CPU spikes, whole machine unresponsive

[fbnoise]

Been trying to diagnose this for a while as I hate taking up Ken's time if a problem is something I can fix. Every other day or so, I'll find my headless, dedicated BI PC unresponsive and see BI is using 95-100% CPU. Normal is anywhere from 30-50%.

i7-4770K
16GB DDR3 RAM
Asus Sabertooth Z87 LGA 1150 Motherboard
C drive for OS and NEW folder: Samsung 840 Pro, Solid State Drive, 256GB
Storage: WD Red 2TB NAS, then another extra intel SSD I had laying around here

Running BI4 as a service (as of this post, running latest build), not running anything else on this machine worth noting

Other info:

• checked all hard drive firmware, updated MOBO firmware, Win10 is updated
• today I installed extra 8GB RAM (total now 16GB) and thought it fixed but unfortunately not
• I have 8 cams, various manufacturers, all 3MP or above, all hard wired
• recording direct to disk
• maxing out quality and FPS (because I should be able to do that)
• continuous record and motion detection
• didn't really have problems until the last couple of months
• might have started around the time I upgraded to Win10
• definitely seems to happen more often after I log into windows vs. restarting it and not loggin in

I'd really appreciate any ideas if anything looks off here. This has been driving me nuts!

 

[Q™]

Have you looked at the Windows Event Log?

 

[fbnoise]

Have you looked at the Windows Event Log?

I have but now that you mentioned it, I checked and found this:

Faulting application name: BlueIris.exe, version: 4.2.3.5, time stamp: 0x563bbb44
Faulting module name: MSVCR120.dll, version: 12.0.21005.1, time stamp: 0x524f83ff
Exception code: 0xc0000409
Fault offset: 0x0000000000074a30
Faulting process id: 0x1bf8
Faulting application start time: 0x01d118d0fdec9b98
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files\Blue Iris 4\BlueIris.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Program Files\Blue Iris 4\MSVCR120.dll
Report Id: 18c33189-eb39-419e-896a-1a7144df1246
Faulting package full name:
Faulting package-relative application ID:

I see that for one user, the MSVCR120.dll issue was possibly fixed with a service pack, but my Win10 is up to date as of now.

Edit: Scrolled through logs and see there are countless instances of this error in the logs. One per second. Log only goes back to 1:20 PM today.

 

[Q™]

I'm reasonably certain you're not going to want to do this, but are you able to go back to your previous version of windows? I know that Windows 10 allows you to do this for up to 30 days after an upgrade from either Win7 or Win8.1.

 

[Q™]

Alternatively, there's no reason to believe that your original ram is bad, but I would swap out the old original ram with the new RAM, boot the machine running only the new RAM, and see what happens. As I always say, when you fail then try to Flail.

 

[fenderman]

Try reinstalling Microsoft Visual C++ http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=40784

 

[Q™]

I would listen to The Fenderman before you try my waQie ideas bro

 

[fenderman]

I listen to The Fenderman before you try my waQie ideas bro View attachment 6166

it can be the ram or the os as you point out...particularly if this was an in place upgrade...

 

[Q™]

fbnoise, I'm certain that will all that ram you must be running Blue Iris 4.x 64-bit, correct?

 

[fbnoise]

Yes, this was an upgrade from Win 8.1 and this is 64 bit windows and BI.

I would listen to The Fenderman before you try my waQie ideas bro View attachment 6166

Haha, he definitely is a wizard. Since I ran the memory diagnostics tool earlier this week, I'll wait and see if this C++ does the trick before I pull out the old RAM.

Thanks to both of you for giving me some ideas. REALLY appreciate it.

 

[fbnoise]

fbnoise, I'm certain that will all that ram you must be running Blue Iris 4.x 64-bit, correct?

