I have just upgraded my motherboard and cpu to a Athlon 64 3400+ with a Asus K8V SE deluxe motherboard, whilst keeping all my other original parts from my XP 1800 system.

My problem is that my computer pauses for rougly a second, every 3-4 seconds or so, in a definite cycle. This is not so much noticable in windows, but games often run smooth for 3-4, stutter or pause briefly, then another 3-4 seconds, and so on. Im baffled!?!

my specs are

Asus K8V SE deluxe
Athlon 64 3400+
1GB mem (1x512 PC2700, 1x256 PC2700, 1x256 PC2100)
XP Service pack 2

i have tried taking out the PC2100 stick, but that made no difference.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

That memory you're using with your new puter is like a mule racing Seattle Slew. That memory is soooo outdated for that processor,
it's not even funny. Not to mention possible compatibility problems. If you got it, go invest in some DDR400 SDRAM. But first wait for a few more responses from this board before you make a hasty decision, as I could be wrong.

Good luck!

YO

0. Is anyting gnawing at your resources in the background?
1. Do you run chkdsk and defrag as often needed?
2. What kinda HDD you got in there?

-- Always do what you are afraid to do --

You are using WHAT RAM?????? THAT'S THE PROBLEM MY FRIEND. That mobo is supposed to work with DDR 400/333 or 266 RAM. The use of PC2100 is not going to keep up with that system and will crash at worse or do what it's doing to you at best. Time to upgrade the RAM as well.

his mobo does support his ram...

Asus A7N8X Deluxe 2.0
ATI 9800 Pro
AMD Barton 2500+
1024 PC3200 Ram
120gig Maxtor HD
Audigy 2
420 watt psu

response #3.....

"That mobo is supposed to work with DDR 400/333 or 266 RAM. The use of PC2100 is not going to keep up with that system "

pc2100 is 266...
pc2700 is 333...
pc3200 is 400...

as i said...the mobo does support his ram

what kind of HardD u got...how many RPM's ?

Asus A7N8X Deluxe 2.0
ATI 9800 Pro
AMD Barton 2500+
1024 PC3200 Ram
120gig Maxtor HD
Audigy 2
420 watt psu

Software and/or drivers. Thats what the rpoblem would be.

CPU: Pentium 4 550 3.4Ghz LGA775 yet to be overclocked
Motherboard: Asus P5AD2 Deluxe
RAM: 2x512MB Kingston PC4200 533Mhz DDR2
Video Card: Gigabyte X800XT PE
HardDisk: 200GB 7200RPM WD

Thanks a bunch for the rapid reponse guys, i only posted it last night! cheers

I tried taking out that 2100 stick to see if that would make any difference, and it didnt seem to. I would have thought that the 2700 sticks would be ok but maybe im wrong.

When this happens the hard drive is really accessing at all, the stutters seem to happen with no really strain apparent. However, the fact that its regular does make me think its memory. Should i try a fresh format of windows and a clean install of all drivers to see if it is a software thing? Just want to exhuast some options before i splash out on more RAM is all.

Also, the 512 PC2700 stick was only bought last week. Would another stick of the same memory put alongside be ok? Or am i better off replacing the lot with 3200?

Just to add, I have a ATi 128 mb 9800 Pro with the latest drivers installed, and my AGP apature in the bios is set to 64mb. Just in case this sheds any more light.

To answer the hard drive questions, i have two. An 8gb drive with windows installed, and a 40gb slave. Would scrapping the old 8gb and sticking with the 40 solve anything? As i said in my previous post, the hard drive doesnt appear to be under a lot of strain, but perhaps the 8gb older drive is slowing things up? Thanks again guys.

One more thing. Ive just popped into the Performance monitor in Windows task manager and notioced that even when no background apps are apparently running, the CPU spikes up to 50% for around a second, then goes back to 0%. This happens at an almost identical rate to the stutters im noticing. Could this be linked?

First of, have you installed all the mainboard drivers (VIA Hyperion 4in1)?

Yes it could be linked. Looks like some software isn't working correctly and blocks your system.
Press ALT-CTRL-DEL and change to processes. Keep an eye on them to see which process suddenly need so much cpu load. If you can find it related to a special program deinstall it and check if the system runs better. If it does try to reinstall the program.
If you can't find it go to into the command line and type MSCONFIG. Go to Autostart and unmark all programs there (note down those who are alredy unmarked). Run again and if your system now runs start go back and start one at a time and check again. As soon as the problem are back you found the troublemaker!

But there are other things you shouldn't have done.
Your 8GB drive is quite old and slow (should be DMA33 or UltraDMA or ATA33 - all the same!) so everytime Windows has to load this will happen very slowly and Windows has to wait. An Windows reads and writes a lot on it's own partition/drive. The drive is still good for your personal data or backup but no more for Windows!
Reinstall or move Windows to your 40GB drive. You can use a smaller partition for Windows, I even suggest that for easier backup.

Is the 40GB ATA100 or ATA133 and is it 5400rpm or 7200rom ???

Remove the 256MB PC2100 and change the Ram speed to 333MHz. 768MB at 333MHz should be faster than 1GB at 266MHz.
512MB or even 1GB PC3200 should be faster but with 333MHz you should be able to live!

Have you ran a GOOD antivirus program through it, and a spyware program?

I had the same problem as you and i scanned for virus, (had a few) scanned for spyware (had over 300) and gave it a defrag and my computer was fine after that

Good luck!

AMD Athlon XP 1900
PC2100 256mb
Geforce FX 5200
Matsonic MS8188e
Windows XP Pro (sp2)
300 watt PSU
56X cd-rom
16X cd-rw
20G 5200rpm hard disk
Standered ATX case w