CPU Question

[Guy Quinn]

Compaq 6330 desktop: P4 2.0 GHz, 512 mb RAM, 60 gb HD
WinXP Home Edition, Roxio EZCD 5.3.2.34, Norton AntiVirus 2002


I have noticed that while running some applications (e.g. CD ripping/burning
and Ad-aware), my system slows down to an absolute crawl. I have recently
been running Task Mgr in the background and, sure enough, the CPU usage goes
up to 100% when ripping or burning a CD. Multi-tasking is next to
impossible.

I know a P4 2.0 processor is not current state of the art, but I was under
the impression that I still had more than enough processor power and RAM to
multi-task. It appears that's not the case after all. Am I missing
anything or do I need to consider going to the next level, processor and/or
RAM-wise?

FYI - WinXP is current as far as updates go, as are the Norton virus
definition files. I defrag and virus scan on a regular basis as well.

Thanks.

 

[Jim Macklin]

You can set priority for running programs, set it so that
some cycles are available for second tasks.
BTW, you should update EZCD to 5.3.5


| Compaq 6330 desktop: P4 2.0 GHz, 512 mb RAM, 60 gb HD
| WinXP Home Edition, Roxio EZCD 5.3.2.34, Norton AntiVirus
2002
|
|
| I have noticed that while running some applications (e.g.
CD ripping/burning
| and Ad-aware), my system slows down to an absolute crawl.
I have recently
| been running Task Mgr in the background and, sure enough,
the CPU usage goes
| up to 100% when ripping or burning a CD. Multi-tasking is
next to
| impossible.
|
| I know a P4 2.0 processor is not current state of the art,
but I was under
| the impression that I still had more than enough processor
power and RAM to
| multi-task. It appears that's not the case after all. Am
I missing
| anything or do I need to consider going to the next level,
processor and/or
| RAM-wise?
|
| FYI - WinXP is current as far as updates go, as are the
Norton virus
| definition files. I defrag and virus scan on a regular
basis as well.
|
| Thanks.
|
|

 

[Sharon F]

Compaq 6330 desktop: P4 2.0 GHz, 512 mb RAM, 60 gb HD
WinXP Home Edition, Roxio EZCD 5.3.2.34, Norton AntiVirus 2002


I have noticed that while running some applications (e.g. CD ripping/burning
and Ad-aware), my system slows down to an absolute crawl. I have recently
been running Task Mgr in the background and, sure enough, the CPU usage goes
up to 100% when ripping or burning a CD. Multi-tasking is next to
impossible.

I know a P4 2.0 processor is not current state of the art, but I was under
the impression that I still had more than enough processor power and RAM to
multi-task. It appears that's not the case after all. Am I missing
anything or do I need to consider going to the next level, processor and/or
RAM-wise?

FYI - WinXP is current as far as updates go, as are the Norton virus
definition files. I defrag and virus scan on a regular basis as well.

Thanks.

The bottlenecks aren't always the CPU. Data transfer to/from drives
will go at whatever speed it can handle and that's it. Some programs
are cpu intensive such as Adaware. This program definitely wants full
focus when scanning the system at very deep levels.

Reserve the more intensive tasks for times that you aren't too busy
using the rest of the computer.


Sharon F
MS MVP - Windows XP

 

[Furry Cat Herder]

The bottlenecks aren't always the CPU. Data transfer to/from drives
will go at whatever speed it can handle and that's it. Some programs
are cpu intensive such as Adaware. This program definitely wants full
focus when scanning the system at very deep levels.

Reserve the more intensive tasks for times that you aren't too busy
using the rest of the computer.

This also sounds like his disk I/O might be mis-configured to not be
using DMA. I can rip and burn DVD's with a 933MHz P3 and I don't
bother with defrag, so I know my disks are an absolute mess. But I
do have UDMA and whatnot configured on my disk drives, plus I have
my DVD burner on one IDE interface and the main system disk on
another. I burned four backup DVDs earlier today, plus surfed the
net, paid my phone bill, printed off some crud, all while burning those
DVDs (4X DVD burning speed, FWIW) and nary a hickup.

You can find your disk controller settings in Control Panel --> System -->
Device Manager --> IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers. You should see
a "Primary IDE Channel" and "Secondary IDE Channel" entry. Under
the "Advanced Settings" tab there should be options for "Transfer
Mode". (These instructures are from this Win2K box -- I'm not by
my WinXP box at the moment ...)

-- Julie.

 

[Sharon F]

This also sounds like his disk I/O might be mis-configured to not be
using DMA.

Good suggestions and those things should be checked too.


Sharon F
MS MVP - Windows XP

 

[Hemlock]

I had a 600 mhz with 386 meg ram, 2 60 gig hard drives.
I ran two downloads from newsgroups,
burned cds and
played movies at the same time, little slow down.

Just testing one day I started viewing 3 movies concurrently and
running IE6, with a large Kazaa download running (25 at a time)
The pc ran fine until the 3rd movie started, then I got jerky motion
on the movies.

You clearly have enough cpu.

Glad you are considering the disk dma,
but do you have the cd on the same channel as the system hard drive?
Sometimes this causes a problem.
My hard drives are separate from the cd.

Hemlock