CPU usage spike

First of all "...30-35 degrees Celcius. With a peak temp of 80..." - I really hope that's a typo or I've misunderstood...to my knowledge 67 degrees C is the point at which hot becomes too hot for Athlon's - but that may be a bit out of date. My first action if I were you would be to reseat the cooling block on the CPU using a decent thermal paste (e.g. Arctic Silver etc) and check that water is flowing properly as 30-35 degrees still sounds a bit warm to me for a non overclocked water cooled system.

Secondly You're really not doing your processor any favours with the video card (What Radeon is it?) I'd seriously think about updating it if it is not a recent Radeon.

The other thing to look at is what processes are running - depending on what you're using the PC for there may be a lot of services running that aren't necessary but get turned on by default by Windows.

Hope this helps

I would say that perhaps the video card is the culprit, but I'm upgrading from an Athlon T-Bird 1.4 with an average heatsink and fan. That temp was higher than this. Graphics card was the same. CPU never spiked like that.

I did some research, and the newer AMDs have a higher upper temp limit. Most users seem to be idling at about 30C.

There's nothing special happening on my machine graphically that would require a better card, and moving a window around the screen should definitely not be taxing.

I guess my real question is, besides putting a better thermal conductor (which I will definitely do...thanks for that)could I have done something wrong in construction that could cause symptoms like this?

Most likely, you do not have a problem with your processor, and you can fix your problems with some routine maintenance. Try to run Spybot Search & Destroy (http://security.kolla.de), and then defragment your computer. If that doesn't work, you might want to run chkdsk to make sure that your harddrive is not corrupted.

The CPU and all the fans should be checked to make surre they are working properly.

Since AMD processors seem to run hotter then consideradding adding extra fans where ever possible,adding thermal compound would help some.

Check what programs are running in the back ground when you are performing the task using Frooty Loops,this may be the culprit to your problem.

I can't believe I'm getting so many responses. Thanks to everyone thus far. I think I'm getting closer to cracking the case (no pun intended, as I'd like to avoid having to open the case at all for now).

Here's the latest. I brought my water temp way down and eliminated any notion that it's CPU temp. I had my CPU running at about 20C. That's pretty darn cool for an AMD. Then I paid closer attention to the task manager. I found that the process that increases greatly is that which needs to redraw (i.e. if I move something around on the desktop or click on the START menu, then explorer spikes. If I have an app open and I drag something over it that causes a repaint to be called, that app spikes.) These spikes will rise to about 75-80% and then immediately calm down. Now the reason I still don't think it's a graphics card thing is because my old machine didn't have the problem (same card), and when I do other things (like rendering a file to wav in FL Studio) it goes to 100% the entire way through the process. That's not a redrawing issue.

Another possibly unrelated thing that I noticed was that when I try to open a wav file it says that WMP can't be found even though I checked the path in the file association pane and it's right. WMP functions fine, too. That could have happened during the install of my sound card, though.

Fresh install of XP SP1, New HD, Clean Files, No Malware.

Could XP just have crapped out on me? A reinstall perhaps?

Could my brand new sound card be causing problems like this? I've never worked with a sound card of this caliber. I'm a veteran SBLive user.

Can't be wattage btw, because I've got a 400W. Plenty for what I'm doing, I'd think.

If you read this far, you are incredibly dedicated and deserve payment. I, however, spent all my money on this damn computer, so all I can give you is my gratitude.

Thanks!!!

still Mike

One issue could be the visual properties of WXP. go to My computer, rigth click, go to Properties, Advanced tab, performance click settings and choose the radio buttomn fro Adjust for best performance. re selct 'smooth edges of screen fonts' show translucent selection rectangle, and use visual styles on windows and buttons.
This should help alot

I have seen this problem with XP before. By any chance is there a command window open Perhaps running in the background? running a Command window under XP will chew up your CPU and cause spikes as you are suggesting. (Open up a Command.Com windows and open Task Manager , every keystroke causes a large CPU Spike) I typically see this when supporting sites while dialed in with PC Anywhere. To get around the issue I open task manager and drop the priority to below normal on the NTVDM.EXE process. This seems to free things up to be able to work. Not sure if this works for you but I thougth I would mention it.