Seemingly inexplicable poor FPS in games

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Hi,

Rig spec is 4.5Ghz AMD FX8150, 16GB (2x8GB) Corsair Dominator RAM, Crosshair V motherboard and Gigabyte GTX680 4GB GPU. CPU & GPU water cooled. I have 2 23 inch monitors. One on HDMI, one on DVI. Both at 1920 x 1080.

So, with the specs of the system done, my issue. Some games hit 60FPS no problem. Run nice and smooth on max setting across the board, talking SimCity, World of Tanks, Age of Empire 3, Settlers 7.

Graphics intensive processes no problem. Loads and loads of programs. No problem. Benchmarking good results and temps never get above 55 even when everything is at 100%!

So, couple of games I bought today because I wanted to feel like I was 11 again, Trainz 2012 and Train Simulator 2013. Neither of these games seem particularly revolutionary in their graphics but, I struggle to get above 30FPS and keep getting random and quite frequent drops to 10FPS.

Is this just a badly written game or is it that there's a setting out somewhere? Could it be the nvidia control panel causing issues? More interesting, the games never use more then 1GB of GDDR and never more then 30% of the processing power. The CPU is pretty much idle. I'm lucky to see temps reach 40.

One thing I did notice, was it seems to be when the scene needs drawing or the distance comes into focus. That seems to hit it hard and everything just grinds to a halt for a second. Turning off fog helped this dramatically.

Hope someone can help. Thanks.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Forgot to mention...played World of Tanks after playing these other games and suddenly I'm seeing drops to 15FPS in that, this is a game that always played at 60FPS. Thought it worth mentioning.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

What about other games - are they all now performing badly?

Not sure. Need to play some more and see. Just seems odd that nothing's been stressed and frame rates aren't where I'd expect.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Fire up afterburner/gpuz/etc.. and keep a look out at what your core boost speed is doing, sounds like the card isn't boosting as high as it should/could.

Card boosts good. I've just overclocked it by about 140mhz and it's fine. Boosts up there no problem, voltage stays stable. Increased temps by 1 or 2 but still, it's dropping to ****e FPS.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

It's 100% no my CPU. Not one of my 8 cores hits 100%...ever! Have noticed that in one of the sims, the GPU is running at 98% most of the time, even with over clock so that looks as if it's just seriously GPU hungry.

More concerning is World Of Tanks. Why is is randomly lagging to 15FPS? Do you know how annoying it is when it happens just as you go to shoot someone? lol.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

It's not problem with the GPU...I recall someone with a FX CPU and a GTX770 having the same dropping down to 15fps problem in World of Tanks.

Games that are CPU demanding and using no more than 1-2 threads is a nightmare combination with the FX CPUs. They simply don't have enough grunt for handling dynamic battle scenes with too many things simultaneously happening at the same time.

100% not the problem.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

It's the same problem as people with frame rate in the 100s when running around soloing doing quests in WOW, and frame rate falls to hell when they go raid with tonnes of people and things happening at the same time.


You do realise most games hardly ever get 100% any of the cores due to how games are coded? The reason why your CPU is not hitting 100% in overall is because the game is NOT using all the cores. Take Guild Wars 2 for example...it would use up to 4 cores, yet none of the cores EVER go beyond 75-80% usage...it's just sloppy coding.

I would suggest you google a bit regarding the frame rate problem on World of Tanks...you will easily see that the CPU is the limitation (may be not directly because of the CPU itself, but how the developer poorly code/optimise the game).

You might want to have a look on the WOT forum instead of asking here:
http://forum.worldoftanks.eu/index....ince-the-86-patch-this-morning-game-breaking/

Dude...seriously. It's not the CPU. Yesterday, 60 to 70 FPS constantly. Today, 50 - 60 with lags to 10 - 20. If my CPU was maxing on a core then that would cause a frame rate drop as data gets "stuck" being processed. This route you're suggesting is way out.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

No more comments about the CPU!!!! The CPU has not changed since yesterday when it was playing at 60FPS and was fine and it isn't the CPU END OF!!!

AStaley...the only thing to have changed is the installation of Steam and the two new games. I'll run a malware check but nothing's been flagged up by it. Latest drivers. The GeForce Experience thing has updated but I can't see that having an effect.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

If he was playing all these games before without any problems at all I don't see why people are insisting it's his CPU.

