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Topic: High CPU Usage on a newer, more powerful laptop!

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Hi all,

I am in the process of changing my 'gig' laptop, and am a little confused as to why the newer, more powerful laptop is running a much higher CPU usage than the older one.

The specs for the two laptops are:

Old:
Laptop: Toshiba Equium A110-252
Processor: Genuine Interl(R) CPU T2050 @ 1.60 GHz
Installed Memory (RAM): 0.99 GB
Graphics Card: Mobile Intel(R) 945GM Express Chipset Family
System Type: 32-bit Operating System?
Operating System: Windows XP Professional Version 2002 with Service Pack 3

New:
Laptop: Toshiba Satellite L450D
Processor: AMD Semipron(tm) SI-42 2.10 GHz
Installed Memory (RAM): 3.00 GB (2.75 GB usable)
Graphics Card: ATI Radeon HD 3200 Graphics
System Type: 64-bit Operating System
Operating System: Windows 7 Professional with Service Pack 1.

There are two set ups I use, depending where I am DJ'ing. The first is with my mobile rig, the second is in a particular club.
With the old system playing audio only with the Numark VDJ interface, the CPU ranges between 5-15%.
When I use 2x Pioneer CDJ 2000s in Midi mode, Pioneer DJM 2000 mixer in Midi mode, and video out, the CPU will run around 50-75%.

On the NEWer laptop, the CPU when running the Numark VDJ interface is around 40-60%. If I plug in the 2 Midi Decks and Midi Mixer, the CPU is up around 90%. Then load a song onto a deck and it max's out the CPU bar. That is before the video output it activated.

Is there something really obvious that I have missed leading to the newer laptop having a much higher CPU usage? There are no other programs running while I run VDJ. It is a fresh install of Windows 7, with only iTunes being the other main program installed so far.

Any help and advice would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance!

Chris

 

Inviato Wed 18 Jan 12 @ 4:34 am
Most likely this is because you have either resized or maximised the skin. This can commonly lead to much higher CPU usage depending on your graphics card's 2D capabilities, because it has to scale the skin graphics on the fly. Ideally you should use the skin at its correct native size or download one that exactly matches your screen size from http://www.virtualdj.com/addons/skins.html

Please see: http://www.virtualdj.com/wiki/Performance%20Issues.html

NOTE: High CPU usage while loading a song is normal and should not cause you any problems - please see: http://www.virtualdj.com/wiki/I%20experience%20high%20CPU%20usage%20when%20loading%20a%20song%20on%20a%20deck.html
 

Inviato Wed 18 Jan 12 @ 4:43 am
The skin on the 'old' laptop is the standard 1280x768, (which is the size of the screen). On the 'new' laptop I use the same size skin as it's the only one that fits within the 1366x768 display. Its running it's native size, not stretched of full screened.

Edit: I've gone through the Latency Check and found the ACPI was using a lot of CPU, (Red Spikes on the checker). Disabled the driver, but although on the latencymon it's gone from 1.8 to 0.5 ms, the latency checker is still showing red spikes. CPU usage within VDJ is no change.

Chris
 

Inviato Wed 18 Jan 12 @ 6:26 am
If the 1280x768 skin fills your entire screen on your 1366x768 laptop then it is being resized (To full screen.) If this is the case, click on the maximise button at the top-right of the skin to return it back to its correct size (Based on the resolutions you've stated above, you should see a gap down the left and/or right hand side of the screen when the 1280x768 skin is at its correct size.)

Alternatively, try one of the native 1366x768 skins that can be downloaded from http://www.virtualdj.com/addons/skins.html?category=all&order=default&resolution=1366&search=

CPU usage and latency are not related in any way. High latency (red spikes) wont necessary mean high CPU usage or vice-versa. If you are using ASIO drivers and get sound break-up (Stuttering, popping, etc.) then you need to find and eliminate the cause of the red spikes (ACPI and WiFi drivers are the most common cause.)
 

Inviato Wed 18 Jan 12 @ 9:01 am
No, the skin is not maximised/stretched so I can see the desktop either side of the 1280 skin on the 1366 screen. I have tried a native 1366x768 skin but has not made any difference.

There are no sound drop outs on either laptop.
 

Inviato Wed 18 Jan 12 @ 12:00 pm
In that case, it is probably something else on your computer that is causing this issue, such as unnecessary software running in the background (This is very common for new out of the box computers that are built with typical home/office users in mind.)

If you are using music videos, it could be because you have disabled hardware acceleration, so that your processor is doing all the work that would normally be done by your video card.

Another possibility is you have not optimised your computer for maximum performance (Please see the above guide.) Most new laptops are configured for maximum power saving/battery life rather than maximum performance.
 

Inviato Wed 18 Jan 12 @ 12:30 pm
SBDJPRO Infinity Member since 2006
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but your new CPU is quite a bit slower than your old one, and you now have the overhead of 64 bit too.

There are a number of things that could be causing excessive CPU usage.

As has already been mentioned by default Windows 7 power saves - even on power adapter rather than battery and tweaking the power saving settings can make a huge difference.

First is to verify that its related to VDJ, so download and run a program called process explorer and see what is eating your CPU.

