7970CF Low Usage, Low FPS.

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wadawada55

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Nov 12, 2012
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So, i used to own 2 6970's which used to run bf3 fine, but had to give them away to a friend.
So i decided to buy 2 Gigabyte 7970's thinking these would last me a few years.

ran Bf3 for a few days running perfectly over 100FPS, but now cant seem to get more than 60 unless scoped in with sniper. I ran MSI afterburner to check if CF was working properly, which it was but cards were running from 55-70% which i'm wondering if that is the issue? Running metro 2033 runs superb, averaging the performance it should be and running at 90%+usage..
Boarderlands two seems to be having the same issue as BF3.. The campaign on the other hand runs 90%+ like it should also.


Specs:
Asus Rampage Extreme III
i7 960 3.2Ghz
12gb G.skill Sniper 1600hz Ram
2x Gigabyte 7970 GV-R7970OC-3GB
TX-850
Corsair GT 120gb
12.11 Beta Drivers (I've tried others, with no change)
Samsung S27A750 120Hz

Reformatted to Windows8 hoping for Better performance but Nothing. (Reason for the two cards on 1 screen, is to get the 120fps+ on gaming to look nice at 120hz..)
 
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What do you mean by saying that you didn't plug the pci-e into the psu? Do you mean that you didn't plug the 6 + 2 and 6 pin connectors into the card? Sorry kinda confused on that one

The FPS should have gone down in bl2 and bf3 but the gpu usage should have gone up...unless even at a down clocked speed it's too much load for the psu to handle.
 
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As for the earlier posts about the CPU bottleneck, I'm still not convinced at all on that one...especially since overclocking did not help at all. A bottleneck occurs when a device is running at 100% and still not strong enough to allow other devices to work properly. If the CPU was a bottleneck, overclocking the CPU would have seen an increase in your GPU usage since the CPU is a little bit stronger and able to open up a bit more...think of it as a water damn or a water stream...if the stream is too narrow, it won't allow enough water through...if the stream is big enough and then made larger, it would still provide enough water to flow into the lake. Make sense?
 
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sorry for late reply, been doing a bit of partying for new years.

For the first reply, i meant i didnt have the Plugs in the Motherboard for the extra power the 2 4 pin molex connectors.

My brothers PSU is a HX1050 which is 80+ gold, which was purchased late 2011.

I can try the dual PSU setup, but not exactly sure on how to jump the PSU, im sure i will find a video online somewhere.
I under stand the Metaphor for wants going on 😛

I just hope after all this its not a card problem..

Because you tried yours in the 3way SLI and it didn't Fix the Usage issue with the Second PSU. Is this suggesting to you it may be a driver issue?
 
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Okay also just tried the cards with the dual PSU setup, No success.
I'm just going to swap out my system with another. Maybe this mixture of PCI 2.0 and the older generation CPU is causing the issues..
 
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Sorry for the delayed response, been quite a hectic last couple of weeks!

I deleted a few posts of mine because I found out that what I had said regarding power is very wrong....don't want false information out there to confuse anyone lol. Regarding psu 80 plus certification, I found out that I had it backwards. The rated power of the psu is the output power, but the 80% (for bronze, goes up for each cert above that) means that it would take 1200 watts of input power(from the wall outlet) to give 1000 watts of output power. I had it backwards and thought that 1000 watts input would give 800 watts output.

So with that said, your 750 watt psu should be plenty for your system. I found out that people with similiar setups as mine (including my overclocking levels) draw about 950 watts on the high end, typical usage is much lower...I think around 500 or 600 watts during games.

I ended up chasing a ghost because of power problems that I was having. My thoughts that I did not have enough power were mostly due to seeing the power kernel error in windows event logger...turns out that it is an error that happens everytime the computer is shut down improperly (system freeze, power bump etc). After a crap ton of research and banging my head against the wall, I found out that I had a bad power strip, talk about frustrating lol. M

y other problem regarding the low usage was due to a bad crossfire cable going to my third card. That damn thing had me freaking out...I was messing with psu setups and board configuration setups and the cable happened to fail while I was doing that stuff...I was getting some nasty discoloration and horizontal lines across my screen. My initial thought was that I fried something lol. So glad it was just a cable!

I honestly didn't think the new cards would do any improvements for you...was wishing it would so you could be done with this issue, but had that gut feeling that it wouldn't help. I still think that your motherboard and cpu combo should be sufficient for your setup, but wouldn't hurt to do an upgrade lol. I'd recommend getting either a 3570k or a 3770k. Both are awesome cpu's! I run a 3930k but only because I jacked up a 3770k doing some overclocking (always watch the offset voltage compared to the vcc voltage, very easy to overdo it there lol). 3770k is awesome but couldn't justify rebuying the same cpu that I already had lol.

