GeForce Go 6600 - refresh rate is low no matter what

junjhen · Joined: 22 Aug 2007 Posts: 3

Hi,

I've been very happy with my laptop (Toshiba Qosmio F25) and highly
recommend it to others. It has been able to handle any game/application
I throw at it. The graphics card is GeForce Go 6600, which has worked
perfectly with my games such as GTA SA and NFS Most Wanted for several
months now, that is, up until recently...

Recently, for no reason whatsoever, it has started showing "stuttering"
symptoms. This would be most apparent when playing games. The first,
say, 10-20 seconds plays really smoothly, but then after that, it slows
down to approximately 1.3 frames per second! and basically becomes
unplayable. I tested it on the two games I have installed on my
computer, and the results are exactly the same, no matter what graphics
level I place it at (high level and high res or low level and low res).
Its always good at first and then it slows down.

I can't think of anything which I've done to my laptop which has
resulted in this - the only main thing is the installation and running
of BBC's Climate Change Experiment - it uses extra CPU when the
computer is idle. Also, I installed some some small video programs
which split AVI files. I've since uninstalled these programs but to no
avail.

The strange thing is, even my browser (Firefox) is working very slowly
as well. Usually, it works very smoothly, but sometimes when I have a
tab which is loading or when I'm scrolling (I have a SmoothWheel
extension installed), the browser "stutters" as well, especially when
there are many tabs open. The loading animation and the scrolling
refreshes at about the same refresh rate as the games do (~1.3
frames/s) I think.

So, if it affects Firefox as well, maybe it is NOT something to do with
my graphics accelerator? Maybe it's something else? Anyway, I've
assumed it has been my accelerator all along and I've looked for
solutions online for several days now... I've tried lowering the sound
acceleration via DXDiag, installing different versions of drivers for
graphics card (ForceWare 78.11, 83.40, 81.98, etc...), lowering the
rendering settings via the games and via the Nvidia Control Panel,
uninstalling all recently installed applications (the BBC Climate
Change Experiment and small video editing applications), installing and
using the PCI Latency Tool and etc... all to no avail!

I'm not much of a graphics card expert, but can anyone tell me if there
is something wrong with my graphics accelerator? I'm suspecting it's
not, as Firefox gets affected as well - if so can someone please help
shed light on my very frustrating problem?? Is there any extra info
which I should also provide to help?

Thanks,
JJ

Archived from group: alt>comp>periphs>videocards>nvidia

Phil Weldon · Joined: 22 Aug 2007 Posts: 324

'JJ' wrote, in part:
| I can't think of anything which I've done to my laptop which has
| resulted in this - the only main thing is the installation and running
| of BBC's Climate Change Experiment - it uses extra CPU when the
| computer is idle.
_____

Disable the Climate Change Experiment; it may be starting up intermittently;
even a very short burst will cause paging.

Phil Weldon

wrote in message @z34g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
| Hi,
|
| I've been very happy with my laptop (Toshiba Qosmio F25) and highly
| recommend it to others. It has been able to handle any game/application
| I throw at it. The graphics card is GeForce Go 6600, which has worked
| perfectly with my games such as GTA SA and NFS Most Wanted for several
| months now, that is, up until recently...
|
| Recently, for no reason whatsoever, it has started showing "stuttering"
| symptoms. This would be most apparent when playing games. The first,
| say, 10-20 seconds plays really smoothly, but then after that, it slows
| down to approximately 1.3 frames per second! and basically becomes
| unplayable. I tested it on the two games I have installed on my
| computer, and the results are exactly the same, no matter what graphics
| level I place it at (high level and high res or low level and low res).
| Its always good at first and then it slows down.
|
| I can't think of anything which I've done to my laptop which has
| resulted in this - the only main thing is the installation and running
| of BBC's Climate Change Experiment - it uses extra CPU when the
| computer is idle. Also, I installed some some small video programs
| which split AVI files. I've since uninstalled these programs but to no
| avail.
|
| The strange thing is, even my browser (Firefox) is working very slowly
| as well. Usually, it works very smoothly, but sometimes when I have a
| tab which is loading or when I'm scrolling (I have a SmoothWheel
| extension installed), the browser "stutters" as well, especially when
| there are many tabs open. The loading animation and the scrolling
| refreshes at about the same refresh rate as the games do (~1.3
| frames/s) I think.
|
| So, if it affects Firefox as well, maybe it is NOT something to do with
| my graphics accelerator? Maybe it's something else? Anyway, I've
| assumed it has been my accelerator all along and I've looked for
| solutions online for several days now... I've tried lowering the sound
| acceleration via DXDiag, installing different versions of drivers for
| graphics card (ForceWare 78.11, 83.40, 81.98, etc...), lowering the
| rendering settings via the games and via the Nvidia Control Panel,
| uninstalling all recently installed applications (the BBC Climate
| Change Experiment and small video editing applications), installing and
| using the PCI Latency Tool and etc... all to no avail!
|
| I'm not much of a graphics card expert, but can anyone tell me if there
| is something wrong with my graphics accelerator? I'm suspecting it's
| not, as Firefox gets affected as well - if so can someone please help
| shed light on my very frustrating problem?? Is there any extra info
| which I should also provide to help?
|
| Thanks,
| JJ
|

