Stuttering/slight freezing

My 7805u runs perfect, temps are normal, games play fine, etc. But every once in a while it "stutters". When playing music it is more noticeable, but also noticeable while playing games. Usually the sound stutters much like a cd skipping. Other times the whole laptop locks up for a second with the sound stuttering. I have two hard drives installed, ones the stock 7200rpm hitachi and the other is a 500gb 5500rpm scorpio blue.

Has anyone else had any similar problems like this?

My 3d mark scores are just the same as others, and while play team fortress 2 on max settings the GPU maxes around 78c and TZS1 and 2 get to 70c. Keep in mind,the ambient temps in my house are 75f-80f.

 

Got any thing running like a program that maybe taking a lot out of the cpu .....any viruses, malware, spyware..ect have u done a scan recently... i had a virus in my old laptop that made it impossible to even play music of itunes cause it was taking away to much resources in the backgound.....

 

When I look at the processes, the cpu jumps from 2% to 12% at the highest, IMO that's normal for vista.
I did a scan a couple of weeks ago and it didn't come up with anything. I might just bootup a live cd and run clamav or w/e it's called to see if there's a rootkit or anything.

 

yeah sounds good ..... hmmm your problem is odd such a beast of a machine and to stutter

 

ive heard of a few people fixing this by re-installing the audio driver (worth a shot i think...)

 

Some of the Hitachi drives have had problems, but the more likely issue is that you've got resource management (Available RAM) problems. The symptoms are very common when RAM resources get to critical levels; the skipping/stuttering is a result of the system being forced to use a hard drive as a Virtual RAM device, literally using drive space to make up for the lack of available RAM.

It doesn't make any difference how much RAM you have, how powerful your CPU is, or what version of Windows you're running - all systems use more RAM than they give back. The only thing a better configuration does is allow you to run longer before RAM levels get to critical. Even with my current configuration, I still run into the problem occasionally because I usually don't restart my system that often.


Explanation
When you start a program or process, a certain amount of RAM (called Available RAM) is allocated for the program or process to run; However, when they're shut down or terminated by the system, the amount of RAM that was allocated (called Used RAM) is not returned to the Available RAM pool for reuse by the system. Over time, the amount of Available RAM gets less and less, until it reaches critical. At that time, the system will use your HD as Virtual RAM device to make up for the lack of Available RAM, and you'll start getting the stutter effect. The reason you see it more with games and other media files is that they use more amounts of Available RAM than other programs to run.

Usually you'll see it more often if you haven't restarted your system in 24 hours, or it's been in Sleep/Hibernate for several hours and it's just been woken up. It's also more prevalent on 32 bit systems, and even 64 bit systems that don't have they complete maximum RAM amount. Before I added another 4gb to my system, even with my configuration I'd experience it occassionally. Left unattended, the problem will eventually get bad enough that your system will slow down to the point that it may freeze. The first indication of this is when your cursor starts to skip, or you're typing text faster than it appears on screen.

Some A/V program settings will cause this problem also, if it's set to scan all files. Since media files are in a constant stream, the virus scan interrupts it at different points, causing the effect.

For Sound only skipping/stuttering, it can be attributed to corrupt drivers, but that doesn't happen that often. Most systems tend to run more background processes than they need. A typical Vista system averages around 100 processes running in the background, give or take a few.

RAM Management/Reclamation
If you have a 32 bit system, you can correct the problem with a RAM monitoring and reclamation program. The one I used for years (still do on my older 32 bit systems) is Memory Boost. It monitors your available RAM levels, and flags you when it gets to critical. At that point, you have the option of "boosting", which means that MB will try to reclaim the RAM used by the system for previously used processes and programs, but not returned to the system's available RAM pool. I run a lot of Adobe design programs that use a lot of RAM, and usually run more than one at a time. On my old desktop, I originally only had 512mb of RDRAM, but using MB allowed me to get the used RAM back so that I didn't have to add any more RAM until the programs reached the point where they needed at least 1gb to run.

MB can be downloaded as a 1 month full trial version. The link above to it also contains several good articles on System Resources and RAM Management, so if you're having problems with the concept read them.

You can also check your System Resources when the problem occurs by opening your Task Manager and checking your RAM levels and CPU tasking percentage. A desktop CPU/RAM Gadget meter is helpful too for showing you at a glance how much your system is being tasked.

 

Try switching off your wireless card when that happens and see if it makes a difference... just a thought.

 

Well I can upgrade my wireless drivers, but the last time I did, it caused a BSOD. I'll try it again though.

Also @CyberVisions that's what I figured, because everytime the stuttering occurs the HDD led is flickering. I also changed the page file to 2GB even though the stuttering happened before the change. It's not JUST the audio, it's the system, it stutters during games.

Maybe it's a memory leak. I usually have pidgin open when it happens... Hmm..

For right now I'll update the drivers to what vista recommends and see if that helps at all.
I'll look forward to reading your replies regarding how to fix this issue.

 

Well I updated the wireless drivers and the problem doesn't seem to show up as much... But it's still there. I monitored the RAM and cpu usage and they both are normal.

 

Try switching the wless off? I think it might be an IRQ conflict or an actual hardware electric interference. Hmmm... technical.

But I'd be curious to see if the problem persists when you have the wless off. My laptop does that at times, especially (maybe exclusively) if I am using the speakers, and not the headphones. If I flip the wless off, or if I'm don't have a program accessing the web, it seems to do better.

 

I'll try it tomorrow while running itunes. I can't really do that while playing games since the games I do play require an online connection (CS:S, TF2, etc.).

 

I've had similar problems in the past and found that they were related to heat. Your CPU temp seems just a tad high. How long has it been since you cleaned the CPU fan/vent and re-applied heatsink compound? Do you undervolt?