Crossfire or cpu problem?

[jason35]

Phenom II 960T (unlocked to x6, no other changes)
2x Radeon 6850(11.12 ccc)
8GB Hyperx ddr3 1600
ASRock 870 Extreme 3 R2.0
1TB Seagate 6.0Gbps
750w Antec psu
screen resolution 1980x1080

1) Just ran prime95 for an hour. Temps were around 66C. Not sure if thats to high. Idle at around 36C using speedfan.

2) In Battlefield 3(multiplayer) i'll be getting about 50-60 fps and it will drop to around 10 and couple times completely freezing but come back after a few seconds. Doesnt seem to have issues with Skyrim. Didnt try any other games yet though.

3) Could bad cores do that even though it didnt give errors during the prime tests? I did no other changes in the bios.


4) And also....I originally had a 870 extreme3 R1.0 but dimm slots and ethernet port were going bad so I replaced it with the R2.0. I didnt do a refresh windows install, instead just installed the needed usb and lan drivers. Would that be a case for the problem?

 

[Motopsychojdn]

Lock the two 'extra' cores back up and see how things are 'standard' that gives you a baseline to work from,
The Mobo is the same Mobo, just a newer bios revision, I.e. v2

not sure of your chip temp limits per se but as a rule Amd chips are 62-65' max dependant on the chip model, I don't like going over 50 personally

bf3, it could be an issue, it may be cores or heat-based, lock up as mentioned and see how it performs standard, it may be the cause it may not, only one way to find out

you shouldn't need a fresh install of windows though for the mobo question, just to clarify

Moto

 

[jason35]

Sorry for late response. Havent had much time to test things.

Didnt think skyrim would of had issues as new vegas doesnt but skyrim had issues of being under 20fps all time. This was fixed with a .dll and some other thing.

Just tried bf3 with 12.1 drivers and it helps, still has drops on few maps. Oman is horrible. Game no longer has the under 10fps, still drops below 20, especially in oman. I do have the cards OC to 850 and they get around 60-65C.


So at this point i'm kinda thinking its either just bf3. 3dmark vantage and 11 seem to be giving comparable scores to others.


Might consider better cpu cooler and oc. Read around that its quite easy to hit 4ghz with this cpu. Can do 3.8 with just multi but gets to hot for my liking. And i'm a noob when it comes to messing with nb and ram timings to squeeze the most out of the system.

 

[Motopsychojdn]

Try disabling crossfire for the games just as an idea, I had to install WoW on my new Rig yesterday and it was great 200-250 fps,
but shearing and freezing up, 'driver error' killing the system so I disabled Crossfire and I'm fine now, just set a profile for gaming if it solves it for you and hope the developers come up with a fix soon
I hate having a 6950 2Gb 'spare' in there lol
Moto

 

[truegenius]

Phenom II 960T (unlocked to x6, no other changes)
2x Radeon 6850(11.12 ccc)
8GB Hyperx ddr3 1600
ASRock 870 Extreme 3 R2.0
1TB Seagate 6.0Gbps
750w Antec psu
screen resolution 1980x1080

1) Just ran prime95 for an hour. Temps were around 66C. Not sure if thats to high. Idle at around 36C using speedfan.

2) In Battlefield 3(multiplayer) i'll be getting about 50-60 fps and it will drop to around 10 and couple times completely freezing but come back after a few seconds. Doesnt seem to have issues with Skyrim. Didnt try any other games yet though.

3) Could bad cores do that even though it didnt give errors during the prime tests? I did no other changes in the bios.


4) And also....I originally had a 870 extreme3 R1.0 but dimm slots and ethernet port were going bad so I replaced it with the R2.0. I didnt do a refresh windows install, instead just installed the needed usb and lan drivers. Would that be a case for the problem?

you will need a better cooler like noctua nh d14 or whichever you prefer
and raise vcore a little

 

[jason35]

Best answer selected by jason35.

 

[jason35]

you will need a better cooler like noctua nh d14 or whichever you prefer
and raise vcore a little

Yea I was thinking a noctua or silver arrow but dont know if i want to spend the money on one lol. I have $15 promo dollars on newegg. Still not sure if I wanna pay the money for one. Any other recommendations that are cheaper that will do the job?...currently all i have is the stock nzxt phantom fans.

 

[Motopsychojdn]

Thanks for B.A. man, did it sort you out alright?
and yes, if you have the $15 off coupon, you might as well invest in some good cooling before you get into overclocking hehe
Moto

 

[jason35]

It did work for skyrim and bf3 but crossfire should work better

Skyrim works great now in crossfire when using tesv acceleration layer/skse launcher

BF3 seems to work ok now with 12.1 preview drivers. Usually gets around 50 frames and dips to high 20s now and then if area is busy.

All other games seem to be working fine. Dirt3, Portal, Dead Island, and iRacing.

 

[Motopsychojdn]

Cool, always good to hear feedback on the forums, lets us know it went well
Moto