Extreme Lag When Starting Programs?

[newengland017]

Hello everyone, I have a bit of a bizarre issue.

Whenever I launch a program, whether it be a game or even Task Manager, my PC starts chugging. BAD. Like if I have Discord open or a YouTube video playing, the audio starts cutting in and out as if I were rapidly starting and stopping the video. It does the same in Discord, plus my friends have mentioned that my voice gets really robotic when this happens. My mouse will look like it's moving at 4 FPS. There's a delay when clicking on things.

It doesn't matter what drive the program is installed on.

It does seem to be worse with some things. I notice it's really bad with League and moderate with Cities Skylines, but in Cities it hits pretty hard in the loading screen. Other games don't cause the issue. But like I mentioned, it even happens a bit with Task Manager. But once the program is up and running, everything is fine.

I've tried doing just about everything I can think of with little luck. I've updated drivers, removed shoddy programs, ran AV scans, cleaned my HW, ran DiskCleanup+CCleaner, and ran HW tests. MemTest came back clean and so did the Intel CPU diagnostic tool. BUT during the Intel test, the issue started during the stress test portion. Bad. Like REALLY bad. But once it's done, everything is fine like nothing happened. I also noticed it chugged during MemTest, but I figured that's just the testing.

I noticed that when I applied a slight overclock, the issue isn't quite as bad, but still happens.

I'm at my wits end. I'm kind of scared it could be my CPU, but otherwise everything runs like a champ. I kind of think it could be some super in-depth issue with how Windows adjusts CPU timing and what-not, but I can't figure it out.

Please help. Any input will be of value at this point.

PC Specs are as follows:

EVGA SSC 1080
Intel i7-6700k with a Noctua NH-U14 cooler
16GB 2133GHz DD4 RAM
ASUS ROG Maximus VIII Ranger Mobo
2 standard HDDs, 2TB and 1TB
Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD (primary drive)
EVGA 750 watt PSU

 

[1LiquidPC]

Did it start after an update? Happen in safe mode? Good temps during the initial spike in CPU usage?

 

[newengland017]

Did it start after an update? Happen in safe mode? Good temps during the initial spike in CPU usage?

It did not seem to happen after an update. It's always been a lingering thing, so I kinda pushed it off.

I have not tried it in Safe Mode.

And I will run the test again and monitor the temp. In R6 Siege, the temps averaged around 65C and peaked at 77C. That seems a tad high to me, but I may be wrong.

EDIT: I ran the Intel test again, and it reports a minimum temp of 49C and a max of 88C throughout the test.

 

[1LiquidPC]

OK. Thanks for the updates. 88C is awfully high for a stock CPU, even for a specific stresstest. However, that shouldn't be affecting your games. This has been going on since you built the PC? How long is this? Do you happen to have the latest UEFI for your motherboard as well? I know you mentioned updating drivers, ect. Also, are there any logs in Event Viewers around the time the lag starts?

 

[newengland017]

OK. Thanks for the updates. 88C is awfully high for a stock CPU, even for a specific stresstest. However, that shouldn't be affecting your games. This has been going on since you built the PC? How long is this? Do you happen to have the latest UEFI for your motherboard as well? I know you mentioned updating drivers, ect. Also, are there any logs in Event Viewers around the time the lag starts?

Well, I upgraded to this processor in 2016. I didn't notice it until I got it, but I can't give a concrete answer to that unfortunately. I have upgraded to the latest BIOS, which was in Jan. of this year. And I did check the Event Viewer logs, and there's nothing out of the ordinary.

If it's any help, my idle temps usually sit around 27-30C or so. Keep in mind I do have a very slight overclock.

 

[1LiquidPC]

A slight overclock shouldn't be causing your issues. When you mention upgrading to this processor in 2016, did you have another CPU installed prior? Given all you tried so far, has a complete OS re-install been tested? What tests have you done on your OS drive? I'd check actual transfer rates & benches. I've seen drives pass tests regarding health, but have abnormally low transfer rates which turned out the drive was bad.

 

[newengland017]

A slight overclock shouldn't be causing your issues. When you mention upgrading to this processor in 2016, did you have another CPU installed prior? Given all you tried so far, has a complete OS re-install been tested? What tests have you done on your OS drive? I'd check actual transfer rates & benches. I've seen drives pass tests regarding health, but have abnormally low transfer rates which turned out the drive was bad.

Well when I upgraded, I got a new mobo as well.
The last time I did a fresh re-install was around August. I have been considering getting a M.2, but that's beyond the point.
And I just did a speed test, the results are below. Everything looks ok, I think.

Sequential Read (Q= 32,T= 1) : 551.247 MB/s
Sequential Write (Q= 32,T= 1) : 525.674 MB/s
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 8,T= 8) : 400.748 MB/s [ 97838.9 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 8,T= 8) : 358.533 MB/s [ 87532.5 IOPS]
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) : 290.855 MB/s [ 71009.5 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) : 260.263 MB/s [ 63540.8 IOPS]
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) : 38.708 MB/s [ 9450.2 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) : 120.189 MB/s [ 29343.0 IOPS]

And btw, thank-you for your help thus far. I really appreciate it.

 

[1LiquidPC]

OK. Is your CPU running at rated speeds? Is powerplan set to power saver, balanced, or high performance? Whichever you use, within settings for it what min/max processor states are listed. I'd also check OS integrity by running an SFC/scannow in elevated command prompt.