BleepingComputer.com: Inexplicable Periodic Slowdown/Lag Spikes

Hello

I noticed that when running heavy applications such as games and video, the program will run, and then begin to lag terribly for a while, and then return to normal, only to lag some more a bit later.

For instance, I will start up a game, and it will play fine for a while, with a good frame rate. Then it will suddenly degrade, my FPS will go to nearly 1 or zero, and stay that way for a bit, like 45 seconds. If I wait, my fps will return to normal as before. However, it will eventually occur again, and occur more frequently afterward.

If I exit the game/app (usually having to kill it) and start it back up it will run fine. This happens with a number of different games/apps.

At first I thought this was due to a program or something running in the background that would start using up my resources periodically, but every time it happens I CTL ALT DEL and bring up task manager, and nothing is out of the ordinary. My CPU usage isn't being sucked up by any one application.

I have a laptop, but I don't think its a heat issue. It behaves that way though, slowing down and then speeding up and slowing down.

I can't think of a reason for this. I don't have any applications that run in the background periodically, or at least none that would lag my performance so bad. It seems to only happen in very graphics intensive programs like games.

It also isn't an issue with the game or whatever I'm doing, because, like i said, it would run at peak performance for a good while. It seems to be just a matter of time before it slows down.

I also have the latest drivers for my graphics card.

here are my specs:
OS Name Microsoft® Windows Vista™ Home Premium
Version 6.0.6000 Build 6000
Other OS Description Not Available
OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation
System Name HAL10000
System Manufacturer Dell Inc.
System Model MXG061
System Type X86-based PC
Processor Intel® Core™2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz, 2000 Mhz, 2 Core(s), 2 Logical Processor(s)
BIOS Version/Date Dell Inc. A06, 4/2/2007
SMBIOS Version 2.4
Windows Directory C:\Windows
System Directory C:\Windows\system32
Boot Device \Device\HarddiskVolume2
Locale United States
Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "6.0.6000.20500"
User Name HAL10000\AAM
Time Zone Eastern Daylight Time
Total Physical Memory 2,045.85 MB
Available Physical Memory 1.15 GB
Total Virtual Memory 4.21 GB
Available Virtual Memory 2.97 GB
Page File Space 2.29 GB
Page File C:\pagefile.sys

This post has been edited by olschool: 08 July 2009 - 07:22 PM