Frame Keeps Randomly lowering to 30!!

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wobblysafe

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Oct 6, 2013
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specs:
Video card: MSI GTX 660 oc edition (2gb ddr5)
Main Board: MSI 970A-G43
Processor: AMD FX-8320 (vishera)
Ram: 8 gb G.Skill (1600 mhz)
Power Supply: 500 watt (80 plus bronze certified :D)
Im also using windows 8 pro

Ok so I got the pc about a month ago, and didnt notice much issues cause I didnt have much games to play other than minecraft.. which odviously ran fine. But now Ive played a couple AAA games and after about 5-10 mins of playing the Framerate will randomly drop down from 60-70 to 25-30 (this is my experience in the battlefield 4 beta btw) But about the same thing will happen in dead island riptide... It will be over 100 fps then drop down to about 30-40, and it makes the games unplayable.. And just to get this straight V-Sync is NOT on, it is off in the nvidea control panel AND in game. I turned the windows power set thing to Performance not power saver or balanced. I turned off power limitations in MSI afterburner, so I have no idea what is up, I am pretty intelligent when it comes to technology (I built this computer thats having problems though...) and I still have no idea what to do! please help!!
 
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bystander

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Don't include BF4 into your woes. The game is in beta, it may be bugs causing problems.

As far as other games go, this is a common problem with some games with less than the fastest CPU's. The only things you can do are to OC your CPU or go Intel, or do both.

AMD CPU's are slow. They offer more cores than Intel, but those cores are slow. If a game is well threaded, these AMD CPU's can perform well. If a game is GPU bound and doesn't ask a lot from the CPU, they perform well, but if a game require a lot of CPU speed and doesn't use a lot of cores, your CPU is going to struggle.

You can usually turn up your graphical settings and not lose minimum FPS, and in bad CPU bottlenecks, you may not even lose average FPS with higher settings.

A lot of game developers do not aim for 60 FPS minimum. Many find 40 to be perfectly fine, which means for those of us who want high FPS, you'll struggle, even with the fastest CPU's.
 
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PsyKhiqZero

PsyKhiqZero

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I would swap out the power supply or get it tested if you can. 80 plus certification is not a quality cert. In fact many companies do cheat it. What is the make and model of your PSU? The AMD CPU uses 125 watts of power. for comparison the Intel i5 uses about 85 watts. With the factory overclock on your GPU this could be too much for you PSU. Also make sure to remove any manual overclocks when trouble shooting.

The only other thing is perhaps your GPU is overheating and throttling to protect itself. try running GPU Z and checking the GPU temps.
http://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/

 
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wobblysafe

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I was worried after I had already ordered the parts that the psu wasnt powerful enough, thanks for the response, I will probably just order a new power supply, Im looking to get a 750 watt. And for the processor and all, I was actually hoping to soon get a new motherboard that supports the i5 Im wanting to get... I forgot the model number but I know what is compatible with what. So after that I hope everything works fine :)

 
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wobblysafe

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I only included bf4 because I had asked others if they were having the issue, and they wernt. Sorry for the misconception. But as for the rest of your reply thanks, I didnt think it could really be my cpu bottlenecking me though, I still doubt it is because in game I never use 100% of it. So it couldnt be bottlenecking me, But I am like I said earlier looking to upgrade to an intel cpu :)
 
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PsyKhiqZero

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Good luck. But so far there is no guarantee that the PSU is the problem. Look up the model number. (info is usually on the side of the PSU visable from the side panel) and google it. I would hate for you to buy a new PSU and not solve your problem.
 
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wobblysafe

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I still have the box that all my pc components came in, I will just look up every component and see if any of them have had a history with this problem, thanks :)
 
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bystander

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You misunderstand how to check if a CPU is bottlenecking. Your CPU will bottleneck far before it ever reaches 100%. With hexacore CPU's, in some games, it'll be a bottleneck as low as 25% usage, but most often at 50% or less.

You have to look at each core. You run into a problem when one of the threads becomes bottlenecked. Most games never use more than 4 cores, but if one of those cores cannot go fast enough, everything is slowed down.
 
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wobblysafe

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Every time I get those frame drops, my power consumption goes down like crazy, the cpu's preformance for the most part stays the same. I think it may be the power supply causing the issue.

 
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Avro Arrow

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I have twin Radeon HD 7870XTs which are more powerful together than an nVidia GTX Titan and my FX-8350 doesn't bottleneck them at all even though I'm at stock speeds. If you're dropping to 30fps, that is not a CPU issue. I would expect that it's a driver issue or a glitch in the game. If the CPU were bottlenecking the card, it would be constant. You wouldn't go from 60-70 to 30, you would never hit 60-70 to begin with. The FX-8320 isn't your problem. I would update your drivers or try with a different game.
 
