AMD CPU is choking on games

[caggles]

Hey all

I have an AMD Phenom II X4 955. When I play many of my games, it chokes pretty severely and very often when it really, really shouldn't. It chokes on World of Warcraft, which is ridiculous. Anyone else heard of this problem, or have any idea of what's causing it?

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Nice to know, now, quit feeding it games, and give it electricity and it wont choke anymore

 

[caggles]

Sorry, my thread got posted before I was finished typing it

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

OK, so......

 

[orangegator]

I'll bet that your cpu is not your problem. But without a list of your system specs or more specific info on the problem, it's impossible to tell what it is. But my best guess from reading your post is that it's a PEBKAC issue.

 

[caggles]

A X4 955 is not going to choke on any game, period.

That's what I was thinking too, but in at least one of these games, it's definitely pegging one of the CPU cores.

Here are my system specs:

AMD PhenomII X4 955 Black Edition 3.2GHz AM3 CPU
ASUS M4A78T-E 790GX Motherboard
XFX Radeon HD 4870 X2 2GB 512-bit Video Card
OCZ Platinum 4GB DDR3 RAM
Corsair 750W 12V PSU

What I have noticed so far from doing a little troubleshooting is that while playing Rise of Legends, my CPU usage is at about 25% most of the time, as in, it's only capable of using one core and it's running the core at full power ALL the time. On the complete opposite side of the spectrum, when I play WoW, it freezes for a moment in a manner similar to the way Rise of Legends does, but when that happens, the CPU usage drops to zero and the game only starts again when it comes back up. And it's not just that the game's usage drops, it's that the entire CPU seems to stop for a second or so.

Those are the two games that I've been using enough recently to notice the problem and do a little troubleshooting, but I know that World of Goo and Starcraft don't cause any problems, and that TF2 does seems to have a similar issue. I've also looked into the possibility of the problem being caused by the Cool 'n' Quiet feature on my CPU, but I've tried both games with that feature both on and off and the problem still occurs.

Hopefully this info will help in narrowing down the problem

 

[xaira]

might i suggest getting the latest drivers, what os do you use, that setup is very powerfull, too powerfull even, it sounds like a software issue, or disc, what hdd r u using?

 

[TechnologyCoordinator]

it sounds like a software issue, or disc

It does seem somewhat similar to an issue I saw in the past where a flaky DVD-ROM drive would cause a game to stutter. If you have an extra optical drive you might want to try swapping it out.

 

[brett1042002]

I have the same CPU... when playing WoW my overall CPU usage is about 35%. My first core is around 80%... 2nd core about 50%... 3rd and 4th cores ~15%. The game is always running at 60 fps (v-sync enabled). I have never noticed any "choking" during gameplay. I don't think the CPU is to blame...

 

[scudst0rm]

Maybe a bios update? I remember hearing that the 955 would get stuck at 800MHz without a supporting bios. What does CPU-Z say? Are you running the latest bios?

Also, temps?

 

[caggles]

I'm using XP, and what's CPU-Z?

 

[xaira]

http://www.cpuid.com/download/cpuz/cpuz_152.zip

download run post screenshot

 

[jedimasterben]

It does seem somewhat similar to an issue I saw in the past where a flaky DVD-ROM drive would cause a game to stutter. If you have an extra optical drive you might want to try swapping it out.

Really? I've never heard of that, as games don't read from the CD but for a moment to make sure it's there.

What is your page file set at? What hard drive do you have? This may be the source of the throttling.

 

[TechnologyCoordinator]

What is your page file set at?

Good question. Some people, such as myself have enough RAM to disable the page file. But even if you still need it I find it's a good practice to make it a static page file, one that has the same maximum and minimum size.

 

[brett1042002]

Maybe a bios update? I remember hearing that the 955 would get stuck at 800MHz without a supporting bios. What does CPU-Z say? Are you running the latest bios?

Also, temps?

You sure you're not mistaking this for the Cool N' Quiet function? This would underclock the CPU when it is not being utilized (power savings). CPU-Z or other software would report the current frequency as something far less than the stock 3.2ghz. This is normal.

 

[jedimasterben]

Good question. Some people, such as myself have enough RAM to disable the page file. But even if you still need it I find it's a good practice to make it a static page file, one that has the same maximum and minimum size.

That's exactly what I do. I have mine set at 400MB, the recommended minimum for Windows 7. That way Windows only writes to it if necessary.

 

[caggles]

My page file initial size is 2046 MB and the max size is 4092 MB. Is that good or bad? And my HDD is 640GB 7200rpm

 

[jedimasterben]

I would set it to the same initial and maximum. If it ever goes crazy and starts writing to it and "thinks" that it needs more room, it will increase the size and begin to fragment, which will slow it down even more, but if it's a static size, then it can't do that.

 

[caggles]

Okay, so do I bring the initial up to the max value or bring the max down to the initial value?