CPU Hits 100% no matter what game I run!!

[tom_green]

Whatever the game may be,Far Cry 1 or Far cry 3,my CPU hits ~100% while running em and I did check for spywares,malwares and all of those,I've got none of it!!

Here's a screenshot of the task manager while running NFS Shift 2 at 640*480....

I'm dead tired of trying to fix this,my mates run the same games but their CPU doesn't cross 60%,,it just takes away all the fun of gaming when your PSU and CPU fans start sounding like they're fitted to a diesel engine!!!

My specs
CPU- AMD Phenom 2 X2 550-3.1 GHz (not overclocked)
MotherBoard - Asus M4N68T-M series
Ram- Corsair (2+2) 4 GB DDR3
GPU- Sapphire HD 7750 1GB GDDR5 (not overclocked)
OS- Win7 Ultimate 64 bit
HDD-500 GB
Monitor- 18.5" VGA LCD
PSU- Some chinese company named 'mercury',450 Watts

Could it be that by GPU is underpowered???
Oh and if you're wondering what happens while I'm not gaming... the CPU usage stays well within 50%... the only other time it reaches 90+% is when I'm converting video files from one format to another......

 

[kiezz]

Oh and if you're wondering what happens while I'm not gaming... the CPU usage stays well within 50%

when you say not gaming is this while doing nothing else cause 50% usage means its doing something taxing enough just think its 50% then the game as well,
click to show processes from all users and repost

 

[tom_green]

Oh and if you're wondering what happens while I'm not gaming... the CPU usage stays well within 50%

when you say not gaming is this while doing nothing else cause 50% usage means its doing something taxing enough just think its 50% then the game as well,
click to show processes from all users and repost

no no.. when it's completely idle it's well below 09%,when I said nothing I meant browsing useless videos on youtube and listening to music and stuff like that .... in short when I'm running more than 4 apps it reaches around 40%...

 

[zombiehawk]

It could be that the cpu just gets overwhelmed by Far Cry 3... What settings you running? high low or medium? Take in mind that you have a dual core.
Does a game crash while playing?

 

[tom_green]

It could be that the cpu just gets overwhelmed by Far Cry 3... What settings you running? high low or medium? Take in mind that you have a dual core.
Does a game crash while playing?

naah,if it was just Far Cry 3 I would've figured it out but it shows the same pattern for Far Cry 1(which is almost a decade old) and also for NFS MW-2005/2012/The Run/Carbon/Shift 1/2 .... I've tried all kinds of settings,high to low but the results are the same.... The games themselves run fine and smooth,I don't get lag,neither does it crash or freeze... I'm mainly concerned about the heat it generates,while running em my whole room heats up and I'm worried that one fine day my whole cabinet will explode into a mushroom cloud if I don't fix this up!!!

 

[zombiehawk]

whole room heats up and I'm worried that one fine day my whole cabinet will explode into a mushroom cloud if I don't fix this up!!!

:lol:

What is your cooling like around the case? you got fans? and check the temps of your cpu idle and loaded.

 

[glitch20]

Whatever the game may be,Far Cry 1 or Far cry 3,my CPU hits ~100% while running em and I did check for spywares,malwares and all of those,I've got none of it!!

Here's a screenshot of the task manager while running NFS Shift 2 at 640*480....
http://myfreewap.com:8080/m/uploads...8ZvC2FV2KWn4OLa5Z6mn5eWqq8ZvC3D/113l_cpu3.png


I'm dead tired of trying to fix this,my mates run the same games but their CPU doesn't cross 60%,,it just takes away all the fun of gaming when your PSU and CPU fans start sounding like they're fitted to a diesel engine!!!

My specs
CPU- AMD Phenom 2 X2 550-3.1 GHz (not overclocked)
MotherBoard - Asus M4N68T-M series
Ram- Corsair (2+2) 4 GB DDR3
GPU- Sapphire HD 7750 1GB GDDR5 (not overclocked)
OS- Win7 Ultimate 64 bit
HDD-500 GB
Monitor- 18.5" VGA LCD
PSU- Some chinese company named 'mercury',450 Watts

Could it be that by GPU is underpowered???
Oh and if you're wondering what happens while I'm not gaming... the CPU usage stays well within 50%... the only other time it reaches 90+% is when I'm converting video files from one format to another......

It's your processor I have an i3-3220 dual core w/ hypethreading + hd 7850 2gb running 1080p farCry 3 on my 1st monitor windowed mode while youtube streaming on my 2nd screen & im on hitting 70-78% on cpu usage

What your experiencing is normal for that kind of processor ^^ btw the lower the resolution the more your cpu handles da load on higher reso your gpu takes over

 

[tom_green]

whole room heats up and I'm worried that one fine day my whole cabinet will explode into a mushroom cloud if I don't fix this up!!!

