Slowdown

When this happens does the fan speed increase?

Does the Harddrive light suddenly start flashing really fast?

Generally, if the CPU usage is low, and the RAM usage is fairly low, the HD may be struggling.
 
Yes the cpu fan speed goes up drastically.
The hdd light does not flash at all.
Im a bit newbie to hardware, do you think there's an issue with the cpu?:confused:
 
If the fan speed goes up dramatically, then it is most probably too hot and the CPU is throttling back to cool itself down.

See if you can download a program which allows you to change the fan speed yourself, or there could be an option in the BIOS.

As a last resort, buy a laptop cooling mat with fans in it. Although personally I found propping up the back with something that does not block the fans worked fairly well.
 
Remove the heat sink from the CPU. Thoroughly clean it with compressed air. Dust under the fan, over the fins is a little more difficult to get rid of. Remove all thermal paste from the CPU and heat sink. Re-apply new thermal paste to the CPU. Use a small amount, too much will hurt cooling performance. I like to use 5 small drops, 1 in each corner and 1 in the center. When you install the heat sink back onto the CPU, it will spread the thermal paste evenly, filling in any low spots on the heat sink.
 
You are all focusing merely on the heat, rather than the actual problem: his CPU unusually going full-whack. Obviously a CPU at full-whack will get hot causing the fan to kick-in, therefore it's kinda obvious that things would slow down, since the CPU is at full-whack.

Not sure what the problem is, but I certainly wouldn't poke around with the hardware; there was no harm in looking, which you've done, so that's good. I would look at software, and I would double check the BIOS is all set right.

BTW, your CPU, the Phenom II, commonly has heat issues; my previous 965 Phenom II was a nightmare with heat, and so I ditched it for something much better. I don't think it's heat at all, though.. just felt like adding what is probably pointless info'.

Try running the OS in safe mode for a while, and make sure to see whether it does the slow down; if it does, worry a bit, then temporarily try a restore point from a time before this problem occurred, and if it doesn't, well.. still try the SR. Since I don't know your OS settings, your software, and any hardware settings, I couldn't recommend much else, other than a system restore. (you should be able to undo the SR, if you get no luck with it.)

G'luck.

EDIT:

OP, it might actually be worth posting your CPU temps, just to absolutely rule that out. (sorry if you already have.. didn't read all the posts, since I have a headache and can't be bothered to do heaps of reading)
 
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Thank you for the advice. unfortunately a system restore is out of the question since my os is freshly installed. About a week ago I wiped my drive and installed xp with sp3 to check, had the same issue tough so I went back to win 7.

Bios settings are set to default. I never changed them since I got the motherboard.

I have cleaned the dust out of my pc and it seems that its working fine so far.

I've been playing some games in the last 2 hours and the cpu temp has been at 50 Celsius at most, no slowdown yet. Load has not been over 70%.

But then again it did run like this before, it usually goes back to the slowdown after a while. Well see what happens now.

Okay I started adding some files to an archive while playing. Load is fluctuating above 95%, temp 54 Celsius. No slowdown during the process.

Ill watch it for a while to see what happens, Im just about set on buying a new cooler.
 
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