windows xp SP2 limits cpu usage on a process?

[Zee]

tried 2 diff progs.... gets capped at 50

 

[spyordie007]

This is not a SP2 thing.

It sounds like you have a HT CPU which by nature is only going to show a thread running @ 50%.

 

[yelo333]

Hyperthreading could do it...SP2'd XP goes over 50% for me. My guess is the program is running at full speed, but only on one CPU. So, the other virtual cpu is sitting unused. Windows' percent meter is 50% for cpu1/50% for cpu2. If it is hyperthreading...it's not a bug, it's a feature


OUCH! beaten by seconds by the guy above me...

 

[Zee]

whoa. that sucks. thanks spy and yelo

 

[spyordie007]

whoa. that sucks

No it doesnt, it's supposed to do that. This is a good thing, it means your system is using the CPU properly.

OUCH! beaten by seconds by the guy above me...

 

[Zee]

Originally posted by: spyordie007

whoa. that sucks

No it doesnt, it's supposed to do that. This is a good thing, it means your system is using the CPU properly.

OUCH! beaten by seconds by the guy above me...

Right that is true, i just meant that would mean my dvd encoding would take longer because the computer is not really going at it....

 

[spyordie007]

i just meant that would mean my dvd encoding would take longer because the computer is not really going at it....

No this is not true. Your encoding will happen at full CPU speed (whatever Ghz it's running at).

The CPU really is going at it; it just doesnt look quite as impressive because taskmanager thinks it's only using 50% of the available processor power (which would be the case if you actually had 2 seperate CPUs, but you only have one). If your encoder were multi-threaded it would than show 100% utilization in taskmanager but in reality you would only seen a marginal increase in encoding speed (certainly not double) as the 2 threads competed for processor resources.

Not to be rude or anything but technically the only problem is that you arent interpreting taskmanager's output correctly in light of your hyperthreaded CPU.

 

[Zee]

ahh, i see, good good. thanks spy