Problem with new 670's

Gregster · 16 Oct 2012 at 11:46

Rusty is spot on but something is wrong if only 3 fps in MW3? No idea though sorry.

SkodaMart · 16 Oct 2012 at 11:47

@Rusty0611
What is your advice to help OP then please?
Get an i7 and overclock the living daylights out of it?

I am sure my advice of checking individual components, then running SLi on one monitor is the more sensible approach.

Rusty0611 · 16 Oct 2012 at 11:48

SkodaMart said:
@Rusty0611
I have had 3 systems with SLi, an 8800 GTX, 260 GTX and a 470 GTX so yes I have plenty of experience with SLi thank you!

You seem to be a bit of a hardware snob?

OP didn't even mention BF3, he mentioned MW3 and said that it was unplayable.

If you read my advice above, you will find that it is sensible and methodical.
Your solution to problems seems to be throwing money at it.

Please keep your nose out of my posts in future

Then the fact that you appear to be borderline clueless is even more baffling. Then again you believe the 660Ti is faster than the 7950 so this isn't surprising.

I responded to the OP right at the top regarding GW2 and then to JamesM's reply afterwards. This was completely clear as I quoted his post. That is why we started talking about BF3.

SkodaMart said:
@Rusty0611
What is your advice to help OP then please?
Get an i7 and overclock the living daylights out of it?

Read above - I've already answered that Guild Wars 2 is CPU limited so SLI makes minimal, if any difference. I don't know about MW3 as I don't play it.

You appear to be mixing up the OP and JameM. Perhaps you should be a little more attentative

.

SkodaMart · 16 Oct 2012 at 11:49

Rusty0611 said:
GW2 is CPU limited...

Don't know about MW3 but performance doesn't look right.

No **** Sherlock!

I'm clueless?

Rusty0611 · 16 Oct 2012 at 12:01

Yes, yes you are.

JamesM said:
I've noticed my 3570k limiting my 670s recently, CPU usage is at 100% but card usage ranges from 50-90% giving me wild FPS changes. That's only at 1080p too =/

Rusty0611 said:
An i5 will CPU limit high end SLI set ups in certain games.

JamesM said:
Even at 4.6GHz? I thought it would manage.. just.

Is an i7 the way to go then?

SkodaMart said:
i7 isn't the way to go, I can't think of any games that use more than 4 cores?

JamesM said:
One of my main games, BF3

BF3 loves cores and HT. It releases the CPU bottleneck on high end SLI/crossfire set-up's. I don't know what you're finding so difficult to understand. On other games which are CPU limited the same principle will apply.

SkodaMart · 16 Oct 2012 at 12:11

But the OP wasn't about BF3 it was about helping someone out with very poor SLi performance on a multi-monitor set-up and you by your own admission said that the i5 to i7 upgrade only gave 3-5% improvement

My advice is clear above.
I will ask again Rusty0611 how would you help OP?

JamesM · 16 Oct 2012 at 12:13

Sorry for messing up the OP's thread!!

Just ordered a i7 3770k to see if it helps, if it doesn't i'll simply return it.

Rusty0611 · 16 Oct 2012 at 12:15

SkodaMart said:
But the OP wasn't about BF3 it was about helping someone out with very poor SLi performance on a multi-monitor set-up and you by your own admission said that the i5 to i7 upgrade only gave 3-5% improvement

And? So it's OK for you to respond to JamesM about BF3 (who incidently isn't the OP) but when I do it's not?

OK

.

SkodaMart said:
My advice is clear above.
I will ask again Rusty0611 how would you help OP?

Your advice to JamesM (whether he's the OP or not) was a load of waffling old nonsense.

Read above - I've already answered that Guild Wars 2 is CPU limited so SLI makes minimal, if any difference. I don't know about MW3 as I don't play it.

Pasted again for the visually impaired.

SkodaMart · 16 Oct 2012 at 12:20

@Rusty0611
So you have just hijacked this thread to nit pick and be pedantic?
You offer the OP no useful advice at all?

Rusty0611 · 16 Oct 2012 at 12:33

What you mean where I pointed out SLI makes little to no difference in GW2 and I can't comment on MW3 because I don't play it? And then where I helped JamesM out as well?

I don't know why you keep saying the same thing when I've answered it.

And then when after you posted a load of rubbish I corrected you? That's called correcting duff information rather than nit-picking and being pedantic.

So all things considered: who's hijacked here? Re-read your own posts for the last 4 or 5 of them. You're basically saying the same thing over and over ignoring the fact you gave out bad advice.

I gave information and leave it to each individual to weigh up the cost/benefit scenario as that is a very personal thing it makes no sense to try to recommend to someone the cost/benefit ratio without knowing their own financial situation.

SkodaMart · 16 Oct 2012 at 14:41

I think I could be missing something here.
I have built a system for desktop, gaming, web browsing and general trolling LOL

Only joking!

I am not bothered where my bottle neck is, as long as the games and programs I use run smoothly at decent frame rates.

OPs system should be capalable of running MW2 at a decent frame rate as my system could do.
I don't however use massive resoultions and multi-monitors, thats why I suggested trying the games with one card and one monitor, then try the other card etc....

As for i5 vs i7, it would appear that the i7 is now superior in some modern games, i.e. BF3

Does this now mean that your i5 is garbage? No it doesn't I suspect that an i5 setup will still run BF3 extremely well, again I would be very surprised if my i3 didn't run BF3.

