Extreme lag issues

[geis]

Hi guys, my gaming computer was recently outfitted with a new copy of windows 8. After installing and using it for a little over a week, everything was running fine until i joined a server for battlefield 3 and my computer began crashing. After ending the task and restarting the computer, all I have had is multiple issues with my computer and lag. Everything I try to run that should run with relative ease, such as games and programs, now suffer from terrible lag after this incident. The task manager has very little tasks running and my cpu and memory usage are both low to, mind you this is a pretty powerful rig (3.2 ghz quad core CPU, 4 gigs RAM, and radeon hd6850 graphics). Now i fear I will have to reinstall windows and all my programs, even though they only take a measly 60 gigs out of 500 gigs of space on my HDD. Can anyone help me with what can be causing this extreme lag after a single game crash/lag out?

 

[rgd1101]

and my computer began crashing.

what does that mean, bsod? run check disk?

full spec?

 

[geis]

Not BSOD
Full specs:
CPU : AMD 955 BE (3,2ghz 4core)
GPU: Radeon 6850
RAM: 4 Gb Patriot
HDD: 500 Gb Seagate Barrucuda
MOBO: Asus M4A79XTD

Basically, I do not have many things installed on my PC, haven't visited any remotely malicious (or potentially malicious) sites, ran full scan using AVAST, restarted, checked task manager to see CPU usage etc.
Literally I have been on most of the day, was playing Battlefield 3 just fine. I got bored of the server I was playing on so I joined another completely secure server and after about 5 mins my game started to lag out, so naturally I tried to all-tab to the desktop to the end the process and nearly froze my computer trying to do so (usually I can alt tab in battlefield or any other game no problem) Ever since then my computer has been sluggish, especially with games it is now having a hard time loading the images on the screen. For example, if I sit in one spot in a game it will run okay, then when I start moving around and whatnot it completely lags out. Any help is greatly appreciated as I hope I do not have to reinstall windows and my programs.

 

[geis]

i.e by crashing I mean more of freezing for periods of time if that helps

 

[Nedal0]

Have you by any chance checked your PC temps on Idle and under Load ?

Did you clean Install Windows 8 or upgraded ?

 

[swifty_morgan]

try booting in safe mode and do a scan or two. also run malwarebytes and/or superantispyware and/or a separate on line scan ( anti-virus ) other than what you have. sounds like a cookie parade.

 

[geis]

The pc temps have been nice and low, not too low however, even under load. This is a clean install of windows 8 after reformatting the disc with the windows 8 install software. I ran malwarebytes and Spybots S&D and both found nothing, not in safe mode however. After getting on this time it seems to have gotten better, but still not quite at the same speed that it was at before. For instance my games are actually playabe now with the framerate and they don't crash but still way more laggy than ever before. I still don't see how a game crash could affect my system this way, all my friends never have these types of problems :<

 

[Nedal0]

What Anti Virus software do you have on the PC ? Are these games Originals or cracked online downloads ?

 

[darth pravus]

Sounds like a HHD issue. Do a S.M.A.R.T check or similar to see if it's failing. Can you hear it excessively reading when moving in games?

 

[swifty_morgan]

go to windows update.

 

[johnbl]

-check event log for disk event indicating a retired block
and another entry indicating a reset too your disk controller.

-if so, the disk is not responding within the expected timeout and the system send a reset.

-you can try all the updates, intel chipsets, bios, ... but also
try and set BIOS to hot swap your drive if you have this setting. It will cause the system to act better with the controller.
- sure, also you can set the power management performance to high and tune it for what you really need.

 

[geis]

I run Avast Antivirus free as well as malwarebytes and Spybots S&D. Non of these games are not cracked, as I enjoy multiplayer and the only way to get on the servers is with legitimate copies, as well as the fact that I do not believe in piracy. Also @johnbl I do not completely understand what you are suggesting for me to do. I haven't ever needed to set my system to high unless running highly advanced games or streaming, and I have noticed a slight drop in multitasking as well. Contrary to what system told me, it has not yet downloaded the windows updates it said that it would multiple days ago, so I am downloading those at this time to see if that helps.

 

[johnbl]

-I just suggested to set the system to high performance in the control power setting in case it was one of the new features for low power system with the new processors. To determine if that was the cause of your delay.

-In particular, to save power the system may queue up some lower priority requests and not handle them until a higher priority request comes in. Some people had problems in the beta with this but they should have been fixed at that time.
Same with the BIOS hot swap setting, turn it on see if your problem goes away. It will force the system to handle some delays in a different way.

-If it does, then you have a better idea of the problem cause.

 

[swifty_morgan]

if it hasn't downloaded like it said it was several days ago............. which could mean while you're tying to game it's also trying to download the updates..., and/or you have a poor internet connection ?

finish downloading and installing the windows updates, and when it restarts go back and look for more. When it's done ........... shut down auto updates and any other app that you allow to update automatically. Stuff like that can really put a damper on other on line activities.

check windows update every Tuesday and see what it has for you to download.... if anything. and manually check for updates on your other apps once a week or just before doing scans.

 

[geis]

It said that it found 7 important updates a couple days ago and said they would be installed automatically, but I guess they never installed for some reason. My computer is perfectly capable of handling downloads while gaming, i have 25mb down. and easily manually installed the updates. Now everything seems to be running better, but even when I didn't have the updates installed my ping in the games was very low and I don't see how that can make my computer run slower, furthermore I do not know why my computer didn't just automatically install them like it is set to do. I guess I'll just cross my fingers this doesn't happen again, by (as far as I can tell so far, not completely sure yet) everything is back to normal, thanks for the help gentleman.

