Gaming Laptop Performance Issues

[Xeper8x8]

Hello all, I have a Dell Alienware M18x R2, which is about 8 yrs in service with not too heavy gaming (Game i usually play is from 2011, so its not too graphically demanding) (Only until late 2019-April 2020 where it was sorta heavier gaming), and around April i've noticed performance issues. It seems to be lagging during gaming. The game itself will be fine for like 5 mins and then the lagging would happen. The lagging would be for about like second or two and then resume back to normal. So i researched why this might occur and seen issues like GPU throttling or CPU Throttling, so i windowed the game and went to see the performance in task manager. I noticed, when the lagging would happen, the CPU usage would dip down from like 20-30% to like 1%, GPU usage would dip down from 50-60% to like 1% and the HDD usage would always spike up to 100% when the lag would happen (Normally it varies in random numbers but always 100 when lagging). Ram was the only thing that stayed the same. So i decided to health check everything. I did cpu health check with the Intel Processor Diagnostic Tool and the program says its fine (I have applied thermal paste to my CPU). Couldn't really find a GPU health checker, but i did the Furmark test and it didnt climb any higher in temp, though the GPU area on laptop does seem warm (which is normal since the beginning anyway), but not crazy hot. Also, I did not apply thermal paste on GPU since i heard its not good to do that. Should i apply there as well? Did hard disk sentinel and it says the hdd is healthy (HDD is 7200 rpm). Should i get a SSD? Maybe my PSU isnt good enough? Its 240w and ive had it for 4 years so far. But why would it start doing this now? Should i get the 330w? Would that even make a difference? I did do a cleaning inside the laptop so theres no dust. Also did uninstalling and reinstalling of drivers and that didnt do anything. Also changed the battery settings to high performance. Not only does it lag in games but in general it does. For instance watching a movie on WMP, itll lag. Opening a song itll lag at the begging or when i select another song. Loading photos takes awhile. Editing on MS Paint lags. Navigating in folders, it lags. Right clicking on a file seems to lag too. So whats going on here? Do i have something throttling? Bad HDD? Weak PSU? Or maybe its because my system is so old and the motherboard is failing?

 

My specs are:

CPU: Intel Core i7-3630QM 2.4ghz

GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660M

PSU: 240w

Battery: 6600mAh
BIOS: Alienware A14

Bit: 64bit

HDD: Seagate (idk the exact model but ik its 7200 rpm) 500GB

Ram: 24GB DDR3

OS: Windows 10 Enterprise (WAS Windows 7 Ultimate when the lagging started to happen. Thought upgrading would do the trick, but nope lol)

[kelvinhall05]

What are your temps? Run stress test on CPU and GPU at the same time and check temps after 5-10 minutes.

[Xeper8x8]

I couldnt find a good way to stress test CPU, so i gamed for 20 mins and had MSI afterburner and Core Temp on and noticed that the GPU Temp would stay at 55c and when lags it would go down to 50c and then go back up to 55c after lag. Never going higher than 55c. The CPU was harder to tell, but Core 0 was the warmest ranging from 40-50max. And Cores 1-3 would be from mid 30s-mid 40s max never hitting 50 like 0 did. Also, did notice that the power would go from 14w to 7w when lag happened. Idk if that is relevant but seemed strange to me.

[ApolloX75]

My MSI GT780DXR; which is a little older than your system (2010), used to have this issue. Turned out to be the wireless card. Apparently older Wireless N cards in laptops have limited compatibility with Windows 10 and many have strange issues with it. I swapped my card out for a newer Intel 7260HW based Wireless AC card and the system now runs flawlessly again. It took a LOT of researching and hunting to figure this issue out with my laptop as it had no overheating and has an SSD. Key symptoms to look for were any time I had a heavy download going; or Steam updating, the system lag would increase.

 

You can buy half height mini PCIE wireless cards, like the Intel 7260HW off Amazon or eBay with no issues for next to nothing, so it's cheap insurance. Some even have new bluetooth protocols too.

