Unexplained lag, need help.

[_Big_Mac_]

Hi there

I currently have a laptop that i am having trouble with. What is happening is that some games are lagging non-stop (Like COD4 and even old games like renegade) yet others are running just fine (RA3, CnC3).

My specs are:
Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q9000 (2 Ghz)
4gb ddr3 Ram
nVidia GeForce 9600m
and am running Vista Ultimate 64-bit

I have some ideas on what the problem could be but am unsure how to go about fixing them, would like to hear people's ideas on what the problem could be and a solution plz!

Thanks

[floop12444]

First of all, welcome to the forum :)
Now could you give us the model of your laptop.
This could be a problem with your temperatures so to check your temps download Everest from my sig, then go to the sensors part.

[_Big_Mac_]

My cpu is sitting on 50 °C (122 °F).

As for the model, it is a HP pavilion HDX18 X18-1109TX

[BoT]

1. do you know your hard drive specs and can you list them?
2. same for the ram.
3. do you have the latest drivers installed?
4. did you monitor your memory usage during gaming?
5. are any power or energy saving features enabled?
6. did you try to play the game from .iso?

[_Big_Mac_]

The hard drive is 500gb running at 5400rpm
It is 4gb of ddr3 SDRAM
As far as i know, i have all drivers related to gameplay fully updated (Directx and so)
I have change my power settings to optimize performance
And all the games are legit, the ones i mentioned are not .iso files.

One thing i've noticed is that when running the tests on my 3d graphics through Everest, all tests near peak performance, except when testing directx 10.

[BoT]

are there any other programs running in the background?
you can check in the task manager.

by specs about the ram i meant speed and timing.
you can find out in everest or cpu-z

which chipset is it and which driver is installed - also cpu-z or everest

which nvidia driver is installed

games on .iso don't have to be illegitimate. i use it sometimes because this way i can give the cd rom drive a rest

did you go into bios yet?

[BoT]

well, the harddrive at 5400rpm could be one reason. especially as laptop/ notebook drive.
if the memory timings are high, 8 and above that could be a reason too.
even thou it would not be unusual for ddr3 memory it is still performance hampering.
you should also monitor the memory usage during gaming. the gpu will use some of the memory and vista can use quiet a bit itself, if you play a memory heavy game then you could run out of memory and the system will put stuff in the swap file on the hdd, which in turn can lead to lag or studder because the data can not be recalled as fast as it could from memory.
the right drivers could come into play as well. usually the manufacturers supplied drivers should work best but i also found that product specific vendors like nvidia can provide good drivers for there products as well.