PC problem

[Dave]

Not a game but I guess this section attracts the nerdy among us! (In fact why not have it as a Gaming and Technology section).

My desktop PC has gone slooooooooooow all of a sudden, particularly when multitasking. My initial reaction was to blame Windows (7 64 bit) and do a fresh install. So I endured the hours of hell this leads to only to discover that the problem persists afterwards. Grrr.

So anyway, basically if I am downloading something or installing something or doing anything that involves disk access, the PC struggles to do any other activity. Right clicking or doing anything basic usually leads to 'Not responding'. Previously I could do loads of things with no issues.

I have 4Gb RAM (working perfectly)
a quad core processor (working perfectly)
a new HD5600 GFX card (working perfectly)

so all those can be ruled out. Now I have been analysing the resource monitor thing and the HD drive write-rewrite speeds seem fine BUT access seems to be intermittent. ie the drive seems to have periods of 'dead time' when it should be accessing the drive. So I thought about buying a drive, cloning the old one and seeing if that works any better (might do that anyway as my old drive is only 250Gb) but I have a feeling that, if the R/W speeds are ok, this isn't the problem.

Only other thing I can think of is a motherboard or BIOS issue.... If it was motherboard hardware it would surely fail rather than slow and as for BIOS, I dunno what to even look for.

So any suggestion? Thaaaaaaaaaaaaaanks!

[WebHead]

If you did a FULL fresh reinstall of Windows, including a complete wipe and rewrite of your hard drive, and the problem still persisted, then you probably have a hardware problem. A bad setting in your BIOS is possible, or possibly it could be Windows is having some driver problems or compatibility issues. But probably, the hardware is failing somewhere. I have a similar problem, my motherboard is suffering a slow death, I get a different error everyday, but she boots eventually (I am on a tight budget lol, don't want to fix it yet). Always seems to be faulty motherboards btw.

On a side note, I would suggest more ram for 64bit OS. 6GB or possibly 8GB, depending on whether it is triple or dual channel. You need double the address space for every activity in a 64bit OS. So you really only have the equivalent of 2GB ram on a 32bit OS, which isn't really much in this day and age. Plus ram is pretty cheap all things considered. You can even get it in pretty colours.

[Dave]

If you did a FULL fresh reinstall of Windows, including a complete wipe and rewrite of your hard drive, and the problem still persisted, then you probably have a hardware problem. A bad setting in your BIOS is possible, or possibly it could be Windows is having some driver problems or compatibility issues. But probably, the hardware is failing somewhere. I have a similar problem, my motherboard is suffering a slow death, I get a different error everyday, but she boots eventually (I am on a tight budget lol, don't want to fix it yet). Always seems to be faulty motherboards btw.

On a side note, I would suggest more ram for 64bit OS. 6GB or possibly 8GB, depending on whether it is triple or dual channel. You need double the address space for every activity in a 64bit OS. So you really only have the equivalent of 2GB ram on a 32bit OS, which isn't really much in this day and age. Plus ram is pretty cheap all things considered. You can even get it in pretty colours.

Yeah I am not going to bother with RAM at the moment. I will be doing a full system upgrade in the next couple of years so will hold off. It's a kinda sudden problem so it's not lack of RAM. It was a clean install so all dirvers were wiped and it was slow immediately (before Windows updates drivers etc). Will go for the HD option I think as an upgrade there is needed anyway.

[WebHead]

Have you tried pulling plugs in and out of the motherboard. Sometimes it's just bad connectivity. You know, wiggle a few things, then hey presto...

[Dave]

Have you tried pulling plugs in and out of the motherboard. Sometimes it's just bad connectivity. You know, wiggle a few things, then hey presto...

No I haven't. Will do that when I install the new disk. I am dreading spending hours cloning and installing and blah blah. Hate it.

[WebHead]

yeh, I know. that's kind of why I've moved to console gaming. I don't need the extra hassle.

[Dave]

yeh, I know. that's kind of why I've moved to console gaming. I don't need the extra hassle.

Just out of interest, mouse based games likes Mass Effect, Company of Heroes etc... is it not shitty playing them on a console. I have contemplated getting an Xbox but dunno how I could cope without a mouse!

