282.882872
Driver with highest ISR routine execution time: HDAudBus.sys - High Definition Audio Bus Driver, Microsoft Corporation

Highest reported total ISR routine time (%): 0.060818
Driver with highest ISR total time: ataport.SYS - ATAPI Driver Extension, Microsoft Corporation

Total time spent in ISRs (%) 0.117352

ISR count (execution time <250 µs): 2420570
ISR count (execution time 250-500 µs): 0
ISR count (execution time 500-999 µs): 14
ISR count (execution time 1000-1999 µs): 0
ISR count (execution time 2000-3999 µs): 0
ISR count (execution time >=4000 µs): 0


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
REPORTED DPCs
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
DPC routines are part of the interrupt servicing dispatch mechanism and disable the possibility for a process to utilize the CPU while it is interrupted until the DPC has finished execution.

Highest DPC routine execution time (µs): 532.912596
Driver with highest DPC routine execution time: ataport.SYS - ATAPI Driver Extension, Microsoft Corporation

Highest reported total DPC routine time (%): 0.038115
Driver with highest DPC total execution time: rspLLL64.sys - Resplendence Latency Monitoring and Auxiliary Kernel Library, Resplendence Software Projects Sp.

Total time spent in DPCs (%) 0.1330

DPC count (execution time <250 µs): 10495129
DPC count (execution time 250-500 µs): 0
DPC count (execution time 500-999 µs): 10
DPC count (execution time 1000-1999 µs): 0
DPC count (execution time 2000-3999 µs): 0
DPC count (execution time >=4000 µs): 0


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
REPORTED HARD PAGEFAULTS
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Hard pagefaults are events that get triggered by making use of virtual memory that is not resident in RAM but backed by a memory mapped file on disk. The process of resolving the hard pagefault requires reading in the memory from disk while the process is interrupted and blocked from execution.

NOTE: some processes were hit by hard pagefaults. If these were programs producing audio, they are likely to interrupt the audio stream resulting in dropouts, clicks and pops. Check the Processes tab to see which programs were hit.

Process with highest pagefault count: svchost.exe

Total number of hard pagefaults 15120
Hard pagefault count of hardest hit process: 8032
Highest hard pagefault resolution time (µs): 829634.290759
Total time spent in hard pagefaults (%): 1.240653
Number of processes hit: 24


_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
PER CPU DATA
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 0 Interrupt cycle time (s): 52.629518
CPU 0 ISR highest execution time (µs): 282.882872
CPU 0 ISR total execution time (s): 8.196663
CPU 0 ISR count: 2420584
CPU 0 DPC highest execution time (µs): 532.912596
CPU 0 DPC total execution time (s): 8.658791
CPU 0 DPC count: 10258015
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 1 Interrupt cycle time (s): 27.591234
CPU 1 ISR highest execution time (µs): 0.0
CPU 1 ISR total execution time (s): 0.0
CPU 1 ISR count: 0
CPU 1 DPC highest execution time (µs): 180.323131
CPU 1 DPC total execution time (s): 0.213884
CPU 1 DPC count: 55637
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 2 Interrupt cycle time (s): 5.839248
CPU 2 ISR highest execution time (µs): 0.0
CPU 2 ISR total execution time (s): 0.0
CPU 2 ISR count: 0
CPU 2 DPC highest execution time (µs): 112.665686
CPU 2 DPC total execution time (s): 0.150519
CPU 2 DPC count: 66344
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
CPU 3 Interrupt cycle time (s): 17.073694
CPU 3 ISR highest execution time (µs): 0.0
CPU 3 ISR total execution time (s): 0.0
CPU 3 ISR count: 0
CPU 3 DPC highest execution time (µs): 148.477928
CPU 3 DPC total execution time (s): 0.266442
CPU 3 DPC count: 115143
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________