What does high ambient CPU mean?

3

I have run userbenchmark test, the results are here: http://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/357122 According to them, the PC has high ambient CPU.

!!!Very high ambient CPU load. These results have reduced accuracy because the CPU was active before the benchmark even started. Check CPU load with windows task manager (CTRL+SHIFT+ESC).

I don't know what that means, and found nothing in google about that. I guess it is high CPU usage when I do nothing. Am I right? I checked, there is no virus in the system according to malwarebytes and eset smart security.

I just changed my Intel Core2 Duo E8400 to a Xeon E5430. The Xeon was designed for 771 socket, not for 775, so I had to use an adapter. Can this cause the problem? Is there a way to fix this?

inf3rno

Posted 2015-08-27T13:19:15.490

Reputation: 931

Seems like a rather silly error. 'Ambient CPU Load' - what a ridiculous term to create. Are they talking about Ambient temperature? I mean the word ambient in itself means 'relating to the immediate surroundings of something'. In the case of load are they comparing it to other people's PC of the same spec? Seems like a silly thing to write. I don't blame you for being confused about this. – Jay – 2015-08-27T13:25:19.993

but you did not tell him, it means that (as far as the software knows) your CPU was very busy doing other things. There is no way to tell if your adaption, or modification is the problem just yet. Assuming windows 7 like it said, you would use task manager and resource monitor to attempt to discover what is using the cpu. Because the thing could also throttle (775s could) it also wouldnt hurt to be checking your temperatures (or cooling) and doing a quick check with CPU-z might show some stuff. and also using more different benchmark items. – Psycogeek – 2015-08-27T13:28:45.157

3"Ambient" in this context just refers to tasks that are not initiated by the benchmarking utility. when you run a benchmarker, you want to close all running applications and shut down any services that are performing heavy work, so that the load on your CPU is as close to 0% as possible before starting the benchmark. That way the benchmarker can introduce and reduce load as needed to do its tests. if you were trying to measure how much a bucket can hold, but you started with an approx. half full bucket, you could not measure the volume of the bucket by the amount you add to it. Empty it first. – Frank Thomas – 2015-08-27T14:01:15.430

@FrankThomas I closed everything I could except smart security, skype and f.lux. Hmm I try again without them. – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T14:02:38.213

@Psycogeek The cpu temperature is high compared to the 8400, but I read that it is common by e5430. It's around 54°C by browsing according to speccy. The 8400 was much lower, but I don't remember. Maybe 43°C or so. It has a 12cm diameter zalman cpu fan. – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T14:06:15.113

I recommend you run Process Explorer (from Technet/Sysinternals) as Admin, and look at the CPU usage before benchmarking. First, if the heavy processing is from Interrupts or Defered Procedure Calls (DPC), then there likely is a hardware problem, and secondly it will help you ID the process creating the ambient load. – Frank Thomas – 2015-08-27T14:09:59.573

I turned off skype, flux and the antivirus, now it was 25%. Still high compared to my other device with antivirus turned on. It had 1%. http://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/357206

– inf3rno – 2015-08-27T14:12:36.833

@FrankThomas According to it system idle process has 97% cpu load. wtf? :D no wonder it causes high cpu temperatures even with a good cooler. – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T14:17:38.387

well, System Idle is not actually a process, but is there to display the absence of one, so that means that your other processes are using a total of 3%. It doesn't explain the ambient issue though. I'd run the benchmarker and continue to examine Process explorer. Perhaps some software (like an AV system) is responding to the actions the benchmarker it taking, and introduces additional load that way. – Frank Thomas – 2015-08-27T14:24:11.410

Let us continue this discussion in chat.

– inf3rno – 2015-08-27T14:28:13.357

1Maybe @Jay is right and they mean CPU temperature. Is your computer properly vuild together with all neccessary cooler running? Maybe dust got collected inside your PC and heats ut up. My PC always makes weird noises on hot summer days and reminds me to clean it – BlueWizard – 2015-08-27T14:46:06.750

@JonasDralle I heats compared to the previous CPU, but I read that this is normal by this model. It's about 54°C by browsing, and 61°C by CPU intensive tasks. It's limit is 67°C. I don't think that temperature is measured by %, at least it would be very strange. – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T15:22:07.533

Please don't [edit] your question to include the answer, answer your own question. Please read Can I answer my own question?

– DavidPostill – 2015-08-29T16:30:23.610

Answers

1

The report complains that you already had programs running which used CPU capacity.

