FPS drops in game - Overclock issue? GPU? Unsure :(

[PhilUK]

Hey guys.

First off, this is my rig.

15 2500K Overclocked to 4.5GHz.
EVGA P67 Micro SLI
GTX 470 SLI
8GB DDR3
22 inch monitor
950W Corsair PSU

The issue I'm getting this in is Battlefield 3. I'm just going to talk you through the issue, what happened and what I've done since.

About a week ago I could play the game on high at a constant 60 FPS. I got a SSD, formatted windows 7, reinstalled it and installed Windows 8.

A few days later my PC started to drop FPS in game from 60 to 55, 50, back up to 60. This only happens after 10 minutes playing. I thought it might be a memory leak from Windows 8, but it wasn't. If I restarted my PC the issue would go away. It basically jumps around a bit. It's not really bad but it's a problem I didn't have a week ago. Plus this machine can play the game on high settings fine.

I checked my temperatures. One of my GPUs was running at 95 degrees, going up to 105 degrees celcius at one point. I took the cards out, cleaned them and swapped the one with the better fan to the one that was running hot. Now they run at 77 and 65. No problems there.

I then wondered if it might be Windows so I formatted and reverted back to Windows 7 but the problem is still there. Play for a little while, the FPS drops, back up, then down.

I then decided to look at my overclock. When I overclocked it, with this mobo, I only really need to change the BaseClock, take off Virtual tech and EIST and it does the rest. So I decided to try and set the voltage myself. It didn't change. I also set it back to 3.3GHz and it kinda ran similar.

Looking on CPUZ the overclock would sometimes revert to 4.3GHz instead of 4.5, but it didn't seem to make a difference, it just did the same thing and 4.3GHz is enough processor power to play this. The game is known to be processor heavy but I don't think it needs 4.3GHz. In any case I fixed that and it didn't change. When I had my previous processor, I5 760 @ 4GHz - if it was too low the game would become choppy. Which is why I overclocked in the first place.

I'm asking for help in what to do next, I've updated GPU drivers, rolled back, used beta drivers, messed around with fans, cleaned everything out, formatted, and attempted to mess around with the overclock. I'm no expert and I do rely on the internet for settings and advice for my overclock but I have a friend who is very competent with overclocking but isn't sure what else it could be.

Maybe a memory leak, maybe the SLI bridge?

Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance!

 

[fornoob]

Hi and welcome to OCF!

Was there any update of the game recently?
Did you try to fix the install of the game?

 

[PhilUK]

Hi and welcome to OCF!

Was there any update of the game recently?
Did you try to fix the install of the game?

Hi! There are constant updates of the game, I have reinstalled the game a couple of times as I have formatted it a couple of times

I've asked quite a few people in my clan and they don't have this issue.

The only constant I can find, is that Battlefield is CPU intensive. When ever my overclock was failing before a similar thing would happen, except that it would be choppy as soon as I entered the game, not after 10-20 minutes. Also I'm pretty sure the overclock is fine.

Is there a way to check or monitor this in game?

If I drop the settings to medium I don't seem to have an issue. But this system has been running the game on 60 FPS on High since release, it's only now that it's happening.

It may be an update issue, but I'm trying to diagnose if there are memory leaks, GPU issues, CPU OC issues etc and am unsure of what to do next.

Thanks

 

[redduc900]

Post the EXACT model of RAM, including both the rated and current frequency, timings, and voltage. And either take pic's of the overclocking related BIOS screens, or post a BIOS template showing all of the overclocking related BIOS settings at the current 4.5GHz clock.

 

[PhilUK]

Hey, thanks for the reply

My Ram is 8GB Corsair DDR3 Vengeance. It's been set to 1600MHz. It was originally 1333MHz. I can't seem to find the DRAM Voltage. But I've included a picture of my CPU-Z

Here are the pictures.

If you require anything else just let me know. Thanks.

 

[redduc900]

Right off the bat, the DIMM voltage is lower (1.493V) than what the modules are rated to run at, which is 1.50V. Bump the DIMM voltage to a value that equals 1.50-1.55V, as shown in the Current DIMM Voltage field. Also disable EIST, C1E Support, C3 and C6 Report, and set Package C State Limit to No Limit. And either enable the DDR3-1600 SPD Profile, or manually adjust the timings to 9-9-9-24-2T (2T Command Rate instead of the tighter 1T for the time being).