As for overclocking, truthfully what is the difference (real world) between an i5 @ 4.0 GHz and and i5 @4.6 GHz ?

Will an i5 @ 4.0 GHz not run your programs and games?

Whilst overclocking to 4.6 GHz looks great in your sig and is fantastic for benchmarking etc, you are pushing your system to the limit and I dare say there are a few of these 'maxed out' systems that are not as stable as lower clocked machines - which just seems like stating the obvious to me.

The reason I built an i3 machine was it was cheap and I was interested to see how well it would perform as a budget gaming machine. So far I have been very pleasantly surprised and all my games run smoothly.

Kaapstad · 16 Oct 2012 at 15:10

JamesM said:
I've noticed my 3570k limiting my 670s recently, CPU usage is at 100% but card usage ranges from 50-90% giving me wild FPS changes. That's only at 1080p too =/

Could it be your CPU limiting performance?

Rusty0611 said:
An i5 will CPU limit hgh end SLI set ups in certain games.

+1

SkodaMart said:
i7 isn't the way to go, I can't think of any games that use more than 4 cores?

I'm getting great performance with an i3 2120!!

Try removing your overclock too, it may be unstable.

Test each part like I suggested, a fresh driver (clean install) is also good advice mentioned above.

i7 is the way to go

My i7 @4.0ghz gets 98% - 99% GPU usage in SLI. The CPU only runs at about 25% - 30% load to do it.

SkodaMart · 16 Oct 2012 at 15:18

Kaapstad said:
+1

i7 is the way to go

My i7 @4.0ghz gets 98% - 99% GPU usage in SLI. The CPU only runs at about 25% - 30% load to do it.

So what would the load on an i5 CPU be?

Kaapstad · 16 Oct 2012 at 15:22

JamesM said:
I've noticed my 3570k limiting my 670s recently, CPU usage is at 100% but card usage ranges from 50-90% giving me wild FPS changes. That's only at 1080p too =/

Could it be your CPU limiting performance?

Rusty0611 · 16 Oct 2012 at 15:27

I didn't get 100% CPU usage on my i5 but it doesn't have to be to signal a CPU bottleneck. 100% CPU usage is just one indicator.

Less than 100% GPU usage on a title like BF3 is another indicator.

SkodaMart · 16 Oct 2012 at 15:31

JamesM said:
I've noticed my 3570k limiting my 670s recently, CPU usage is at 100% but card usage ranges from 50-90% giving me wild FPS changes. That's only at 1080p too =/

In BattleField 3?

SkodaMart · 16 Oct 2012 at 15:34

I'm going to buy Battlefield 3, just to see how it runs.
It looks a great game anyhow, I enjoyed Battlefield 2.

JamesM · 16 Oct 2012 at 15:55

SkodaMart said:
In BattleField 3?

Yes and in other games too, Borderlands 2 for example however I discount BL2 currently because it's a new game and probably needs more optimization.

My 3570k runs at 4.6GHz which IMO isn't that high although it does need a decent amount of voltage to get there. I do run a custom water setup though so temps don't concern me too much.

Playing BF3 at 1080p, CPU usage is at 100% on all cores at 4.6GHz while GPU usage on both cards fluctuates between 50-90%. This doesn't really bother me that much however FPS drops do and seeing the game drop to 50fps with ultra settings when I have two 670s and an overclocked 3570k is rather odd (especially at only 1080p when at some point I plan to upgrade monitor too). I've changed from low, medium, high and ultra, turned AA off and although I might have slightly higher top end FPS, it still drops to 50 or so during intensive battles so it's not the graphics cards. I'm also fastest in the Heaven benchmark thread for dual 670s so it's 100% not the cards or drivers limiting the cards.

Running one card for BF3 I get 99% usage constantly.

I've ruled out drivers, have run the 670s at default clocks, have added 8GB more memory (making 16GB total) and still end up with same result. Have even installed BF3 on my SSD rather than HDD to see if that was causing the issue.

Kaapstad · 16 Oct 2012 at 16:08

JamesM said:
Yes and in other games too, Borderlands 2 for example however I discount BL2 currently because it's a new game and probably needs more optimization.

My 3570k runs at 4.6GHz which IMO isn't that high although it does need a decent amount of voltage to get there. I do run a custom water setup though so temps don't concern me too much.

Playing BF3 at 1080p, CPU usage is at 100% on all cores at 4.6GHz while GPU usage on both cards fluctuates between 50-90%. This doesn't really bother me that much however FPS drops do and seeing the game drop to 50fps with ultra settings when I have two 670s and an overclocked 3570k is rather odd (especially at only 1080p when at some point I plan to upgrade monitor too). I've changed from low, medium, high and ultra, turned AA off and although I might have slightly higher top end FPS, it still drops to 50 or so during intensive battles so it's not the graphics cards. I'm also fastest in the Heaven benchmark thread for dual 670s so it's 100% not the cards or drivers limiting the cards.

Running one card for BF3 I get 99% usage constantly.

I've ruled out drivers, have run the 670s at default clocks, have added 8GB more memory (making 16GB total) and still end up with same result. Have even installed BF3 on my SSD rather than HDD to see if that was causing the issue.

Try running your CPU @4.0ghz if there is no change in GPU performance it could be that you need more threads rather than more speed.

JamesM · 16 Oct 2012 at 16:08

Kaapstad said:
Try running your CPU @4.0ghz if there is no change in GPU performance it could be that you need more threads rather than more speed.

Sorry should have mentioned that I've tried it at 4.4GHz and still have the same issue.