Underperforming GPU?

OllyCS

OllyCS

OllyCS

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15 Feb 2021
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Hi All,
I am very new to the whole PC spec thing but decided to build my own PC dedicated to editing 4k footage as my laptop was not cutting it.
I looked at the specs required for the software I am using (Davinci Resolve 17) here before buying:
https://www.newsshooter.com/2020/11/13/blackmagic-design-davinci-resolve-17-1-released/

Being an "in for a penny, in for a pound" kind of person I decided to go for the higher-spec in pretty much every area, I was super excited as I did a lot of research but honestly, since putting it together all enthusiasm I had has almost gone. I have had multiple issues for weeks that are making me wonder if my GPU (or overall spec) is either faulty or not powerful enough. Many of these issues were resolved by uninstalling and reinstalling the GPU drivers but the overall performance still seems questionable for the amount of power I have.
When running Davinci I frequently experience stuttering, often freezing and I get very little smooth use out of it. I expected the spec I have to deal with the software far more efficiently - maybe a few stutters when dealing with long timelines of 4k footage and visual effects but not simply after starting the program and having maybe 4 minutes of footage with no visual effects. I am starting to think that there must be something wrong with my GPU - which is the worst part to have issues with at the moment with such short supply!
My spec is:

GPU - Radeon RX 580 series - 8GB VRAM, 2000MHz
CPU - AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 8-Core Processor
RAM - 64GB Corsair DDR4

I also occasionally still see the brightness of the screen flicker when playing the witcher 3 (it seems to only happen in dark scenes) and overall performance on things like browsers can be slow too. I am not an avid gamer but I think there are occasional stutters/frame rate issues with the witcher too.

Should I be having these issues with the spec I have? If so, what kind of spec should I be looking at? If not I think my only option is sending the GPU off to Gigabyte to be fixed or to return to Overclockers and buy a similar spec.

Side note - I am curious what kind of games I should be able to play with no issues with this spec? Should I be able to play graphic intense games like Red dead redemption 2 or cyberpunk 2077?
 
The RX 580, is about four years old. It was hardly the best graphics card four years back, let alone in 2021.

You have not stated your game resolution. With that graphics card, I suggest 1080P. The CPU is good and a strong multi-tasking CPU. For gaming it is also pretty good. Not the best but pretty good.

Perhaps you should stress test the graphics card with Furmark, and check it with GPU Z to see if the clocks are good.

Also, see if you can download 3D Mark and bench your 580. Then you can compare the score to similar PC's and then see if you are limited by it.

Also, with my graphics card, I enable Vsync, because it eliminates stuttering. I do it at the driver level and it is less hassle for me.

As above what monitor are you using, resolution? Check the refresh rate of the monitor, 144 Hz refresh really helps, and newer monitors have great refresh rates 165 Hz and beyond.

Also your RAM, have you enabled XMP in BIOS? Or DOCP for its speed? RAM is important for Ryzen to perform well. 3000 Mhz and above is best.
 
As said above, I'd suggest you download something like 3D Mark and bench the PC, to check if it's performing as expected.

I don't use this software, but from the system specs, it doesn't look like the graphics card has a lot to do, so unless it is massively underperforming for some reason, I think it's unlikely to be the problem. Usually with software like this all the graphics card has to do is render what you're seeing, which even at 4K isn't a big deal.

What is the SSD you're loading footage from?

The Witcher could be a driver problem or a game glitch.

You shouldn't have issues with browsing, can you describe the problem in more detail? Are using other software while browsing?
 
Thank you all for your replies, I really appreciate it!
To answer a few things:
I've got a 4k monitor as I'm editing a 4K film so generally I try to put everything in 4K to make the most of my monitor's resolution.
I benchmarked the system spec and it came out as 'good' but around 300 points below average which surprised me as I thought it would be an above-average set up with 8gb VRAM, 8 core CPU and 64gb RAM?

I have turned vsync on as well as XMP (couldn't find DOCP) - I had never heard of these before so thank you for pointing them out - I'll post an update on whether these changes help.

Re the SSD I'm loading from - I realised the footage I was using in the editing software was on my HDD. I moved some footage over to the SSD and this seemed to make a noticeable difference in speed, although it is still lagging. I have a 1TB Samsung 870 QVO, 2.5” SSD (Read 560MB/s, Write 530MB/s, 98k/88k IOPS).

I am running 2 sticks of Vengence 3200Mhz (32gb) RAM and have just looked up how to test RAM stability so will do that now!

Browser issues were just lag problems but I have realised this may just be the wireless mouse I am using (I used a wired spare and it works nicely).

Overall, should I be concerned if the benchmark rating is only "good" - I thought that although the GPU was fairly old that the power it has would be more than sufficient but perhaps I just need to think about selling/returning my current GPU and upgrading to something else when they become available? Are there any GPUs that will handle 4k editing no problem whilst still not costing over £6/700? Will this GPU also be able to handle AAA games in 4K or am I expecting too much for the budget I have?
 
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Editing you want the davinci on a ssd with operating system and the project file on another ssd also called a scratch disk, This where the file can be read from and saved to

The rx 580 is a 1080p gaming gpu to play 4k AAA games you will need a 3080 or 6800xt costing around £750 approx.
 
I have turned vsync on as well as XMP (couldn't find DOCP) - I had never heard of these before so thank you for pointing them out - I'll post an update on whether these changes help.
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If your memory was running at 2133 it would significantly underperform.

Re the SSD I'm loading from - I realised the footage I was using in the editing software was on my HDD. I moved some footage over to the SSD and this seemed to make a noticeable difference in speed, although it is still lagging. I have a 1TB Samsung 870 QVO, 2.5” SSD (Read 560MB/s, Write 530MB/s, 98k/88k IOPS).
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I thought that might be the case, the I/O can be the bottleneck with loading videos and photos.

Overall, should I be concerned if the benchmark rating is only "good" - I thought that although the GPU was fairly old that the power it has would be more than sufficient but perhaps I just need to think about selling/returning my current GPU and upgrading to something else when they become available? Are there any GPUs that will handle 4k editing no problem whilst still not costing over £6/700? Will this GPU also be able to handle AAA games in 4K or am I expecting too much for the budget I have?
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The 'good' part is irrelevant, what benchmark did you use? You need to compare against RX 580 for the GPU and 3700X for the CPU. The only purpose for running one is to check the system is working normally (and if it is, to find out what the problem you're experiencing is). As already said above, you'll never play AAA games in 4K with a RX 580, even the top-end graphics hardware (£1000+) struggles with that sometimes.

Have you checked on the forum (if there is one) for this software? It could even be a software issue at 4K editing is kind of at the 'bleeding edge' right now and some software has issues even with £5000 PCs.
 
Really helpful replies so far, thank you.
I had read multiple things about the requirements for the editing software but I think I still underestimated the amount of power I would need to edit in 4K.
All other issues have been resolved now (flickering screen and stuttering in browser) so that's a huge plus.

I am looking into upgrading to a 3080 and biting the bullet - I'm looking at it as being an investment spread over many years.
This brought me to a host of new questions about whether my CPU will bottleneck performance - most seem to think not.
I'm also curious to find out if there is a way to link the performance of my RX 580 and the 3080 to combine their power? From what I have read it seems you can only link cards of a similar spec? Don't know if anyone has any info on whether it is possible though?
 
Your cpu wont hinder performance at 4k as games are gpu bound at that resoloution.

Forget using the 3080 with the 580 it wont work .

Editing 4k video you want the program you use on one ssd with windows and the file on another ssd to read and write to.
 
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