HEL-80 Optical drive issue

Aight folks, I'm using the Powerpro 8:15 (HEL-80 chassis). It really hasn't left my side since I got it
I went to install Battlefield 2, put CD 1 in and fired up the install. I was listening to MP3's at the time, which I am pretty much always doing at any given time.
During the installshield prep phase of install, I got some nice long periods of nasty stutter and actual SLOWING of the mp3 I was listening to, as if it were a record and someone was impeding the spin of the turntable. Along with that, the mouse cursor was moving very slowly and choppily and programs were slow to respond to clicks and keyboard input. A quick ctrl-alt-del showed my CPU usage to be 53% (Core 0 was at 95-100%, Core 1 was at 8-10%) This effect stopped when the install paused to ask for disk 2.
I went ahead and canceled the install to check out this problem. I figured out that it occurred during ANY transfer of information from the CD/DVD drive: Playing DVD's, installing or accessing programs, or even just copying files from the optical drive to the hard drive, whether it be a CD or DVD. It does NOT happen with copying files from one section of the hard drive to another, or anything else not utilizing the DVD drive.
I tried all the usual fixes I could think of for performance issues: Scanning for virii and spyware, clearing caches pagefiles temp dirs etc., checking drivers (all standard windows drivers, no drivers exist for this DVD drive), and all that fun stuff.
So, to make a long story not quite so long, whenever I use the DVD drive for ANYTHING, my CPU usage (on only the CPU-0 core of my dual core mind you) shoots to 100%, therefore disallowing normal use of the computer until its done.
This just started happening between uses of the laptop. Everything worked fine the day before, including the DVD drive. Everything STILL works fine, except the massive CPU usage during use of the dvd drive.
It has never had an issue with multitasking, i.e. burning DVDs while gaming, using BitTorrents while gaming, scanning for viruses while gaming, or doing all those at once.

-Bios version on mobo is 122b
-Core2Duo T7200, no OC
-GPU was overclocked for a few weeks, but i removed the OC a while back due to needing the battery life, no issues during OC or after
-HDD is the seagate momentus 7200rpm 80gb
-Optical drive is the Lite-on Slimtype SSM-8515S, firmware reports as GSL1
-All drivers are up to date as of about a month ago. I use this computer every single day, so I would have noticed issues before now.

I'm sure this is something stupid that I'm overlooking...so feel free to ridicule me, I can take it
Thanks for reading my giant block of rambling 4am text.

 

It really sounds like the Transfer mode of the IDE channel has dropped to PIO mode (as opposed to DMA). If the drive cannot use DMA, then a heavy load is placed on the processor to move the data around. You can check the transfer mode by going to 'Control Panel' and opening Device Manager. Right click on the secondary IDE channel and choose 'properties' Click on 'Advanced Settings' at the top and make sure that neither 'device0' or 'device1' has a transfer mode of 'PIO.' If that is the case then change it to 'DMA if available' and reboot. Once the system starts back up check the transfer mode again. If it is still PIO, then there may be an issue with the drive. You can try to remove both the drive and IDE channel from Device manager then reboot to see if that helps. You can also physically re-seat the drive. If all else fails give support a call at 877-944-4449.

 

You are definitely right in the fact that it is in PIO mode, and after changing it to DMA and rebooting, it dropped back to PIO. I am going to try removing it from the manager and reseating it when I get home. Much thanks!

 

Had some extra time before I needed to leave, so I removed the drive and channel from device manager and powercycled. Scan for changes>check if its installed>start up media player>start transfer, and bam, the sweet sounds of MP3s running distortion free while transferring a 3 gig file...
Thank you again for your accurate assessment and solution!

 

No problem. I am very glad to hear that you got it working.