Clevo D900F / Win XP SP3 - CPU idle time 15-21%???

Hello to all!

I just bought the Clevo D900F, what a [big! and] fantastic machine.

Mine has already the BIOS for XP, so I could install it. My vendor sent me some XP drivers, and the other I could find in this great forum - thanks!

This test installation only has XPSP3 + machine drivers. It will be the base for a digital audio workstation. Please consider that I'm just a musician, not a computer expert!

Everything seens and feels to be working, but I'm experiencing a very confusing situation: after booting XP, if you left the machine idle for some time, you can see it's using 17-21 % ! And the first core (core0?) graphic is no lower than mid (in task manager). Strangely, it shows all process with 0% and idle with 99% ?!

I believed that task manager was not displaying correct information, so looking thru Process Explorer I found that all that CPU usage (up to 21%) is on 'System interrupt' ?! What's that?

I did a safe-mode boot and it disapears!!?!!!

How can I troubleshot/fix this issue? Anyone can instruct me?

(On my previous AMD DAW, I've never had any similar problem like this!)

Thanks for your attention and sorry for my bad english!


all the best,

brave.

 

Welcome to the NBR forums.

I would not consider it a problem since thats normal.

you must disable some background services/programs if you want to optimize the system.
- Indexing service
- System Restore
- Auto Defrag
- antivirus/anti-malware suites
... etc...

 

Hello!

I tried what you said: I disabled all startup itens and all non-Microsoft Services, but the idle CPU usage is just the same - average 17%, low 13-15%, higher 21-23% (while nothing happening, not even a mouse movement).

So it's a driver issue? Because when I boot in SAFE mode, it goes to 0% what I believe is the correct...

My previous DAW (AMD) has 'a lot going on' (some services, startup itens) and goes 0-1% maximum when iddle.

Please note that all that CPU usage on my 795 is 'System Interrupt' - it shows as 'cpu usage' on the task bar, but all process are 0% (idle time 99%) - I just found the interrupt thing when using Process Explorer...

Any idea??? (please!!)

It does not sound good to think some 500Mhz are being lost - for nothing...



all the best,
brave.

 

Make sure to get the latest chipset drivers, matrix manager drivers, and...

.. maybe disable some of the devices like:
- webcam
- infrared
- card reader

 

Gophn, I have vista ultimate x64 loaded, and with firefox, windows live messenger, an AV virus scan, yahoo mesenger, steam, daemon tools, poweriso, lightscreen, fraps, skype, HWmonitor and the winamp agent running, I am getting an average idle percentage of 2 - 8%. Every now and then it spikes to 12-15%, but that's my AV scanner running that does that, if I pause/stop the scan it doesn't do that. His fresh start into 17-21% is ridiculous. Disabling those services would help RAM more than CPU.

As far as I knew, the Windows XP BIOS was still a beta, wasn't it? Maybe that's what's causing the problem.

------------------------ Not related to original question below ------------------------

Even though you did not ask for it, I must point out that windows XP is an inferior OS (especially for this system which basically begs for x64 OS usage) and the x64 version of windows XP is not the best ideas for use.

 

Hi guys,

Thanks for the replys and attention!

I really don't know what is happening...

As "D2 Ultima" said, I would like to point that my previous Digital Audio Workstation (AMD-based) running underclocked to 800Mhz with WIN XP SP2, lot of processes, audio multitrack software, many devices drivers,... and so on... - a lot going on! - barely goes up to 15% !

On my Clevo, as I said, it goes from 15 to 21% while * nothing * is happening, o a clean install with additionally only D900F's drivers! If you turn off all startup itens and all non-microsoft services - it does not get any better.

The only way to get 0-1% (as I believe it should be?) is to boot WIN XP SP3 on safe mode.

Now goes my 'dumb' question (remember, I'm just a musician): what are the differences of a "system / system without startup itens and only microsoft services" vs "the same on safe boot"? What is disabled / removed? Because I believe that the cause is on the middle of it... The Clevo drivers I'm using?


No one else is running D900F or similar in Win XP??


Believe me guys, I really need to do it for now (and some months ahead)...

Do you suggest me any way to troubleshot this / test possibilities?

Drivers? Bios?

Here goes an image of the sitatuion:

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Thanks for helping!


all the best,
brave.

