High System CPU Usage

**Blue Matt0** · October 10th, 2010

After upgrading to 10.10, my i7 Desktop has become quite slow.
It appears that something in the kernel is using quite a bit of CPU. top shows between 30 and 40%sy, with no processes using over 3% individually, and only 3 or 4 processes using more than 1%.
mpstat shows similar results under %sys (ie not under any interrupt handlers).
As far as I can tell there is nothing in syslog or dmesg that could indicate a problem.

I'm not sure if it could be related, but my computer occasionally boots to only a screen saying "Nvidia Beta Driver" and never continues. As far as I can tell this screen always flashes when X initializes, but usually disappears. I have a feeling it is just the other issue eating all my CPU and preventing the Nvidia Driver from initializing.

Note that the 30-40% CPU makes animated images lag, audio stutter and often freeze while I type, causing the computer to miss several words.

Core i7-920 Overclocked to 4.0GHz
Nvidia GTX 260
10.10 Upgrade from 10.04 x86_64

**cap10Ibraim** · October 10th, 2010

if you still have the old kernel try uninstalling the new kernel and use the older one just to test if it's a kernel issue

**Blue Matt0** · October 10th, 2010

I do have one, but whenever I try to boot it, it never gets past the splash screen, so I guess the answer is no, I don't have an old kernel.

**Blue Matt0** · October 10th, 2010

Is there a program that might allow me to see which modules/parts of the kernel are using the most cpu, or is there really any way to go about debugging this at all?

**Blue Matt0** · October 10th, 2010

For the record, I still see this problem after removing the Nvidia drivers and rebooting.

**efflandt** · October 10th, 2010

There was someone who had an issue with an i7 in the RC which he resolved. But I did not reply to that post, so I do not know how to find it (a forum search for i7 comes up empty).

It did lead me to install htop which gives an ascii graphic representation of what your cores are doing. But I have had no issues with i5 650 3.2 GHz w/nvidia GT 220 video (10.10 beta from scratch upgraded to RC which after updates is probably current).

**Blue Matt0** · October 12th, 2010

This issue occurs on my system with the livecd, as well as after a full reinstall with the latest updates.
Both with proprietary Nvidia Drivers and with them removed.

Intel Core i7 920 - Overclocked to 4 GHz
EVGA X58 SLI LE
Nvidia Gefore GTX 260 x2
4x2GB DDR3 RAM
Alfa Wireless-G (Realtek RTL 8187)
USB Audio