My computer has always stuttered a lot. What's my problem?

[Tiptup300]

I built my computer years ago and it's always had two problems.

One is that when I turn it off it occasionally will refuse to turn back on. I believe it's the power supply, it's really the only part I skimped on when building it and it's been doing this more and more often. There is no post code when I turn it on, the light on the mobo just turns red and I have to flip the psu off and on, then try turning it on again until it sticks.

Other major problem is that it cannot run any game smoothly at all. The games will run fantastic for a bit, then stutter stutter stutter, go perfectly smooth, stutter stutter stutter. It just kills me, I've never liked playing pc games, and I think it's just for this fact.

Please help me.

I put my CPU-Z output here: http://pastebin.com/1xfWnJeK

Basically I've got:

MOBO:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188024

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600, I can overclock it I just never have.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115017

NVIDIA Geforce GTX 550 Ti, I recently got this because my other gfx card just stopped working
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127573

Dual DDR2 2GB + 2 GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231122

PSU:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341002

HD:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822147007

So please, help me, what's my weak link? What can I do to overcome this and enjoy Bioshock Infinite.

NOTE: I also have the stuttering issues while just using windows. Specifically when I open new applications my whole computer will lock up for a few seconds.

I'm thinking it's my harddrive because in taskmgr it goes to 100% use a lot.

I use Windows 8, but I also had the issue with Win7.

 

[ssddx]

i've had good luck with ocz psus in the past (albiet they were pricey models). what you may want to do is disconnect the unit and check the voltage outputs. a faulty psu can cause some issues but its hard to say this is exactly the issue here.

a failing had drive can also cause stuttering/slowdown and other abnormalities. however, the pc should still be able to access bios and post fine.

which brings me to the third idea. are you sure there isnt a motherboard issue? perhaps something as simple as not having all of the psu power connectors installed on the mb resulting in low voltages.

provided you have onboard video you can try disconnecting all unneccessary components and seeing how post/bios performs then add components (hd, then video card, etc) to see when you have trouble.

afterthought: perhaps check your ram usage in games. in this day and age i would say 6-8gb is ideal though i've never used more than 3-4 at once in a game. since this is your system total there may be slowdown issues or crashes. just an idea to check though.

my guess as is would be one of the four though. psu, mb or hdd, ram or some combination. its hard to say without doing all the legwork testing everything though.

 

[Tiptup300]

i've had good luck with ocz psus in the past (albiet they were pricey models). what you may want to do is disconnect the unit and check the voltage outputs. a faulty psu can cause some issues but its hard to say this is exactly the issue here.

a failing had drive can also cause stuttering/slowdown and other abnormalities. however, the pc should still be able to access bios and post fine.

which brings me to the third idea. are you sure there isnt a motherboard issue? perhaps something as simple as not having all of the psu power connectors installed on the mb resulting in low voltages.

provided you have onboard video you can try disconnecting all unneccessary components and seeing how post/bios performs then add components (hd, then video card, etc) to see when you have trouble.

afterthought: perhaps check your ram usage in games. in this day and age i would say 6-8gb is ideal though i've never used more than 3-4 at once in a game. since this is your system total there may be slowdown issues or crashes. just an idea to check though.

my guess as is would be one of the four though. psu, mb or hdd, ram or some combination. its hard to say without doing all the legwork testing everything though.

I can test out the if the PSU is causing things soon so I'll probably be able to try that out tomorrow.

I'll also make sure everything's pluged in and secure in the mobo. I don't think it's the graphics card causing the boot issue because I had an old one in my computer and it still would happen.

Over time it requires more and more times I have to try-fail-try-fail until it comes back on. Like, significantly more. It started maybe a year after I put everything together, but only occasionally, now it's every time my computer happens to be off it takes like 20 times or more before it starts working.

I thought the ram might be a possibilty too, but it only ever gets to maybe 80% to the top and this stuttering happens for underpowered games too.

I really feel like it's the harddrive, is there any utility that can benchmark it to see if possibily theres a problem. There was another thread on here that said they had a Hitachi hd and their pc had similar problems, but it was never soloved.

 

[ssddx]

the hdd shouldnt cause post/bios issues but may cause issues starting windows or performance issues.

like i said, just check everything out and try to isolate what the issue is.

 

[Tiptup300]

Okay, took everything out, just cpu mobo and two power cables going to it. Still works but occasionally gets the yellow light thing. Before hand I experimented with pretty much every combination. I got no where, but after putting it back, it still did it, so I had to do the off-on game and I noticed that I have a much higher chance of it working when I unplug all the usb devices. In addition to how it was reacting with almost nothing hooked up, I think the psu might be some sort of half bad, where it doesn't have enough power to boot so it just gives out. Not sure, just a guess based on experience not knowledge.

In addition I noticed that at most times my Disc usage on taskmanager is 100%, like always, until it turns off then it's back to 0. I feel as though that's not normal.

 

[ssddx]

there could be some fault with the motherboard too. its hard to tell sometimes.

disk usage shouldnt be at 100% when idle.