Laptop Troubles

[TechnOkami]

So, I'm not the most tech-savvy of people.

However, after realizing that I have more than enough memory to go around (only 1/4 of it is in use total), running a defrag on my hard drive, and even going a far as a system restore, my laptop which was able to run Fallout New Vegas, Saints Row 4, and Skyrim (on low graphics) can now not run any of them without being awfully slow.

Or rather, all three of them started to be really slow, and I did the things I mentioned above, with a friend's help, to see if it would alleviate the problem.

It didn't.

I'm really livid about it and am probably going to be reloading Windows 8 onto my system, because I was running these games just fine a few days ago, and now they suddenly start acting up when there's nothing obviously visible as to what I could have done to cause this. I would assume that the issue is that I downloaded a lot of mods for Fallout 3, but I had more mods set for Skyrim much before that, and it was running them just fine!

I'm just honestly at a loss. I've done what I know how to do (which is probably limited), and I will most likely be starting my system off from scratch. If that doesn't do anything... then I don't know what it could be. Could it be a hardware error? Could I have burnt out the graphics card that quickly?

I realize I'm not offering much tangible information, but some kind of feedback would be really nice.

[valadil]

I don't know Windows 8 at all, but here are some basic suggestions to get you started.

Restart your computer and open the process manager. Are there any programs using most of your ram/cpu? What are they?

Reinstall your graphics driver.

I've seen new video cards die quickly when they're duds. When this happens is really, really obvious. You see all sorts of weird graphical artifacts for about a minute, then the system overheats and freezes. Playing slowly isn't really a sign of video card failure.

Is your laptop plugged in? Some operate at a slower clock speed when they're unplugged as a way of saving battery life. Others have two video cards and only use the power hungry one when you have AC power.

Some of your game mods might also be problematic. How do those games run without any mods at all?

[TechnOkami]

I didn't think of the graphics driver. I'll try that.

Edit: AAaaaaaaaaand it didn't work. Lovely.

To answer your questions more specifically:


Restart your computer and open the process manager. Are there any programs using most of your ram/cpu? What are they?
Not really. There's Steam and Skype that start up when I turn on the computer, but I was able to run these games (individually) with Steam and Skype running in the background just fine. I don't know what happened.


Reinstall your graphics driver.
I did. It didn't work.


Is your laptop plugged in? Some operate at a slower clock speed when they're unplugged as a way of saving battery life. Others have two video cards and only use the power hungry one when you have AC power.
I always have it plugged in. I like performance.


Some of your game mods might also be problematic. How do those games run without any mods at all?
Without any mods, they ran fine. Few of the mods that I installed had better graphics for what they were, like a better female base model for instance, but those alone didn't cause any lag inside the game itself.

I should mention though that something I did recently, which "might" have caused this, is that I downloaded a lot of individual mods for Fallout New Vegas, and then applied them to the game through an Offline Nexus Mod Manager, the same one I was using for Skyrim. It was working fine for Skyrim beforehand, and all these incidents happened only after I downloaded and installed the mods individually to my laptop.

And then everything went to hell in a hand basket.

[TechnOkami]

(please pardon the double post)

I should mention that for someone who was previously running Saints Row IV at 1680x1050 just fine a few days ago should not be forced to drop the settings to 320x200 for the same quality of performance.

I am really, really annoyed by this.

[valadil]

Not really. There's Steam and Skype that start up when I turn on the computer, but I was able to run these games (individually) with Steam and Skype running in the background just fine. I don't know what happened.


Could you check anyway? I'm trying to rule out a virus or something taking over your CPU.



Without any mods, they ran fine. Few of the mods that I installed had better graphics for what they were, like a better female base model for instance, but those alone didn't cause any lag inside the game itself.


Right. I'm trying to eliminate the variables in what's hurting your performance. Mods are one such variable. If you can disable them all and the games run the same, logically you know the mods weren't the issue. If that's not the case, you know that at least one mod is problematic (or at least one combination of mods, which is a much more obnoxious problem to troubleshoot).

[TechnOkami]

The processes that took up the most of the Disk's work space were Service Host:Local System (Network Restricted) stuff, quickly followed by Skype, Steam and my antivirus, pushing up the Disk use to 90+%. After that they calmed down and now my disk use is at 0%, with memory running at 19%.

The Disk did spike again, and that was the Antivirus Downloader, but I've been staring at the Task Manager as asked for a while now, and everything's pretty consistent. Memory at 19%, Network at 0%, and CPU/Disk staying at 0% but occasionally shifting between 0-5%

I pulled up Risk of Rain, and things spiked on the initial start up, but now they're staying around the following values:
CPU: 3%
Memory: 21%
Disk: 0-4%
Network: 0%

Pulling up Saints Row IV didn't cause as much of a spike, mostly because it was Steam revving up which caused the spike. Setting the graphics back to and having them run at 1680x1050 lead to the following values:
CPU: 3%
Memory: 30%
Disk: 3%
Network: 0%

For both of these, both Skyrim and Fallout and any mods and the Nexus Mod Manager were not on my computer. Saints Row is still slower than it should be, and Risk of Rain, which previously ran fine at 60 FPS now occasionally drops down to 40 during gameplay. It remained consistently at 60 previously.

