Whats bottle necking my 7950?

[PrinceVampiro]

I recently upgraded from an old XFX 5770 and although there is a noticeable improvement in FPS. I am still not achieving anywhere near my new cards full potential. The reviews and benchmarks I have read show that my system is being held back somewhere. I think it may be my CPU or possibly I'm not taking full advantage of my RAM slots/speed. Let me know what you guys think could be holding me back the most or what would be my best bet at upgrading first to see the most improvement. Motherboard only supports AM3 processors by the way, but here is the specs along with some links to the harder to find components in my PC.

Windows 7 64 Bit
Gigabyte HD7950 3GB Graphics card
6GB DDR3 10600 ram 1333mhz I believe.(came with pc on purchase, only 3 out of 4 RAM slots are in use)
AMD Phenom ll x4 840T processor. 2.9GHZ (3.2GHZ turbo)
N-Alvorix-RS880-uATX motherboard
OCZ Modxstream Pro 700w PSU
Seagate Barracuda Sata 3.0GB/s 7200RPM 1TB HD

Hard Drive - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148433

Motherboard - http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c02560084&lc=en&cc=us&dlc=en&product=5049516

 

[Deemo13]

This looks familiar from somewhere

You are probably just getting bottlenecked by your processor if anything.

 

[Spaniard United]

Agree ... if anything, probably the CPU.

There really aren't many choices if you're wanting to keep the same mobo. Basically a more powerful Phenom II (x4 or x6).

Your RAM speed is as good as your mobo seems to support. Another RAM module isn't going to do much for you ... so basically you need a new motherboard before any real upgrading can be done.

*Fake Edit* You said Phenom II x4 but the link you gave was for an Athlon II x4 though in the picture is shows a Phenom II. Which is it? It seems like it's Athlon and if so, the odds your bottleneck is your CPU just increased.

 

[PrinceVampiro]

Agree ... if anything, probably the CPU.

There really aren't many choices if you're wanting to keep the same mobo. Basically a more powerful Phenom II (x4 or x6).

Your RAM speed is as good as your mobo seems to support. Another RAM module isn't going to do much for you ... so basically you need a new motherboard before any real upgrading can be done.

*Fake Edit* You said Phenom II x4 but the link you gave was for an Athlon II x4 though in the picture is shows a Phenom II. Which is it? It seems like it's Athlon and if so, the odds your bottleneck is your CPU just increased.

Hmm yeah youre right, thanks for pointing that out on the processor link. I guess I was strictly looking at the 840T in the description.. but theirs 2 diff versions of my processor, the older version is just called Phenom II x4 840 which isnt as good as the 840T version that I have. But my processor is definently a Phenom II x4 and not an athlon so I removed that link. My processor is the same speeds as that one though. 2.9GHZ, 6MB L3 cache.

 

[Deemo13]

Do you have an upgrade budget?

 

[PrinceVampiro]

Do you have an upgrade budget?

um, not really a budget but the cheaper the better with Christmas around the corner lol.. plus I just unloaded $300 on my ATI 7950. I thought about trying to find a decent priced motherboard and maybe an I5 or I7 processor. Or maybe thought about keeping my board and getting a six core phenom.

Currently debating upgrading to this CPU - It has turbo boost of up to 3.4GHZ

http://www.ebay.com/itm/AMD-Phenom-II-x6-1065T-2-9GHz-9MB-Hex-Core-AM3-95W-HDT65TWFK6DGR-/271109658733?_trksid=p3284.m263&_trkparms=algo%3DSIC%26its%3DI%26itu%3DUCI%252BIA%252BUA%252BFICS%252BUFI%26otn%3D21%26pmod%3D130765626131%26ps%3D54

What do you think? Any suggestions on a averaged price CPU or possibly a board and CPU?

 

[Deemo13]

I don't think the X6 would be that much of an upgrade. An i5 would be a solid choice. You have DDR3, so you don't have to buy that luckily.

 

[Azn Cracker]

if there is any bottleneck. its almost certainly your processor. get a new one! I'd go with a i5 3570k. or if you are an amd fan, the fx series isnt half bad.

 

[Deemo13]

if there is any bottleneck. its almost certainly your processor. get a new one! I'd go with a i5 3570k. or if you are an amd fan, the fx series isnt half bad.

I'd only go for the Piledriver FX.

 

[poweruser_24]

You have a dual channel architecture motherboard, but 3 dimms installed, so you may be taking a small performance hit with one ram module, assuming that the pair are running in dual channel, and the remaining 1 in single, rather than all 3 in single channel. Not sure that it will be a complete bottleneck, but may be worth removing the unpaired module to see if it increases performance (cheaper than buying a new one to find out). Provided you aren't running lots of background services requiring the full 6GB then it wouldn't hurt for a quick test.

