Poor Performance on a Brand New Build

[gravatrax]

I am having very poor performance with a current build of mine and I can't figure out why.

In any case this is my setup
Core i5 3570K
EVGA GTX 670SC 2gb
Asrock Extreme4 Z77 Mobo
8GB Of G.Skill Ram
500 Antec PSU

I was playing BF3 today on ultra and even with certain elements turned down I was only getting 40FPS! Skyrim was giving me similar problems to, any ideas on how to find and root out this problem?

 

[ujaansona]

What's your monitor resolution?

 

[gravatrax]

1920x1080

I don't understand why it dips so persistently, I have heard of people using the exact same specs more or less with very minimal hiccups, is there a tool to monitor rig performance in game to see how much processing/gpu power I am actually using.

I am wondering if my PSU may be bottlenecking power to the graphics and cpu but I think the PC would bluescreen or restart before that happens.

 

[santaclaws]

I'm not sure but perhaps your PSU isn't providing enough power so your components aren't performing as they should. Upgrade your drivers then report back.

 

[ujaansona]

According to this review http://www.guru3d.com/article/evga-geforce-gtx-670-sc-review/19 your card is capable of running BF3 at nearly 50 FPS with all the eye candy turned on. But in different combat/Multiplayer situations it may come down to 40FPS. Is that the minimum FPS you're having?

EDIT: Your PSU seems to be fine. Could be a driver issue though.

 

[JamesSneed]

This is pretty normal. Test your FPS in BF3 single player mode. Then try a small multiplayer map like 16 or 20 man. Certain maps in 64 player mode are very intense and if your issue is getting 40FPS in those only then your getting about the performance I would expect.

You didn't say but you could overclock the 3570K to help as BF3 is very CPU intense on the 64 player maps.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

500 watts should do it if it's a decent PSU .... HCP/HCG/CP/SG series ok, Basiq I'd be concerned
http://www.geforce.com/hardware/desktop-gpus/geforce-gtx-670/specifications

Guru3D's BF3 test came in at 55 fps for the reference 670, 56 fps for the EVGA SC and 57 fps for the Asus TOP. It's a bit slower in multi player . I know my son plays in ultra in single player mode but drops to high in multi player.

 

[gravatrax]

The PSU is a little a little old its an EarthWatts 500, I did think about going the overclocking route to help it a bit, Hmmm, I guess I'd just have to buy a better Graphics Card, perhaps I should have gotten the 4gb version after all. In any case I'd have to upgrade the PSU to OC.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371007

That the one I haz^

I was thinking about this PSU
http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Professional-750-Watt-Certified-Compatible/dp/B0029F21LK/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1341846670&sr=8-3&keywords=corsair+750+psu

 

[ujaansona]

At 1080p 4GB VRAM won't help, 2Gb is fine. Just change the PSU & SLI with another EVGA GTX 670SC 2gb.

 

[gravatrax]

Hehe Maybe in the future

It would help skrim when I set the Ugrid to 15 lol
Unfortunately my mobo would only run on card x16 and the other at x8 so Id probably need a mobo upgrade too

 

[kdickinson87]

I've heard of driver issues with the 6xx series NVidia drivers. Are they the latest version?

 

[gravatrax]

Yes they were, I did a complete reinstall of my PC.

I don't think I've heard of of too many issues regarding Nvidia drivers, honestly from what I've seen they are more stable than that of ATIs.

 

[rocknrollz]

They are not more stable. That is nonsense. But Nvidia usually makes a habit of fixing problems in their drivers faster.

 

[gravatrax]

Just what I've heard man.

Alright so on the subject of overclocking. I am completely new to it and have no idea where to start.

 

[neomec]

Do you have AIDA64? Run some benchmarks.
Also; What is your RAM speed? 1600Mhz?
HDD - Any Green or Blue versions? RPM?
What about mobo drivers? Intel Chipset Drivers particularly...
And temperatures?

 

[gravatrax]

I will try that out too. I running a Sandra Test right now.

Ram Speed is Supposed to be 1866Mhz, however I checked the bios and CPUZ was reading reading at 1600Mhz, So I increased the frequency to 1866Mhz manually though the bios. I reset the bios so I will have to go back and do it again.

Within the Asrock Tuning Utility I I increased the CPU Ratio to x42, (PCIE Freq x100 so it should be 4.2 Ghz).

My Hard Drive is a Western Digital Caviar Black 7200RPM Hard Drive 1.5 tb

I am pretty sure I had all the drivers installed correctly this time around I left out the VirtuMVP and that was it, but all the intel related drivers I installed.

Ill get you some temps after this test. I typically run about 28-30c Idle maybe a little more with general computing (dling stuff at 2.0+mbs, listening to music, etc. etc.)

 

[neomec]

You should get min. 50-55 fps with these. Don't bother with OC. Your build just fine.
Try FurMark to stress GPU and monitor temps.
Try different or old version of Nvidia drivers. Even try beta versions!
CPU-Z and GPU-Z... Check for any low reports? PCIe 3.0 or 2.0 ?
Your mobo supports 2x PCIe 3.0 x16.
Check power cables on GPU. How do you feeding GPU?
Don't use same power cable for feeding the gpu. You need two 6-pin PCI Express power connectors.

 

[gravatrax]

I use two six pin wired directly from the PSU. Well I overclocked to 4.2 Ghz and the game would not even launched. Then I set it back to 3.4 not luck, 3.2 nope. 3.7 nope. So I am uninstalling and reinstalling the game. which requires re downloading it. I have no idea what is going on but it always gets stuck at connecting for both mp and sp

GPUZ

 

[neomec]

Don't bother with OC. Set to the default.
Also you're not using latest driver from nvidia. (301.42 WHQL)
Install with default settings, it seems physx drivers not installed. Battfield 3 not using it but you will need eventually.
mpdepends on connection and player count. Try to test with SP only.

 

[gravatrax]

I ovclocked to 4.2Ghz I never go below 55

I did a fresh install of windows, as well as updated to the drivers. Everything seems to be running smoothly again. Thanks for the help!

 

[gravatrax]

Here is me playing the Game!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbn0b9O1FW0&feature=plcp

 

[JamesSneed]

Glad the OC did the trick for performance. Hopefully some in here, neomec, sees this and realizes a CPU OC can really help in BF3 in multiplayer mode.