[WebHead]

Well in the case of Mass Effect, I don't have an Xbox, so I have to play it on PC. Can I say it has been nightmarish, because the DRM protection on the CD. The game won't even boot in my vista install anymore, I had to install fresh on my XP installation then copy the save games over. All just because I changed my graphics card. Then the sound drivers aren't compatible, so some sounds are too loud, and cut scenes are too quiet with speech. It has to be one of the buggiest software ever! You just know it would run OK on console.

You are right about mouse based games, but also wrong. For shooter the humble controller is adequate now. Most games have locking systems for aiming, but even if they don't, you can get the hang of it with practice. It is serviceable. So Mass Effect is good on console, and for the reasons previously mentioned, probably more pleasant on console also.

Strategy games, stick to your PC. There is not substitute for a mouse in those games. Even inventory based games are painful without a mouse. See oblivion, fallout, etc. Kind of Mass Effect with inventory as well. Company of Heroes belongs on PC only, along with Starcraft, etc.

But there is a certain advantage to laying down on a coach or even the bed when you play a game versus sitting 1 metre from the monitor in an upright position. I enjoy console gaming now, it is far more comfortable. And social, other people can watch or join in easily.

[Dave]

Well in the case of Mass Effect, I don't have an Xbox, so I have to play it on PC. Can I say it has been nightmarish, because the DRM protection on the CD. The game won't even boot in my vista install anymore, I had to install fresh on my XP installation then copy the save games over. All just because I changed my graphics card. Then the sound drivers aren't compatible, so some sounds are too loud, and cut scenes are too quiet with speech. It has to be one of the buggiest software ever! You just know it would run OK on console.

You are right about mouse based games, but also wrong. For shooter the humble controller is adequate now. Most games have locking systems for aiming, but even if they don't, you can get the hang of it with practice. It is serviceable. So Mass Effect is good on console, and for the reasons previously mentioned, probably more pleasant on console also.

Strategy games, stick to your PC. There is not substitute for a mouse in those games. Even inventory based games are painful without a mouse. See oblivion, fallout, etc. Kind of Mass Effect with inventory as well. Company of Heroes belongs on PC only, along with Starcraft, etc.

But there is a certain advantage to laying down on a coach or even the bed when you play a game versus sitting 1 metre from the monitor in an upright position. I enjoy console gaming now, it is far more comfortable. And social, other people can watch or join in easily.

Interesting. I might get a console in the future but strategy games are still top of my list of favourites although I do enjoy a whole variety.

On the subject of my poorly PC, I am about to install Windows on a new Western Digital 1Tb black (dual processor 7200RPM) drive so if there was a drive problem that is sure to cure it. If not, well.... who knows!

[MONSTAR]

You cant play shoot em ups on PC without some mofo with aimbot. You dont get any of that with the PS3

[Rus-Evo]

Is that cos without a mouse they have to make all the games too easy (because of the controller)??

I know some people use a mouse on the PS3....but how many really do?

[MONSTAR]

I duno, your telling the story

[Dave]

Well my new hard drive seems to have solved the initial problem but a weird new one has developed. My external drive (on which I backed up everything) is no longer recognised. So I took the drive out of its casing and simply mounted it as an internal drive. Now Windows tells me it's empty and unformatted. No idea how that all happened. Anyway - I am currently running EASEUS data recovery to see if that recovers everything. Also now the BIOS tells me its searching for USB mass storage devices and it does it for aaaaages. After it doesn't find any everything is ok. On a brighter note, the boot up after that on the new drive is very quick.

EDIT - so far EASEUS is saying it's found 5000 files so sounds promising. Only trouble is I will have to pay 50USD to recover them. Worth it though if it works.

[WebHead]

So your backup failed? Uh oh!

[Dave]

So your backup failed? Uh oh!

Yes

However EASEUS is now saying it has found 385,000 files so far!

[Dave]

These data recovery things are bloody painful to use.

Does anybody know a disk diagnostic tool that is actually any good? That might be able to do some repairs. Nothing shitty like PCPitstop

[WebHead]

Unfortunately I can't help you on that one. I've always had a backup drive or whatever that saved my butt.

[Dave]

I just want to say....

I LOVE TESTDISK. Forget paying for recovery crap. This thing rocks!