If this is the wrong place to post this, I apologize. I've tried searching these forums and various forums, but so far it seems every thread I find is either more for one of my several issues, or is best answered with something that doesn't apply to me (i.e. AMD-related.)
My Computer's Specs:
Dell Inspiron
Windows 8.1 x64 bit
Intel Core i5-4460 CPU @ 3.20GHz (Quad core, I believe) x64 bit
8gb RAM
Some DVD RW+ drive (Unsure of manufacturer or specs)
1tb HDD (Unsure of manufacturer or specs other than size)
Nvidia GTX 750ti w/ 2gb VRAM
Thermaltake 500w PSU
The Issue:
When I first bought the machine maybe two months ago, it ran super smooth, booted quickly, had no problems, and even before installing my Nvidia GTX 750ti and a bigger 500w PSU, it ran plenty of my games perfectly (albeit on lower settings) with the built in GPU in the i5-4460. I installed the new PSU and Nvidia card maybe two-four weeks ago.
About a week and a half ago, as if some switch were flipped from "great" to "crap," my machine is having all sorts of problems now. In the task manager, the memory is almost always above 75% in use, the HDD will jump to 99% usage randomly when hardly anything is being done on the machine (such as only steam open.) When playing many of my games, which previously ran at least at 60 fps with the Nvidia card installed, now many of them will stutter or hang terribly. I can't use fraps to record like I did just a week or two ago, because that only exacerbates the HDD usage problem.
Along with this, the system will once in a while freeze entirely and hang... I'll still hear people in skype, or music from my game, but everything will freeze on the screen, forcing me to force restart the machine by holding the power button on the front. Sometimes, the machine will just restart itself. I'll be minding my own, and everything will go black... then start up again, as if I had just rebooted.
Sometimes, restarting the machine helps these issues. Other times, the issue comes right back. I bought the machine to replace an aging and dying laptop, and had to dip into my tax return to even afford it (that or go without a working computer for however long.) I've invested plenty of my meager income into this box, only for it to suddenly start working nowhere near as good as it had before.
I have no idea how to solve this, or what to do. As I've said, I tried scouring forums all over the net to see what other people have done to solve these issues, but either nothing has worked, or hasn't been relevant to my issues.
What I've Tried:
-Based on what I've seen in some other forums, I've tried disabling Superfetch as some threads had suggested, saw sight improvements, but not much.
-Tried disabling Windows Search and setting Ndu.sys to not launch automatically (setting a value to 4 in regedit?)
-Ran a quick scan with Windows Defender, didn't find any malware or viruses
-Trying a full scan now, will update when that completes
-Tried to update as many of my drivers as I could... As far as I can tell, I think I've upgraded my mother board, bios and network drivers (although for some reason Dell's recommended drivers for the wireless/bluetooth adapters refused to install) Updated any and all Dell software, let Windows 8.1 update itself as it saw fit, updated to the latest Nvidia drivers for my GPU
-Update: Full Windows Defender scan finished and found one threat, promptly removed it. Not sure if this has helped yet, but either way, good to get rid of that.
-Update 2: Read somewhere that it might be Windows Defender running some sort of automated background scan or something? Changed a few things in scheduled tasks (just setting it to only run when the machine has been idle for 10 minutes, and cease when idle is disturbed.) There was a weird freeze about five or ten minutes after this, and I force-reset the machine... So far, can't tell if the problem is gone, or just hasn't struck again yet.
-Update 3: Ran a piece of software to monitor temperatures on the CPU and GPU while playing a game with a friend of mine... Temps seemed okay, so not sure if that's the problem.
I'm running out of ideas and desperate for help. I'll give any info needed to solve the problem... I know how to run a dxdiag, I've looked once or twice at Windows event-log thing... (?) but I'm still relatively new to anything later than XP, and have never had to delve this far into my machine's inner-workings, so be aware of that.
My Computer's Specs:
Dell Inspiron
Windows 8.1 x64 bit
Intel Core i5-4460 CPU @ 3.20GHz (Quad core, I believe) x64 bit
8gb RAM
Some DVD RW+ drive (Unsure of manufacturer or specs)
1tb HDD (Unsure of manufacturer or specs other than size)
Nvidia GTX 750ti w/ 2gb VRAM
Thermaltake 500w PSU
The Issue:
When I first bought the machine maybe two months ago, it ran super smooth, booted quickly, had no problems, and even before installing my Nvidia GTX 750ti and a bigger 500w PSU, it ran plenty of my games perfectly (albeit on lower settings) with the built in GPU in the i5-4460. I installed the new PSU and Nvidia card maybe two-four weeks ago.
About a week and a half ago, as if some switch were flipped from "great" to "crap," my machine is having all sorts of problems now. In the task manager, the memory is almost always above 75% in use, the HDD will jump to 99% usage randomly when hardly anything is being done on the machine (such as only steam open.) When playing many of my games, which previously ran at least at 60 fps with the Nvidia card installed, now many of them will stutter or hang terribly. I can't use fraps to record like I did just a week or two ago, because that only exacerbates the HDD usage problem.
Along with this, the system will once in a while freeze entirely and hang... I'll still hear people in skype, or music from my game, but everything will freeze on the screen, forcing me to force restart the machine by holding the power button on the front. Sometimes, the machine will just restart itself. I'll be minding my own, and everything will go black... then start up again, as if I had just rebooted.
Sometimes, restarting the machine helps these issues. Other times, the issue comes right back. I bought the machine to replace an aging and dying laptop, and had to dip into my tax return to even afford it (that or go without a working computer for however long.) I've invested plenty of my meager income into this box, only for it to suddenly start working nowhere near as good as it had before.
I have no idea how to solve this, or what to do. As I've said, I tried scouring forums all over the net to see what other people have done to solve these issues, but either nothing has worked, or hasn't been relevant to my issues.
What I've Tried:
-Based on what I've seen in some other forums, I've tried disabling Superfetch as some threads had suggested, saw sight improvements, but not much.
-Tried disabling Windows Search and setting Ndu.sys to not launch automatically (setting a value to 4 in regedit?)
-Ran a quick scan with Windows Defender, didn't find any malware or viruses
-Trying a full scan now, will update when that completes
-Tried to update as many of my drivers as I could... As far as I can tell, I think I've upgraded my mother board, bios and network drivers (although for some reason Dell's recommended drivers for the wireless/bluetooth adapters refused to install) Updated any and all Dell software, let Windows 8.1 update itself as it saw fit, updated to the latest Nvidia drivers for my GPU
-Update: Full Windows Defender scan finished and found one threat, promptly removed it. Not sure if this has helped yet, but either way, good to get rid of that.
-Update 2: Read somewhere that it might be Windows Defender running some sort of automated background scan or something? Changed a few things in scheduled tasks (just setting it to only run when the machine has been idle for 10 minutes, and cease when idle is disturbed.) There was a weird freeze about five or ten minutes after this, and I force-reset the machine... So far, can't tell if the problem is gone, or just hasn't struck again yet.
-Update 3: Ran a piece of software to monitor temperatures on the CPU and GPU while playing a game with a friend of mine... Temps seemed okay, so not sure if that's the problem.
I'm running out of ideas and desperate for help. I'll give any info needed to solve the problem... I know how to run a dxdiag, I've looked once or twice at Windows event-log thing... (?) but I'm still relatively new to anything later than XP, and have never had to delve this far into my machine's inner-workings, so be aware of that.
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