Author: CCDSystems
Subject: Please help - severe computer lags, Win XP SP3
Posted: 07 February 2014 at 12:14am
I have used KernRate to identify that the IntelPPM process on my computer was dragging the CPU down. I implemented the fix (changing the registry value from a 1 to a 4) and now when looking at KernRate output, IntelPPM isn't there, and my computer is less laggy.
Subject: Please help - severe computer lags, Win XP SP3
Posted: 07 February 2014 at 12:14am
Thank you, in advance, for anyone who chooses to help.
My computer has been exhibiting strange behavior for the last month or so, and I have gone through a weeding-out process, removing apps, killing scheduled tasks, etc., in preparing this machine to be upgraded, and in the hopes it can still be a reasonable machine after the upgrade.
As others have noticed, sometimes after addressing the IntelPPM issue, a second issue arises to a lesser degree. In my case, it's the NTOSKRNL, NTFS or HAL.
I find that there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason for the kernel hogging all of my CPU, and when it does, I am at its mercy until it decides to quit. I have been running KernRate for large periods of time (set to start at boot), in the hopes that _after_ one of these sluggish times, I can review the output and determine the cause.
I used Kernrate_i386_XP.exe -m -b 4 -i 2500 -w 3 -j "symsrv*symsrv.dll**http://msdl.microsoft.com/download/symbols" -z hal, and captured the output to a file. Would someone be willing to help me diagnose and correct this issue I'm having?
The key bits I see from there:
---> Profile Bucket Size Set to 4 bytes
/==============================\
< KERNRATE LOG >
\==============================/
Date: 2014/02/06 Time: 15:16:07
Machine Name: DevBox
Number of Processors: 1
PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE: x86
PROCESSOR_LEVEL: 15
PROCESSOR_REVISION: 0303
Physical Memory: 3143 MB
Pagefile Total: 8986 MB
Virtual Total: 2047 MB
PageFile1: \??\C:\pagefile.sys, 4000MB
PageFile2: \??\G:\pagefile.sys, 2000MB
OS Version: 5.1 Build 2600 Service-Pack: 3.0
WinDir: C:\WINDOWS
Kernrate User-Specified Command Line:
D:\Utilities\KrView\Kernrates\Kernrate_i386_XP.exe -m -b 4 -i 2500 -w 3 -j symsrv*symsrv.dll**http://msdl.microsoft.com/download/symbols -z hal -yr fi
lename.kv
Kernel Profile (PID = 0): Source= Time,
User Requested Rate= 2500 events/hit, Actual Rate= 2441 events/hit
CallBack: Finished Attempt to Load symbols for 806ef000 \WINDOWS\system32\hal.dll
Waiting for 3 seconds before starting to collect profile data
Starting to collect profile data
***> Press ctrl-c to finish collecting profile data
===> Finished Collecting Data, Starting to Process Results
------------Overall Summary:--------------
P0 K 0:28:47.153 (96.1%) U 0:00:47.358 ( 2.6%) I 0:00:23.373 ( 1.3%) DPC 0:00:05.948 ( 0.3%) Interrupt 0:01:18.793 ( 4.4%)
Interrupts= 9446961, Interrupt Rate= 5254/sec.
Total Profile Time = 79898 msec
BytesStart BytesStop BytesDiff.
Available Physical Memory , 1396944896, 1344311296, -52633600
Available Pagefile(s) , 6501023744, 6491680768, -9342976
Available Virtual , 2133266432, 2131902464, -1363968
Available Extended Virtual , 0, 0, 0
Total Avg. Rate
Context Switches , 5302743, 2949/sec.
System Calls , 49109805, 27315/sec.
Page Faults , 57126185, 31774/sec.
I/O Read Operations , 132917, 74/sec.
I/O Write Operations , 108703, 60/sec.
I/O Other Operations , 424905, 236/sec.
I/O Read Bytes , 73249052, 551/ I/O
I/O Write Bytes , 32962452, 303/ I/O
I/O Other Bytes , 36430092, 86/ I/O
-----------------------------
Results for Kernel Mode:
-----------------------------
OutputResults: KernelModuleCount = 159
Percentage in the following table is based on the Total Hits for the Kernel
Time 7077258 hits, 2441 events per hit --------
Module Hits msec %Total Events/Sec
ntoskrnl 3467027 1797328 48 % 4708663
0 3467027 1797328 48 % 4708663
Ntfs 1617949 1797328 22 % 2197380
0 1617949 1797328 22 % 2197380
hal 979792 1797328 13 % 1330682
0 979792 1797328 13 % 1330682
fltMgr
<snip>
===> Processing Zoomed Module hal.dll...
----- Zoomed module hal.dll (Bucket size = 4 bytes, Rounding Down) --------
Percentage in the following table is based on the Total Hits for this Zoom Module
Time 979792 hits, 2441 events per hit --------
Module Hits msec %Total Events/Sec
KfLowerIrql 631971 1797328 56 % 858296
0 631971 1797328 56 % 858296
HalpQueryPerformanceCounter 122703 1797328 11 % 166646
0 122703 1797328 11 % 166646
KeRaiseIrqlToSynchLevel 121167 1797328 10 % 164560
0 121167 1797328 10 % 164560
HalProcessorIdle
<snip>
Again, any and all assistance is greatly appreciated. This has been a workhorse of a machine, and I don't want to have to put it down (but rather, want to upgrade it).