System chugs after several minutes in game

[Niku-Sama]

Strange problem. I've already ruled out something getting hot before we get there, temps are fine just wanted to start off with that.

Anyway, When it happens its a whole system slow down, i first noticed it in The Finals, which is a new game so i tossed it up to that for a while but i noticed it happening in other games too.
It affects sound, network, video and over all speed. it goes from 100+ FPS to a slide show and if i am online it'll give me packet loss and high ping notifications. it wont alt tab out or start task manager very well.
i cant pin it to anything specific in task manager either if i remember to open it before the game and the off chance i make it to task manager before it stops.

It never completely hard locks, occasionally the game crashes.

I've noticed it in:
The FInals
Hunt Showdown
Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion
Ripout

It doesnt happen in:
Mechwarrior 5
Frogun
Homeworld Remastered
Doom 64
Daemon X Machina
Doom (2016)

I thought it might be driver related so i reverted to versions that came out before i noticed it.
Also it happens within the first few minutes of a match and, if the game doesnt crash, its totally fine the rest of the time.
If it does crash and i restart the game after the crash it'll still chug so its not like its a one and done, it'll do it every time the game runs

System specs:

7800X3D
EVGA 3070 Ti
G.SKILL Trident Z5 Series 32GB 6400
AsRock B650E Taichi
2x HP EX950 M.2 2280 1TB PCle
1x HP FX900 M.2 2280 1TB PCle
750W modular Corsair PSU
Windows 11 Pro


I'm going to keep trying but thought if any one has any ideas


Edit:

I've been doing some digging and it looks like it might be a windows problem?
I managed to catch something in the act:
"C:\Windows\System32\ntoskrnl.exe"
This starts hitting the system after a games been running for a little bit for about ~30% or more cpu usage on top of whats already running, no extra ram usage. Depending on the game its close to maxing out the cpu. the temps remain ok when it does this still

I dont remember updating windows but it like to do it by it self some times

 

[Trap05]

Have you tried SFC and DISM?

 

[Niku-Sama]

I did SFC repair, i forgot about DISM. i'll try that tonite.

After posting last night i tried a bunch of things to no change.

I DDU'd my drivers and re installed with a clean driver install
Updated the b650e taichi bios and left everything stock except for V SOC, its set at 1.245V like i had set it before and it was fine before.
ran msconfig and disabled some services not needed for the system to run: AMD 3d V cache scheduler, iCUE services, Realtek audio services, Updaters, Etc.
I left memtest going overnight and after 4 sets of 13 different tests it found nothing. This was run under the XMP profile.
I installed the driver for the "onboard" radeon graphics on the cpu, it was not installed for some reason. noticed it before i DDU'd
Reset GPU to stock.
Ran malware scans.
Trimmed drives.
Cleared caches and other junk.
updated updated updated.

I re ran some of the games, Doom 2016 doesnt do it but the others do. Something must have given it a false positive when i was testing but last night for about an hour i didnt see the same symptoms.
Turnip boy could be an unrelated problem, i try to use a controller on it and its through EPIC and its notoriously bad about controllers for some reason. i have to run the epic camges through steam if i want a controller to work right, or even work at all like in the case of Daemon X Machina. So i'll update the list


Doing some digging i opened up the event log and found a bunch of errors regarding an eac dll. some googling leads me to Easy Anti Cheat, which is something Hunt showdown and The Finals both have. After going down that rabbit hole i found some other people experencing the same issue online recently (Dec '23) but none of them have a real fix yet either. They were affecting the same games and others like Warthunder and 7 Days to Die.

so after DISM i'll probably look into that.

 

[don256us]

A quick google search confirms SFC /scannow along with chkdsk C: /f /r /x

Apparently this .exe manages your RAM.

But the article I found also states that driver updates may resolve the issue along with the removal of any overclocking you might have. I would start with doing all of the updates I could find for Windows, your MB and GPU. Included in the MB make sure your sound card is updated along with you NIC.

On other sites, they suggest that many people have this issue do to bad RAM. They suggest you run a memory test. I like memtest86+.

 

[Niku-Sama]

A quick google search confirms SFC /scannow along with chkdsk C: /f /r /x

Apparently this .exe manages your RAM.

