CPU usage spikes issue after connecting 240hz monitor?

[Midgetguy]

I'm not sure if this is just something that people have always had a problem with and there just continues to be no solution or if it's just because of my rig which is super old. Hopefully someone has an idea what's going on with my computer; if it's just because my computer's really old, then that's good news to me, at least it'll probably be fixed when I update my rig.

Here's the basics of what I'm working with:
Intel i7-4770k
16GB DDR3
RTX 2080 Ti (latest drivers)
Seasonic 850w Titanium rated PSU
Win10 Pro 22H2, build 19045.2846
2560x1440 240hz monitor (connected by DP)
2560x1440 60hz monitor (connected by DP)

Every so often (dunno how many times a day, no regular intervals between when it happens), my CPU will spike to 100% use for 1-5 seconds, resulting in stopped video playback (but audio playback will continue), stopped audio and video playback, or general system unresponsiveness (though I'm able to move around the mouse still). I've been trying to search the internet for any similar scenarios, but I couldn't find something that quite matches what I've got going on and other stories I've read involve people having it regardless of what they're doing while mine seems to do the opposite.

Other posts I've read about people with monitors of different refresh rate find problems when they're running games and hard stuttering and whatnot, but playing games is exactly when my computer has absolutely no issues. Aside from lower overall framerates due to having such an old rig, I don't have stutter issues or the game stopping for a couple seconds at a time, everything runs as well as I could reasonably expect. Comparatively, I could have nothing running aside from a browser watching a stream or videos and and randomly, video stops for a couple seconds while I can see in task manager that my CPU's fully loaded for those couple seconds. AND, if I have a video up on one monitor while I'm playing a game on the other monitor, there's never been any sort of usage spike issue.

I really have no idea if there's truly something going wrong or if it's just because of how old my CPU is. Thoughts?

 

[3x0]

What process is using the CPU?

 

[Deleted member 57642]

At a first glance - could be related to bottleneck - that mix of old and newer components may struggle to keep in sync. Might help a bit if you use the iGPU for the 60 Hz monitor and the Video Card for the 240 Hz model. Also, was it like this from start - or it's a new thing? You should monitor the running processes (check if any particular app is taking-up more resources - higher CPU usage) - and the temps too (for thermal-throttling). Even Power Throttling is a possibility - if you're also using an inadequate PSU.

 

[Midgetguy]

It's new behavior as of adding in the 240hz monitor. I was previously running 2 60hz monitors without a problem.

To answer @3x0's question, I managed to catch a glance of processes in task manager during one of these brief spikes, the process is WMI Provider Host.

No thermal throttling issues, nothing's running hot in there that I'm aware of (CPU and GPU are all very reasonable temps) and I can't imagine it being power throttling; like I said, this isn't happening during power-intensive tasks, that's hilariously when I actually never have problems (for me, gaming load is probably the most intensive task period). I'm also running a Seasonic 850w Titanium rated PSU, these components should be nothing that thing can't handle.

Edited first post to include some other specs, might be relevant.

 

[Midgetguy]

Forget, after investigating your suggestions, I've ended up finding the problem. Though it didn't end up being anything suggested, I appreciate the brainstorming just to at least kick me into doing more looking. I ended up finding some Alienware software on my computer and promptly uninstalled (I honestly dunno how it got there after I hooked up the monitor, which indeed is an Alienware monitor).

So it seems the status quo remains: Dell hardware can range from good to occasionally amazing, but their consumer software will forever be piles of utter trash.

 

[Mussels]

I'm not sure if this is just something that people have always had a problem with and there just continues to be no solution or if it's just because of my rig which is super old. Hopefully someone has an idea what's going on with my computer; if it's just because my computer's really old, then that's good news to me, at least it'll probably be fixed when I update my rig.

Here's the basics of what I'm working with:
Intel i7-4770k
16GB DDR3
RTX 2080 Ti (latest drivers)
Seasonic 850w Titanium rated PSU
Win10 Pro 22H2, build 19045.2846
2560x1440 240hz monitor (connected by DP)
2560x1440 60hz monitor (connected by DP)

Every so often (dunno how many times a day, no regular intervals between when it happens), my CPU will spike to 100% use for 1-5 seconds, resulting in stopped video playback (but audio playback will continue), stopped audio and video playback, or general system unresponsiveness (though I'm able to move around the mouse still). I've been trying to search the internet for any similar scenarios, but I couldn't find something that quite matches what I've got going on and other stories I've read involve people having it regardless of what they're doing while mine seems to do the opposite.

Other posts I've read about people with monitors of different refresh rate find problems when they're running games and hard stuttering and whatnot, but playing games is exactly when my computer has absolutely no issues. Aside from lower overall framerates due to having such an old rig, I don't have stutter issues or the game stopping for a couple seconds at a time, everything runs as well as I could reasonably expect. Comparatively, I could have nothing running aside from a browser watching a stream or videos and and randomly, video stops for a couple seconds while I can see in task manager that my CPU's fully loaded for those couple seconds. AND, if I have a video up on one monitor while I'm playing a game on the other monitor, there's never been any sort of usage spike issue.

I really have no idea if there's truly something going wrong or if it's just because of how old my CPU is. Thoughts?

It may be unrelated to what you're thinking the cause is - can you measure the CPU clocks at the time it's hitting 100% usage to be sure it's not downclocking at that moment?
HWinfo will show this better than other programs

Since you mentioned the alienware software, it could be something like changing the power states in windows to try and be "green"