is Ghost Recon Expected to Stutter on my system or just how it is?

[ExoMale]

got a 28 minute video of me going through the presets which im uploading to youtube, so will show that later, but first time playing this game on pc i wasnt sure what to expect, but its not as smooth as it probably should be even on low settings, is that my hardware or just how the game is?

just copy and paste this so you dont need to read my sig(what i put on video descriptions)

intel i3 [email protected]
gigabyte ga-h55n-usb3
8gb 1333mhz xms3
120gb + 32gb ssd & 250gb + 1tb hdd
Evga SC 1050ti 4gb
Evga supernova gs 550w gold FM
Coolermaster Elite 110

now i know recon requires quads pretty much, but normally i can be fine, fallout 4 while a more modern i3 and 16gb ram with 1gb card was used at the same res i play at still i could get buttery smooth playing over 50fps on high or highest and the same stage the division played smoothly too, much better than now, basically i used to run games better with a weaker gpu and an i3 before and while recon is very playable even on 'very high' , i just cant seem to figure out why even on low settings the max can go a bit more above 45, but most the time its around the 30's or dips below? basically like the fps range is near identical through all presets bar ultra.

ive only installed it because of the free weekend, undecided how much i could get in to it to buy it, but obviously i dont want playable stutter all the time lol

 

[ExoMale]

thanks for reply.

yeah i understand about the vram limits, but even on low? according to the settings that requires less that 2gb at something like 1.7gb, surely if my card has 4gb and can use it then i shouldnt have iffy performance on the lowest setting and at 1366x768? i had a 270x before and only ever used 1.7gb of it in the division for example without issues on high settings, i dont know how the game engines used differ, but surely something not right? when i first went to options on the very first launch of the game it was defaulted to low, but it doesnt seem to play any differently to higher settings just better looking graphics, i dont know if using afterburner and upping the gpu will improve anything? dont know how well these cards overclock.

 

[ExoMale]

i just been playing some and i turned off that thing suggested above although it said not recommended, i also had chrome in the background as im still uploading to youtube and i was recording as well, i was that unibad base and the fps while low 20's if not just under at certain times and upwards of 40, i died so didnt carry on to more open land lol, the stuttering wasnt too bad, but im still getting use to the controls as well, so a bit all over lol.

anyways i home button out to take some pics of usage, looked better on my phone, so hopefully readable, imgur doesnt put them in order not that it will make much difference.

^these ones are obviously about the GPU performance^

^these ones of the system memory/overall usage^

with the gpu percentage not even touching 70% it seems then id imagine my i3 being 1st gen is being the bottlekneck or am i looking at it wrong and its the limitations of system memory maxing out at 8gb?

while i failed the 2nd part, i was just doing the first convoy mission and was 20-30fps maybe a bit over(wasnt looking all the time) and obviously the odd stutter, but when the truck stopped at Polito's home ground during gun fire and car explosions it got pretty laggy and stooped to 12fps for a few seconds, went back to 20-30 when it came to tag and get on with the stealing car mission, i failed from poor aiming lol

 

[ExoMale]

Your CPU is below the minimum spec they published for the game, so it certainly won't be helping things. RAM and GPU should be OK by the looks of it.

https://support.ubi.com/en-GB/Faqs/000025882/System-Requirements-for-Ghost-Recon-Wildlands

yeah i know, but its never been an issue with other quad required games under newer i3 processors ive had and some i5 processors are not worth the jump to from an i3, clearly then as i do like playing on pc with this far that i need a better processor and not a dual core with turbo.

never looked it over after uploading, but this is the 28 minute long video i made, so hopefully tells the story.

i am sticking to very high settings now, see no gain going lower.

