Terrible i7 3700k graphics performance

[Rich_1000]

Hi there,

I've just built a system which briefly consists of the following:

i7 3770k Ivy Bridge
Gigabyte z77x-d3h
8gb of ram
I don't have a dedicated GPU - I understood that the graphics capabilities of the processor would be enough for my purposes.

After noticing graphical glitches I ran some benchmark tests. The 3D results were awful, with my system only seeing 3 - 4 fps when running 3DMark 11.

The test results are here:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4593643

Even flash is glitchy. All drivers are up to date.

Any suggestions greatly appreciated.

 

[Brett928S2]

Hi

Buy a card....

All the best Brett

 

[Rich_1000]

I appreciate what you're saying, but the results should be far better than that - as in about 8 times better.

 

[Deleted member 217926]

Did you install the latest drivers? It even says in your results there is a driver problem.

Edit: Ok I reread and you said all drivers are up to date. You have the latest BIOS and chipset drivers as well? From the Gigabyte website not from the driver CD that came wth the board?

 

[cbrunnem]

Hi

Buy a card....

All the best Brett

usual post from Brett

I appreciate what you're saying, but the results should be far better than that - as in about 8 times better.

can you better explain the problem? what are these graphical glitches you speak of and in what programs are they happening in?

 

[Rich_1000]

Did you install the latest drivers? It even says in your results there is a driver problem.

Edit: Ok I reread and you said all drivers are up to date. You have the latest BIOS and chipset drivers as well? From the Gigabyte website not from the driver CD that came wth the board?

Yes, I just ran a scan of my system with Gigabyte, which confirmed that all drivers are up-to-date.

 

[MotherFerJones]

Huh.... Thats intel HD4500 graphics, the best onboard graphics they make, which i kind of like being the smartest person with down syndrome. Its either the CPU or the Mobo, check the pads on the CPU to make sure all the pins in the socket are contacting the pads on the CPU, there should be a little indentation on each pad, not much but youll see it. If you want to be really lazy you could just RMA both CPU and MOBO, but have a sob story to tell customer service or it might not go through.

 

[Rich_1000]

I've already had to RMA one motherboard which didn't work at all (same model).

If the CPU wasn't contacting properly I'd be surprised if it would work at all. I'll take a look though.

 

[Deleted member 217926]

It also says your processor was running at 2.2Ghz. Not sure what's up with that. I have not even run 3D Mark in years but it looks to me like you scored in the correct percentile. Out of 1,700 results of similar systems 1,638 scored between 700 and 1,400. So you are on the low end of normal.

Your video driver is too new so that might explain part of it and your CPU bing underclocked explains the rest. According to the website:

Intel

Intel HD Graphics 4000
8.15.10.2712 Drivers

Are the latest supported drivers. You are using:

Driver version 8.15.10.2761

 

[MotherFerJones]

Well it depends on the pins that arent contacting, if its the power pins, then yeah, no go on power on, but if its like a memory controller pin then it just might cause the problem your talking about, sounds like your CPU isnt getting enough dedicated memory from your RAM which is ridiculous since your rocking 8GB's. So thats why i suggested looking at your CPU pads.

 

[Rich_1000]

[Intel HD Graphics 4000
8.15.10.2712 Drivers

Are the latest supported drivers. You are using:

Driver version 8.15.10.2761[/quotemsg]

I actually updated the drivers to the current version via intel's site after running the test. I then rain it again but it made no difference.

I'm not sure how the drivers not being supported could affect the test. After all, surely the test suite is simply asking the PC to render 3D objects and timing how long it takes to do so. I could be missing something though.

The processor speed confused me too.

 

[neon neophyte]

it has already been suggested, but i think you overlooked it confusing it with drivers. is your motherboard BIOS the latest version? BIOS does not = drivers.

 

[Rich_1000]

it has already been suggested, but i think you overlooked it confusing it with drivers. is your motherboard BIOS the latest version? BIOS does not = drivers.

I ran a Gigabyte check which confirmed that everything is up to date. I believe that it checked the BIOS too. Don't worry, I appreciate the difference (although what I wrote above didn't make that clear). I'll check again. Something isn't right.

 

[cjl]

3-4 fps is normal for low-end graphics on 3dmark 11. You might be able to improve it a bit if your processor is actually running at 2.2GHz, as 3dmark says (it's possible your CPU isn't running at full speed, but it's just as likely that 3dmark is reading your core speed wrong). Honestly though, 3dmark isn't necessarily representative of what you need the graphics for. What are you doing with your computer that uses graphics, and what errors are you seeing?

 

[Rich_1000]

3-4 fps is normal for low-end graphics on 3dmark 11

Given the nature of the 3D in the test it didn't look like anything which the processor should have a problem with. I read a few reviews that the i7 is more than capable of playing most games in the 20-30fps range, and most modern games look at least as computationally demanding as the 3D models used for the test.

I've updated the BIOS from F7 to F15. This hasn't affected the test results, with the exception that the utility now recognises the correct clock speed.

I should point out that I'm not using the PC for games, or anything 3D-related for that matter. However, if I've spent good money on top of the range i7 processor I'd like to make sure that it is working correctly.

