Poor Memory Performance

[csxkidd]

Hi,
I have an HP desktop a6313w (and by the way does that "w" stand for Wal-Mart, lol), and I've run some tests on it. The main one I run is on PCPitstop.com and it keeps coming back saying that I have poor memory performance.

I have 2GB of RAM and it isn't saying to add more memory. I really don't have any programs starting up with the PC except for AVG anti-virus. As far as other programs that may be running, I think most of them are neccessary.

Here is one suggestion that I will copy and paste that it suggests:

Level 2 cache may be present, but is turned off. See the tip Enable Processor/Memory Cache for more information.
It is possible that the system BIOS is incorrectly reporting that the cache is disabled. This is a frequent problem with some PCs, particularly AMD-based systems and Via chipsets. If your system is showing average performance then your cache is probably not disabled and your BIOS is reporting incorrect information. You can download our SMBIOS information utility to see all the information your BIOS is reporting

I've looked in the BIOS settings and don't see anything on how to enable Level 2 cache.

Is there any programs that I could run that I could provide a log file for you guys to look at? The PC is only about 6 months old and I am very particular about keeping it cleaned up.

I've run Auslogics Disk defragmenter, disk checker, reduced the system restore storage capacity, run CC cleaner, registry mechanic and Glary's utility that's currently being advertised on Downloads.com which is a pretty good program. I did all of this and then cleaned out any spyware and am still getting the message.

Thanks for any help

 

[cdogg]

Unfortunately, "most" desktops (even from HP) that are sold at Wal-Mart have cut corners to reduce cost. That's not to say yours is underpowered necessarily.

Please provide more information on what you have - CPU, memory speed, version of Windows, etc.

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Einstein
[tab][navy]For posting policies, click [/navy]here.

 

[BadBigBen]

Take a look at SiSoft Sandra and Lavalys Everest (Ultimate Edition) (both are commercial but have Trial versions) which will do a Memory Benchmark and compare it to other systems...

this way you will get a better overview...

Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."

 

[Kjonnnn]

Just a novice question. Do you experience poor memory performance, or are you just going by what the software told you?

 

[csxkidd]

I wouldn't say that the performance is necessarily poor, but it's not what I think it should be. I had made the comment to my wife a couple of times that it should be doing much better in my opinion. It doesn't hang up or anything, but my laptop has a 1400 MHz processor and 712 GB of RAM and it's about the same.

The HP I'm talking about has the following in it:
2600 MHz Dual-Core Processor - Total 5200MHz
2GB Ram
2 300GB Hard Drives

I've done everything I can do improve it. I've run disk checking scans on the hard drives, defraged it with Windows and another defragging program and used a few different spyware, anti-virus and registry cleaning programs.

Would it be OK to post a log of the BIOS info. and running processes. If that's to much to post, I can host the files so it won't take up so much space.

Thanks

 

[BadBigBen]

2600 MHz Dual-Core Processor - Total 5200MHz

wrong assumption there, you have two cores running each at 2.6 GHz, not a total of 5.2 GHz it just don't work like that...

2GB Ram is nice, but 2gig is not 2gig, e.g. 2gig PC-133 is slower than 2gig PC-333, which is slower than 2gig DDR2-800, etc... then there is Dual and Single Channel, Latency etc. that also come into play... and the ChipSet has a lot to do in the equation of memory performance...

Would it be OK to post a log of the BIOS info.

what would the purpose be for that info? Do the Benchmarking I told you about above, and it will tell you if the system performs as it should...

Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."

 

[cdogg]

"...and used a few different spyware, anti-virus and registry cleaning programs"

Changing out software often can lead to a bloated registry and can become part of the problem. So be careful doing that. Even registry cleaners don't catch everything. The one that has done the best job for me in the past is Registry Mechanic.


You did mention the memory size but not the memory "speed". Also, the make/model of your CPU would be nice to have too. Go into your BIOS configuration screen at startup or use a program like Belarc Advisor in Windows to get more specific details on what you have.

Also, please give us some specific examples of "slow":

1) Like for instance, does it take more than 3-4 seconds for Word or Internet Explorer to open (test this when your system is idle)?
2) How long does it take for you to see your desktop and for things to settle after powering on your PC?
3) Do you have a lot of icons appearing at startup in the lower-right corner next to your clock (system tray)?
4) What are the icons in your system tray?

This is just a guess, but at this point your biggest culprit is likely what's starting up with Windows. HP and other vendors have a tendency in some models to load a lot of software in Windows such as support tools, 3rd-party demos, etc., that you don't need.

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Einstein
[tab][navy]For posting policies, click [/navy]here.

 

[csxkidd]

Hi,

Here is little bit better description of what I have in this PC. I understand that I don't have a 5200 MHz processor. I don't get too deep into this stuff, but as far as what I think I know, is that most programs are written to utilize only one core. I may be totally off on that, but at first I thought I did have a 5000+ processor and was wondering why in the world it wasn't lightening fast.

CPU - Athlon 64 X2 with Dual Core technology
Chipset - NVIDIA GeForce 6150SE nForce 430
RAM - DDR2 PC2-5300

I downloaded the SiSoft Sandra and it's pretty much over my head, lol. I ran about four tests on the memory and disk reading and writing performance and come in last place vs. the other four it was compared to.