 

[jaideep1337]

best bet here is to upgrade to a 965 BE ovet the 840T and OC it further. 965s can easily reach 4.0 GHZ and at that level the bottleneck will be minimal

 

[Deemo13]

Well, considering this is originally a HP, it might not overclock the processor.

 

[PrinceVampiro]

You have a dual channel architecture motherboard, but 3 dimms installed, so you may be taking a small performance hit with one ram module, assuming that the pair are running in dual channel, and the remaining 1 in single, rather than all 3 in single channel. Not sure that it will be a complete bottleneck, but may be worth removing the unpaired module to see if it increases performance (cheaper than buying a new one to find out). Provided you aren't running lots of background services requiring the full 6GB then it wouldn't hurt for a quick test.

Nice suggestion. I think I'm gonna give that a try here shortly just to see what happens since I've been wondering about that as well.

 

[Spaniard United]

I highly doubt the current mobo has much if any OC capabilities. From everything I've seen, my recommendation is to buy a new mobo. For your CPU I would agree to shoot for an i5, but if budget is a factor then you could go for a Vishera FX series (not Zambezi). In that case get a mobo that supports AM3 and AM3+ so you can continue to use your current CPU until you get the new one.

 

[soundguruman]

I recently upgraded from an old XFX 5770 and although there is a noticeable improvement in FPS. I am still not achieving anywhere near my new cards full potential. The reviews and benchmarks I have read show that my system is being held back somewhere. I think it may be my CPU or possibly I'm not taking full advantage of my RAM slots/speed. Let me know what you guys think could be holding me back the most or what would be my best bet at upgrading first to see the most improvement. Motherboard only supports AM3 processors by the way, but here is the specs along with some links to the harder to find components in my PC.

Windows 7 64 Bit
Gigabyte HD7950 3GB Graphics card
6GB DDR3 10600 ram 1333mhz I believe.(came with pc on purchase, only 3 out of 4 RAM slots are in use)
AMD Phenom ll x4 840T processor. 2.9GHZ (3.2GHZ turbo)
N-Alvorix-RS880-uATX motherboard
OCZ Modxstream Pro 700w PSU
Seagate Barracuda Sata 3.0GB/s 7200RPM 1TB HD

Hard Drive - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148433

Motherboard - http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c02560084&lc=en&cc=us&dlc=en&product=5049516

Should use 2 hard drives. 1 TB drive is very, very slow.
Use a small fast hard drive for the OS only, and store your personal files only on the 1 TB drive.
Set the small OS drive to boot first. Do not store your personal stuff on the OS drive.
This will speed the thing up quite a bit...

One thing is to make sure that the priority of the game is highest; there maybe other processes running that have priority over the game.
Including for instance security programs and antivirus. The latest of which have gaming modes.
If there is not a gaming mode on the security try turning it OFF. Now test it with the security turned off. Multiple mismatched security programs can cause conflicts.
“Free” security downloaded from the internet can cause lots of problems…



Another good thing is to eliminate as many unused / junk / UN-needed applications.
Try to get rid of resource hog, un needed / unnecessary applications.
turn off the screen saver
Go into the power profiles,
set standby, hibernate and sleep to OFF
leave the monitor standby ON, that's OK (maybe not, try OFF)
Set the Hard Drive standby to NEVER
Set system Performance to MAXIMUM, not "quiet mode."

Open the bios set up and make sure "cool and quiet" is OFF. (AMD)
There may be a performance setting in the bios setup you have...make sure it's cranked up to max.
in the bios, see that the allocation for video, if available, is maxed.

Now open the hardware manager profiles...
click start
click computer
click system properties
click device manager
double click on mice and other pointing devices
right click on HID compliant mouse
left click on properties
click on the power management tab
UN-check the box that says: "allow the computer to turn off this device to save power." (there is now NO check mark in this box)
click OK

Now repeat this procedure for all mice, monitors, keyboards, and ALL USB ports on the device manager list.

You must open ALL the devices one at a time, as above, and turn off the power saver, for each device.

 

[PrinceVampiro]

I highly doubt the current mobo has much if any OC capabilities. From everything I've seen, my recommendation is to buy a new mobo. For your CPU I would agree to shoot for an i5, but if budget is a factor then you could go for a Vishera FX series (not Zambezi). In that case get a mobo that supports AM3 and AM3+ so you can continue to use your current CPU until you get the new one.

Yeah this board isnt much in terms of being able to OC and everything. Hopefully I can find a pretty decent deal on a new MB and Processor since its getting near Christmas time. I've practically rebuilt this old HP, I might as well upgrade the board and processor and finish getting rid of the rest of HP's restrictions lol. Then i'll have a fully custom PC inside an HP case haha.

Just curious, why do you say Vishera FX and not Zambezi?

 

[Deemo13]

Vishera is faster and newer.

 

[Spaniard United]

Zambezi aka bulldozer had some shortcomings that vishera aka piledriver addressed.