But the article I found also states that driver updates may resolve the issue along with the removal of any overclocking you might have. I would start with doing all of the updates I could find for Windows, your MB and GPU. Included in the MB make sure your sound card is updated along with you NIC.

On other sites, they suggest that many people have this issue do to bad RAM. They suggest you run a memory test. I like memtest86+.

i think we were posting at the same time.

Yea i saw that too about ram management but i've found some other things that kinda make that definition sound like an over generalization of what it does.
alot of things use it for a lot of different reasons, but a popular one is call scheduling from other programs and system processes

i did run memtest last night with no problems and update anything and everything i could possibly think of.

i even unhooked things while it was bugging out and still couldnt get any changes.
i did find something about easy anti cheat and some other people having a similar problems. the ones i want to play the most, use EAC too so after i DISM tonite i'll probably look into it

edit:
ok i am home now
This is the error that sent me on the quest for easy anti cheat\
Session "dc3a3596-71e1-45a3-b2ea-39ad5322fe51" failed to start with the following error: 0xC0000022

normally i wouldnt think any thing of it but there are hundreds of these same errors over the past week and they all correspond with times i am playing a game

 

[Niku-Sama]

I DISM'd and no change.
total uninstall and reinstall of games and EAC (using BCU) and no change

i'm gonna try and find a new game that i havent played on this system that has EAC and see if it does the same

edit:

Alright i just installed Rogue Company.
Never played it on this computer and it started doing the same thing.

i'm almost certain is Easy Anti Cheat now

 

[don256us]

This would be far from the first time anti-cheat software acted in a more destructive way. Hopefully you get resolution before too long.

 

[Niku-Sama]

yea i'd like to be able to let them know some how other than hoping it crashes and gives me a UE report window, which did happen the other day and i did report it linking this thread.
i also feel like i've done a fair bit more testing than the average user at this point too.

edit: 1/7/24

I'm part of an alpha playtest for an old franchise and they recently added Easy Anti Cheat to the game and while theres no test currently, the log in screen running was enough to monitor the same thing.
about 5 minutes after loading and watching task manager this game does the same thing as the others have, previously i had no problem.

I'm being vague on the game because i am not sure if there was an NDA on this one or if there was one how far it goes. I usually get into Betas and its less of a problem, its not often i get into Alphas.
Once i find out or if it moves up in process i'll re edit this post

 

[Niku-Sama]

OK i found the culprit.
It only took me totally blowing away all my drives and forgetting some things losing them for ever but at i saved the pictures right?

anyway, over the "snow" storm we had and since i could only walk places (bmw + ice = no) so i deleted all my boot drive partitions because i was going to fix this problem at all costs. and i figured since i was doing that i was going to do the same to my other drives after i get windows reinstalled and shuffle some important things around after scanning them for "threats". after it comes back clean i shuffle. blast the last of the partitions and format and start the downloading again.

i remembered to tell windows to not automatically install things this time and i start installing things one at a time and giving them about a week in between started with video drivers of course, then onto chipset, and this week was a thunderbolt driver.

and of all things after installing the thunderbolt driver last night, the problem came back. i just uninstalled it again and the problem went away.

its an intel thunderbolt driver.

Intel_DCH_TB_v1_41_1325_0_U20220413_1

i would like to be able to use this but i would rather things not run like ****

 

[don256us]

I would not have even thought about that. Great find. I also would not have had the patients to find out like you did. Respect.

Thank you for the update.

 

[EarthDog]

Interesting. Wonder why it does that...

Also, that's a pretty old TB driver. I'm using 1.41.1340 (10/2023 for z790). There's a much newer one on the b650e taichi support site. Consider trying that one and see if it helps.

That said, zero issues here with TB causing any problems and those ports are in use daily.

 

[Niku-Sama]

Interesting. Wonder why it does that...

Also, that's a pretty old TB driver. I'm using 1.41.1340 (10/2023 for z790). There's a much newer one on the b650e taichi support site. Consider trying that one and see if it helps.

