Need help figuring this out..

Egon

Egon

Active Member
Okay, for about two months now whenever I start to play a game the frame rates suddenly drop down to about 15-25fps but then shoot back up to the 100s constantly in a loop.

I first thought I would try to update my drivers if they needed to be updated. That didn't help.

I searched google or a while and came up with some suggestions of playing with the BIOs. So I did that, no change.

Then I started to think what could cause this... So I opened up SpeedFan and saw that my CPU had an average of around 90C but the usage was normal(0-10%). That night I ordered a cooling pad.

Now that I have this cooling pad I've gotten the temp down to the mid 80s - high 70s. I didn't like that very much so I opened it up and cleaned the small amount of dust out, didn't change the temps at all and all games still suddenly drop to 15-25fps and go back up.

So I googled again. They said to look at voltage. Since I'm using a laptop I unplugged it from the adapter and the temp suddenly went down to 58-62c. I could play games, but hardly. 18-26 max unplugged. If I plug it back in the temps go right back to mid 80s. Plugged in I get a normal range from 110-90fps with the sudden fps every 45 seconds or so.
 
Does the framerate decrease in room with small number of textures where the game works fine and it suddenly starts working slow in the SAME room or does the framerate decrease ONLY in the big areas which are full of many textures?

If your answer to the first question is NO and to the second is YES,then your graphic card is not strong enough to execute all the textures at the normal framerate.What you CAN do is to increase the virtual RAM to 4096 MB,then put the colors in Windows to 16-bit then go into your graphic card driver properties and put EVERTHING there on the LOWEST POSSIBLE LEVEL OF QUALITY!!!Also in the game you are playing put EVERYTHING on the LOWEST POSSIBLE LEVEL OF QUALITY and also put the game resolution to 640x480 if possible!!!After you have done all this,exit the game and then restart your computer.




Cheers!
 
I can run games just fine, all med-high at 60-100fps and then suddenly I get these drops in fps. I could be standing still in a room with nothing going on and it'll just drop like a stone for 5-ish seconds and then jump right back up for a bit and then go back down. It keeps doing that in an endless loop.

Just to make sure I did what you suggested and that still didn't help. Hrm...
 
How your operating system works?Does it lag too sometimes or stops responding at random times?
Also try to turn off ALL foreground and background programs that you have turned on.They might cause this too...
 
It responds normally, no lag or slow downs. Every thing is turned off as well and it still happens.
 
Try this then:

-Completely uninstall the game which doesn't work properly!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
-Repair your operating system with it's Windows CD or DVD disk (if you don't have the disk then skip this step,but if you do have it,DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP)!!!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
-When you bought your computer,you probably got the drivers with it such as the drivers for chipset,graphic card and so on.So now install THOSE DRIVERS WHICH YOU GOT WITH YOUR COMPUTER!!!Install them in this order:

1) Chipset driver (After it is installed restart your computer)...
2) Graphic driver (After it is installed restart your computer)...
3) Sound driver (After it is installed restart your computer)...
4) Network driver (After it is installed restart your computer)...

-Now check your disk for errors and be sure to turn on both options!
-Restart your computer...
-After the disk check is done,defagment your disk...
-After the defragmentation is finished,restart your computer...
-Download the Eusing Free Registry Cleaner version 2.0 from here:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/zlh5wo

-Install it...
-Turn it on,go to Edit->Options and check EVERYTHING in there then click OK
-Close the Eusing Free Registry Cleaner version 2.0
-Turn it back on and scan your registry by clicking SCAN REGISTRY ISSUE
-Wait for the scanning process to finish...
-After the process is finished,clean ALL found registry by clicking REPAIR REGISTRY ISSUE
-Now exit the Eusing Free Registry Cleaner version 2.0 and restart the computer...
-Now install the game again


Try all this exactly as I wrote it here and tell me if it fixed the problem.




Cheers!
 
It's not just one game though. It's all of my games. They all started to do this weird fps drop. They run perfectly fine, with no drops, if the laptop isn't plugged in to the adapter. Although they only get 25fps max for simple 3d games.
 