 

[Xeper8x8]

1 hour ago, ApolloX75 said:

Apparently older Wireless N cards in laptops have limited compatibility with Windows 10 and many have strange issues

I was using Windows 7 when the lag started though. I upgraded around September i think. I will say though the lag was worse with Windows 7 lol. I want to try your suggestion but like, what if it aint that, you know? Maybe i can see if my local tech store has that Wireless card or something better than mine and see if it works. 

[ApolloX75]

42 minutes ago, Xeper8x8 said:

I was using Windows 7 when the lag started though. I upgraded around September i think. I will say though the lag was worse with Windows 7 lol. I want to try your suggestion but like, what if it aint that, you know? Maybe i can see if my local tech store has that Wireless card or something better than mine and see if it works. 

Ah I didn't see the mention of 7 being the start of the issue. I haven't used 7 on my laptop in a long time, so I can't confirm if I had the issue back then or not. Like I said, it's cheap insurance. I think I got my new card for about $20 CDN.

 

I mean I'm not going to say it's your issue for sure; but I've fixed a couple older laptops that had this issue (using Windows 10) in the last year or two, so if anything it could be worth a shot if you can't find anything else causing the problem.

[TechnoTheBear]

I know you said the HDD read out as healthy, but from everything else you said, it does sound like an issue with the hard drive. Though I'm not sure what would cause it to read out as healthy when it's not. 

 

It would be tedious, but I think the easiest way to eliminate the possibility of it being the HDD is to maybe buy a $15 ssd off eBay and throw it in their, install windows and just use it for a while and see if it does the same thing. If it does, then throw your hdd back in there and be glad you didn't buy an expensive ssd to replace it with. If it doesn't, buy yourself a bigger, nicer ssd and be happy the diagnostic fee was basically $15 and some time.

[Xeper8x8]

29 minutes ago, ApolloX75 said:

I mean I'm not going to say it's your issue for sure; but I've fixed a couple older laptops that had this issue (using Windows 10) in the last year or two, so if anything it could be worth a shot if you can't find anything else causing the problem.

I'll still go to the tech store at some point in time and see what they got, if its cheap enough ill get it and guess i can use a better Wireless card anyway lol.

 

27 minutes ago, TechnoTheBear said:

I know you said the HDD read out as healthy, but from everything else you said, it does sound like an issue with the hard drive. Though I'm not sure what would cause it to read out as healthy when it's not. 

My brother thought the same thing too. That its the HDD. Especially when i told him it spiked to 100% everytime it lagged. Maybe the program is outdated or something. Seemed kinda old. But i think im going to try that option too, since im kinda thinking it might be that too.

[Xeper8x8]

Update: Upon further gaming, i noticed when i would interact with quest givers, the mouth would move and the subtitles would show but the sound of the voice would be couple seconds late. When this happened i noticed the HDD usage would spike up to 100 again for as long as the delay was there and neither CPU nor GPU would dip like they would when say i Kill a zombie or run. i THINK im about ready to call this a HDD issue. Luckly i ordered a SSD yesterday so hopefully that dos the trick lol.

[Xeper8x8]

On 11/12/2020 at 12:42 AM, TechnoTheBear said:

It would be tedious, but I think the easiest way to eliminate the possibility of it being the HDD is to maybe buy a $15 ssd off eBay and throw it in their, install windows and just use it for a while and see if it does the same thing. If it does, then throw your hdd back in there and be glad you didn't buy an expensive ssd to replace it with. If it doesn't, buy yourself a bigger, nicer ssd and be happy the diagnostic fee was basically $15 and some time.

Ok, so i received my SSD today around 120gbs, and it turn out that it WAS the HDD that was bottlenecking my performance! I...I cant believe it lol...all of this time, like since April, it was that HDD the WHOLE TIME! Kinda happy and angry at the same time since i wish i knew way back when since it was right under my nose this whole time. So should i get a bigger SSD? 1TB maybe? Anyway, Thank you everyone for helping or trying to help! i appreciate it!