Something wrong with my 970?

DannyDorito

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Oct 27, 2016
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I purchased a pc with an i5 4460 and gtx 960 about a year ago and ever since i upgraded to an MSI GTX 970 ARMOR 2X OC 4GB ive been having problems, if i play an old game like tf2 and crank the settings all the way up as i know it will play fine because i've seen benchmarks handling this game fine however in a regular fight my fps goes all the way down to 30-40 fps at times. I've checked afterburner and my gpu usage stays at 20%. When i render the game at 4k and max settings, i get the same framerate however above 60% gpu usage, i always keep my drivers up to date and i know that all of my hardware is compatible because i've done extensive amounts of research, on the other hand. DOOM handles great staying at 100+ fps one maximum settings without a hassle. But a game like mirrors edge catalyst i get almost the same problem as tf2, the gpu usage stays at about 60% the entire time with horrible framerates and stuttering at ultra settings.

That being said im not tech savvy at all but i do know the basics. I really need help on this because I want the most out of this expensive card.
 

Justinsanity

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Sep 11, 2015
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1. Make sure you're completely uninstalling your drivers with DDU in safe mode before installing new ones.

2. What PSU are you using?

3. List all the games that work fine, and which do not that you've tested.

4. Try "repairing" the games that don't work. (verify game cache in Steam, repair in Origin)
 

DannyDorito

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Oct 27, 2016
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1. I uninstalled all the 960 drivers manually with the windows uninstaller and then installed 970 drivers from the nvidia website with a clean install. Im not sure if i need DDU to do this as i researched this but if you really think its worth it then i could.

2. Im using the corsair CX600, i understand that it is considered a pretty bad psu overall but i dont see any power problems and it provides enough power for the gpu.

3. Pretty much all games do this with a few exceptions like doom, if the graphics settings are lowered, the gpu usage decreases which leaves me with the same fps but uglier graphics and lower gpu usage.

4. I always perform a cache check on games that are glitchy or crash, The game files dont seem to be the problem.
 

DannyDorito

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Oct 27, 2016
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So i did the whole DDU process, installed the drivers and im afraid there is no change. i Tested Mirrors edge catalyst and Team fortress 2 with the same outcomes of low gpu usage and low framerates.

 

Justinsanity

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Haven't used an nvidia card in a while so I don't remember exactly what the driver settings are like, but what do you have set under "power" settings? Try messing around with those and see if you get better framerates, the driver could be trying to conserve power or something.
 

DannyDorito

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Oct 27, 2016
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Changed the power mode to max perfornance without a different once more.
 

Justinsanity

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Hmm this sounds frustrating. :(

If you want to rule out a software issue, you're going to need to format your hard drive and reinstall Windows. If that doesn't fix it you probably have faulty parts or something went wrong when you were installing your card.