WEIRD: Computer stutters EXACTLY every hour.

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gtrajectory

Weaksauce
Joined
Feb 26, 2008
Messages
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So, my computer is suffering from a very short stutter (like 2 seconds) EXACTLY ever hour. For example, yesterday always that the windows timer was X:08 (X=hour; 08=minutes), it stuttered. It always happens, regardless if you are playing, or just listening an MP3 (you notice it because the whole computer stutters, including sound). Today is happening with 19 minutes (happened every single hour, when the minutes where 19)

This is a fresh install of XP SP2.

My computer is:

Q6600 G0
Sapphire HD 3870X2 (Latest Catalyst)
2GB Geil BlackDragon
Gigabyte X38-DQ6 (Bios updated)
SB 5.1 Live using KX Drivers
Enermax Infinity 720W


This is really weird and I would really like it to stop.

Thanks,
 
virus? :p

maybe windows indexing is screwy? or windows update? dunno, its a weird issue... maybe check your power management? see if windows is trying to power down hard drives every hour possibly.
 
IdiotCow said:
virus? :p

maybe windows indexing is screwy? or windows update? dunno, its a weird issue... maybe check your power management? see if windows is trying to power down hard drives every hour possibly.
Click to expand...

Not really. Windows update is set to manual, power management is set to not turn off anything (not even the monitor). Windows indexing... I just reinstalled the SO after a format.
 
If it's that consistent, I put the problem as software, not hardware. I.e. dying hardware wouldn't behave like clockwork. It would respond to stimulus - much the same way OCed hardware crashes during increased loads.
 
Check the scheduled tasks to see if something got put in there unexpectedly - some software does odd things. (I once had a program add its timer entry and delete all others in the process!).

Open task manager and watch the processes tab to see what kicks in at that time. Sort by %CPU so the active processes are at the top (or bottom - your choice). If it's two seconds, you should see what process does work at that point.
 
Michael Daly said:
Check the scheduled tasks to see if something got put in there unexpectedly - some software does odd things. (I once had a program add its timer entry and delete all others in the process!).

Open task manager and watch the processes tab to see what kicks in at that time. Sort by %CPU so the active processes are at the top (or bottom - your choice). If it's two seconds, you should see what process does work at that point.
Click to expand...


I did that (today was stuttering every hour at 30 minutes) and when the stutter happened, everything was at 00% CPU usage (nothing abnormal).
 
Mav451 said:
If it's that consistent, I put the problem as software, not hardware. I.e. dying hardware wouldn't behave like clockwork. It would respond to stimulus - much the same way OCed hardware crashes during increased loads.
Click to expand...

QFT...leaning toward software issue.

How fresh of install? How many added programs? Turn off updates for all 3rd party apps.
 
Hmm, I'm wondering if there is some electrical appliance in the house like a refrigerator/freezer drawing a lot of amps every hour causing a voltage drop on the 110 line.
 
A power hiccup would not do this.

If nothing shows in Task Manager processes, it could be some internal Windows process that doesn't register on TM. Sort of like those long slow boot processes that seem to take forever yet don't show anything in TM while the HDD light is off - something is happening but nothing is letting me know what's going on.

If you are keen and have the right administration functions in Control Panel (I'm not sure if these are in XP or only XP Pro), you can run traces and logs of all sorts of stuff. Not well documented and these functions can be quite frustrating, but they could tell you more than anything else. Otherwise, search Google for Windows under-the-cover analysis tools.
 
Michael Daly said:
A power hiccup would not do this.

If nothing shows in Task Manager processes, it could be some internal Windows process that doesn't register on TM. Sort of like those long slow boot processes that seem to take forever yet don't show anything in TM while the HDD light is off - something is happening but nothing is letting me know what's going on.

If you are keen and have the right administration functions in Control Panel (I'm not sure if these are in XP or only XP Pro), you can run traces and logs of all sorts of stuff. Not well documented and these functions can be quite frustrating, but they could tell you more than anything else. Otherwise, search Google for Windows under-the-cover analysis tools.
Click to expand...

I've downloaded ProcessMonitor, which shows shitloads of stuff per second. A stutter happened at 1:01. Then, I saved the log of the entire second and searched all the operations done. I can't see nothing abnormal going on.
 
I think the problem is in the 250 or 200GB SATA disk. Its 5:58 and the next stutter is in 6:01, so I don't have much time left. Can I unplug a SATA disk while the PC is running?
 
If you had Vista you could watch the performance monitor to see what program is accessing the HDD or using CPU cycles.

But Vista sucks.:rolleyes:, not
 
sounds dumb but are all the clocks correct? I heard a while ago that this guys bios clock was off by like a couple seconds from his windows clock ( yeah i wa l ike wtf that can happen?) and whenever the bios clock and windows clock would have the same time ( think he said once a day or somethinga) that his computer would shut off. horrible long shot but.....
 
i have this problem at the moment with my dual core opteron...every now and then, from an audio perspective, someone is scratching a record and my computer will pause for a split second and then resume just fine.
 
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