Response shows 100% but Windows 8 UI obviously laggy

Henry Yei · September 25, 2013, 05:33:44 AM

I'm not exactly sure how Processs Lasso calculates responsiveness, but I hit a situation where my system become slow as molasses in terms of UI in Windows 8. Stuttering mouse movement and slow window refreshing were the symptoms. I looked at Process Lasso, and most apps were at 2% or less CPU usage. There was one app called AudioSwitch using 12%. This is on a AMD FX8350, 32GB RAM.

I started killing processes to see which one was causing it. It ended up being AudioSwitch. This is an tray app which toggles between your audio devices when clicked.

In Process Lasso, I had AudioSwitch set to restart if terminated because Its known to crash every once in awhile.

I'm filing this bug mostly to see if there is a better way to calculate responsiveness or get a clue on what process lasso may not be accounting for that may have slowed my system down that badly. AFAIK, there is no IO involved in this app (no writing to disk)

BenYeeHua · September 25, 2013, 08:41:20 AM

How about the DPC Latency?
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So, it look like the Audio Switch is biting on the same core, or it locked in core 0?
The ways to calculate the Responsiveness has been tweak 1 times, so you might need to getting more information, or the way to reappear this issue.

Henry Yei · September 26, 2013, 02:04:16 AM

Where can I find DPC latency? I am not using any beta. Was the last tweak pushed out in the official version? I have set the program to be locked in any core. I was kinda bewildered how one lone program could slow my 8 core system that badly and only show 12% CPU usuage in Process Lasso.

edkiefer · September 26, 2013, 07:34:34 AM

Just Google it , it can be DL from many places .
It is a windows tool

http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml#background

There also a LatencyMon tool , but i haven't used either so not sure on there useage .

http://www.resplendence.com/latencymon

BenYeeHua · September 26, 2013, 02:41:03 PM

And check the Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\Performance Information and Tools\Advanced Tools , there are showing the Performance issues.
If the "Performance issues" showing anything, click on it and view the log in Event Viewer, it might showing it is some heavy graphic thing running for example, and watch the log time too, sometimes it is showing the old one..

edkiefer · September 26, 2013, 04:24:23 PM

I forgot to say the DTS and Latency monitor if run and you find high numbers in various app . It could be bad driver or how bios is set, but mainly drivers i do believe .

I test this on new hardware, new build so it been a while since I used it .

I wonder why windows (WEI) says new hardware detected, need to re-run WEI , when nothing has changed hardware wise in a yr .
I think the graphic id go up for some reason 7.3>7.6 for 660ti . but I bottleneck on harddrive of 5.9 for total score .
I would need SSD to get better score there .

BenYeeHua · September 26, 2013, 05:27:02 PM

QuoteI wonder why windows (WEI) says new hardware detected, need to re-run WEI , when nothing has changed hardware wise in a yr .
I think the graphic id go up for some reason 7.3>7.6 for 660ti . but I bottleneck on harddrive of 5.9 for total score .
I would need SSD to get better score there .

This happen for me too, when I just swap the Ram.

edkiefer · September 26, 2013, 07:06:45 PM

yes, that makes sense but I didn't change any hardware , but maybe driver update or changing bios setting might do it .
Not sure when it happened as I never check WEI .

Henry Yei · September 26, 2013, 08:54:09 PM

Ah, I thought DPC could be found instead Process Lasso. DPC is not compatible with Windows 8. I ran LatencyMon, and it points out that ndis.sys is the driver with the highest execution on all 8 CPUs. I have a PCI-Express WIFI N ethernet adapter on my desktop for Internet.

From my Events log, I can see several warning messages about my "Desktop Window Manager is experiencing Heavy Resource contention"
and my "Desktop Window Manager responsiveness has degraded"

I have an AMD Radeon 7950, which is near top of the line, so not sure what I can do about it. I'm really running anything graphically intensive other than having a lot of windows and/or tabs open. Every once in awhile I run a game in windowed mode, but the degradation happens when I am not running anything obviously graphic intensive...

BenYeeHua · September 27, 2013, 07:44:45 AM

Quote from: edkiefer on September 26, 2013, 07:06:45 PM
yes, that makes sense but I didn't change any hardware , but maybe driver update or changing bios setting might do it .
Not sure when it happened as I never check WEI .

Registry WEI score broken?

Quote from: htyei on September 26, 2013, 08:54:09 PM
Ah, I thought DPC could be found instead Process Lasso. DPC is not compatible with Windows 8. I ran LatencyMon, and it points out that ndis.sys is the driver with the highest execution on all 8 CPUs. I have a PCI-Express WIFI N ethernet adapter on my desktop for Internet.

From my Events log, I can see several warning messages about my "Desktop Window Manager is experiencing Heavy Resource contention"
and my "Desktop Window Manager responsiveness has degraded"

I have an AMD Radeon 7950, which is near top of the line, so not sure what I can do about it. I'm really running anything graphically intensive other than having a lot of windows and/or tabs open. Every once in awhile I run a game in windowed mode, but the degradation happens when I am not running anything obviously graphic intensive...

I need more information.

For example

QuoteThe Desktop Window Manager is experiencing heavy resource contention.
Reason : CPU resources are over-utilized.
Diagnosis : A consistent degradation in frame rate for the Desktop Window Manager was observed over a period of time.

This show it is the CPU issue.

QuoteThe Desktop Window Manager is experiencing heavy resource contention.
Reason : Graphics subsystem resources are over-utilized.
Diagnosis : A consistent degradation in frame rate for the Desktop Window Manager was observed over a period of time.

This show it is the GPU issues.

QuoteThe Desktop Window Manager is experiencing heavy resource contention.
Scenario : Video memory resources are over-utilized. Reducing number of running programs and open windows may help resolve this condition

This show it is the GPU memory issues.

So, can you giving me more information from the Event Viewer?

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QuoteAh, I thought DPC could be found instead Process Lasso. DPC is not compatible with Windows 8. I ran LatencyMon, and it points out that ndis.sys is the driver with the highest execution on all 8 CPUs. I have a PCI-Express WIFI N ethernet adapter on my desktop for Internet.

Yes, WiFi will causing high DPC latency, but <1000us don't causing much issue for me, except you are >1000us for the DPC latency all the time then it will not be the issues.(except you are doing some music production and need a lower latency for your sound card)

Jeremy Collake · October 15, 2013, 11:16:42 AM

The Responsiveness Metric only detects latency in the messaging subsystem, so lags originating in other subsystems may not be represented.

That said, I am working on improvements to this metric - the first changes to it in many years.

BenYeeHua · October 15, 2013, 05:26:54 PM

Yes, maybe OT but I will just say it.

For LatencyMon, after windows 8 came out, they are using "Interrupt to user process latency" to measure the DPC latency, but I always getting more inaccurate result from many people, like my friend, he has some issues on the hard disk, the whole I/O hang, sometimes, and LatencyMon will showing a high DPC latency, but the reported ISR/DPC routine execution time(I guess they are getting this information from Windows Kernel) will show no any driver are using 1xxxxx us for the DPC latency.

Just a story for a bad hardware that causing hang, but I think you might getting some information from it.