After all that if its VDJs executable then its possibly either a skin size issue, a plugin issue or a sound card issue. You say you have already ruled out skin size so lets look elsewhere for now. Please provide what soundcard you are using along with your sound setup and performances page.
 

Inviato Wed 18 Jan 12 @ 5:39 pm
I've just had a look at the process explorer, nothing is standing out at me on there.

The sound card is the Numark Virtual Vinyl interface that came with the software, or when in the club, using the Pioneer ASIO driver through midi control.

Why is the 64-bit worse than the 32-bit?

Chris
 

Inviato Thu 19 Jan 12 @ 11:01 am
Another thought I have is if I increased the RAM in the 'old' laptop, (which will be a max of 4GB being a 32bit system?) would this have a big positive affect on performance/CPU usage?
 

Inviato Fri 20 Jan 12 @ 5:13 pm
Adding more RAM wont make the CPU any faster, but it should improve performance.

1Gb is a bare minimum for XP, let alone also running VirtualDJ at the same time. A 32-bit machine will take a maximum of 4Gb (3Gb useable - See http://blogs.msdn.com/b/hiltonl/archive/2007/04/13/the-3gb-not-4gb-ram-problem.aspx )

With 1Gb there will be a lot of swapping memory too/from swap file on disk, degrading system performance and slowing down disk access (E.g: Loading songs.)
 

Inviato Fri 20 Jan 12 @ 5:45 pm
yk23PRO InfinityMember since 2006
Your processor is just to slow. It scores a 497 on http://www.cpubenchmark.net/midlow_range_cpus.html which most of those processors in that same range came out more than 6 years ago. If you bought a system that ran in 1800 range you should be pretty good. I think what you have right now is just good enough for web surfing and other non-processor intensive stuff. I am running a 2nd gen i7-2630QM which runs around 6330. My cpu never spikes above 3 or 4% but of course it cost around $1000. If I were you I would take that computer back and get something faster instead of trying to make it work. Before buying anything else check the processor against this site, try to get something that shows 1500, 1800, 3000 or more.

More memory might help on the old system a little, but your may still end out needing a newer system in the end. The older system scores a 757: http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+T2050+%40+1.60GHz

-David
 

Inviato Sat 21 Jan 12 @ 2:00 pm
Nice one, never heard of CPU benchmarks, so I tought, i have to try this out...

I have Intel Core i3-2310M @ 2.10GHz and its scores 2599

Does this mean I shouldn't have any problems using vdj? At least for the processor?
 

Inviato Sat 21 Jan 12 @ 5:20 pm
I agree with other comments about your CPU actually being slower, just because its newer that does not make it faster.
If I had to choose between both laptops I would go with the old laptop and upgrade the memory (If supported by mother board).

IMHO, I think you should return the new laptop and buy more memory for the old one.

If your looking to upgrade you should look into quad core CPUs or even the higher end dual core CPUs.
If your going to be doing video your laptop also needs to be equiped with a dedicated Video card with a minimum of 256MB of DDR3 memory as recommended by Virtual DJ.
 

Inviato Sat 21 Jan 12 @ 5:44 pm
Thank you for the advice. I haven't bought a new laptop, the newer one is my partners that is never used. I may upgrade the memory in the old one for now, I want a quad core laptop eventually so that is what I'll be looking at. Thanks again for all the advice!
 

Inviato Sun 22 Jan 12 @ 3:54 am
kencatPRO SubscriberMember since 2011
SOLVED!!!!

I had this problem for a couple of years. even updated laptop's to a £2.5k gaming i7 laptop,b= loaded reloaded windows 7, 10 etc yet the problem remained. I followed every string in performance and couldn't nail it down. Slow start up, slow tabbing between folders etc...then I came a thread where someone said do nothing with your machine and let it settle down, it worked for him. that didn't work, but it got me thinking. I have 2Tb of music and karaoke half of which is to red on an external hardrive. it's an SSD, so I thought no speed problems! Then I actually got to speak with a software project manager from Microsoft! He spent 10 mins looking at my setup and fixed it in 30 seconds!

To cut a long story short. it comes down to indexing. even though you don't see indexing doing an awful lot in device manager, and the content of the VDJ xml file. Simply two large music files even broken down to sub files Won't Work when split across 550gb external SSD and 1.5Tb internal drive on 2 seperate buss structures. I can already here the doubters saying we'll I don't have problem!! So here's the fix

I split my content as Music and Karaoke. on the Laptop I placed the Music as I have use it on the fly etc. the karaoke on the external ssd. Now remember I said they guy fixed his by leaving it alone for a day or so? after unplugging the external drive, restarting the PC I left it alone for a day. BINGO!!! everything works!!... Connect the external drive and whilst it finds the drive OK as long as you don't access it everything it still OK. Ah but you want to use karaoke off the external drive! I started using karafun software (Sorry VDJ). So I upgraded the hard driveinternally for storage and the ssd for windows. with everything under one roof, and leaving it to create the required Xml files, everything now works perfectly.

My next battle is to get it all to work with my new Pioneer DDJ RZ...!

Ken

 

Inviato Sat 04 Nov 17 @ 1:59 pm


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