This tutorial involves changing features of Windows and if done incorrectly may cause registry errors. Please PM me if you have further queries. I am not responsible for any mistakes you make resulting in damage to your system. Please read all steps thoroughly.
Difficulty level: 4/10 (most people can do this pretty easily )
Time to complete: About 20 mins max
Applies to: Windows 7 and above. Only recommended for mid-high end desktops with good cooling or high end laptops
Please note : ( This colour represents method or steps )
I am writing this guide/tutorial after the experiences that I have had myself. I was playing my usual battlefield 4 and a few other games and noticed that my game was getting sudden lag spikes and such. I tried everything including a Windows reinstall but then, core unparking was what did the trick.
So what is 'Core Unparking'?
Basically, for about 4-5 years now and when Windows 7 was launched, the use of multi-core processors has increased dramatically; almost all desktops nowadays have at least dual core CPUs. The way Windows 7 was designed was that it would 'park' the unnecessary cores when they are not needed in order to save power and keep the temperatures cool, and then 'unpark' them when they are needed. (Parking just means putting in a unused idle state) Sounds good right?
Well no. The problem is, sometimes they stay parked even when they ARE needed. Therefore, what we can do is permanently 'unpark' them and disable Windows from ever allowing them to be parked and sitting idle.
"So how do I know if I am having this problem?"
The most common symptoms of unneeded parking of cores by Windows are:
So here is how it is done
If this utility doesn't work for you, there is another one I would strongly recommend:
http://tinyurl.com/mkhutem. It is called Park Control. Follow the same steps as above up to number 3). After that the link has the specific instructions for how to use this utility.
If none of those work, here is another, manual method => (credit to TomG and sky60234 of Cakewalk forums)
After any of these methods, you can retry the resource monitor operation to check if it has helped. Most of all though, the 'symptoms' should have now disappeared if this was the issue!
Surely, there are some drawbacks, right?
No, not really!
The only real drawback is that there will be marginal increase in power consumption since all cores are active. But this is almost negligible because even if all are active, they won't all be at 100% load. Also, I'm sure you were already aware of your systems max power consumption well before you bought or built it....right? But yes, apart from that there is no real drawback of doing this.
Hope this helps!
Difficulty level: 4/10 (most people can do this pretty easily )
Time to complete: About 20 mins max
Applies to: Windows 7 and above. Only recommended for mid-high end desktops with good cooling or high end laptops
Please note : ( This colour represents method or steps )
I am writing this guide/tutorial after the experiences that I have had myself. I was playing my usual battlefield 4 and a few other games and noticed that my game was getting sudden lag spikes and such. I tried everything including a Windows reinstall but then, core unparking was what did the trick.
So what is 'Core Unparking'?
Basically, for about 4-5 years now and when Windows 7 was launched, the use of multi-core processors has increased dramatically; almost all desktops nowadays have at least dual core CPUs. The way Windows 7 was designed was that it would 'park' the unnecessary cores when they are not needed in order to save power and keep the temperatures cool, and then 'unpark' them when they are needed. (Parking just means putting in a unused idle state) Sounds good right?
Well no. The problem is, sometimes they stay parked even when they ARE needed. Therefore, what we can do is permanently 'unpark' them and disable Windows from ever allowing them to be parked and sitting idle.
"So how do I know if I am having this problem?"
The most common symptoms of unneeded parking of cores by Windows are:
-Micro stutters
-Lag spikes
-Sudden freezes
-Low CPU usage
-...and sometimes low frames per second (fps) when gaming
In Windows, here is how to check if you really are suffering:
1) Close all applications
2) In the Start menu (or press Win key + S in Win 8) type 'resource monitor'
3) Right click and run resource monitor as an administrator
4) Click the CPU tab
5) On the right hand side, you should see some green+black grid graphs. Each graph represents a Core in your processor. Watch carefully to see if a core is grayed out and says 'parked'. If it does, then continue with this tutorial, if not, I'm afraid this won't help you.
6) If no cores show as parked, also check when running a heavy application such as a game or other software.
So here is how it is done
- The easiest method =>
1) Create a Windows restore point if you wish, by typing in Start menu - 'Create a restore point'
2) Create a backup of your registry , incase something goes wrong. Start -> type 'regedit' --> Run as admin-> Click the 'file' tab --> Export --> select save location (suggest a usb stick) and name it something like registry backup.
3) Download this utility called 'Coder Bag-core Parking manager' http://tinyurl.com/7h99bu7
4) Run the downloaded .exe program as administrator
5) Click the 'Check Status' button
6) Once the parked cores appear, click 'Unpark All'
7) Done! Just restart your PC.
If this utility doesn't work for you, there is another one I would strongly recommend:
http://tinyurl.com/mkhutem. It is called Park Control. Follow the same steps as above up to number 3). After that the link has the specific instructions for how to use this utility.
If none of those work, here is another, manual method => (credit to TomG and sky60234 of Cakewalk forums)
- 1) Start -> type 'regedit'
2) Find this key: " 0cc5b647-c1df-4637-891a-dec35c318583 "
3) Within this key, there is a value called: " ValueMax "
4) This value represents the % number of cores the system will park - the default 100% ie: all Cores are potentially park-able
5) Change the value from 64 to 0 so the " ValueMin " and " ValueMax " are both zero
6)You will have to find the key a few times and repeat the process for each time it is found - the number of instances will depend on the number of power profiles in your system
7) Do a full shutdown and power-off and cold-re-start
8) Done!
After any of these methods, you can retry the resource monitor operation to check if it has helped. Most of all though, the 'symptoms' should have now disappeared if this was the issue!
Surely, there are some drawbacks, right?
No, not really!
The only real drawback is that there will be marginal increase in power consumption since all cores are active. But this is almost negligible because even if all are active, they won't all be at 100% load. Also, I'm sure you were already aware of your systems max power consumption well before you bought or built it....right? But yes, apart from that there is no real drawback of doing this.
Hope this helps!
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