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bystander

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Actually, a lot of games bottleneck like that. Most do in fact. They reach a spot that is extra intensive and requires a lot more CPU power than most, and your FPS drops.

Tomb Raider is the most obvious example. It'll run great, but there are a few spots where your FPS will drop to 40-50 (30 or less in 3D). At those points it is the CPU bottlenecking performance.

BF3 in multiplayer on large maps is also like this. It'll run over 100 FPS, but drops to the 40's in large combat situations.

WoW is also like this. In raids, FPS drops.

Is it possible something else is causing this? Sure, but it likely is doing it by slowing the CPU down causing an even greater bottleneck.

He should be monitoring the CPU clocks and see if the fluctuate. See if there is another process stealing power. It may also just be the CPU, which 90% is fine, but there are some games which it is not ideal for.
 
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Avro Arrow

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The thing is, CPU bottlenecking is not an issue with the new Vishera CPUs. I got some graphs from AnandTech, they show that the FX series doesn't blow anything out of the water but that they are very capable gaming CPUs:
51123.png

51124.png

51138.png

51140.png

51140.png

51141.png

These probably aren't the games involved but it's a decent metric. The OP also said that his power consumption sinks like a stone when this happens so it might be that his PSU has an intermittent drop in output. I would say that's far more likely the culprit. CPU bottlenecking doesn't decrease power use. Now, the fact that he has an AMD CPU might compound the problem or make it more noticable but I don't believe that it is the root cause.
 
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wobblysafe

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I have tried rolling back my drivers to older versions, and I have tried updating them to the newest. But no matter which driver I use I still end up with the same problem. I tried turning off every power saving/balancing feature I have just to see if maybe it was kicking into power saver mode mid game. But after disabling every power saver thing that I know I have, the issue continued. I have tried overclocking the card by 10 mhz, which didnt make any difference. When looking in MSI afterburner, Every time my fps drops to 30, my psu and gpu's power levels drop like crazy, I think it must be a psu problem though because if the gpu power level drops, it must mean it isnt getting the required power from the psu to preform as it should. Could it be that my 500 watt psu isnt powerful enough. Or could it just not be a good power supply..?
 
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wobblysafe

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Well the FX processors are cheaper, so I would hope that they would be slower. I bought the 8320 because it was cheap, not because I wanted to have the most beast super computer in the galaxy. But I doubt my issue has anything to do with the cpu, if you read my other posts you would see that my power usage is droping drastically when the frame drops happen. If that in anyway can relate to the cpu bottlenecking tell me, but I have a strong feeling its my psu that is causing the issue.

 
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bystander

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I'm not sure you can tell much by that. The power dropping could simply be the GPU load is dropping because the CPU isn't keeping up. The GPU uses a lot more power than the CPU.

Can you monitor the CPU usage and clocks, during the drops? Can you monitor the temps of both the GPU and CPU as well?
 
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wobblysafe

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Nothing out of the ordinary happens with the cpu when the drops happen.
I have been monitoring the gpu temps, but I will try and monitor the cpu temps this time, (I have the core temp program) and see if anything weird happens there, but the card doesnt have any temperature jumps it stays steady throught gameplay (Under 70 degrees celcius)

 
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Avro Arrow

Avro Arrow

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I may have found the problem. This is a game-related issue. It's all over the steam community. Read these:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/216250/discussions/0/828937545882241235/
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3114747
http://steamcommunity.com/app/216250/discussions/0/828937420198443816/
http://steamcommunity.com/app/216250/discussions/0/828937545916562632/
http://steamcommunity.com/app/216250/discussions/0/828936719119190435/
And here, the proof that it's not your CPU:
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/673401-dead-island-riptide/66039589?page=1
This guy's getting fps hiccups in some places in Dead Island Riptide and he has an Intel i5-3470 even with VSync off. From everything I've read, it's just a very badly coded game and that's where the issues lie. People with all kinds of builds are experiencing the same thing as you.
 
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wobblysafe

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Thanks! and I have actually just played a couple other games and realised it didnt happen in them, like splinter cell blacklist, I just get constant 60-70 frames, So im guessing it is a game problem, just.. with the two games I play the most..

The only problem is that other people say they arnt having this issue in bf4 and they to are using nvidea cards, but it could just be a bug I got downloading it, because I did have some issues downloading the beta, and for dead island, as you said it must be a normal thing, so thanks :)
 
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wobblysafe

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When I said ordinary I was refering to how the other parts in my system were "Ordinarally" performing during the drops, sorry I should stop using any form of sarcasm when typing, but basically nothing is running as intensive as it was when the frames were high, but after running other games with no issues, I am going to assume for now that the games are the problem, maybe I will update my drivers again (As the beta drivers are out) and see how gameplay works out with those installed, thanks for the feedback though :)

 
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