 

Firstly, a system doing a safe boot only loads the basic services that allow windows to boot. *Nothing* else is loaded. No audio, no video, no extra OS functions (system restore etc), nothing. It is all basic, bare-level "let-windows-work-and-nothing-else". Disabling startup items is only one aspect of it, you will *not* be able to disable everything (I.E. create a safe mode boot) without extensive knowledge of operating systems. Even I could not do it offhand.

Secondly, no, people have been clingy to their windows XP and refused to let it go, and tried to get it to run, some have edited the installer to load what drivers might work etc. You will most likely only find people using Windows 7 with this machine, very few Vista users (because people are stupid and simply wish to skip Vista for no reason) and the odd person who is still wishing XP will work properly. This machine was built without initial support for windows XP and remains without Clevo's full support to this day. The BIOS for windows XP is a beta, and is not completed, and the windows XP drivers for this machine are the same. They are not guaranteed to give you 100% functionality.

I suggest to you to use windows Vista ULTIMATE (no other version please, this is the most stable copy of windows I've ever used). If you MUST skip Vista, then use Windows 7. I suggest using ultimate again, as unlike with windows XP, from Vista onward microsoft began building the OS at Ultimate and then removing/adding back features to create the lower end copies (Windows Vista Ultimate was first, then Business was done by removing the media center functions, then Home Premium was done by adding back media center and removing security policies etc, then Home Basic was done by removing about 90% of the OS). So Ultimate = most stable, Business = 2nd in line, Home Premmy = 3rd in line, Home Basic = should be burned in the fires of hell and the sun for all eternity.

In terms of windows XP, home edition was made and then professional was made by adding a few features (which is why people say home edition was more stable than professional).

If you cannot use Vista or 7 for your job, could you explain why at least? If you have some issues you are not sure about, we'll be glad to help you in fixing them

 

Everything you listed is pretty normal. Both the idle process, (which should be taking most of the CPU time at idle), and even a high CPU usage at idle isn't an indication that something is wrong with your configuration. As you've indicated, your system Interrupts are the source of your idle CPU usage with the 18% CPU usage correlating almost directly. Also, with it going away with booting into Safe Mode, it's almost assuredly your LAN hardware that is generating the idle CPU load, which is again, typical. This would be the fault of the LAN driver, and you could try and change this, by changing the LAN driver. Usually this means upgrading the driver

You have two Ethernet ports on the laptop, the wired Realtek 8169 GB port, and, (usually), an Intel WiFi port. You could try disabling either port and see if that affects your CPU idle usage. This should give you a better idea of which device is causing the problem. If the port that is causing the problem is one you don't use, you could run your system without the port enabled, although that's not an optimal solution. Better to visit the network hardware vendor's website, either Realtek or Intel, and see if there is a driver you can download from there and install, in order to address this issue.

If it's the wired Realtek 8169 ethernet port, (which is my guess), you can try the most recent driver listed here, which is currently 5.719. If this doesn't change the CPU idle time, then you could also try emailing Realtek support and asking them if they can help you with this issue.

Good Luck..

 

But jas, you forget that his machine is a D900F. I.E. He's using an i7 core. He shouldn't have such high usage unless he's playing GTA IV or something

 

Hello to all,

I tried the LAN and WiFi - both disabling, uninstalling and updating - and nothing new...

As I said, on SAFE MODE I can get ~0% CPU idle time usage. So I just tried VGA MODE - by what I know the difference is that it loads video card drivers, isn't it?

In this VGA MODE I got the same 15~21% CPU usage, so would it be correct to assume that my issue is related to NVIDIA drivers??? Anything else?

I must thank you all for helping!


all the best,
brave.

PS: to "D2 ULTIMA": I have some 'not so new' applications that runs a bit unstable on VISTA and WIN7, that I'm not able to update for now (time/$). Also we have some ctrl software for custom hardware that for sure does not work on VISTA and is very unstable for WIN7 - also for now we can't afford the cost and time to redevelope these... But it doesn't mean that we will not go for WIN7! We just need to 'schedule' it and do it on the right time for us. Thanks for asking, thanks for helping!

 

Hello everybody,

I tried some video drivers (no sleep).

The videoboard of this machine is GeForce GTX 280M. It came with driver 185.85.

I tried 186.81 (which is the most recent version you get accessing thru Nvidia's site) and 191.56 (beta? but not the most?) - both did not install (could find no hardware?) using their 'setups' - I could only using Device manager and Update driver (I don't remember from where I downloaded them, but they are real and no virus)

They 'worked', but with same high CPU usage results.