This means that the benchmark tool cannot fully outload your CPU because some space is already in-use and thus the test results might differ from what your real CPU might be able to do

The warning message shows because they want to warn you that CPU-related results might be distorted

BlueWizard

Posted 2015-08-27T13:19:15.490

Reputation: 298

But I wasn't running anything. :S – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T14:06:59.900

You was running in the background. Open the Taskmanager and sort by CPU load. Maybe some program runs in the background and sucks away all your precious CPU power. – BlueWizard – 2015-08-27T14:42:19.107

Nope. I have 1.3% cpu load if only process explorer and the antivir is open. If I move the mouse in circles on the desktop I got 25-30%, but I don't know whether that is normal. – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T15:19:13.600

I'm pretty sure that this is not normal. Check running programs. Maybe you have something installed that uses the mouse curosor position for heavy calculation – BlueWizard – 2015-08-27T15:21:20.253

I don't think there is an app like that. Except the nvidia driver I guess. And the mouse driver. It is logitech G400. I think I have the same issue by Linux Mint Cinnamon. At least it has some strange freezes, which I could not debug. Maybe related to this, maybe not, I don't know. – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T15:24:20.690

explorer.exe uses 25% of the cpu... :S – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T15:31:21.440

I'm sorry but I cannot explain this behaviour. – BlueWizard – 2015-08-27T15:33:07.800

if I put focus on firefox and move the mouse there, than that uses the 25% of cpu. ... – inf3rno – 2015-08-27T15:33:46.367

1

The mouse movement can cause what looks like a lot of load when you wiggle it around because the mouse cursor needs move and redrawn and this, in very basic terms, "invalidates" a portion of the screen where it was and now is. Then the applications must repaint the invalidated portion. Not all programs do this in the most efficient way possible, but it does add up to CPU usage over the time of movement. (https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/gg153550%28v=vs.85%29.aspx ; https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/dd145002%28v=vs.85%29.aspx )

– Yorik – 2015-08-27T20:37:33.047

1@Yorik I have the high ambient CPU warning if I don't move the mouse at all, so this is not the cause, but does not matter, I don't want to push this question further. :-) By fast mouse movement I have 30% CPU both in Windows and Linux, so this is not operation system dependent. Maybe the motherboard or the CPU has issues. I'll change the CPU, maybe that solves the problem. – inf3rno – 2015-08-28T09:55:17.587

@inf3rno - If this answer does not solve your problem you shouldn't accept the answer. – Ramhound – 2015-08-28T12:13:38.837

@Ramhound It answered my question. I needed more investigation to find the cause (check my edited question), but in general the answer was right. – inf3rno – 2015-08-28T12:15:20.793

@inf3rno: I was merely speaking of the cause of the cpu load with mouse movement. The documentation I linked was specific to windows but this is a general computer+display concept and is OS agnostic. – Yorik – 2015-08-28T14:17:01.047

1I tested on my machine and my CPU workload also scales up when I move my mouse or move windows around. I never noticed this behavior even tho it kinda makes sense. I wasn't able to get my CPUI load over 5% just by mouse usage but I can reach up to 25% by moving my windows around very quickly. This might not help you directly but at least I provide some information that I can reproduce – BlueWizard – 2015-08-28T14:42:23.890

1After all: Userbenchmark.com registered your Hardware and spit out a report as intended. Maybe it's best for you just to stop worring. Having a lower CPU load won't increase or lower your benchmark results – BlueWizard – 2015-08-28T14:44:50.690

@JonasDralle I think either that this is not something we should worry about. Maybe you got better CPU and/or worse mouse, and that's why it is only 5% by you. – inf3rno – 2015-08-28T20:29:55.790

-1 his title used the word ambient and asked what the error message with that word meant and you didn't even use the word "ambient" in your answer, in defining what it meant – barlop – 2015-08-29T16:46:41.430

0

Please don't edit your question to include the answer, answer your own question. Please read Can I answer my own question? – DavidPostill

Conclusion:

I accepted the answer of Jonas, because most probably high CPU load triggered the warning. I did not find any process which could cause this, but when I move the mouse I have about 10-30% CPU load on the process I have focus on. This does not depend on the mouse, on the operation system (at least I checked with Win7 and Linux Mint) and on the USB port I plug the mouse in. I checked the CPU with different tools, checked the idle process, but as far as I can tell, there is no problem with that except the temperature is somewhat higher than I had by the previous one. No problem with the memory and the hard drives as well, and most probably no problem with the video card. So the only options left: a.) this is normal by this computer, b.) my motherboard will die due to hardware failure, c.) this is some kind of BIOS issue.

Update:

I discussed the topic in some forums. We recognized that the BIOS update changed the CPU multiplier to 6x instead of 8x. That's why I had 25% performance drop. According to them the higher CPU usage by mouse movement is normal in some systems, so I don't have to buy a new motherboard. With 8x multiplier I have about 22% instead of 30% by mouse movement, so it is linear, which means that the mouse movement requires always the same amount of counts. This appears to be normal to me.

I discovered when I use keyboard only to start the test and wait 1-2 mins before the test, then I don't have the ambient CPU warning. So I think this problem is solved. Here is my new test without the warning: http://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/358532

inf3rno

Posted 2015-08-27T13:19:15.490

Reputation: 931