vellu · Joined: 22 Aug 2007 Posts: 48

My first guess as to a reason for an overall system performance decrease
would be a virus/malware infection. I very much doubt the problem has
anything to do with specifically graphics if even Firefox is affected.

junjhen@gmail.com kirjoitti:
> Hi,
>
> I've been very happy with my laptop (Toshiba Qosmio F25) and highly
> recommend it to others. It has been able to handle any game/application
> I throw at it. The graphics card is GeForce Go 6600, which has worked
> perfectly with my games such as GTA SA and NFS Most Wanted for several
> months now, that is, up until recently...
>
> Recently, for no reason whatsoever, it has started showing "stuttering"
> symptoms. This would be most apparent when playing games. The first,
> say, 10-20 seconds plays really smoothly, but then after that, it slows
> down to approximately 1.3 frames per second! and basically becomes
> unplayable. I tested it on the two games I have installed on my
> computer, and the results are exactly the same, no matter what graphics
> level I place it at (high level and high res or low level and low res).
> Its always good at first and then it slows down.
>
> I can't think of anything which I've done to my laptop which has
> resulted in this - the only main thing is the installation and running
> of BBC's Climate Change Experiment - it uses extra CPU when the
> computer is idle. Also, I installed some some small video programs
> which split AVI files. I've since uninstalled these programs but to no
> avail.
>
> The strange thing is, even my browser (Firefox) is working very slowly
> as well. Usually, it works very smoothly, but sometimes when I have a
> tab which is loading or when I'm scrolling (I have a SmoothWheel
> extension installed), the browser "stutters" as well, especially when
> there are many tabs open. The loading animation and the scrolling
> refreshes at about the same refresh rate as the games do (~1.3
> frames/s) I think.
>
> So, if it affects Firefox as well, maybe it is NOT something to do with
> my graphics accelerator? Maybe it's something else? Anyway, I've
> assumed it has been my accelerator all along and I've looked for
> solutions online for several days now... I've tried lowering the sound
> acceleration via DXDiag, installing different versions of drivers for
> graphics card (ForceWare 78.11, 83.40, 81.98, etc...), lowering the
> rendering settings via the games and via the Nvidia Control Panel,
> uninstalling all recently installed applications (the BBC Climate
> Change Experiment and small video editing applications), installing and
> using the PCI Latency Tool and etc... all to no avail!
>
> I'm not much of a graphics card expert, but can anyone tell me if there
> is something wrong with my graphics accelerator? I'm suspecting it's
> not, as Firefox gets affected as well - if so can someone please help
> shed light on my very frustrating problem?? Is there any extra info
> which I should also provide to help?
>
> Thanks,
> JJ
>

junjhen · Joined: 22 Aug 2007 Posts: 3

Hi, thanks for the advice - I've updated my virus checker and Ad-Aware
and have run through them once. There are no viruses or malware on the
system.
I've also uninstalled the Climate Change Experiment.

My physical memory usage is only about 60% (of 1G) and under 20% of
virtual memory.

I ran 3DMark2001SE and got a score of just under 4000. Although the
test reports some OK framerates, in reality the screen showed extremely
low framerates and my system is still really slow!

Any other suggestions?

junjhen · Joined: 22 Aug 2007 Posts: 3

I've just carried out a System Restore to a point a few days ago and
the problem is gone! I still don't know what the problem was... but
wow, System Restore works like a charm!

Phil Weldon · Joined: 22 Aug 2007 Posts: 324

'junjhen' wrote:
| I've just carried out a System Restore to a point a few days ago and
| the problem is gone! I still don't know what the problem was... but
| wow, System Restore works like a charm!
|
_____

Thanks for reporting your results. If you ever discover what caused the
problem, please reply in this thread. It could help others.

Phil Weldon

wrote in message @v46g2000cwv.googlegroups.com...
| I've just carried out a System Restore to a point a few days ago and
| the problem is gone! I still don't know what the problem was... but
| wow, System Restore works like a charm!
|