Windows 7: Troubleshooting Severe Latency Issues

I am having issues with latency on my computer (Windows 7 64bit, 2.2 GHz, 6 GB RAM). I initially tried to do some research myself to resolve the issue. I stumbled upon this site:

DPC Latency Checker

and I then followed the instructions on that page. I tried to isolate all network drivers and audio drivers, but it did not remove my severe latency issue. The executable from that website showed I was experiencing latency, approximately 200,000 microseconds.

The page mentions using RATT, but I am not sure how exactly that would work and it seems it might have some issues with Windows 7 anyways.

Can anyone offer some direction on what to try next? I am at a loss at this point and it is flat out preventing me from doing any recording whatsoever, as the playback is never in sync with what I record.

Thanks for any help offered!

Information on your PC's hardware would help. In addition what is the reason for looking at latency? If its for audio recording, the Latency that is reported by problems such as the DPC latency checker are not directly related to audio latency (I have a recording studio using Sonar X2).

If you have a Gigabyte motherboard and have installed Easy Tune 6, the Easy Tune program is a known cause of latency spikes such as displayed by the DPC Latency Checker.

Recording latency is another issue. Those of us with computer based recording studios are well attuned to that. If you are trying to record with a PC sound card, forget it. Get a "real" recording interface unit, even a small one such as a Focusrite Scarlett, Roland Duo-Capture, etc. I'm using a Roland Octa-Capture and have acceptable latency in the 5ms area. I also have an MAudio Fastrack Ultra 8R and get about the same with that. Both of these units are USB connected devices. I previously had a Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 (Firewire connected unit) and about 12ms was the best I could do with that.

Thanks for your response fireberd!

I am not quite sure how to go about checking the hardware of my computer internals other than taking it apart, but here is some information I have that may or may not be helpful:

• Dell Inspiron 1545
• Intel Core 2 Duo CPU (T6600 @ 2.20 GHz)
• 6 GB RAM
• 64bit Windows 7

I looked under the device manager to see what I can find, but I am not sure exactly what you are looking for as far as hardware goes.


The major problem I have with the latency is when I record. I am using Reaper along with Guitar Rig 5. I am using a Behringer interface. It's not great, but seemed to get good enough reviews. The latency is enough that I can't realistically record multiple instruments, as the playback skips every so often.


One thing I noticed is that the latency is an issue when running other programs as well, so it seems it may not be an audio issue (wrong section of the forum for me to post?), but something causing the latency altogether. When I was trying to record before, I would only have Reaper open and then Guitar Rig opened through Reaper as a VST. Nothing else was open and I disconnected from the internet as well. It did not solve my issue. In fact, I notice the latency even when just using iTunes and Firefox, with nothing else open, even after restarting the computer.


I am attaching a screenshot from the latency checker (even though I know you mentioned it may not provide anything), just to show the latency issue. The only things I had open at the time was Firefox and also iTunes (playing a song). I can actually hear the issue in the song due to the latency problem.

The Dell Insprion 1545 is what I was looking for.

Wi-Fi is known to cause pops and clicks and looking at the DPC latency checker its showing the red peaks.

When you are recording, you don't want other items opened as they can interfere. Same way you need to disable the Wi-Fi when recording. Basically, you want the minimum running. Even with a fast desktop (I have an i7 3770 CPU and 16GB of RAM and an SSD for the OS and Sonar), I disable the network, and only have Sonar running when I record.

With the audio latency (which may improve if you get the system latency down), are you using an ASIO or WDM driver? Or the problematic ASIO4ALL? for your Behringer interface unit? I'm not a "no Behringer" type. I have a Behringer BCF2000 that I use for a "control surface".

I do have it disabled when I record, and the latency is still as bad as shown above. I tried to troubleshoot with the checker software as well, without the WIFI on and completely disabled and it still existed. I meant that even without running recording software, and also without I still get the latency issues. Do you have any idea what else I could check or where I could look?

I've seen other posts from users with this model PC and similar problems that they were never able to resolve.

I would say the best option, if you haven't tried it, is the Dell community users forums. I would start on the Laptop hardware forum and go from there. Laptop - Dell Community

As far as the Audio, I asked about ASIO/WDM/ASIO4ALL. Confirm what you are using for the Behringer and the recording program.

I am sorry, I missed that question. I am using ASIO4ALL.

ASIO4ALL can cause problems including latency. On some it works OK on others it doesn't. Is there any other option, such as WDM that you can use?