Really slow Windows 7 always at 100% CPU despite new install and RAM upgrade

After my XP system crashed I did a clean reformat with Windows 7 Ultimate on my Dell Dimension 4600 PC. It is a 2.66 Ghz Pentium 4. I used to have XP on it with only 1gb RAM. I tried the existing 1gb out for a bit and decided I needed an upgrade to 2.5gb (a pair of new 1gb cards plus two existing 256mb cards), but that has made no difference at all.

The PC runs at 100% CPU usage momentarily as I load any website. Sometimes I can't scroll through a page smoothly even after it loads. Of course streaming video is a total no-no (always choppy or in low resolution). It even runs at 100% after startup when it's probably checking for Windows updates. It's incredibly frustrating that a new install and an upgrade has made no difference.

I have made certain tweaks:
-Aero was disabled from the very beginning
-Search indexing (Windows Search) is disabled
-Switch the Power Plan to high performance mode and the processor's power management to "active cooling"
-Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service is disabled
-I don't have any unnecessary programs running continuously except MS Security Essentials.

None of these changes made a difference. I have noticed that my Windows Experience score is only a 1.0 because the graphics cards seems to be acting as a bottleneck. I have an integrated Nvidia GeForce4 MX 440 with AGP8X.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

What process is using 100% CPU? Check with the Task Manager's Processes tab.

What is your Nvidia's device driver version & date? Check with Device Manager.

 

Doug...

On this machine the way you have it set up, no way will you be able to play HD video. Normal video at YouTube, you should be able to play, however.

I had a Dell 2.8 GHz a few years back that I took up to 3 GB from 1 GB. It held its own until HD video took over at YouTube. I decided to get a new machine. I actually have one of those graphics cards you have in yours. I never used it, but it was used and cheap, so I bought it and tested it. I don't see how it could be worse than the onboard graphics, although it wasn't enough of a benefit to me to use it. I had some flickering, so I just pulled it.

You probably don't want to hear this, but maybe it's time to look at a core2duo machine or a quad core machine. You can get into a core2duo machine for less than $100 with 3 or 4 GB if you can find the right deal...

 

It's all taken up by Firefox. It's not even Flash player or anything like that.

The driver date is 11/3/2003 and the version is 4.5.02. I used Windows to find and updated driver and it switched to a Standard VGA adapter from Microsoft that wouldn't let me change from 800x600. So I rolled it back to the initial drive.

Can you suggest one from this page? http://www.drivermax.com/driver/update/Display-Adapters/NVIDIA/NVIDIA-GeForce4-MX-440-with-AGP8X

 

Are you saying that I can get a separate graphics card that will override the integrated one?

Yea, it looks like I'm just gonna have to let this PC go soon. This summer it'll be 10 years since I've had it.

 

Did you ever check the Windows Upgrade Advisor to see if your computer was suitable for an upgrade to Win 7. Being 10 years old, I suspect it is not.

 

Hi my friend , you can create this cd

http://www.hirensbootcd.org/download/

burning it with

http://www.majorgeeks.com/ImgBurn_d4870.html

there is many tool which helps you to test your memory with memtest86 ( four 5 hours at least ) even you have to find the manufacturer of hdd testing your hdd

go to Start
Right click to My Computer
Properties
Hardware tab
Device Manager
Disk Drivers

there is a code of your hdd like this ( for instance )

HDS722516VLSA80

even is there any ? in Device Manager ? Start - Run mmc devmgmt.msc - Ok :wave

 

I couldn't run the Upgrade Advisor because my system had crashed, but the repair guy said the system was good enough to install Windows 7. I just ran it now and it says it's good for everything except Aero and that my graphics driver is not compatible. As I said below, I'm looking for someone to suggest the correct driver for me to install.

 

Ah I see...your Nvidia GeForce4 MX 440 is integrated and AGP8X? That sounds strange to me. I have an AGP8X version of the same graphics card that was an add on...

Core2duo and quad core...those aren't going to go out of style for work. They stream HD, although I'm sure a video format will come along eventually that they won't run, but they run MS Office, too. Also, you can play most of the 2005 and older games on them if you just play to keep your edge. Best thing is you can basically have it all with one for $100 or less if you look around. Splurge and put in a second hard disk for backups, and you are good to go...

 

It looks like this would ge the driver from that page: http://www.drivermax.com/driver/update/DISPLAY/NVIDIA/NVIDIA-GeForce4-MX-440-with-AGP8X/1201938

I can't comment on the trustworthiness of DriverMax.

If it were me I would download the XP driver from Nvidia and if Win7 says it is not compatible and suggest running it in Compatibility mode as XP SP2 or something go ahead and do that. It should work fine. http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_93.71_2.html

Slimdrivers is another possible solution. You can uninstall slimdrivers (which will annoyingly set itself to load at startup after you get the drivers you want/need).

**
As far as Win7 on that machine is should run OK after a slow bootup. Does IE also use so much CPU? Which version of FF?

Also consider doing another new install after you get your driver situation figured out. Perhaps it was just a buggy load?

 

It could very possibly be a shoddy install job by the repair guy because another problem I've been having is bits of hard drive space disappearing into thin air. Like around 1 GB per day since the repair around 10 days ago.