 

[PhilUK]

Ok I've done everything but the DIMM voltage. I've changed the DIMM voltage (mv) up high but the current dimm voltage just stays at 1.493 V. I changed it, saved it and looked and it doesn't change.

Here's a couple of pics after saving.

Sorry about the quality. It's the glare.

 

[TsunamiJuan]

Honestly it doesnt sound like an overclocking issue. It sounds like a settings problem in the video card driver. Its also not uncommon for some nvidia cards to get stuck in the wrong power state or throttle down mid game if the settings on the card are wrong or the card isnt being driven hard enough to warrant what it feels is a full load.

If you could give me some info about your gpu's, Driver version, Type, Post a GPU-z window. I can probably walk you through How to diagnose this. Aswell as the work arounds for it.

http://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/

 

[redduc900]

You hit F10 to save and exit, then re-entered the BIOS after making the changes?

 

[PhilUK]

Honestly it doesnt sound like an overclocking issue. It sounds like a settings problem in the video card driver. Its also not uncommon for some nvidia cards to get stuck in the wrong power state or throttle down mid game if the settings on the card are wrong or the card isnt being driven hard enough to warrant what it feels is a full load.

If you could give me some info about your gpu's, Driver version, Type, Post a GPU-z window. I can probably walk you through How to diagnose this. Aswell as the work arounds for it.

http://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/

I'll be with you in 5 minutes, thanks.

You hit F10 to save and exit, then re-entered the BIOS after making the changes?

No, I went across to the save screen and hit save then went back. Also checked it if it was saved when exited.

 

[CaNsA]

I had a similar issue with my gtx560 recently.
Turns out having logmein + orb running in the background/systray was the culprit.

Close all un-needed progs/apps and give it a bash.

 

[PhilUK]

Ok i have GTX 470's in SLI. I have a MSI Twin Frozr on the bottom slot and a regular 470 on the top slot. The monitor is connected via the top card on the right connector. DVI.

I am running driver version 310.33. It's a beta driver, but I don't seem to have as many issues as I did before with this driver. It was up and down a lot more often. Now it's not as severe but it did this the other day and then started again.



Here's the GPU Z pictures before I started playing a 64 man Metro game on BF3 on high video settings. (Left hand is the MSI Twin Frozr, Right hand image is the normal 470)

And here's mid game, under what I would imagine to be a lot of load. I have manually set the fans to 80% for the MSI 470 and 60% for the regular. The bottom slot seems to get a lot hotter for some reason, I think it's the fact it's a micro board and the components are cramped on that slot. No biggie though, I think.

Thanks again!

 

[CaNsA]

I dunno why i bother sometimes....

 

[TsunamiJuan]

I had a feeling you where using a nvidia card So theres a few things to do to fix this. For starters making sure the power mode in the nvidia control panel is at maximum performance. This doesn't 100% fix the problem But it lessens it to some degree.

Next download http://downloads.guru3d.com/NVIDIA-Inspector-1.94-download-2612.html

Its gonna have the ability to control power states of the card. If you watch it while your gaming what i think your gonna notice is that the power states are cycling between 3d mode powerstate mode, and either the secondary power states or idle. You can go into the overclocking settings in nvidia inspector and actually channge the performance speeds for the other power stats. I'll make some screen shots for you later to show exactly where you should be looking (wont be till i get home from work though so about 5 hours or more). Its also not uncommon for nvidia cards during long run times to get stuck in one step below max 3d power state which i think is p4. You can fix that problem by doing this aswell.

Also you might want to consider going to a new driver since they have improved the problems with this quite a bit inthe newer drivers. 301.xx is particularly bad about this, and most of the time is a performance decrease for the 400 series cards.
Either 306.97 Stable or 310.xx which is the current beta. Admittedly I haven't used the new betas yet but I have been running the 306.xx on my 400 series card without this bug happening that often any more as opposed to the 280-304 series drives where it happend alot.

 

[PhilUK]

I dunno why i bother sometimes....

Please try to remember that I can't see every post at once, and I'm also cooking dinner and trying to post and take screenshots etc.

Give me a chance! I was going to reply to you.

I'll try that right now. Should I look for any suspicious applications in processes that are taking a lot of memory up? I cant see anything. I've just formatted the computer so I only have skype, msn, origin, teamspeak, spotify and some cpu monitoring stuff.

