FX-9370 Shows 4 Cores Not 8

[hunterbob33]

I recently built my second gaming rig and it is running a FX-9370 8 core processor and when I check in task manager (under performance) it only registers 4 cores. I've on several occasions tried to find out why this is but I have been unable to learn anything. Any help that anybody could provide would be great! If it's necessary I can provide a full list of specs.

 

[synphul]

A lot of people report this issue. It could just be the way windows sees the cpu, it's comprised of 4 modules with 2 cores each with many of the resources being shared between each pair of cores in a module. Maybe windows is reading the module count as cores and reporting cores as threads since it can process 8 threads at a time.

Something you can try, go to start menu and type in 'msconfig'. Under the boot tab click 'advanced options' and where it says 'number of processors' tick the box, drop down the menu and select the highest number (8). Save the settings and reboot the pc, see if it changes what windows reports back. I would think it's a windows reporting problem rather than a case of only half of your cpu working.

 

[hunterbob33]

A lot of people report this issue. It could just be the way windows sees the cpu, it's comprised of 4 modules with 2 cores each with many of the resources being shared between each pair of cores in a module. Maybe windows is reading the module count as cores and reporting cores as threads since it can process 8 threads at a time.

Something you can try, go to start menu and type in 'msconfig'. Under the boot tab click 'advanced options' and where it says 'number of processors' tick the box, drop down the menu and select the highest number (8). Save the settings and reboot the pc, see if it changes what windows reports back. I would think it's a windows reporting problem rather than a case of only half of your cpu working.

I actually have already tried that solution but it only gives me the options 1-4 cores it doesn't go above that. Do you have any other ideas?

 

[akseli]

What Windows you have? If you have Win 8 or above, and you have upgraded the computer from 4 core model, reboot.

You are not running Windows on virtualization?

Normally there should be no reason to set any specific number of "CPUs" on the msconfig setting, as without the setting, Windows will use all it can see.

 

[hunterbob33]

What Windows you have? If you have Win 8 or above, and you have upgraded the computer from 4 core model, reboot.

You are not running Windows on virtualization?

Normally there should be no reason to set any specific number of "CPUs" on the msconfig setting, as without the setting, Windows will use all it can see.

Windows 7 Home Premium and I did originally have a quad core in the old build that my current hard drive was originally in but all of the other hardware is completely new in my current rig.

 

[akseli]

Windows 7 Home Premium and I did originally have a quad core in the old build that my current hard drive was originally in but all of the other hardware is completely new in my current rig.

That sounds something that could be related. You did a fresh install of Windows right?

But, even if you did, usually Windows only creates the new partion for WIndows itself, and uses the old system partition if the disk had one. It's a small, usually 100 MB partition which can be seen from "disk management". It contains bootloader and some other stuff. It's not mounted so that it doesn't have a drive letter assigned.

My hunch would be, that something in the old partition has something, driver code or setting, that's limiting the number of cores to 4 like it was in the previous build it was created in. The setting is the same as the mentioned msconfig edits.

You can rewrite most of it by going to Windows recovery mode, started by booting and pressing F8, then go to recovery console.
bootrec /rebuildbcd

But I'm not sure it would help. It's worth a try though.

Another try. Go to device manager and click action ->scan new hardware.

Hmmm...oh by the way, you have installed the latest service pack and all upgrades right? Because I think support for FX series came with some hotfix.