I've been running WinDirStat regularly and it looks like it's all getting eaten up by C:\Windows. Out of a 72gb drive, the Windows folder is taking up 12.4gb and growing, and 56% of that is in the winsxs folder.

 

That is about normal for Win7. If you are doing updates then copies of the updates are kept in winsxs folder which will always be your biggest folder within the Windows folder. My winsxs folder is 8gb for a 6mos. old installation. If yours grows beyond 10gb in the next week or so then you might have a problem. If it levels off at less than that then I think it should be OK.

***
You know I was thinking one other thing. Since device manager sees your Nvidia card. Go to Start>type in wu and hit enter. That will bring up Windows Update. After it searches for updates it should have a link for Optional Updates. Click that and see if it suggests a driver for the Nvidia card. If it doesn't then I would try the Nvidia link I suggested earlier.

 

The Forceware from Nvidia's site wouldn't install because it didn't recognize the OS. It didn't ask me about Compatibility mode either.

Slimdrivers found an upgrade and I installed it but the driver's date and version has not changed from the previous one. I can't tell if it actually installed.

 

Update: Since the Forceware was useless I wanted to uninstall it but unknown to me it got rid of EVERYTHING including my existing driver. So I had to do a system restore back to whatever Slimdrivers installed (it was called Epson Twain 5). But again, the driver is still listing the version I had to start with which was 4.5.0.2 and Roll back is grayed out so it seems like nothing even installed.

Why isn't there a simple download for version 6.14.10.9371?!

 

It would seem that Nvidia never officially released a driver. I'm not sure it is graphics driver that is the problem.

Just to be clear on whether this is a card or integrated. Is the graphics connector towards the bottom of the case in a horizontal position? Which would suggest an AGP card?

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=192890&d=1356118651

What is currently listed in Device Manager under Display Adapters? Is it standard VGA or does it reference Nvidia?

***
And with FF closed does IE browse sites OK and use less resources?

 

Yea it's toward the bottom, horizontal blue VGA connector with a S-video port right next to it. The "DAC Type" for the adapter says Integrated RAMDAC. The Device Manager lists it as "Nvidia GeForce4 MX 440 with AGP8X (Dell)"

IE runs just as poorly as FF. 100% usage when loading webpages. Chrome has much better performance but still not good enough.

 

It sounds like it is recognizing the card. I found this thread and it looks like you have to right-click the Nvidia executable and select compatibility mode to get it to install. Or unpack the Nvidia exe into a folder and then go to Device Manager and manually browse to the unpacked folder and tell it to use the .inf file. 7-zip will unpack an executable but I think compatibility mode should work.

This seems to be the most reliable driver for win7 but it was written for XP so you need to right click it and use compatibility mode to install.

 

I actually figured out the compatibility thing right before seeing your post. I now have version 6.14.10.9371 dated 10/22/2006.

Videos are streaming a lot better now, not as unwatchably choppy. But that could also be because of a speed upgrade I just got for my internet connection.

So is it possible to get a GPU upgrade based on the info I gave?

 

Read through that thread I linked to because even though it was old some posts were as recent as 2012 and there were references to disabling hardware acceleration with the latest drivers. There seemed to be some consensus that the older version ran a little better without any tweaking.

You'll probably get better advice in the Hardware forum on a new GPU. You main stumbling blocks are no PCI-E slot and a low wattage PSU.

You will be limited to an AGP or PCI card. Someone in Hardware could help you determine which is better even on an old model. Years ago AGP was considered better but I am not so sure if that is still true.

There are really only two PCI and you would have to go to EVGA's site to get the PSU requirements. Plenty of people have used the EVGA 128/256mb with older Dells and had no problem with the PSU even though it doesn't quite fit the minimum requirements. The passive heatsink cuts down on power consumption. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...001402 40000048 600007853&IsNodeId=1&name=PCI

I'm not familiar with the AGP versions but they are mostly the same chip so probably similar results. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...100007709 600007850&IsNodeId=1&name=AGP 4X/8X

There may be more choices on Amazon. I really think EVGA is your only PCI option but there may be more AGP over there.

 

Well it seems the version I installed does have issues since I just got a BSOD when opening a video file (first time loading a video file since updating the driver). The message Win7 gave me is:

"This problem occurred because your video card doesn't support the required version of DirectX. This version of Windows requires a video card that supports DirectX 9.0 or newer."

I confirmed with dxdiag that I have DX11. So now apparently my video card doesn't support DX9 or newer because I upgraded the driver? But the older version of the same video card did support DX9 or higher? Makes no sense.

That thread you linked is very helpful since they had the same issues as me. So how should I switch to 71.90? Should I roll back the driver to 4.5.0.2 and then update?

 

Now we are getting above my head. I think your video card only supports Directx8 or lower from what I have found of its specs. The DX11 may be coming from Windows having it installed but that doesn't necessarily mean your video card supports it.

I'm not very good at drivers. I think you can just uninstall the current driver in Device Manager and then right-click the 71.90.exe and select Compatibility mode and let it install then reboot. I don't think you have to reboot after the uninstall. But am unsure.

I'd create a restore point then go ahead and try the above. I'm sorry I can't be more specific.

 

Well I updated to 71.90 with no issues since. I would say there is a slight improvement in video streaming since, but again it might be entirely related to the speed boost.

Thank you very much for your help.

As for the disappearing hard drive I'm going to have to start another thread for that.