Normal E1705 CPU Usage?

Hey all. I have an e1705 and did the whole reformat operation when I first got it. It's pretty nice, but I noticed the other day while watching a streaming video that the CPU usage was at 100%. I don't know if this is normal because the thread with the official review for the e1705 says it can be running several different programs with the CPU usage at around 3%.

Right now i have several firefox windows open and mcafee running in the background and the CPU usage is at 50-55%. I have 50 processes running, the commit charge is 347M/3939M (whatever that means), and I have 2GB of RAM. Also sometimes it seems as though the fan kicks on when it shouldn't. I don't know if that's related, but anyway... Does anyone have any thoughts about this? I'd like to get the CPU usage down if possible...if it isn't normal.

Thanks

 

I can stream video with very little CP usage (5-10%). I'm sure it depends on the quality/size of the video tho. My guess is there is something else running.
Sometimes Microsoft updates can take a lot of CPU cycles. Since you recently did a reinstall, maybe that was happening?
Can you stream video and watch the task manager again? 50 processes seems like a lot to me.

 

Yeah...my E1705 never gets up there when I stream videos along with FireFox...

You might have some sort of hidden process or virus thing running that makes it so high.

 

have you installed all drivers from dell's download drivers page for your laptop?

intel chipset + video driver + etc.

 

Well doesn't it depend on what processor you got in your e1705?

 

To some extent, but modern processors (especially Core chips) are all fast enough that you should not notice a significant difference.

You may have some background processes running as mentioned, or perhaps you're just looking at the Task Manager at odd moments. My Thinkpad (t2500) spikes to 100% sometimes, it doesn't stay there, but it does hit 100% while 'idling'. If you want to monitor temperatures, fan usage and more CPU information, look at Notebook Hardware Control as well as i8kfanGUI. Both are freeware and quite informative.

 

something seems wrong to me, streaming video shouldnt stress your cpu, I suspect you picked up a cootie or three somewhere

run your av software in safe mode

 

Hi,

I hava a E1705 (for specs look in my sig).

Your CPU usage seems very high to me. In normal office/internet-use, my CPU usage is below 5% most of the time, just sometimes gets up to 20-30%, especially when I open documents, scroll large pages fast... I've got even 65 processes running (never formatted it, have got the Dell stuff still on it), but most of them show 0% CPU usage in Task Manager. I also think this should be the first thing for you to do, look in the Task Manager, if you can identify the process which produces this high CPU load.

I just tried what happens when I watch a video on Youtube: At the beginning, the CPU usage goes up to about 25%, but then down to below 10%, most times below 5%.

Greets,
Tobi

 

Are you watching HD videos? I have heard that those can be really processor intensive depending on the video card you have.

 

Also, by saying McAfee is running in the background, do you mean it's just in the tray being normal, or you are running a full system scan? That's can eat a lot too if you are.

Also, in the Task Manager, you should be able to see what exactly is eating the CPU by a percentage meter under the processes tab.

 

thanks for the replies everyone. i guess i was looking at my task manager at a bad time when i posted earlier. right now i have this one window open to send this reply, gaim is running, mcafee in the taskbar, i'm using wireless right now, and maybe a couple other processes running that don't need to be. CPU usage hovers around 3-6% and spiking randomly to around 15%. i believe i have all the correct drivers loaded; i followed southerngirl's instructions for the reformat and everything was reinstalled with no problems, and that was about a month ago. i try to keep it basic because i know how fast things will snowball into problems when you clutter a system. after the reformat, i installed photoshop, acdsee, my gps software, microsoft office, and maybe a couple others. i've disabled most everything's startup through msconfig so when the laptop boots up there are only ~45 processes running. i guess that's low enough from the 70+ dell makes it.

it has 2GB 667mhz ram, the T7200 2gHZ processor, the GeForce GO 7900 GS, etc...basically the best components offered at the time i bought it.

Ok, so while typing this reply i kept the task manager open and checked the usage. with 5 firefox windows open, gaim, mcafee in the taskbar, windows explorer the usage still hovers around 3-8%. as soon as i click a link to stream video, and expand the window to it's fullest size the usage tanks to around 45-50%. i guess that's the problem. if anyone is curious where the video come from, it's peekvid.com. anyway, thanks for the help everyone!