Oh, an odd thing I noticed regarding the RAM.. With 8GB of RAM, I had noticed 80% Memory usage at some points (which seems quite high for dedicated BI server). Now with 16GB of ram, I now see it going as high as 55% Memory usage. It's as if Windows was hungry for more RAM and that was causing it to choke. It turns out the extra 8GB of ram didn't fix, but I still find that odd.

Anyways, after the C++ install, CPU is down to under 50% so far and peaks at 80% when BI is moving files into storage (I assume that because Disk usage spikes during that time also). I'll post an update after letting it play out some.

Thanks again!

 

[Q™]

You may also was to test the disks that BI is reading and writing to also fbnoise.

 

[fbnoise]

You may also was to test the disks that BI is reading and writing to also fbnoise.

I suspected drive problems, too, but I ran diagnostics using each manufacturer's software and all checked out good. I do wonder if my setup would be better with OS on an SSD and everything (including New and Storage folders) on a WD Purple drive. When those Intel 750 series SSDs are affordable, I'd love to throw Blue Iris on that. I may just sell my cat and get one.

Only a few hrs since C++ install but I have a hunch this fixed it.

 

[Q™]

Please let us know in a day or 2 what the result has been fbnoise.

 

[fbnoise]

Been over 24 hrs now and CPU still between 50-70%. I don't want to get my hopes up, but it's looking great so far.

 

[fbnoise]

Had a couple of crashes yesterday - same thing as before (BI using 100% CPU, PC frozen). Didn't investigate event viewer errors - got fed up and chose to "Reset this PC". At this point, I have a relatively clean Windows install, and clean BI install (entered all settings from scratch rather than restoring from the old install). Not confident this will fix, but feel like outside of some possible hardware problem, this will be the best chance of fixing. So far so good.

 

[fenderman]

Had a couple of crashes yesterday - same thing as before (BI using 100% CPU, PC frozen). Didn't investigate event viewer errors - got fed up and chose to "Reset this PC". At this point, I have a relatively clean Windows install, and clean BI install (entered all settings from scratch rather than restoring from the old install). Not confident this will fix, but feel like outside of some possible hardware problem, this will be the best chance of fixing. So far so good.

At this point it might be best to do an actual clean install of w10...its really easy with the media creation tool from microsoft.

 

[fbnoise]

At this point it might be best to do an actual clean install of w10...its really easy with the media creation tool from microsoft.

Thanks a lot. I will definitely do that if symptoms show up again. I wish I would have done that from the start, but things are going well.

BI has been running for 21 hrs since PC reset, consistently at 30-40% CPU (usually when I check it's at 34% which is amazing) and using half the RAM (down from 50% to 25%). This fix might actually lower my utility bill and pay for the RAM I didn't actually need.

 

[fbnoise]

Wanted to post an update.

CPU started spiking again and locking up like crazy. Tried running BI on the SSD while storing Alerts, New, and Stored on the WD Red drive but no help.
Wiped the computer clean again, did a clean Win10 install as fenderman suggested. Been running well for 14 hrs so far. Hoping this will do the trick but if not, I'll check w/ support.

 

[fbnoise]

Duhh moment. Noticed something that greatly effects the CPU usage (though can't pin it down to this every time I see a lockup).

On my BI server, CPU usage is at 40% when operating normally. Connecting to BI on my LAN using BI Viewer 2.5.2, quality set to High Efficiency, never using Instant Replay, CPU on BI machine jumps to 80%. Quality set to maximum, BI machine locks up and won't recover even after BI Viewer is closed. I'm usually running it on "Balanced" which has similar CPU effect as High Efficiency. Sometimes we have two instances of the BI Viewer running in the house. I admit it never occurred to me that BI Viewer and server's CPU could be related but it seems to have a huge impact. The BI iOS app has an almost negligible effect on CPU.

Is this expected behavior while viewing 6 IP cameras via BI Viewer? Not even 100% sure this is causing all of my CPU problems, but either way, it looks like I need to find a new way to view the cameras on our local PCs.. Maybe luck out on a half-decent IP cam viewer from the Windows store that'll connect directly to each cam.