 

[geis]

Alright so I just had the same issue again when trying to run battlefield. It runs perfect for about 45mins or so, and then all of a sudden starts to lag out. When quitting the game (it runs on a web browser), the browser plugin needed to run the game has a message saying it is unresponsive, then disappears immediately. Afterwords, I try to run another game with my browser open in the background to play music, as I always do with this certain game, and it always runs fine. That is, when I haven't been playing battlefield, and after my battlefield game lags out it seems to affect my system's ability to run games while the browser is open (chrome). Even this morning, the night after the incident, my computer still struggles to run games with the browser open, and, as it did last time this happened, it slowly gets faster and faster every time I get back on the computer until its back to normal. Even after uninstalling the browser plugin it still doesn't run perfectly right away. Now that I realize the problem is somehow linked to running battlefield, does anyone have any ideas of how it is being caused and how to fix it. I never had this problem on windows7. Should I just re install battlefield and see if that fixes it? Any help will be greatly appreciated.

 

[swifty_morgan]

what do you have for a connection ? why would you have the browser open for anything but the game ? what's running through windows firewall ? what's running on start-up ?

start/search/msconfig--------- look under start up and services.

don't have messaging-email notify open or anything else.

 

[technoholic]

This stuttering is about visuals only? i mean do you get corrupted sound too? Check your GPU driver. Some catalyst driver version(s) may be causing this. Try to completely uninstall your catalyst and try an earlier or newer driver. Let's see if this helps. 12.11 is still beta, you can try using 12.10 or maybe 12.7 (this is quite stable one afaik)

 

[technoholic]

This stuttering is about visuals only? i mean do you get corrupted sound too? Check your GPU driver. Some catalyst driver version(s) may be causing this. Try to completely uninstall your catalyst and try an earlier or newer driver. Let's see if this helps

 

[geis]

what do you have for a connection ? why would you have the browser open for anything but the game ? what's running through windows firewall ? what's running on start-up ?

start/search/msconfig--------- look under start up and services.

don't have messaging-email notify open or anything else.

I can almost assure you that my internet is not the problem, and I am not as much of a newbie with computers that I might be coming across as, but I know you are only asking these questions to help, so thanks. My startup programs have been configured to be exactly how I want them, but if it is crucial for you to know my startup programs include : AMD catalyst control center, Skype , F.Lux, avast, and my silencer mouse drivers. I have the browser open to run battlefield, but when I play my other game I enjoy listening to pandora radio station, and have NEVER had problems running both, it only starts lagging the game (moderately) /browser audio (slightly) after having lagged out on battlefield. Now after it happened to me the first time when I originally made this thread earlier last week, I installed the windows updates and my computer (eventually) came back to normal and was running great again, easily handling having the browser open with multiple apps running and the other game as well. I do not have messaging-email notify open, yet even if I did my computer would be able to handle that easily when it is running normally. I have all the standard windows apps that come with windows 8 running through firewall as well as a few games (including battlefield), other than that, the only notable one is punkbuster A & B, which is required to play on Battlefield services (to prevent hackers and such from screwing with the game). Not sure if you need more specific information, fee free to ask and once again thanks for the help/

 

[geis]

This stuttering is about visuals only? i mean do you get corrupted sound too? Check your GPU driver. Some catalyst driver version(s) may be causing this. Try to completely uninstall your catalyst and try an earlier or newer driver. Let's see if this helps

Are you talking about my catalyst Vision control center?

 

[swifty_morgan]

you seem too sure of yourself. here's my take. your high end computer isn't that high end. the processor is lacking and your video card isn't the best for playing BF3.

I was asking so I could give you some kind of idea what you need to do to help. ......... lower resolution and lowered game settings are the first thing to come to mind.

How many sound drivers do you have running ? on board/HD-HDMI from the video card are just 2 that will give you problems running together............

 

[johnbl]

If a resource is not getting released correctly you will get this problem. But it will not be caused by your connection. Start resource monitor and watch the amount of memory being used creep up while you are playing your game. In particular, enter a game to load the map, then leave the game and enter another game to load another map. After loading and unloading a bunch of maps, your system might be out of memory and have start a nasty lag because of the lack or resources. if you exit the program you would expect the memory to be released. It it is not it is a bug and you have to figure out who is screwing up. Just make sure you update your key drivers before you spend a bunch of time looking at it. Really sucks to find out it was a know bug fixed months ago.

 

[geis]

you seem too sure of yourself. here's my take. your high end computer isn't that high end. the processor is lacking and your video card isn't the best for playing BF3.

I was asking so I could give you some kind of idea what you need to do to help. ......... lower resolution and lowered game settings are the first thing to come to mind.

How many sound drivers do you have running ? on board/HD-HDMI from the video card are just 2 that will give you problems running together............

I have my battlefield at setting that can easily be ran by my computer, and, as i stated before, I never had these problems on windows7. Not once. I'm not sure if you are understanding that the game runs perfectly for a time, and then randomly decides to lag out and crash the browser plugin. These problems were never experienced by me on windows7, and I do realize that this is only mid-range computer. I do not have any sound drivers running, my headset's drivers do not run on this OS.

 

[geis]

If a resource is not getting released correctly you will get this problem. But it will not be caused by your connection. Start resource monitor and watch the amount of memory being used creep up while you are playing your game. In particular, enter a game to load the map, then leave the game and enter another game to load another map. After loading and unloading a bunch of maps, your system might be out of memory and have start a nasty lag because of the lack or resources. if you exit the program you would expect the memory to be released. It it is not it is a bug and you have to figure out who is screwing up. Just make sure you update your key drivers before you spend a bunch of time looking at it. Really sucks to find out it was a know bug fixed months ago.

I am going to look into reinstalling the graphics drivers, but I never had these problems even when playing on a bunch of maps on windows7. Since I just installed the newest things available last week (thats when I installed windows8) I do not see how anything can be that out of date. I will look into this further though