 

[ExoMale]

thanks for replies and did wonder how long it be before someone said to upgrade ha.

its only this game i even thought to check usage of as i was making that video, but is my i3 the bottleneck because it lacks the cores or a combination of that and old age and low clock?

reason i question, the last i3 i did any proper gaming on was the 4160 i had and at the stock 3.6ghz despite slower gpu cards used, i had no such issues running quad required demanding games at 1366x768 unless i tried to push passed the 1gb vram cards, but even BF4 played very well on high with 100% gpu usage aswell, so would i not be better trying to overclock or it the architecture just too old to compare?

i had been looking at the i5 750/760 and had another look at the i7 860 or a xenon i was pointed to, but since i had to return my i7 because it was dead it does make me think whether i should try spend £25-40 for an 4c8t cpu again or just replace it all with a better system, was thinking about a gaming laptop, but i dont think a 950/960m will do the job for this game if my pc is only lacking cpu grunt and knowing a 1050ti is much better.


is this game cpu or gpu bound or a bit of both?

 

[ExoMale]

yeah i am always looking on there, so will keep my eyes peeled.

one thing i am wondering, will a true 4 core with my 1050ti make a big enough difference? was looking up ghost recon benchmarks on 'notebookcheck' and it seems a 970 is minimum id need along with a quad to get over 40fps at 1920x1080 on medium/high/very high?, okay thats not the res i game at, but because i was looking up gaming laptops, the 1050ti mobile version just tops the desktop 970 by couple fps and i dont know how comparable the mobile version of my card is? think most their test systems for the 40fps onwards had i7's and the odd i5 processors, desktop or laptop variant.

i found a a really cool system for £290, sadly its in southampton so miles away and this is on facebook lol

i5 3450
8gb
gtx 970
no hdd
power supply model unknown
Aerocool Strike X Air

so its the fact of that case and it having basically the minimum spec id need to run this game better, but 290 seems a lot, is this the sort of price i should be expecting to get a quad and a 970? i could probably get an i5 for mine, but im still limited to 8gb ram and itx boards up to skylake are hard to find or pricey.

 

[ExoMale]

Shock when 10 year old dual core CPU struggles with AAA title in 2018.

You need an upgrade, and you also need to know that you can take screenshots rather than using a camera.

im used to taking pictures with my phone, so i dont think of screenshots lol, but thanks for the advise.

its not meant to be a shock either, i know theres a few years between this and the haswell i3, so architecture has changed, but regardless of the lower clock speed as well, the formula is still the same pretty much, 2 cores 4 threads which is why i wanted to know specifically what the issue was if a newer i3 never gave me bottleneck. i could get a cooler and overclock to 3.6 or near there if that was the issue, but i doubt it is.

 

[ExoMale]

Buy a i5 760 for £23 off the popular auction site.

i could get it under £20 from that lovely(sarcasm) 2nd hand shop in town thats so popular lol, but after buying a 860 from them for £35 that turned out to be dead, i question buying processors from them, but equally i dont want to pay more than i have to if it can be found cheaper.

 

[ExoMale]

Someone I know tried out the benchmark during the free weekend with an RX480 and and AMD Phenom II. Most FPS at lowest settings sub-1080p was 30 (avergaed 20ish), GPU utilisation never went close to 100% and changing graphical settings did barely much at all to help.

I took the opportunity to remind them that it's time to upgrade to Ryzen. If I'm not mistaken, this game is pretty CPU heavy.

I myself haven't played this game since open beta. Back then with a 4790k and a 970 I was struggling to get 60fps at 1080p. I feel like it's been worse this weekend with my Xeon and 980ti (admittedly I put most of the graphical settings at max or close to it), averaging around 40fps in gameplay. This seems to backup my theory that this game likes CPU, since having a much better graphics card doesn't seem to outweigh having a slightly worse CPU.

My brother got average ~50% GPU utilisation (around 30fps @ 1080p settings) on i5-4460 and RX480 back in the beta, but he didn't try the game this weekend. I'm inclined to believe that he might have gotten similar results these days.

seems like this game has been made favour to those who have money to buy high end 1070-1080ti cards and i7 processors then which is bad i feel, but i think this game is meant to run better with Nvidia.

 

[ExoMale]

Got to love your logic.... doesn't run well on your 8 year old low end processor, so immediately you go to the extreme and suggest it needs the absolute highest end new system to run.

