Re: New PC lagging

kaucukovnik · 09-30-2009, 09:00 PM

Hello everybody,

Sorry for hijacking an old thread, but I have a very similar problem.

I have put together this machine (low budget, you know - and it's quite upgradable):

Asus P5QL SE
Pentium 4 Prescott 630 3.0GHz + ArcticCoooling Freezer 7 Pro
2GB Kingston RAM
Leadtek GeForce PX9500GT
500W PSU noname :-(
It can run newer games of course, but they are all surprisingly choppy. For example in The Witcher I have extremely low framerate in some areas (below 5 FPS) whether on min or max settings. That is weird.
Even really old games do not run perfectly. Old Unreal Tournament (NOT 2003/2004 or UT3) does have very noticeable lag. Something must be very wrong.

3dmark06 shows a score of ~ 2500, which is also quite low - similar machines have at least 4000 as far as I know.

Even if I overclock the CPU to 3,78 GHz and the GPU to 700 MHz (from 550), nothing changes. Also tried disabling HyperThreading in BIOS, no avail. I have installed the XP SP2 patch for multicore CPUs, no change at all.

I expected the CPU to be a bit of a bottleneck, but this is obviously not a performance issue. My suspect number one is the motherboard. I have read quite positive reviews on this series, but who knows?

I'm out of ideas. Does anyone know what else could I try?

dai · 09-30-2009, 09:39 PM

put in a quality psu if you are o/clocking it needs to be higher than normally required

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...corsair%2b650w

kaucukovnik · 10-01-2009, 12:24 AM

Thanks for the reply. Yes, I know the PSU is not good for OC, I just tried it to find out if it is a CPU performance issue (which is clearly not the case, seeing that old games perform poorly as well). Normally I run it at stock speed, everything set on Auto in BIOS.
The whole system is meant as temporary solution to be upgraded as I have more money and the need for more performance. I just hoped it'll be noticeably better than my old one (Athlon 3000+ with Radeon 9500 and 768 RAM) even in this state.

Another detail: Both RAM and MB support 1066MHz, but the memory runs at 800 (FSB real clock 202 MHz, to be precise). But I suppose that's ok with default settings.

dai · 10-01-2009, 12:31 AM

current psu

brand
model

kaucukovnik · 10-01-2009, 11:25 AM

So this strange behavior can be caused by PSU? If so, then it most probably is that, because the PSU is a totally cheap noname 500W ba***rd (I'll look closely when I have the PC shut down and opened up). And I'll try to test with someone other's PSU (a friend of mine has a Corsair one, I hope he'll like the idea of putting it out of his PC for a moment

) and post the result.

dai · 10-01-2009, 11:58 PM

friends come in handy

kaucukovnik · 10-03-2009, 05:38 AM

Heh, the PSU has NO LABEL to get the needed numbers from, and the box also doesn't say anything except the 500W (which is disputable as well). It's a real POS. Today I noticed that Everest shows +12V being only around 10V, so the PSU definitely needs replacing, whether the problems are caused by it or not. What do you think about Corsair CX400 400W?

**speedster123** · 10-03-2009, 05:44 AM

as Dai pointed out, this is your best bet-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...corsair%2b650w

09-30-2009, 09:00 PM	#1 (permalink)
kaucukovnik Registered User Join Date: Sep 2009 Posts: 4 OS: Win XP SP2	Re: New PC lagging Hello everybody, Sorry for hijacking an old thread, but I have a very similar problem. I have put together this machine (low budget, you know - and it's quite upgradable): Asus P5QL SE Pentium 4 Prescott 630 3.0GHz + ArcticCoooling Freezer 7 Pro 2GB Kingston RAM Leadtek GeForce PX9500GT 500W PSU noname :-( It can run newer games of course, but they are all surprisingly choppy. For example in The Witcher I have extremely low framerate in some areas (below 5 FPS) whether on min or max settings. That is weird. Even really old games do not run perfectly. Old Unreal Tournament (NOT 2003/2004 or UT3) does have very noticeable lag. Something must be very wrong. 3dmark06 shows a score of ~ 2500, which is also quite low - similar machines have at least 4000 as far as I know. Even if I overclock the CPU to 3,78 GHz and the GPU to 700 MHz (from 550), nothing changes. Also tried disabling HyperThreading in BIOS, no avail. I have installed the XP SP2 patch for multicore CPUs, no change at all. I expected the CPU to be a bit of a bottleneck, but this is obviously not a performance issue. My suspect number one is the motherboard. I have read quite positive reviews on this series, but who knows? I'm out of ideas. Does anyone know what else could I try?

09-30-2009, 09:39 PM	#2 (permalink)
dai Manager, Hardware Forums Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: west australia Posts: 56,539 OS: win 7 32x 64x rtm	Re: New PC lagging put in a quality psu if you are o/clocking it needs to be higher than normally required http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...corsair%2b650w __________________

10-01-2009, 12:24 AM	#3 (permalink)
kaucukovnik Registered User Join Date: Sep 2009 Posts: 4 OS: Win XP SP2	Re: New PC lagging Thanks for the reply. Yes, I know the PSU is not good for OC, I just tried it to find out if it is a CPU performance issue (which is clearly not the case, seeing that old games perform poorly as well). Normally I run it at stock speed, everything set on Auto in BIOS. The whole system is meant as temporary solution to be upgraded as I have more money and the need for more performance. I just hoped it'll be noticeably better than my old one (Athlon 3000+ with Radeon 9500 and 768 RAM) even in this state. Another detail: Both RAM and MB support 1066MHz, but the memory runs at 800 (FSB real clock 202 MHz, to be precise). But I suppose that's ok with default settings.

10-01-2009, 12:31 AM	#4 (permalink)
dai Manager, Hardware Forums Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: west australia Posts: 56,539 OS: win 7 32x 64x rtm	Re: New PC lagging current psu brand model __________________

10-01-2009, 11:25 AM	#5 (permalink)
kaucukovnik Registered User Join Date: Sep 2009 Posts: 4 OS: Win XP SP2	Re: New PC lagging So this strange behavior can be caused by PSU? If so, then it most probably is that, because the PSU is a totally cheap noname 500W ba***rd (I'll look closely when I have the PC shut down and opened up). And I'll try to test with someone other's PSU (a friend of mine has a Corsair one, I hope he'll like the idea of putting it out of his PC for a moment) and post the result.

10-01-2009, 11:58 PM	#6 (permalink)
dai Manager, Hardware Forums Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: west australia Posts: 56,539 OS: win 7 32x 64x rtm	Re: New PC lagging friends come in handy __________________

10-03-2009, 05:38 AM	#7 (permalink)
kaucukovnik Registered User Join Date: Sep 2009 Posts: 4 OS: Win XP SP2	Re: New PC lagging Heh, the PSU has NO LABEL to get the needed numbers from, and the box also doesn't say anything except the 500W (which is disputable as well). It's a real POS. Today I noticed that Everest shows +12V being only around 10V, so the PSU definitely needs replacing, whether the problems are caused by it or not. What do you think about Corsair CX400 400W?

10-03-2009, 05:44 AM	#8 (permalink)
speedster123 Mentor Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: United States-New York-Long Island Posts: 5,212 OS: xp pro SP3	Re: New PC lagging as Dai pointed out, this is your best bet- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...corsair%2b650w __________________ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -