Processor Bottlenecking my GPU

ZephryS · Mar 1, 2015

Hey guys,

I am new here. So, please bear with me. My current GPU is Sapphire r9 290 tri-x. Previously I used Gigabyte hd 5570, After upgrading my GPU I thought I will be able to play NFS Rivals on ultra settings with a stable fps. However, I saw my fps dip below 30 on ultra settings. I am guessing my processor is bottlenecking my current GPU. My current specs are,

Asus p7 h55 ml-x
Intel core i3-540
8 gb kingstone 1333 mhz ram
Thermaltake 730 watt smart powersupply
Saphhire r9 290 tri-x

Is my processor bottlenecking my GPU? If so, by how much?

Thanks!

Darkbreeze · Mar 1, 2015

Almost certainly. I'd really recommend either a newer Haswell refresh i3 or i5 and a new board as none of the newer chips are going to be supported by that socket type. Any of the i5's or i7's would be good choices, but even an i3-4360 would be better than that older i3 with it's slow base clock speed and small cache size.

mamasan2000 · Mar 1, 2015

I wouldn't go below Quadcores. That grahics card will never get utilized fully otherwise. Especially not in todays games.

coozie7 · Mar 1, 2015

There's a little good news, though, the motherboard supports quite a few other CPUs of that generation, including the venerable but potent i7s:
http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P7H55M_LX/HelpDesk_CPU/ Obviously, you'll need to look through either Craiglist or Ebay to source these parts but with a little hunting you'll probably be able to find a decent i7 which will help relieve the restriction.
Old as they are these parts are still plenty capable, especially if you can overclock them and would make a very good 'stop gap' upgrade until you can move to a more up to date platform.

Switching to a Haswell i5 is going to release yet more performance from the Tri-X but it's a expensive upgrade, requiring a new motherboard and, possibly a fresh Windows licence (unlikely unless yours is/was an OEM machine, Microsoft are usually OK with moving a license from one system to another as long as it's installed on just the one system).
As a useful point, it's possible you can reuse the existing memory, although these new chips really want DDR3 1600 as a minimum you could reuse the existing memory, at least for a while to soften the financial blow.

Darkbreeze · Mar 1, 2015

mamasan2000 :

That's bullshit, and a highly incorrect, if accepted, misbelief. Plus, the i3 I'm talking about has a very high single core speed at 3.7Ghz and has four threads. Do you really think the i7 is an 8 core chip? It's not. It's four cores with hyperthreading. The i3 is two cores plus hyperthreading and as seen in the benchmarks at the following link, performs nearly as well as the i5 in most titles and actually outperforms it in some applications and benchmarks as seen in the rest of the article. i3's are far more capable than most folks give them credit for, and in reality, a current generation i3 outperforms even an overclocked FX chip in almost every category so don't tell me it's not suitable for use with big cards.

http://www.techspot.com/review/943-best-value-desktop-cpu/page6.html

Darkbreeze · Mar 1, 2015

This would be a nice upgrade from what you have now, and the i3 can be substituted with an i5 or i7 if desired, but is being shown for the sake of keeping the price relatively low. The high clock speed and four thread capability make it almost as good at gaming titles as the more expensive i5. Some advantage can be gain with higher end i5's and i7's over the i3, mainly in application usage, but the i3 is still very capable and able to run most games at a high level.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-4370 3.8GHz Dual-Core Processor ($159.98 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($71.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $231.97
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-01 12:43 EST-0500

mamasan2000 · Mar 1, 2015

http://gamegpu.ru/rpg/rollevye/dragon-age-inkvizitsiya-test-gpu.html

i3 gets on average 20 fps less than fx-8350, at stock clocks I might add (who runs stock anyway?).

Darkbreeze · Mar 1, 2015

Did you even look at the MUCH more recent benchmarks I linked to? It does NOT get 20FPS less than the 8350. It gets higher frame rates than an 8320 overclocked to 4.6Ghz, which is the exact same chip as the 8350. On Thief, it gets almost 20FPS more than the overclocked 8 core FX chip. I don't know where you got that muddy old Russian benchmark from, but it isn't realistic. Maybe on that ONE particular title, or the handful of titles that dramatically make use of many threads, but that's the exception, not the rule.

http://www.techspot.com/review/943-best-value-desktop-cpu/page6.html

ZephryS · Mar 2, 2015

Thank you everyone for your kind and helpful solutions. I will probably get an i3 or i5. I didn't think that I would require a new mobo & processor when i was upgrading my GPU. I really appreciate your help everyone.

Darkbreeze · Mar 2, 2015

If you go with an i3, it would probably not make any sense to go with any model lower than the 4360 or 4370 which both have four threads and faster base clock speeds than some of the i5's. Whether you go with an i3 or i5, make sure it's a Haswell refresh chip, or wait a little bit longer and see what Broadwell brings to the table.

Search

Processor Bottlenecking my GPU

ZephryS

Reputable

Darkbreeze

Darkbreeze

Retired Mod

mamasan2000

Distinguished

coozie7

Champion

Darkbreeze

Retired Mod

Darkbreeze

Retired Mod

mamasan2000

Distinguished

Darkbreeze

Retired Mod

ZephryS

Reputable

Darkbreeze

Retired Mod

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page