An 1156 I5 or I7 likely would be enough to remove your bottleneck, or as you say a newer I3 would equally be good enough.

actually no, that isnt my logic lol, like i said in one of my replies, i was checking a benchmark list on that 'notebookcheck' site(linked from a google search, not purposely typed the page) as i wanted to find out what mobile gpu youd need and all the green highlights with 50 plus fps were mostly high end parts as it states further down what their test systems are.

here is said link for my 'logic' https://www.notebookcheck.net/Ghost-Recon-Wildlands-Notebook-and-Desktop-Benchmarks.207090.0.html.

maybe ill try the overclock option till i find something better first as i still am looking for a replacement system if worthy enough, mean ive just missed out on a i5 4460, 8gb, asus h81m-plus tower for £75 because i cant get anyone to pick it up and tomorrow i could go pick up an am3 -matx with fx 4130 for £30, but stats put it only marginally better in certain areas to my i3.

in a way i wish i didnt buy my elite 110 and got another cube that supports bigger boards

 

[ExoMale]

Is the game installed on an SSD?

I've got a 4790k OC'ed and a 1070 and it's fine for 60fps at high/ultra settings 1440p but it never runs smoothly. Every time it struggles I only have to look down to see the access light on as it streams from the SSD. It would be even worse from a HDD.

8gb is also probably not ideal.

Before you upgrade, make sure the game is installed on an SSD with plenty of spare room and you are running no unnecessary services or programs.

It may improve things enough for you to manage...or it will prove everyone right above who says your CPU isn't up to it which I would agree with.

the folder for ubisoft launcher and files for it are on an ssd, the actual games are installed on a sata 3 1tb hdd 7200rpm running through a sata 2 port, my ssd is the recent purchased 120gb wgd which currently has like 60gb left although i think i might have actually sent the ubisoft folder with my other programs to my 32gb ssd im using as storage, so basically i dont have the capacity for a 55gb game on an ssd.

 

[ExoMale]

Well duh you'd need a high end mobile GPU to run it, most mobile GPU's below a 970m are trash for gaming and any gaming laptops with that level of graphical horsepower are always going to be pricey because of the form factor.

The reason you're getting stutter, as has already been pointed out several times, is because your paltry i3 is being thrashed by a demanding game. You need more physical threads, a 1050ti is fine for GR at 1080p but your current system is struggling. Look on the bay and get a Xeon X3430 for less than £10 which will give you 4 physical cores and you'll see a decent uplift in performance.

Not just about mobile graphics listed in that link nor was i just talking about those graphic chips. yes im fully aware the first time what has been said about my i3, i am catching up on replies plus i dont just want 'bottleneck' to be the only reason, i learn from what i read more than experiencing which is why i ask for specific information.

 

[ExoMale]

ive changed im plans, after my last couple replies last night while i was doing file transfers and playing The Forest the system shutdown again, so i thought screw it, ive put my am1 in my elite with my 1050ti keeping the 8gb ram too and ive put my intel back in the smaller Cit case to test it then sell it, cant be bothered with it now.

my sempron just about managed Fortnite on low-medium(did a video of all presets), the recon weekend is over, so ill wait till i can get a better system before i buy that, im hoping my sempron might handle sim city 2013 and possibly skyline, you can notice the slowness through other activity(first time i actually used this) lol, video editing is still fine enough which is a plus.

 

[ExoMale]

You answered your own question there! Basically you know what the problem is but you thought it may not be a problem despite knowing it was a problem

ha great logic isnt it, i suppose because the 4160 i had was my first i3(first hyperthreading after a dual i5 with turbo) and the only quads ive ever had were q6600, q8300, athlon x4 860k and also had a athlon x3 of which the q8300 was the only one i tried to game with lol, i am just assuming all i3 variants will basically perform the same with the hyperthreading making them act like quads and really more about clock speeds being more apparent effect. think i gamed with the haswell i3 too much lol, think i only played anno 2205 on an 1155 i3 aswell, im too much of a console gamer ha.

 

[ExoMale]

Good shout on the instructions, is there a way to find out what instructions a game uses without being a coding wizard or creator of said game? For a future reference like.

