I get intermittent CPU usage spikes on my laptop that make it run very slow. When I check the task manager performance monitor, sometimes these spikes are 100%

Dell Inspiron 9100
Intel Pentium 4 CPU 3.00 GHz 2.99 GHz
Windows 7 Professional 32-bit
2 GB RAM

I have identified 2 programs in particular that cause my computer to slow down - Spider Solitaire & any Flash game.

My fan seems to run a lot and it is noisy. Maybe the high CPU usage is causing it to run hot?

I use this laptop for school, so I need it to last until next summer.

So don't play those games if you need your computer to be responsive to other running programs. Simple.

Or make sure you have the latest versions of each. Or run the older versions in compatibility mode. Or run the online version of Spider Solitaire instead of the stand-alone version (or vice-versa).

Make sure you DO know what's running when your machine slows down. Get "What's my computer doing" for free from:
http://www.itsth.com/en/produk...r-doing.php?fromwmcd

Jeff/CompGuy

I removed the games. I downloaded "What's my computer doing", and even when I ran the flash game "Spinnacles" on Neopets that seriously slows down my computer, nothing out of the ordinary showed up in the list. Here's what the task manager shows as processes running:

taskmgr.exe
dwm.exe
OSA.exe
FINDFAST.exe
firefox.exe
msseces.exe
BCMSMMSG.exe
explorer.exe
taskhost.exe
Ati2evxx.exe
winlogon.exe
csrss.exe

I can't find any reason for the intermittent slow performance. It is an older model laptop I've had since 2005, so maybe it just doesn't have enough power for games with Windows 7. I don't recall having the problem when I had XP on it.

You don't need dwm,osa,findfast. You're not likely to be still using SpyBot (which uses bcmsmmsg.exe).

You didn't have to remove the games--if you're not running them they have no effect on your cpu usage.

Did you ever run a compatibility test before upgrading to Win7? I'm not surprised a 5-year-old laptop would have trouble with some parts of Win7...

Jeff/CompGuy

If they're there, I'll play them I added memory before upgrading to Windows 7 and I ran the compatibility test. It gave me a couple of yellow flags. bcmsmmsg.exe is a modem driver. Performance seems a bit better with IE than with Firefox. I plan to get a new laptop in Jan. I want something lighter and slimmer but not sure if I want something as small as a netbook.

http://www.what-is-exe.com/fil...es/bcmsmmsg-exe.html
says that bcmsmmsg.exe "should be found in your spybot folder"! But you're right--that's bad information. Sorry.

I don't trust information on the Internet in general, but technical notes from a site like this are usually pretty reliable, so I don't double-check them for a quick post here.

Jeff/CompGuy

I restored the laptop to XP. The performance has improved.

 
Diane...

Just saw your note herein and wanted to tell you my experience with a netbook.

It's been WONDERFUL!

I've been working exclusively on a DELL Inspirion Mini since last Xmas and I love, love, love it. The only add-on I have is a DVD-CD drive that stays in its case except for the 3-4 times a year I need to install something via CD.

If I were doing serious numeric data-entry I'd opt for a USB keypad, but I haven't missed it for my use.

*CJ

I think my laptop is dying. The CPU usage spikes continued after the downgrade to XP. It is so slow that it is practically unusable.

Have you checked to see what is taking up the CPU usage when the spikes occur?

CPU spikes COULD be a sign of a dying piece of hardware, but that's not usual. How long do the spikes last--a few seconds or more?

Try using your computer for a few hours in safe mode with networking. Do you get the spikes then too?

Jeff/CompGuy

Hi Jeff,
This is what happens. I start the laptop, open Firefox and check my e-mail accounts & favorite sites. I might open a document over the network, or play Spider Solitaire (I deleted it from Windows 7, but when I downgraded, I still have the games on XP) I notice that the computer is slow, then check the task manager and the usage is at 100%. Then, it slowly drops down to 3-4% with occasional spikes that last only a few seconds. Firefox or IE seem to be the processes using the most resources. Also, the fan blows a lot and is noisy.

Sounds to me like you are trying to use your computer before it has fully booted up. Try starting it up and going away for fifteen minutes, then see if you still have these problems.

A noisy fan can be anything from, well, a noisy fan to a sign that the computer is overheating. Overheating can cause CPU blips because the CPU isn't functioning properly. Often the heat sink over the CPU has to be removed, more thermal grease applied, and then the heat sink replaced. The grease dries out and stops performing efficiently over the years.

On the other hand, laptop prices have plummeted. Pay attention to sites like dealnews.com and you'll find fantastic deals on modern laptops for a few hundred dollars. There's never been a better time to buy a new computer.

And that's almost always true, you know, since prices keep going down!

Jeff/CompGuy

I got a new laptop, but I would like to get the old one in shape.

I don't think it was from attempting use before boot was complete, though Firefox did take a long time to start. The excess CPU usage happens after I've on for a while. There is some dust build-up around the fans. Is it difficult to apply thermal grease?

It's not difficult to apply thermal grease--but working inside a laptop can be hard. You have to remove the heatsink over the CPU to apply the grease and then replace it, and you may have to take out lots of things to get to that point.

Frankly, I usually leave such jobs to the technicians in a computer store IF the fix is worth $100 or more to me. If it isn't, I junk the laptop. Again, with prices so low these days, I wouldn't fuss much over an old laptop with little resale value. Sell it on eBay with the flaws mentioned and move on...

Jeff/CompGuy

I was planning to give it to a friend.

I had a thought that the problem might be a software issue rather than a hardware issue. It might be looking for something or trying to execute some process that it can't find. What is your opinion about the various utilities that "clean & optimize"? Are any of them worth bothering with?

Well, you said that it was your browser (IE or FireFox) that were using most of the resources when the CPU spiked. I assumed you found that out by looking at the processes list in the Task Manager. So that would rule out the scenario you're presenting of an unknown process or application launching. You'd see that in the process list.

There are good utilities, many of them. I have WinPatrol Plus running constantly to oversee things in my main computer. I think this review site:

http://pc-system-utilities-sof...w.toptenreviews.com/

is reasonably impartial in its reviews, even though it probably gets commissions for selling the products it reviews. It gives a good starting list for what software you should look at.

System Mechanic also received an excellent review recently in the NY Times...

Jeff/CompGuy

 
Diane...

I started experiencing a serious slow-down of ALL applications on my netbook. Web pages took 45-90 seconds to open, email was c r a w l i n g, even switching between two open tabs would take an ungawdly amount of time.

I checked my usage and yep, I had HUGE CPU usage spikes, and not just at boot up, but alllll through the day.

I clicked over to the PROCESSES tab and resorted the listing by Mem Usage to see how much memory was being used by each application and noted a lil' beast by the name of "jqs.exe" was second only to iexplore.exe.

JQS stands for Java Quick Starter and it became standard in Java's SE 6 update 10 (6u10), and unless you're regularly running JAVA apps, is unnecessary to have running allllll the time, not to mention it's a memory pig. I disabled it with the directions provided here and after a re-boot, I'm back to having my normal swift system.

*CJ

Thanks CJ

I gave the Dell laptop to my son; he wanted to install Linux on it, so JQS should no longer be a problem on it for him. I will keep that in mind if my desktop or my new laptop begin to crawl.