They run perfectly fine, with no drops, if the laptop isn't plugged in to the adapter.
Click to expand...

That's odd. If anything, you'd think it would be the other way around, as many OSes will run in a lower-performance mode when not plugged in to increase battery life. Even so, I would still check out your power-options in control panel.

Have you tried the suggestion of S.T.A.R.S.? You ought to do eveything he said in the order he said and see what that does for you...

Okay, for about two months now whenever I start to play a game the frame rates suddenly drop down to about 15-25fps but then shoot back up to the 100s constantly in a loop.
Click to expand...

What happened two months ago? Think! Anything even if you don't think it's related - have you bought or installed any new hardware, software or peripherals? Gotten any updates?

Also, I would try disabling everything extra from starting up on your system using msconfig and see if that helped. if you're not sure how to do that, post back and I can help you out. Good luck!
 
Unplugged the multiplier goes down as well as the Core VID and Core Speed. No drop in fps but games have insanely low fps anyway.
Plugged in, everything goes up, VID, Speed and Multiplier. The fps drop every few seconds but the normal fps is a good 100+ when it isn't dropped.

Power settings are on High Performance for both on and off battery. All the advanced settings are the same.

I did what he suggested. Sure probably not in that exact order but it was the first thing I did.

No new hardware installed, a few bits of software and some updates. But they were also installed on all my other computers and they don't have this problem. Everything is disabled at startup except for the 2 or 3 that I need.
 
Egon said:
I did what he suggested.Sure probably not in that exact order but it was the first thing I did.
Click to expand...

Now I will quote my sentence:

"Try all this exactly as I wrote it here and tell me if it fixed the problem."

I have a reason why I said that.You should do it in the EXACT order as I said.
If you have done it EXACTLY as I said later on and the FPS in games STILL suddenly drops for no reason then the problem MIGHT BE hardware related.Maybe your RAM chips are bad.RAM is used to temporary store the information of anything wether that are programs,games and so on...and therefore games use MUCH RAM and if your RAM chips are bad,that is the reason.Download the MemTest version 3.8 and test your RAM with it.Here is the link:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/oymm0d

How to use it:

If you for example have 512 MB of RAM,in the MemTest 3.8 program write "380" and not "512" because MemTest 3.8 needs some free RAM in order to be able to use it so it can test your RAM.Leave the MemTest 3.8 to test your RAM for the next 12 hours at least.If after 12 hours you get ANY error message,your RAM chips are bad and needs to be replaced.

If you did not get any error with the MemTest 3.8,then lets again try something using the software way.:D

-Put 16-bit colors in Windows
-Increase your virtual RAM to 4096 MB
-Go in the options of your graphic card and there put EVERYTHING on the lowest possible quality
-Go in your game options and there ALSO put EVERYTHING on the lowest possible quality
-Restart your computer...

If the problem is still the same,check if the ventilator on your graphic card works and does it have any way to flow the hot air out...
Check all your other ventilators too.Also check the temperature of your processor and report it back here!




Cheers!
 
OH, that RAM bit reminded me of something. When I used to play Left 4 Dead 2 I would randomly have the game freeze and its sounds would repeat, the screen would then go to black or flash black and white a few times... but then go back to the game as if nothing had happened. This was before the fps drops were happening. I'll do the memtest tonight.
 
Okay! I found out what the problem is. Turns out that AMD's PowerNow! was enabled in the BIOS... And for some reason that doesn't mix well with Windows 7. So I turned it off and now the fps drops have stopped!

But now I have a bit more serious problem. Because I turned off PowerNow! my laptop overheats and shuts off maybe 1 minute into playing a game. I have to figure out how to underclock my 'AMD Turion x2 Ultra ZM-82' or find a way to cram a better cooler in the laptop.
 
What's the temperature of your processor right before the computer shuts down?If its over 60,then your computer will shut down automatically to prevent the damage to your hardware.Have you checked the entire BIOS?Maybe there you have some more options for your hardware that you can adjust...
 
Around 103C is when it shuts off. The only things I can change in the BIOS is the date, time, boot order, PowerNow!, password and one other unimportant thing that I can't remember.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top