I do appreciate your efforts, honestly.

 

[PhilUK]

I had a feeling you where using a nvidia card So theres a few things to do to fix this. For starters making sure the power mode in the nvidia control panel is at maximum performance. This doesn't 100% fix the problem But it lessens it to some degree.

Next download http://downloads.guru3d.com/NVIDIA-Inspector-1.94-download-2612.html

Its gonna have the ability to control power states of the card. If you watch it while your gaming what i think your gonna notice is that the power states are cycling between 3d mode powerstate mode, and either the secondary power states or idle. You can go into the overclocking settings in nvidia inspector and actually channge the performance speeds for the other power stats. I'll make some screen shots for you later to show exactly where you should be looking (wont be till i get home from work though so about 5 hours or more). Its also not uncommon for nvidia cards during long run times to get stuck in one step below max 3d power state which i think is p4. You can fix that problem by doing this aswell.

Also you might want to consider going to a new driver since they have improved the problems with this quite a bit inthe newer drivers. 301.xx is particularly bad about this, and most of the time is a performance decrease for the 400 series cards.
Either 306.97 Stable or 310.xx which is the current beta. Admittedly I haven't used the new betas yet but I have been running the 306.xx on my 400 series card without this bug happening that often any more as opposed to the 280-304 series drives where it happend alot.

I am using the driver version 310.33, which is the latest beta driver.

Is there anything from the screenshots that have concerned you?

I'll have a look at it, I'll also ask my friend to give me a hand because I'm new to this program and I've never overclocked my card before.

I looked in the Nvidia control panel. Power mode was on 'Adaptive'. I have changed it to 'Prefer Maximum Performance'. I'll give it a whirl in a little while and report back. Whenever you can do the screenshots is fine, no rushing

Thanks so much for taking the time to help me, that goes out to everyone.

 

[CaNsA]

I'll try that right now. Should I look for any suspicious applications in processes that are taking a lot of memory up? I cant see anything. I've just formatted the computer so I only have skype, msn, origin, teamspeak, spotify and some cpu monitoring stuff.

Drop all that and try it agian.
Also, disable the bull**** services like "Windows Search" and "Superfetch" etc etc.

 

[TsunamiJuan]

I am using the driver version 310.33, which is the latest beta driver.

Is there anything from the screenshots that have concerned you?

I'll have a look at it, I'll also ask my friend to give me a hand because I'm new to this program and I've never overclocked my card before.

I looked in the Nvidia control panel. Power mode was on 'Adaptive'. I have changed it to 'Prefer Maximum Performance'. I'll give it a whirl in a little while and report back. Whenever you can do the screenshots is fine, no rushing

Thanks so much for taking the time to help me, that goes out to everyone.

nothing in your gpuz tabs concerned me. I must of read the number wrong dyslexia ftw. Umm i will post the screen shots/guide when i get home to show you exactly where you need to look on nvidia inspector. aswell as what to do. ITs pretty easy once you know whats going on. Plus its a great trick in general to improve performance on alot of games.

 

[TsunamiJuan]

Nvidia inspectors pretty easy first screen shot here I have the power state the card is currently in circled. If you find that the cards getting stuck in a power state. Usually p3 for alot of nvidia cards that are being under utilized by software. Then follow screenshot 2. Select the power state in question and increase the clock speeds for that power state and click apply. Generally you dont need to play with voltage for this. It will take whatever the set voltage is and apply it across all profiles most of the time.






You will have to do this for each card seperately I believe for SLI. As nvidia inspector doesn't force across both cards like some applications will. All you have to do to change this is by the bottom next to the pay pal link similar to how gpuz worls. Theres your current selected card. click there and it will let you switch which card your editing.

This isn't a permanent change. So if you go to high or something generally its not gonna cause damage or prevent you from loading into windows. You will have to set it again after rebooting your machine.

an additional performance not to pevent dropping of frames in games. Make sure texture quality under the nvidia control panel is set to high performance not quality. This will help keep frame rates more stable aswell.

 

[jlwmanagement]

I will admit that I only glanced at the thread, but the first pic said your CPU was 52 degrees in the BIOS. That seems super high for being under no load. Have you looked into your CPU getting too hot and throttling?