 

[MotherFerJones]

Run a real game not a benchmark, download fraps , download a free game like League of Legends, then play and see if its up to snuff, If your getting bad results in a REAL game then i would be worried.

 

[Rich_1000]

Looks like my expectations were too high. With the exception of physics score, my system benchmarks better than that tested at TomsHardware:

www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ivy-bridge-benchmark-core-i7-3770k,3181-4.html

 

[cjl]

3-4 fps is normal for low-end graphics on 3dmark 11

Given the nature of the 3D in the test it didn't look like anything which the processor should have a problem with. I read a few reviews that the i7 is more than capable of playing most games in the 20-30fps range, and most modern games look at least as computationally demanding as the 3D models used for the test.

3dmark isn't designed to run efficiently - it's designed to tax systems. My desktop (with a pair of 580s in SLI and a 3960x, which is currently at 4GHz) only gets around 60FPS on the first two tests, 80 on the third, and 40 on the fourth, even though it's only running at 1280x720 with no AA (the default settings). That same pair of 580s can run pretty much every game out there at 2560x1600 at similar or higher framerates with all settings maxed out, in some cases with significant AA as well. Even though the graphics don't appear to be that impressive, they are incredibly taxing on the GPU, so it's completely normal for yours to struggle to put out a few FPS in this test.

(Here's my result if you want to see any more details: http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4594502 )

Also of note is my CPU clock - it's running at 4GHz in reality, but 3dmark appears to have measured its idle clockspeed instead (1.2GHz), so yours may well be running at full speed and the same mismeasurement is occurring in your case.

I've updated the BIOS from F7 to F15. This hasn't affected the test results, with the exception that the utility now recognises the correct clock speed.

I should point out that I'm not using the PC for games, or anything 3D-related for that matter. However, if I've spent good money on top of the range i7 processor I'd like to make sure that it is working correctly.

Honestly, it sounds like it should be fine to me as long as the clocks are working properly (and to test that, download CPU-Z and then run something stressful and make sure it clocks up to at least 3.5GHz under load). It should also be able to run most games at low to moderate settings - games are, for the most part, dramatically less taxing and demanding than 3dmark, so they should be able to run without a problem.

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

Looks like my expectations were too high. With the exception of physics score, my system benchmarks better than that tested at TomsHardware:

www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ivy-bridge-benchmark-core-i7-3770k,3181-4.html

If I had seen this earlier, I would have told you and showed you just that.

You were expecting WAY too much. HD4000 may be the best iGPU that Intel has ever had, but that still doesn't mean it's much good. It's not meant for gaming. It can do it, but you need very low expectations for someone to be happy gaming with it.

I'm actually more concerned with your Physics score. Granted, my 2500K is @ 4.5, but my Physics score is 8149. http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4510174

Try re-running the bench with the High Performance power profile enabled in Windows. That should at least report max 4 core Turbo speed to the program and we'll see if the lower speed has anything to do with the slightly low Physics score (it seems low to me, anyway).

 

[sarinaide]

Ditto, honestly HD4000's forte is certainly not gaming, but sufficient for encoding and rendering, considering 3DMark 11 while it may not look impressive is stressing the GPU component by stressing tessellations and effects the HD iGP comes crashing to unplayable rates.

In GPU dependant game titles, HD4000 cannot break double digits so its about right.

 

[amuffin]

There are 1000+ other people who scored the same as you.

Physics score is good, gpu score, not so much....

 

[cjl]

If I had seen this earlier, I would have told you and showed you just that.

You were expecting WAY too much. HD4000 may be the best iGPU that Intel has ever had, but that still doesn't mean it's much good. It's not meant for gaming. It can do it, but you need very low expectations for someone to be happy gaming with it.

I'm actually more concerned with your Physics score. Granted, my 2500K is @ 4.5, but my Physics score is 8149. http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4510174

Try re-running the bench with the High Performance power profile enabled in Windows. That should at least report max 4 core Turbo speed to the program and we'll see if the lower speed has anything to do with the slightly low Physics score (it seems low to me, anyway).

The physics score still involves some graphics, and when the iGPU is being used, the main core can't turbo as high, and the GPU is using some of the cache. Because of this, the same Intel CPU scores substantially lower, even on physics, when the iGPU is being used compared to a discrete card. You can see that in the linked review - with the iGPU, the physics score is 7625, but the same CPU scores 9819 in physics with a Radeon 6570 to handle the graphics (which is hardly a powerful GPU).

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

The physics score still involves some graphics.

I actually didn't know that, but that makes a lot more sense now.

 

[Rich_1000]

I just wanted to thank everybody for all the useful information provided above. I've since downloaded a couple of game demos and the 3D performance is absolutely fine. 3DMark made me think that my system's performance was far worse than it actually is - the fact that the scenes which they render look like those of late-90s PC games is probably what threw me, although I realise that they are no doubt designed to be computationally expensive.

In hindsight I may have been better going for an i5 Ivybridge, rather than an i7, and used the money saved (along with a bit more) to buy myself a nice graphics card. However, given what I've seen since I originally posted, I'm happy with my system.