Yeah I know it’s very old and really you need the 750 or an i7 to stay in the game somewhat, but I read it to be a good performer and a good overclocker, but obviously I expected too much despite it seemed okay in the other games I Was playing and really I only installed recon for the free weekend to try.


I am still looking at ryzen, I am still trying to find 1155/1150 quad bundles too, but things are a bit too out my reach price wise at the moment, I’m trying to avoid spending money I shouldn’t lol and having issues with my intel, so it’s devaluing even more than it’s probably worth in a build lol. I’m looking to buy a 2nd system because at the moment I’m having a little fun seeing what my sempron can do in games and making videos ha.

 

[ExoMale]

I’m going to have to sort something out if I want to game(my sempron does fine for normal stuff), yesterday I discovered my cpu docket had some bent pins which I reckon was causing issues and I couldn’t fix it, so it’s now scrap ha.

I have a chance to get a branded tower with a haswell socket for £75, but it has a g3250 or one of the Pentium G’s, I know it’s not a gaming chip, but it could get me kick started and can still a 4460 for £50.

 

[ExoMale]

Yeah I know, but I’m fussy and people sell crap spec for stupid money and not always good spec part bundles for fair price either, So i usually buy fairly cheap or a certain generation, add what I’ve already got to it then buy a better processor for example.

Normally I have a system with a pretty decent cpu but crap graphics, this time round it’s the opposite, now while I could probably find a 1155 socket i5 build for a certain amount, I do feel buying the next gen up but with a dual core better spent because regardless of hyper threading or not, the socket will last longer.

I only got my 1st gen i3 because it cost me £20 for all but a hard drive, because it had start up issues which a change of ram had fixed it for the time being. Mean I wouldn’t really want to spend £75 on what is a Lenovo ThinkCentre tower just to get the 1150 socket.

 

[ExoMale]

You bought 1st gen i3 540 CPU for £20???

You need to stop being too fussy buy CPU at stupid prices you thought price was fairly cheap and cut out annual losses because i3 540 CPUs is available to buy for just only £5!

I agreed with others that you better off not buy cheap random OEM brands which has very few CPU supports than retail motherboards every year and buy only 1 motherboard that will last you 5 to 10 years with 54W TDP Coffee Lake Celeron G4900 that is faster and has lower power consumption than 73W TDP i3 540 for a start then a year later or 2 you could upgrade Intel CPU to i5 8400 or i7 8600 like I did with Ivy Bridge i7 3770K CPU, motherboard and 16GB DDR3 for a very good £450 - (sold 3 years old Phenom II 940 CPU, ASUS M3N72-D motherboard, 8GB DDR2 for £150) = £300 that lasted for 5 years then upgraded to Coffee Lake 8700K system and sold old system for £200, my old still very powerful 3770K will last for another 5 years with 2nd owner.

My basket at Overclockers UK:

• 1 x Intel Celeron G4900 3.10GHz (Coffee Lake) Socket LGA1151 Processor - Retail= £37.99
• 1 x Gigabyte H310M-S2V Intel H310 (Socket 1151) DDR4 Micro-ATX Motherboard= £47.99
• 1 x Team Group Vulcan T-Force 8GB (2x4GB) DDR4 PC4-25600C16 3200MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black/Grey (TLGD4= £89.99

Total: £186.47 (includes shipping: £10.50)
​

Lol no, that £20 got me the i3 with cooler, the motherboard, less ram than I put in, the case and the original 300w cit unit, so minus a hard drive is was a complete system with starting issues which was ram related at the time.

The reason I was thinking the haswell again is because I can keep my 8gb ram kit even if it is 1333mhz and put my 4gb kit in my am1 keeping costs down with how much even 4gb ddr4 used or new is costing as I worked out a total amount of £157 to get a kabylake pentium, m-atx board and 4gb 2400mhz all new items, but that haswell with the pentium is a Lenovo ThinkCentre e73 mini tower which states to have a 60w limit which is better than that sff version I had, but not worth the time if my 1050ti wouldn’t run, it seems a grey area with reviewers whether that limit is just for its 180w unit they come with.