That said, zero issues here with TB causing any problems and those ports are in use daily.

when ever i go to asrocks site for this board the one i talked about in my last post is the one that is available to download. i downloaded it on thursday or friday.

i'm trying to figure out why it started giving me problems suddenly, that driver had been installed for about a year or more and then started giving me a problem about a month or so ago?
maybe a windows component got updated and it doesnt like it any more?

i donno

 

[EarthDog]

Yeah..i read it wrong. Yours is from 9/2022. Yikes.

Maybe try a newer version. See if there's one from z790 taichi that's newer and see if that helps. Or maybe even intel. Asus' is from late 2023

 

[rainless]

OK i found the culprit.
It only took me totally blowing away all my drives and forgetting some things losing them for ever but at i saved the pictures right?

anyway, over the "snow" storm we had and since i could only walk places (bmw + ice = no) so i deleted all my boot drive partitions because i was going to fix this problem at all costs. and i figured since i was doing that i was going to do the same to my other drives after i get windows reinstalled and shuffle some important things around after scanning them for "threats". after it comes back clean i shuffle. blast the last of the partitions and format and start the downloading again.

i remembered to tell windows to not automatically install things this time and i start installing things one at a time and giving them about a week in between started with video drivers of course, then onto chipset, and this week was a thunderbolt driver.

and of all things after installing the thunderbolt driver last night, the problem came back. i just uninstalled it again and the problem went away.

its an intel thunderbolt driver.

Intel_DCH_TB_v1_41_1325_0_U20220413_1

i would like to be able to use this but i would rather things not run like ****

Thunderbolt??! Why the hell would a z790 have Thunderbolt?

I thought that was a Mac thing? I also thought it was irrelevant in the age of USB 3.xx+...

 

[EarthDog]

Thunderbolt??! Why the hell would a z790 have Thunderbolt?

I thought that was a Mac thing? I also thought it was irrelevant in the age of USB 3.xx+...

Because, previously, usb only went up to 20 gbps (3.2 gen 2x2). With usb 4 it can now reach 40 gbps like TB4 can. There are some differences, however. I know we had a thread or two talking about it here late last year.

But, for the same reasons Apple did too... video can go through it as well, but mostly fast storage. Ive used one for years with my external m.2 storage i use for daily work.

 

[Woomack]

If TB causes issues, then turn it off in BIOS. It's probably easier than discovering that the OS forced installation behind your back.
Windows should install the proper WHQL driver via Windows Update. Drivers that are with motherboards are sometimes weird. At least when I was testing TB4 SSDs, then the default OS driver was always the best. Maybe there is some other related issue, like the BIOS version. Either way, it's really weird that the TB driver causes that.

Btw. Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion was much more fun than I expected

 

[rainless]

Because, previously, usb only went up to 20 gbps (3.2 gen 2x2). With usb 4 it can now reach 40 gbps like TB4 can. There are some differences, however. I know we had a thread or two talking about it here late last year.

But, for the same reasons Apple did too... video can go through it as well, but mostly fast storage. Ive used one for years with my external m.2 storage i use for daily work.

I must've missed that whoooole era... I think I'm still on a z390!

I mean... I love my board... it's got like FOUR M2 slots on it. (I think one of those is supposed to be for wifi, but you can still stick like a little 120GB drive or something in it instead). I don't think any board I ever owned had TB.

Btw. Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion was much more fun than I expected

Is that like a Free Epic Game that I missed or something?

How could TWO people know that game?!

 

[Woomack]

The second one - Turnip Boy Robs a Bank, was released in the last few days. I don't remember if I was playing the first one on Xbox or Switch, but it was free. More fun than I had to play any AAA title in the last years (or I missed something; BG3 was better for sure, just not sure if I can count it as AAA).

 

[rainless]

The second one - Turnip Boy Robs a Bank, was released in the last few days. I don't remember if I was playing the first one on Xbox or Switch, but it was free. More fun than I had to play any AAA title in the last years (or I missed something; BG3 was better for sure, just not sure if I can count it as AAA).

Was it on Gamepass? Maybe I have it then... (Not like Nintendo to give away free games...)

 

[Woomack]

I don't remember, but probably yes. I can't see it in my games library on Nintendo. I sold Xbox some time ago, so I can't check it now.