Seriously, could overheating cause this?

[Ken2012]

Seriously, could overheating cause this? *Updated*

Simply, most of my games run at a much lower framerate than they did 3-4 months ago. Doom 3, in particular, runs at about half the framerate that it once did.

Could an overheating system cause this? AFAIK, overheating usually results in crashes/system lock-ups, as opposed to dilapidated performance like this...

FWIW, I've monitored my temps via Everest, while CPU and GPU temps seem OK, the only thing that concerns me most is my motherboard temp, which reaches up to around 45C when under load.


And for the record: I've used McAfee anti-virus and Ad-Aware to scan for malware, each found nothing. Before you ask .

Thanks in advance.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

I dont think so. Your cpu and gpu could clock themselves down if they get to hot, but if your motherboard really gets to hot it would crash (as mine used to do) and not slow down. Besides that 45degrees celcius isnt a very abnormal tempreture.

 

[Mize]

More likely a resource issue (MacAfee is running in the BG, etc.) or driver issue.
What all is running when you bench?

 

[Ken2012]

What all is running when you bench?

McAfee, BitTorrent, Win Messenger... Win Explorer... the usual stuff.

All in all, around 600MB of my 2GB of RAM is being used at any given time. CPU usage is negligible.

 

[digitalwanderer]

Kill off McAffee & Messanger, also when is the last time you defragged your drives?

 

[Ken2012]

Kill off McAffee & Messanger, also when is the last time you defragged your drives?

A) Silly question, but is there any reason why McAfee and/or Win messenger should be hogging more of my resources than they once did, i.e 3-4 months ago?

B) Haven't defragged in about 4 months...

 

[karlotta]

Some ppl have speculated that the last four "patch tuesdays" have made gaming slower in XPs....

 

[Skrying]

A) Silly question, but is there any reason why McAfee and/or Win messenger should be hogging more of my resources than they once did, i.e 3-4 months ago?

B) Haven't defragged in about 4 months...

1.) McAfee is a disaster, get a beter anti-virus program simply because McAfee is likely to do more damage than it will ever prevent.

2.) Defragging can often make a difference but I'm doubtful it will change your framerate unless you are hitting the hard drive in game and then you'd probably notice it more in a sense of stuttering instead of a halving of FPS.

3.) Find a different program to confirm temperatures. Driver panel likely for your video card and depending on your CPU SpeedFan of TAT.

4.) Clean out your drivers.

 

[Rainbow Man]

Format and reinstall when performance goes down the toilet.

It's the only way to be sure!


Oh and beware big corporate antivirus solutions IMO. They tend to suck bad. I run NOD32 it never caused an issue for me ever in over 2 years of use.
Peace.

 

[Ken2012]

Clean out your drivers

Check to that. Same difference

Format and reinstall when performance goes down the toilet.

It's the only way to be sure!

I was honestly hoping to avoid doing this. Done it so many times before post bizarre WinXP issues...


This time, to make things further complicated I have Win Vista (x86) installed. Is it stress-free to install XP after installing Vista? Will the Vista boot manager recognise the XP install correctly?

Thanks again.


EDIT: AFAIK, gaming performance is terrible in Vista, otherwise I'd just use that as my primary (gaming) OS. Correct me if I'm wrong on this, haven't been keeping up to date with the Vista gaming scene...

 

[Skrying]

Gaming in Vista has come a long way.

 

[Mize]

Format and reinstall when performance goes down the toilet.

It's the only way to be sure!


Oh and beware big corporate antivirus solutions IMO. They tend to suck bad. I run NOD32 it never caused an issue for me ever in over 2 years of use.
Peace.

For no apparent reason my rig is not locking up randomly...I think it's the latest iTunes and my realtek drivers, but they're the latest for the HD audio... Running SuSE until I get motivated to reinstall XP...I hate that!

 

[mito]

it takes one rogue dll to make your system crawl.

 

[Rainbow Man]

My new monster is doing the "random reboot cha-cha-cha" thingy right now. I'm pretty sure it's Nivdia's fault (nTune and Forceware; either or both in collusion with each other).

The thing has uber crashed on me just by changing the monitor resolution.. Sigh. And there was a time when NV's driver stability was considered king.


Peace.

 

[mito]

Rainbow Dude,

Read this thread, it's funny.......

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1204384

 

[Mize]

Rainbow Dude,

Read this thread, it's funny.......

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1204384

LMFAO!

 

[Rainbow Man]

That's one good and melted fan wire if ever I saw one lol! Thanks for the chuckle.

Fortunately that's not my issue. CPU's running in the upper 40s even when overclocked to 3.4GHz so no prob there..
Peace.

 

[SugarCoat]

My new monster is doing the "random reboot cha-cha-cha" thingy right now. I'm pretty sure it's Nivdia's fault (nTune and Forceware; either or both in collusion with each other).

The thing has uber crashed on me just by changing the monitor resolution.. Sigh. And there was a time when NV's driver stability was considered king.


Peace.

does vista have the same auto reboot on error setting that XP comes with out of the box?

As far as the OP, defualt bios settings if you're running an overclock to kill it. Heat normally causes instability, not performance degradation. If i was having the same problem as you i'd go through the whole uninstall drivers, reboot, driver cleaner, fresh drivers, routine. You know what else you may want to do is download the newest soundcard drivers and install them, let it uninstall and reinstall which it should do automatically.

 

[Ken2012]

Well, in Doom 3 I get the same horrible performance in Vista . Haven't tried any other games, TBH.


Specs:-

AMDX2 4400
2GB DDR400
ASUS A8N-SLI SE
7800GTX 256MB SLI
Audigy2 ZS Plat

Latest drivers all round for both XP and Vista. I'm not overclocking anything, either.

 

[Ken2012]

Well, I've narrowed the problem down to:-

Switching in and out of the game.

Fire a game up, framerate is perfect. Ctrl+Alt+Del out of the game, and back in, FPS is halved... switch in and out of the game again, framerate is back to normal...

This happens in XP, btw. Presumably, whatever causing this to happen in XP is also, somehow, the culprit of my pathetic performance in Vista (see above).

Worth noting also that my 3DMark06 score is good each time I've run it (around 7000 3DMarks).


Thanks once more.