I really don't understand why it's been messing up, but thank you for the help so far.

[Don Julio Anejo]

Did you recently update Windows, or let it auto-update? Or worse yet, install Windows 8.1? There are a lot of rumours flying around the net that 8.1 doesn't play well with games and/or drivers.

What video card (or better yet, full specs on your laptop) are you using? Did you recently change some settings on purpose/by accident, such as in AMD Overdrive (AMD's built in overclocking utility)? When you reinstalled the driver, was it from a full working installer file you had (i.e. "I have AMD Catalyst 13.1 and I'm going to reinstall from that"), or was it by downloading the latest driver from the manufacturer's site?

Have you tried rolling back the driver to an earlier version? In a lot of cases, this helps (what you're describing is 80% likely driver problems). AMD is currently playing with drivers day-to-day cause of their R9 290 series cards, and they may have messed with something by accident.

Lastly, download a little utility called GPU-Z, it'll be able to tell you what frequency/etc your card is running at, and run a benchmark such as PCMark or 3dMark 11 on your PC. Check the score you get against people with a similar card, you'll at least know if the card itself works properly or if it's something like a broken fan that causes it to throttle and slow down.

[TechnOkami]

Did you recently update Windows, or let it auto-update? Or worse yet, install Windows 8.1? There are a lot of rumours flying around the net that 8.1 doesn't play well with games and/or drivers.Yep, it's 8.1. But it's been 8.1 for a while now, so it shouldn't be affecting the games at all, or it suddenly just decided to take a dump on me now all of the sudden. I honestly don't know.


What video card (or better yet, full specs on your laptop) are you using? Did you recently change some settings on purpose/by accident, such as in AMD Overdrive (AMD's built in overclocking utility)? When you reinstalled the driver, was it from a full working installer file you had (i.e. "I have AMD Catalyst 13.1 and I'm going to reinstall from that"), or was it by downloading the latest driver from the manufacturer's site?*fumbles around the computer a bit*

OS: Windows 8.1, 64-bit
System Manufacturer: Notebook
System Moel: W65_W670SZ
Processor: Intel(R) Core (TM) i7-4700MQ CPU @ 2.40GHz (8 CPUs), ~2.4GHz
Memory: 8192MB RAM
Page File: 2534MG used, 6858MB available


Have you tried rolling back the driver to an earlier version? In a lot of cases, this helps (what you're describing is 80% likely driver problems). AMD is currently playing with drivers day-to-day cause of their R9 290 series cards, and they may have messed with something by accident. I have done a system restore. The problem though is I don't think I allocated enough memory dedicated to system restore, so it only went back so far.


Lastly, download a little utility called GPU-Z, it'll be able to tell you what frequency/etc your card is running at, and run a benchmark such as PCMark or 3dMark 11 on your PC. Check the score you get against people with a similar card, you'll at least know if the card itself works properly or if it's something like a broken fan that causes it to throttle and slow down.

Well, I downloaded it, and I don't know what it's telling me, or what I should be getting from it. I also don't have either program you mentioned, and from the looks of it I'll have to buy them, and I don't have the money atm.

I should note: I am impatient, and am doing a full recovery for the laptop. If this doesn't solve the issues... then it's a hardware issue.

[Don Julio Anejo]

Yep, it's 8.1. But it's been 8.1 for a while now, so it shouldn't be affecting the games at all, or it suddenly just decided to take a dump on me now all of the sudden. I honestly don't know.

Quite possible, actually. I see it popping up all over the web.


OS: Windows 8.1, 64-bit
System Manufacturer: Notebook
System Moel: W65_W670SZ
Processor: Intel(R) Core (TM) i7-4700MQ CPU @ 2.40GHz (8 CPUs), ~2.4GHz
Memory: 8192MB RAM
Page File: 2534MG used, 6858MB available

Ironically, doesn't say which video card it is, though I'm guessing you've got the built-in integrated Intel GPU (HD4400 if I'm not mistaken). If that's the case, however, it's probably not the drivers. Intel stuff usually doesn't force updates on you unless your laptop came with auto-update software that forces you to update everything (Lenovo, for instance).


I have done a system restore. The problem though is I don't think I allocated enough memory dedicated to system restore, so it only went back so far.
Honestly? System restore is almost always almost completely useless unless you make a new restore point just before you do something. I actually keep it off to save space, though I can usually troubleshoot my computers and have live CD's and a hard drive reader for when I can't or something hardware-based breaks.

Well, I downloaded it, and I don't know what it's telling me, or what I should be getting from it. I also don't have either program you mentioned, and from the looks of it I'll have to buy them, and I don't have the money atm.
They are actually shareware - they have free versions that let you run benchmarks, but are limited in what options you can use. However, it sounds like more hassle than it's worth if you're already reformatting your drive.

At this point, the most likely culprit is either Windows 8.1, or a hardware issue.

[TechnOkami]

Well, one complete factory reset later and everything is functioning the way it used to be. Everything is back to normal. And... I do enjoy mods, bu I also don't want to go through that again, especially since I don't specifically know what caused the issues in the first place.