Now I got anoter 186.81 from nvidia site, I could install from it's setup but the same bad issues... Same on VGA MODE.

I tried installing different drivers (IR, ethernet, audio, wifi,...) that I found here, but same CPU usage results again. The Intel mainboard drivers appeared to install but it was too fast, I'm not sure if it installed - really too fast.

I tried SAFE MODE + NETWORKING (to verify if the problem is network drivers?) and 0-1% - the same as SAFE BOOT, so it seems no problem.

I even tried uninstalling video drivers, so Win used a generic VGA driver... and I've got the same bad results - both normal boot and VGA MODE - so it may be not (just?) the video driver?!?

Man, I'm getting very worried about this...


Keep the faith! What now? Any other ideas?

(I'm starting to hate these interrupts!)


all the best,
brave.

 

how about not changing drivers.

try disabling devices in the Device Manager to check if one is causing the issue

 

There are unfortunately lots of folks who have posted about this on the net, and their solutions have run the gamut. Some have fixed this problem by addressing a hardware issue, reconnecting, or correctly connecting their HDDs, etc. Some have fixed this by resetting their system BIOS. Others have fixed this by reinstalling Windows from scratch, or changing from a Home version of Windows to a Pro version. The most interesting solution to some users problems, was to turn off OS effects, such as turning off Aero in Vista, and turning off transition effects in XP.

The challenge is in discovering which hardware device is causing your interrupt storm, as you noted. I would say that yours isn't a big one, because some folks have reported CPU usage of 50% or over at idle with their Interrupts, but this is again an i7 CPU. I agree with Gophn in that to isolate the problem better you should go into Device Manager and, with the Process Explorer running, try disabling your hardware devices one at a time, starting with LAN, IEEE1394 (firewire) ports, USB ports, and other non-essentials. Disable them one at a time, but don't reenable them, until you see a drop in the Interrupts CPU utilization. If you see your Interrupts CPU load drop after disabling a device, then go back and reenable your other devices and see if you've isolated the culprit.

Unfortunately that's as refined as it gets. There is a tool from Microsoft called the Kernrate Viewer, which is a general-purpose profiling tool for tracking CPU utilization by kernel-mode and user-mode processes. This tool can give you some guidance into which hardware interrupts are hogging the CPU, but that information can be misleading, as this post, from this HP user forums thread, suggests.

You can also read about some other users' experiences with similar problems at this nVidia users forum thread as well as this Techarena forum thread, and this ST&T forum thread.

Good Luck..

 

One more thing. Since you have this problem under Safe Mode with VGA, and because that loads the nVidia driver, it does look like you experience this problem only when the nVidia driver is loaded. I know you stated that you tried this, but I would try again uninstalling the nVidia driver completely, and booting without anything other than the stock Windows XP video drivers. Remember to uninstall the nVidia drivers completely, when you've booted into Safe mode only, otherwise you aren't really removing them completely. You could always completely reinstall XP and then before you added any additional drivers, check your Interrupts idle CPU usage to see if it's normal. Then install the nVidia drivers and check again to see if it's up now.

If it works, then you may have a situation where it's not necessarily the nVidia drivers, but your video card may be either not installed completely, or the video card may be a bit flaky and only generating the interrupts when the nVidia driver is loaded. I would then try reseating the video card, although this is something that requires relatively major surgery on your laptop, and you need to exercise some caution when you do it. Alternately if you are still under some return period with your vendor, you could contact them and let them know that you are having problems with the video card, and see if they will replace it for you. I don't know of a specific diagnostic program for the nVidia card, but there may be one you can run to test the hardware directly.

Lastly, if you're in a situation where you are trying to determine if you have a hardware problem, (like trying to determine whether you need to send the machine back as defective, etc.), which certainly seems possible given the wide spectrum of situations that can cause these kinds of interrupt storms, then it may be wise to try and install a different Windows, like Vista of 7, or even a 64 bit XP (x64), or XP SP2, if that's all you have, as a test. If you don't have an Interrupts CPU idle load problem under a different version of Windows, then it would seem that you are safe in assuming that it is some type of Windows driver problem. BTW, in doing this testing it would be important, given your results so far, to at least load the nVidia drivers, and see what your Interrupts CPU idle load is at.

Good Luck..