Cos they read it on a forum that the game is badly coded. Which is total rubbish. It utilises multiple cores, none of which are reaching 100% so...it is impossible the CPU is at fault. Especially when yesterday, it ran fine.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

After a quick read of the WOT forums. This kind of problem seems to be pretty common since the 8.7 patch. It could just be game related. On the train simulators, i would say it was down to the cpu as a lot of these games only run on a single core where amd are weak. I think it was cities 2012/13 my mate played with his [email protected] paired with a 7970 and performance was rubbish due to the engine using only 1 core on the cpu.

What settings are you using on train simulator. Guys with more powerful systems than you are reporting that using aa @ 3x3 setting is giving to much performance hit. They say use 2x2.

I've been looking into the setting on all the games. I've got WoT working again, i think! The sims, Trainz apparently has a problem since a big Service Pack in April. It appears to revolve around the maps rendering every time the camera moves such as going round a corner or actually moving the camera. This would fit what I have noticed that with far reduced draw distance and no anisotropy, i can get 50+ FPS, all be it this jumps around getting as low as 25 FPS. I think this is all down to an update on the game, don't see how the Steam client could be effecting things although both the new games I'd expect to play well are from Steam and the WoT problem started with a Steam install and the new games. From what I can see, Train Sim uses 4 cores and Trainz 5, Train Sim is eating the GPU though, running at 99% all the time. Trainz barely touches anything. However, this does look to a be a game issue. At least I'm getting there with knowing what's causing the problems.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

OP don't seem to realise games are subjected to change when it comes to optimisation. It seem the recent updates/patches have brought quite a huge performance issue for lots of people (despite people used to run the game fine). I'm not saying people using Intel CPU ain't suffering the problem, but from what I read around, the issue seem to hit people that ain't using overclocked core i5/i7 much harder (mostly likely due to to weaker single-threaded performance).

If he wants to hear "his GTX680 is too weak for the game", and sure I will say that...

With regards to Trainz, it appears that an update on that is causing the issue. As for why yesterday WoT worked great and today not so much, no idea.

I am well aware that games and software are updated and optimised, or that's the intention of the update, but sometimes they don't go well. However, this is a very different argument to the your CPU is **** argument you started out with.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

(I didn't mean updates to the Steam client Updates to the game via Steam.)

The game checks for updates whenever you load it, it's not a steam game. At least, mine isn't.

It appears that the updates for games that come through Steam aren't always the most recent, oddly. I think I'm just going to have to come to terms with the fact that it's not my hardware and it's the games. World of Tanks seemed better today, maybe it's just I never noticed it, or it was considerably less noticeable.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

I'm not sure if you realise this, but game problem or not, using 1 cores or 4 cores, a Bulldozer FX CPU (even overclocked) would bottleneck a GTX680 for online gamings in general.

Even if a game uses up to 4 cores, your FX8150 at 4.50GHz is only around as fast a Phenom II X4 at around 3.90-4.00GHz. I would imagine the FX8150 and 4.50GHz would handle most single player FPS/action games fine and possibly won't bottleneck the GTX680 so long as they use a minimum of 4 cores, but any less than that, or playing games online, the GTX680 will get bottlenecked right away.

Bottomline is, you simply won't come close to getting the most out of your GTX680 with the current CPU you got, particularly if you play older games (which don't use more than 2 cores) as well.

Can you qualify this as I'm not seeing any effects of said bottlenecking. The occasional stutter is back where it was, not there or very rare and this is down to a mod that I've installed for WoT. My original query was more with relation to the sim games. Trainz it transpires has a problem and is badly written so it's not running right on ANY system.

If I look at my core monitor, why am I seeing 4 or 5 cores at work and none of them are hitting 100%? If I move PhysX to my CPU, I am seeing one core at 100% as expected.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

For what its worth. World of Tanks can be bottlenecked quite heavily by the cpu. With running 1x 6970 with an OC on, 1920 x 1200 and most settings set pretty high / max I get around 80% CPU usage on one core of a 4.7GHz 2600K. The othe cores are generally on 0 - very little use.

I'm not seeing that?

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

OP is the same guy who tried to tell people the VRAM on SLI'd cards stack, in a thread he started about using 3x 780s for photoshop.

It's easier for people to help you when you show a little humility and don't act like you know better. The CPU is crap.

So you're telling me my CPU has gone from been absolutely fine yesterday to crap today!!!! And, I was happy to admit that I was wrong about the SLI. I was trying to tell anyone anything either. Simply how I thought things would work with multi-monitor and stuff wasn't the case.

This thread is not about whether or not my CPU is an Intel i CPU. What I was asking for is if people have experienced similar things where some games have bad FPS and others don't and if there's a setting somewhere that could be effecting it. Or, could it be the games are badly written.