Like I said earlier, I usually go to

http://pcpitstop.com/pcpitstop/default.asp

and it runs a quick benchmark test on the PC compared to others who have ran tests on the site and here's what it shows:


Category Typical Your World
Value Value Rank
CPU 18463MIPS 18961MIPS Top 12%

RAM 9901MB/sec 5740MB/sec Bottom 39%

Video 120MP/sec 258MP/sec Top 7%

Disk 49 MB/sec 56MB/sec Top 10%

Internet 1655 kb/sec 4885 kb/sec Top 45%


Total Rank - Top 27%




You can see that in the RAM category it's ranks me in the bottom 23%. Maybe I'm just being wierd, but I don't like it, lol. I only paid $599 plus tax for this PC (no monitor) at Wal-Mart back in March and I guess I ought to be pretty satisfied. It's not slow per say, it's just not doing what I think it should as far as "snap to" quickness when I open a program or the internet. Of course it only takes 3-4 seconds, so maybe I'm fussing for nothing.

As far as startup programs go, when I get a new PC, the first thing I do is uninstall all of the junk that comes with it. Under 'startup' in msconfig I only one box checked and thats AVG. Beside my clock I have my volume icon, network status icon and AVG tray icon. I've configured System restore to only use 10 GB of storage for restore points and cut out some of the bells and whistles in Windows Vista. Not a whole lot though. I just disabled Aero, and some other minor unnoticeable things.

When this website started talking about Level 1 and Level 2 cache being disabled, I thought that maybe there was something I could adjust to get the memory performance test up. That's all this complaining I've done is about.

Thanks,
Chris

 

[csxkidd]

I meant bottom 39% on the RAM test, not 23 %.

 

[cdogg]

As you can see from the chart in the link below, PC2-5300 has a max bandwidth of 5333 MB/s:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDR2#Chips_and_modules

Either the reading you're getting of 5740 MB/s is not correct, or you have more than one stick of PC2-5300 that is running in dual-channel. Regardless, the benchmark is showing results "close to" what your expectations should be. The reason why it says "bottom 39%" is because there are newer DDR2 and DDR3 modules out there with higher bandwidths that this benchmark has been run on. I would take that lightly with a grain of salt. It is not all that important.

Also keep in mind that the memory benchmark is a theoretical one. It is not a real-world benchmark. The difference is that theoretical benchmarks use simulations that are repeated thousands of times over to stress the component that they are testing. This is not a load that the system is likely to counter in everyday use. That's another reason not to stress out about the results.

Remember, the biggest bottleneck in any PC is usually the hard drive. It is much slower at transferring data in comparison.


~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Einstein
[tab][navy]For posting policies, click [/navy]here.

 

[BadBigBen]

Cdogg, good answer... and that result that csxkidd got, leads me to believe that he has either a single 2gig stick or 2 1gig sticks running in single channel mode...

I am saying this cuz I too ran the PitStop test just for kicks on my old board (AthlonXP 2600+ and 1gig DDR 333 mem) which came out a tad slower than what he reported (5240 mb/s) and ran the test on my new system (9 months old actually - Core2Duo 2.6ghz with 4gig PC-800 in dual channel mode) which reported the speed of the RAM as 13779
MB/sec ranking Top 4% ... and NO OC...

so I believe that either adding RAM or at least checking if it is running in DUAL CHANNEL mode may increase that score...

Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."

 

[csxkidd]

Thanks for the advice. I do have two 1 Gig Sticks of Ram. How do I check to make sure it's running in dual channel mode?

Thanks

 

[csxkidd]

Me again. I started up my PC where it would would go through the BIOS settings information. It says that it's running 128 bit dual-channel unbuffered memory. I have two seperate 1 gig sticks.

Under the product specs of my PC on HP's website, it says that my MB supports PC2-6400. It currently has 5300. If I upgraded and bought one 1GB stick of RAM, would the two sticks of PC2-5300 still run in dual-channel mode while the other one ran in single channel? Or, would it be a better benefit to buy two more sticks of the same memory that's already in there?

This is the first time I've ever heard of dual and single channel, so pardon me if I seem a little ignant. Thanks,

 

[cdogg]

No, all memory in the system has to run at the same speed. It will default to the lowest common denominator, which would be 667MHz.

Because you have a newer Athlon CPU, the motherboard uses a bus system called Hypertransport. Hypertransport will certainly benefit from faster memory. So upgrading to two 1GB sticks of DDR-800 (PC2-6400) could make a little difference, only if you replace the PC2-5300.

Although you'll see an improvement in some benchmarks and real-world applications, the difference may or may not be enough to justify the "price" of the upgrade.

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Einstein
[tab][navy]For posting policies, click [/navy]here.

 

[BadBigBen]

As Cdogg mentioned, to keep the DUAL CHANNEL mode you'd have to get TWO sticks...

What I think though, the problem lies elsewhere... namely that slow onboard graphics card the single chip nVidida 6150SE (128 meg shared mem)... and the PC running Vista 32bit probably with Aero turned on (resource HOG)...





Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."