:lol:

What is your cooling like around the case? you got fans? and check the temps of your cpu idle and loaded.

well,there's no additional cooling equipment attached to my cabinet but it does have 3 fans (cpu,gpu and psu)... my cpu core temps when idle are around 36-45 C ... I haven't checked when loaded but I'm sure they turn pretty hot when loaded with games,all 3 fans begin spinning rapidly,it's a miracle that my cabinet doesn't take-off to the skies

 

[zombiehawk]

well it is most likely the kind of cpu you have. But you should get some more airflow going on in your case though to decrease the temps. The fan in the psu and card wont help much with the airflow. At least one intake and one exhaust fan will push the heat out and replace it with fresh air

 

[tom_green]

It's your processor I have an i3-3220 dual core w/ hypethreading + hd 7850 2gb running 1080p farCry 3 on my 1st monitor windowed mode while youtube streaming on my 2nd screen & im on hitting 70-78% on cpu usage

What your experiencing is normal for that kind of processor ^^ btw the lower the resolution the more your cpu handles da load on higher reso your gpu takes over

so you're basically suggesting that no matter what I do,my CPU and GPU will work as a team to make sure that the CPU load remains at 99%? uh,that's a bit unfair... but couldn't it also be that my GPU is underpowered??

 

[tom_green]

well it is most likely the kind of cpu you have. But you should get some more airflow going on in your case though to decrease the temps. The fan in the psu and card wont help much with the airflow. At least one intake and one exhaust fan will push the heat out and replace it with fresh air

well before considering that I have a doubt,are the two inter-related??as in,will the CPU usage go high just because of the heat factor??or is it just the other way,??"the heat goes up bcoz of high CPU usage" ??

 

[zombiehawk]

The heat goes up because of the usage.
But also heats go up because of the existing heat and no enough fresh air.

 

[tom_green]

The heat goes up because of the usage.
But also heats go up because of the existing heat and no enough fresh air.

even better,I will leave the cabinet open and see if it makes a difference...

 

[goonbar79]

Edited:
Something is definitely up if your cpu is hitting 100% usage for even older games at all different settings. Typically, as the graphics settings are set to higher or maxed out, the less cpu will be used, because most of the loads are going to the gpu. The same goes for higher the resolution, the more gpu clock & gpu memory used, thus less load on cpu. As system uses more gpu, the less of impact cpu performance makes on framerate, which means less cpu% is used. The system thermal is another issue. (The cpu load causes thermal to go up, but thermal doesn't cause cpu clock to go up). I would work on the cpu% first.

I see that your monitor is 18.5 inch, so it looks fairly outdated. What resolution are you running your games? What framerates are you getting on Farcry 1? Don't test with latest games, because it will be difficult to know if the high cpu load is caused by cpu issue or high cpu demand from latest game. I would try the following with Farcry, and more graphic intensive FPS game (something like Crysis would be a good choice), and see what the cpu% is. The idea is to find a sweetspot game that uses 100% of gpu while using only a portion of cpu, so that the bottleneck is the gpu, not cpu.

1. Set max resolution for your monitor. if possible, test out with hi-res monitor (1080p).
2. Set graphic settings to max, or near max, with various settings turned on.
3. Try to shoot for playable framerate (around 20~40 FPS).
4. See if your cpu load is any different when these checkpoints are in place vs. your original test results.

If your cpu load is still 100%, I think something is wrong, either your hardware (anything can be the culprit at this point: mobo, cpu, ram, gpu, psu, hdd) or your OS. I would definitely start by reinstalling everything (OS and game), and retest.

Good luck!

 

[DiaSin]

Im not sure it IS is CPU.. He says he has the same issue with Far Cry 1, and my laptop (Core 2 Duo T9800, Radeon HD4530M, 4GB DDR2) will max that out at 1080p with about 35 FPS and 85% CPU usage..

I wonder if he is getting unsteady voltage from that random chinese PSU.. would that cause this?

 

[goonbar79]

Im not sure it IS is CPU.. He says he has the same issue with Far Cry 1, and my laptop (Core 2 Duo T9800, Radeon HD4530M, 4GB DDR2) will max that out at 1080p with about 35 FPS and 85% CPU usage..

I wonder if he is getting unsteady voltage from that random chinese PSU.. would that cause this?

Good point. cheap PSU could cause multiple issues, including unstable cpu load. So testing the system with another psu could be a good troubleshoot starting point.

Also, come to think of it, Farcry is probably not a good game to test this out because his gpu is probably overkill for it. But the important thing is that old apps and games should not put too much load on this cpu, so 100% usage means red flag.

 

[swifty_morgan]

start/msconfig........... shut everything down not really needed under services ( see filter at bottom ) and under start up. then I would boot in safe mode and do multiple scans for maggotware.

after that I would reboot ( internet disconnected from pc ) and run some games.

farcry1 shouldn't be causing problems but your system wasn't designed to run the other.

 

[gamerk316]

Ok guys, lets not overcomplicate:

AMD Phenom 2 X2 550-3.1 GHz

Theres the problem.