For some reason everyone has decided that magically my CPU has turned into a pile of turd because I installed a new game. This is why I hate forums ...read the original post!!!!!

I don't give two ***** about what people think about my CPU. I like it, it never causes me any problems. It runs cool and plays and does everything I ask of it.

All I wanted was some feedback from people who may have had a similar experience and if changing the settings in games and the nVidia control panel sorted the problem or if the game's were badly coded.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Forget about looking at CPU usage...you should monitor your GPU usage instead. The simplest way is to monitor your GPU usage while in game (you can use on-screen display feature of MSI Afterburner. If your GPU usage is dropped far from 99/100% and getting low frame rate, and and dropping your graphic setting doesn't improve the frame rate at all, then you got a CPU bottleneck. Unlike crossfire/sli with multi-GPU set up, if your GPU usage is not hitting close to 100% at all time (with the exception of capped frame rate or vsync to 60fps), it always points to CPU bottleneck rather than driver issue (with the exception of if you changed GPU and might have so leftover drivers from previous cards which may causing problem).

Not the case as I've been trying to say. There's nothing wrong with my hardware. All I wanted to know is if people have had similar experiences and if settings changed things.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Couple of good answers which have led me to look things up and try things and everything is fine.

If I had an i7 4770k and had the same OP, would I be getting these responses or is it because it's an AMD people go to a generic, the CPU is **** and bottlenecking everything answer rather then reading the actual OP?

This forum seems completely and 100% biased towards Intel i CPUs. My FX8150 has done everything I've asked of it and never caused me any problems. Benchmarks are just a dick waving competition. Who can get the highest number without actually looking into how hardware is being tested and whether or not that test suits some hardware more then others. There's benchmarking software out there that favours AMD CPU but I never see anything about that. It's all just about Intel.

When I find games don't play at max settings, I change my hardware. Like I just did with my GPU. My benchmarks sucked for the last two cards but they still played everything up till a few months ago. There's more to computers then sitting there for a whole weekend running test after test just so you can say my computer comes with x amount of points. Just use the hardware and enjoy it!

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Are you sure your clocks on your card were boosting when gaming? You can get them stuck on 2D clocks and that would cause poor performance.

The CPU in terms of gaming of single/dual threaded games is crap though, the IPC just isn't there.

Mostly, card boosts to 1250mhz from 1050 or whatever it is normally. Idles at 320mhz.

Trainz it doesn't but that's because only 30% of the GPU is being utilised, same as the CPU BUT, there's a known fault with that game causing performance issues for everyone so it's an irrelevant point at the moment. Till the game is fixed anyway, then I'm sure it'll be fine.

It seems like everything is working ok now anyway. Changed a few things and all is as well as it's going to be. Train Simulator is running well with everything absolutely maxed out except anti-aliasing which I've set to FXAA and I honestly can't see much change between that and the max setting. Might up it a bit.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

You're talking to the wrong person about getting the highest X/P score as that's what i enjoy and that's what i buy hardware for - rarley play games.

As for the forum being bias towards Intel....yes and no, it's more to do with Intel being far far superior in the one thing that matters for gaming - IPC. When games only utilise 1-4 cores (a lot of games....) Intel will come out top, only in games where they can take advantage of all the others AMD provide do they break even and even then the 4c4t Intel will trump the best AMD has, no to mention the 6c6t beasts.

Don't get me wrong, overclocking can get addicitive. Squeezing every last bit of performance out of something is fun and rewarding however, for people to automatically default to the CPU sucks answer just because it's an AMD is ******** especially when I was very clear in that yesterday all was well and today not so well.

So, a 4 core CPU is really all that is needed in life at the moment? I use a lot of development programs and don't often see all 8 cores being used at once, they do all get used but it's usually 1-4 at a time. if that's correct?

At this moment in time, I can run all my games at max settings and see no problems. Bar the anti-aliasing on Train Simulator but as mentioned, even the most powerful Intel rig can't take the max setting. Trainz is just broken. Get good frame rates till the scene needs drawing. And this is the problem everyone has.

 

[Th3M8dH8tt3r]

Interesting comparison there for the benches in WoT. I'm well up there with average of 50FPS. It must be the mod that's known to cause lag, causing more then normal, although it has been better today, as stated.

The fact my monitors only go to 60hz means I'm happy. I don't notice much over 25FPS to be fair. It's only when it gets down to 15 or hangs for a second is it noticeable. I like my 8150, it works and I'm not about to go and spend over £1,000 on an Intel setup when I'm not going to see any difference. Most games I play on the Xbox (One) anyway. It's only sims and RTS that I play on PC.