CPU usage help

[Iaso 0]

So, I have an i5 4670k, WoW should run on a potato, why is it wavering between 20% and 30% cpu usage all the time?

Is there something wrong here or is anyone else experiencing this?

 

I have a gtx 770 and I've capped fps to 60 with vsync

 

 

[humbug 1]

i have the same processor. same usage. if 2 wows are open for my bank its jumps to like 50%. if anyone knows a fix that would be sweet. also, wow crashes about 1/4 the time upon login when everything loads for the first time, or when i hearth sometimes.

the error is something about memory, i have addon memory set to 0, and have 8gb memory

 

anyone know anything about what could be causing the crashes?

[IzZaGod 0]

I had a problem kind of like that and it ended up being my power supply. My original went out so i got an old smaller one that had only half the watts of my orginal and it just wasn't enough power to run it but it was a laptop. I'm sure you've already tried it but if you have a dedicated graphics card then you need to make sure it's the one being used and all settings on high performance. But like i say, mine is a laptop that i use as a tower and i haven't owned a desktop in a long time.

 

18 hours ago, humbug said:

i have the same processor. same usage. if 2 wows are open for my bank its jumps to like 50%. if anyone knows a fix that would be sweet. also, wow crashes about 1/4 the time upon login when everything loads for the first time, or when i hearth sometimes.

the error is something about memory, i have addon memory set to 0, and have 8gb memory

 

anyone know anything about what could be causing the crashes?

 

Also i have the same  problem with the error message still but mine usually is either just random or when i log off. If you get crazy bad lagg from having 2 open at the same time then try minimizing and going back into it, that seems to work for me but your problem could be different.

[kittenbasher 0]

There's two important things to note.

1) Your CPU usage graph might be set to overall utilization, which is the usage per core divided by number of cores, since WoW is a single-threaded game this means even if it maxes out one of your cores to 100% it will show up as 25% on a 4-core processor, realistically more like 30% as the system takes something as well. You can change this by going into the performance tab of your task manager, right clicking the CPU usage graph and select Change graph to > Logical processors.

2) CPU's, unlike GPU's aren't made to max out. The "Usage %" of both of these chips also means slightly different things, in GPU it means how large portion of it's TDP is being consumed, and in CPU it basically means how many calculations of the maximum possible cap are being done each time the clock ticks. When a GPU is at 100% it means it's pumping out as many frames as it can per second, CPU on the other hand gets a static workload to chew through, and if it maxes out it means it's not up to getting that stuff done in time and causes freezing.

 

All in all I wouldn't worry about your CPU being underutilized if it's not causing performance issues for you as it only means the CPU has nothing more to do.

Another thing to note is that WoW is an old game and modern CPU's have way broader instruction sets, which the WoW process cannot utilize, especially on Intel that means your game can make use maybe 60% of your clock time at best.

[Iaso 0]

54 minutes ago, kittenbasher said:

There's two important things to note.

1) Your CPU usage graph might be set to overall utilization, which is the usage per core divided by number of cores, since WoW is a single-threaded game this means even if it maxes out one of your cores to 100% it will show up as 25% on a 4-core processor, realistically more like 30% as the system takes something as well. You can change this by going into the performance tab of your task manager, right clicking the CPU usage graph and select Change graph to > Logical processors.

2) CPU's, unlike GPU's aren't made to max out. The "Usage %" of both of these chips also means slightly different things, in GPU it means how large portion of it's TDP is being consumed, and in CPU it basically means how many calculations of the maximum possible cap are being done each time the clock ticks. When a GPU is at 100% it means it's pumping out as many frames as it can per second, CPU on the other hand gets a static workload to chew through, and if it maxes out it means it's not up to getting that stuff done in time and causes freezing.

 

All in all I wouldn't worry about your CPU being underutilized if it's not causing performance issues for you as it only means the CPU has nothing more to do.

Another thing to note is that WoW is an old game and modern CPU's have way broader instruction sets, which the WoW process cannot utilize, especially on Intel that means your game can make use maybe 60% of your clock time at best.

My concern is that somehow the cpu is being overutilized. I don't remember my cpu being used so much playing vanilla WoW over all this years.

 

That's why it's strange that my cpu is being used so much all of a sudden. I'm inside Dire maul east, all by myself at the moment and my pc is making a noise like I'm playing witcher 3. CPU usage is 32% atm.

 

On my task manager, at the CPU tab it says "Total utilization in all nuclei" (translated), at my WoW.exe cpu usage is 32%

[kittenbasher 0]

Well we play the game today very differently than we did in 2005, consider resolution, addons, ingame settings...

If that's a concern, have you tried if disabling addons reduces your CPU usage? You can also switch to a lower tier power consumption profile within Windows.

[Iaso 0]

15 hours ago, kittenbasher said:

Well we play the game today very differently than we did in 2005, consider resolution, addons, ingame settings...

If that's a concern, have you tried if disabling addons reduces your CPU usage? You can also switch to a lower tier power consumption profile within Windows.

If isn't normal, it's a concern. Considering 2 months ago CPU usage was normal, 2005 isn't 2 months ago. That's what I meant.

It might be some kind of incompatibility with windows or like you said the profile might be forcing the cpu into an erratic state. To note, I sometimes play on my laptop which has ubuntu linux installed and there doesn't seem to be any problems with the laptop's cpu while I play. I use exactly the same graphic settings/addons.

Also, for probably less obvious reasons I was wondering if it could be a security issue, somehow my wow.exe being hijacked for nefarious ends which could compromise either my computer, account or even both.

 

It might be an addon though, I'll try to isolate the potential problem further.

[dabmaster 0]

25%-30% is normal on that processor. Overlock it if you want more performance. 

[Ramzan 0]

 

On June 8, 2017 at 1:53 PM, Iaso said:

My concern is that somehow the cpu is being overutilized. I don't remember my cpu being used so much playing vanilla WoW over all this years.

 

That's why it's strange that my cpu is being used so much all of a sudden. I'm inside Dire maul east, all by myself at the moment and my pc is making a noise like I'm playing witcher 3. CPU usage is 32% atm.

 

On my task manager, at the CPU tab it says "Total utilization in all nuclei" (translated), at my WoW.exe cpu usage is 32%

Sounds like a bitcoin mining program is hidden somewhere in your WoW folder.

I think someone should dig around in the World of Warcraft folder and try to find where the bitcoin mining program is hidden ;)

[Pottu 290]

Vanilla wow.exe is no pinnacle of programming. Leave it running on the title screen and CPU usage can go to 100%

I would recommend turning Vsync on so that it doesn't try to run some insane FPS amount. As for RAM, it's better to use a fixed number instead of 0 which means dynamic. So put 512 there, for example, as that is plenty enough for your addons and then the client does not need to dynamically request more RAM when it needs it. That should help a little bit as well. Cleaning your computer of dust and double-checking fan profiles is usually useful too.

Of course, there is always the possibility of malware being hidden in your PC and being run in the background. It never hurts to run safety checks. But it just is the nature of the beast, vanilla client was not programmed for modern CPUs and Windows - when running a 14-year old program, odd things are bound to occur.