 

[DiaSin]

Ok guys, lets not overcomplicate:

AMD Phenom 2 X2 550-3.1 GHz

Theres the problem.

That is really most likely not the issue. Like I said, one of the games that he has problems with I am maxing out on a comparable CPU, with less resource usage. Read the replies to a thread before you make assumption based on the initial post.

 

[goonbar79]

That is really most likely not the issue. Like I said, one of the games that he has problems with I am maxing out on a comparable CPU, with less resource usage. Read the replies to a thread before you make assumption based on the initial post.

Agreed. Phenom ii x2 550 3.1ghz is similar in performance to the previously mentioned Core 2 Duo T9800 @2.9ghz OR Core 2 Duo E6850 3ghz. I had E6750 OC'd t 3.2ghz paried with 8800GT playing Crysis on mid setting at 1680x1050, getting 60 fps average. During gameplay, the CPU% was fluctuating between 60~95%, depending on whatever the heck is going on.

When gaming, unless your cpu is bottlenecking gameplay the WHLE TIME, your cpu usage shouln't be 100% the WHOLE TIME. That is why running Prime95 for all cpu cores heat the the cpu more so than gaming.

 

[tom_green]

Edited:
1. Set max resolution for your monitor. if possible, test out with hi-res monitor (1080p).
2. Set graphic settings to max, or near max, with various settings turned on.
3. Try to shoot for playable framerate (around 20~40 FPS).
4. See if your cpu load is any different when these checkpoints are in place vs. your original test results.

If your cpu load is still 100%, I think something is wrong, either your hardware (anything can be the culprit at this point: mobo, cpu, ram, gpu, psu, hdd) or your OS. I would definitely start by reinstalling everything (OS and game), and retest.

well,firstly,my monitor is outdated if you are speaking in terms of signal transmission,mine uses analog signals,bcoz of which I have to use a DVI-VGA adapter... but in terms of size,I wouldn't think that would matter anyway,
My monitor is always set to the max resolution of 1366*768...

Check out the following snapshots...

1 Far Cry 1 frame rates at it's lowest settings --> http://myfreewap.com:8080/m/uploads/paafnqmhmJmqsuylpJzhz9LIlJZvC2Ff4qLd2dTsoJ2co6qg/113t_fc1-fr.jpg

CPU-usage was again,at 90+... but while running Far Cry 1,there was a process named 'rundll.exe' which consumed about 40% of the cpu,it opened along with Far Cry 1 and the game wouldn't run without it...

2 Far Cry 2 maxed out,CPU and GPU readings --> http://myfreewap.com:8080/m/uploads...f4qLj19TsnZ2ZqK6gqwZvC3DZvC3D/113u_fc2-fr.png

3 Far Cry 2 frame rate while maxed out --> http://myfreewap.com:8080/m/uploads...ZvC3D/113w_farcry2_2013-02-27_11-25-16-66.bmp

4 CPU/GPU readings while idle http://myfreewap.com:8080/m/uploads...9XJz9en2uTa5aapn5aVqwZvC3DZvC3D/113v_idle.jpg


hope they give out somethin.....

 

[amuffin]

That is really most likely not the issue. Like I said, one of the games that he has problems with I am maxing out on a comparable CPU, with less resource usage. Read the replies to a thread before you make assumption based on the initial post.

Don't you mean Initial D?

Haha, I just had to.

 

[tom_green]

Im not sure it IS is CPU.. He says he has the same issue with Far Cry 1, and my laptop (Core 2 Duo T9800, Radeon HD4530M, 4GB DDR2) will max that out at 1080p with about 35 FPS and 85% CPU usage..

I wonder if he is getting unsteady voltage from that random chinese PSU.. would that cause this?

That's exactly what I suspect... every component of my hardware is standard except for the PSU... my pc doesn't show extreme symptoms of underpower-ness but.. I still think that could be it!!

About my processor... come on ppl,I've seen blokes run high-res games using intels' core-2 duo... mine's an AMD and it's 3.1GHz,7 MB cache,better than the 1st and 2nd gen of i3 processors...give it some credit...

 

[amuffin]

That's exactly what I suspect... every component of my hardware is standard except for the PSU... my pc doesn't show extreme symptoms of underpower-ness but.. I still think that could be it!!

About my processor... come on ppl,I've seen blokes run high-res games using intels' core-2 duo... mine's an AMD and it's 3.1GHz,7 MB cache,better than the 1st and 2nd gen of i3 processors...give it some credit...

Well, that's just unfortunate.

You know that's not true.......?

 

[tom_green]

Good point. cheap PSU could cause multiple issues, including unstable cpu load. So testing the system with another psu could be a good troubleshoot starting point.

Also, come to think of it, Farcry is probably not a good game to test this out because his gpu is probably overkill for it. But the important thing is that old apps and games should not put too much load on this cpu, so 100% usage means red flag.

I'll try it out with a diff psu and see if it makes a difference... I can't re-install the OS until a few more months,I'm working on a project and can't afford the risk involved.. I hope a good PSU solves this....