aragon12 Posted October 2, 2006 Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 hey, I'm using utorrent and I think its great but have a problem regarding spikes in its I/O performance and cpu usage. I found video in windows media player stuttered every couple of mins and after looking into it using process explorer I found taht utorrent was giving me spikes in I/O performance (R+O over 20MB) and simutanouely getting cpu spikes over 80%.This occurs only sometimes but I cant pin down any definate cause i.e. other programmes clashing as it can happen with nothing else running and everything else running. I have set the cache in utorrent to 70MB but when these spikes occur the cache in disk statistics will not show utorrent as using 70MB but rather a combined amount of 20MB for example and the cache will not increase to 70MB no matter how long I leave the programme to seed or downlaod. At other times when i'm having no problems the cache will reach a combined amount of 70MB. I can verify this by looking at process explorer, however I can find no diferences in the total system usage of resources in process explorer when im having problems and when im not - other then the spikes that utorrent is causing.I also use emule and bitcomet for downloading and have no such problems with those. So I'm sure its not a hardware issue, but im stumped! Any help??? My system is athlon xp2600 (non-overclocked)asus A7N8X deluxe motherboard512 mb Ram1x 160gig seagate barracuda HDD (2 partitions 100gig and 60gig)1x 250gig seagate barracude HDDwindows xp sp2 Running peerguardian 2, zonealarm sercurity suite Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ultima Posted October 2, 2006 Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 How are your cache settings configured? Are you using any incompatible software? Can you tell us what transfer modes the IDE/ATAPI controllers are set to in Start > Run > devmgmt.msc? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aragon12 Posted October 2, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 Hey, Primay IDE channel isDevice Otransfer mode: DMA if availableCurrent transfer mode: Ultra DMA mode 5Device 1transfer mode: DMA if availableCurrent transfer mode: Ultra DMA mode 5Secondry IDE channel isDevice 0transfer mode: DMA if availableCurrent transfer mode: Ultra DMA mode 2Cache settings are:overide automatic cache size and specify: 70MBreduce memory usage when the cahce is not needed (unchecked)enable caching of disk writeswrite out untoruched blocks every 2 minutes (unchecked)write out finshed peices immediatlyEnable caching of disk readsturn off read caching if the upload speed is slow (unchecked)remove old blocks from the cacheincrease automatic cahce size when cache thrashing (unchecked)I am not using any software other then zonealarm and peerguardian that i could see affecting utorrent - i.e. no beta software or memory tweaker or harddrive tweaker. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aragon12 Posted October 2, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 I've just looked at the virtual size of utorrent in process explorer and its showing as 75MB this is usually the size that utorrent has in private bytes (memory usage) right now its about 11MB in private bytes and its still giving I/O and cpu spikes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ultima Posted October 2, 2006 Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 Um... don't write pieces out immediately. Don't remove old blocks from the cache. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aragon12 Posted October 2, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 I have made the changes dont write out peices immediatly and dont remove old blocks from the cache, the cache has increased to 22MB but has stopped and remained stable arounf that amount but im still getting I/O (Read and other) spikes around 25MB and CPU spikes over 80% usage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Switeck Posted October 2, 2006 Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 Also check increase automatic cache size when cache thrashing, that should allow it to increase to max and stay there.Peer Guardian (v2 or v1?) should be unneccessary if you use µTorrent's ipfilter.dat -- though you may need to convert Peer Guardian's blocklist to the format µTorrent uses. I'm pretty sure Peer Guardian has a cpu hit every time µTorrent opens a new connection -- and it may make it so µTorrent is the parent process that appears to be causing the high cpu %.Zone Alarm too can be doing packet+ip inspection, causing a large cpu drag that appears to be caused by µTorrent.You might see at least a slight decrease in severity and occurance of these cpu spikes if µTorrent isn't allowed to make lots of new connections at once or stay connected to lots of connections at once. There's not much speed gain on average torrents going from 30 connected peers+seeds per torrent to 300+ connected peers+seeds unless you're uploading very very rapidly yourself...or barely uploading at all and counting on leeching off random people who upload a little to you. I set my half-open connection limit to only 4 in µTorrent because I don't mind a slower ramp-up in speed on my torrents in exchange for more stability and less cpu spikes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aragon12 Posted October 2, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 checking the thread with the highest cpu usage using process explorer gives the following stacks during IO/cpu spike gives:ntoskrnl.exe!KiDispatchInterrupt+0x7fVETMONNT.SYS+0x996aVETMONNT.SYS+0x9ed8VETMONNT.SYS+0x97bdVETMONNT.SYS+0x9075VETMONNT.SYS+0x8184VETMONNT.SYS+0x7512VETMONNT.SYS+0x7460VETMONNT.SYS+0x4857VETMONNT.SYS+0x462bVETMONNT.SYS+0x4d14VETMONNT.SYS+0x26caVETMONNT.SYS+0x25bdVETMONNT.SYS+0x257aVETMONNT.SYS+0xbcbVET-FILT.SYS+0xd9entoskrnl.exe!IofCallDriver+0x32ntoskrnl.exe!RtlEqualUnicodeString+0x4cfntoskrnl.exe!ObOpenObjectByName+0xdbntoskrnl.exe!FsRtlCurrentBatchOplock+0x212ntoskrnl.exe!IoCreateFile+0x4fntoskrnl.exe!NtCreateFile+0x30vsdatant.sys+0x2f3f6ntoskrnl.exe!ZwYieldExecution+0xb78ntdll.dll!KiFastSystemCallRetutorrent.exe+0x1ba97utorrent.exe+0xa4f4utorrent.exe+0xb58cVETMONNT.SYS and VET-FILT.SYS do not appear in stacks unless there is a spike... googled them but never came up with much only antivirus that has never been installed... does anyone know if that are part of zone alarm or malware?? if someone has zone alarm secriity suite installed can they also search in windows directory and confirm that it appears in there install.SWITECK - followed ur instructents check increase automatic cache size when cache thrashing didnt help. And zonealarm heuristic and byte inspection is turned off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Switeck Posted October 2, 2006 Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 This is what I discovered about VetMonNT.sys:Computer Associates (RealTime Anti-Virus Protection Driver):\windows\system32\VetMsgNT.1 (no version)\windows\system32\VetMsgNT.exe 1.1.0.1\windows\system32\drivers\Vet-Filt.sys 10.54.0.12\windows\system32\drivers\Vet-Rec.sys 10.54.0.12\windows\system32\drivers\VetFDDNT.sys 10.59.2.0\windows\system32\drivers\VetMonNT.sys 10.54.0.12That filename is used by some viruses/trojans to do their dirty work.If you don't have Computer Associates AV, you *NEED* to get that file removed IMMEDIATELY! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ultima Posted October 2, 2006 Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 ZoneAlarm uses CA's antivirus solution. The problem lies with ZoneAlarm. Get rid of it and use another firewall and antivirus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aragon12 Posted October 4, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 4, 2006 Hey thanks for all the help... quick update I have disabled the antivirus and antispyware component of zonealarm secruicty suite through the zonealarm control panel. I was able to determine that it was the on-access component of zonealarm antivirus that was causing the problem. After disabling zonealarm antivirus and antispyware I installed AVG free version after reading good reviews of this product and now my setup is working fine again. utorrent I/O reads about 256kb with negilable cpu usage (usally shows as 0%). Am now using AVG free version as my main antivirus and on-access antivirus (or realtime antivirus), but still would be able to use zonealarm as a on-demand scanner by reenabling it if I ever need to.Thanks again for all ur help Ultima and switeck... Stars!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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