Speaking of PCI 2.0, I'm kinda curious as to what your GPU-Z is saying about your setup. Please run GPU-Z and look at your bus speed for each card...next to the bus speed is a ? button, click that and it will run a render test. Can you let me know what it is saying your bus speed is during the render test? It should be displayed on the bottom left hand side of the screen....hopefully both cards are running at PCI 2.0 8x If they aren't both running at 8x, then that would most likely be your problem.

From what I have heard, PCI-E 2.0 8x is fast enough for these cards...correct me if I am wrong, but you are running a single monitor setup, correct? I believe that multi-monitor setups would benefit from either 2.0 16x or 3.0 8x/16x but can't remember for sure.
 
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That is good! Theoretically, your system should be good enough to run that setup well. Hmm now to think about what else would cause your problems...I'll do some brainstorming and get back with you
 
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I don't think this will fix your problem but it is worth a shot...

I found out that to do the official overclock in afterburner for a crossfire setup requires a little more than just doing the -xcl. You actually need to do it for both cards. Reason I don't think it will fix your problem is because you were having issues before you installed afterburner, but this is still worth a shot...


Use the link below for better instructions...uninstall afterburner (click the option that doesn't save your profile options for upgrade, I believe it is no). Do a complete uninstall of the drivers (use the guide in the link below or use atiman). Reinstall drivers (I'd recommend using 12.10 for now since it is an official driver, beta might cause you issues). DO NOT enable overdrive in CCC (don't think it would hurt but just want to keep all extra variables out of the equation). Install afterburner, run it and let it restart your computer. Now two options for -xcl..you could either do it one card at a time by turning the computer off and having only one card in its designated slot (make sure to keep each card in its crossfired slot, so if card 2 is in slot 3 keep that card in its slot and remove card one) plug the monitor into that card, reboot and do the -xcl to include rebooting the computer...then do the same for the other card. Or you could do the registry merge, follow the info in the link below.

Also one other question. I think you already answered this, but are you running 32 bit or 64 bit windows? You need 64 bit for this setup to work properly.
 
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okay so tried that, with the way of plugging in to each card and enabling the -xcl part followed by a reboot. ran a game, sempt to have a little improvement, but it could have just been the 12.10 drivers that are installed.

but still element of it the cards dropping using in more intense areas.
Playing far cry 3 with dual cards causes microstuttering though. but think that did that on the newer drivers.
 
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I'd be more so willing to bet that the -xcl is what gave you most of your improvements. Basically -xcl is a way for afterburner to edit the registry file for each card to change the powerplay settings...so if only one card has the updated powerplay there very well could be a conflict between the two cards. To test/verify that you could install the 12.11 beta drivers and do the complete process above again...just always make sure to uninstall afterburner when updating drivers.

Far cry 3 is still having crossfire issues. Google far cry 3 crossfire and you will see a bunch of posts on it. One way to get rid of the micro stutter is to run dx9. For some reason far cry 3 doesn't like amd for dx11.


Now that you are seeing some improvements, I would overclock your CPU to 4.2 or higher, make sure your ram is atleast 1600 and make sure to disable ulps on both cards.
 
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im sorry to say this but... Im not sure on how TO oc my CPU, when i OC it i use the ROG oc Profile which puts it to 3.8 but during that the CPU will reach like 90 degrees whilst stressed. The ROG oc profile though doesnt change any of the voltages or anything, just changes the blk frequencies and multipliers.

I did have a guide which i followed it before to oc it to 4.5 which worked without a hitch, but cant find it anymore.
 
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90c at 3.8 is def not good! I'm guessing that it is changing your total vcc voltage up way too high...or your thermal paste is bad on your CPU. I'd pop the cooler off and check your thermal paste before you do any other overclocking. Keep in mind that you only need a small amount of paste, no bigger than the size of a pea. Some people like to just put a dab in the middle of the processor and put the cooler back on. That way is ok but I don't think it does a good job of distributing the paste. I prefer to put a dab in the middle and work it across the top of the processor with either a piece of plastic or put your finger in a plastic bag and spread it around. Just don't put your finger directly in the paste or use latex gloves...both could contaminate the paste.

I'll see if I can find you a good guide to use. What cooler are you using? Stock or aftermarket?
 
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hahaha its okay i know how to do the paste correctly, i usually like to put a bit around each piece of the cpu, the grab like a card and spread the paste so a nice layer is covering the whole CPU. But it has been a while since i have change it.

Im using an aftermarket cooler, which is a Noctua NH-U12P.
 
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Bump your power limit up to +20 I would also recommend bumping your core clock up to 1125 and memory up to 1500. Shouldn't have to change voltages for those levels. Did you disable ulps?

If that still keeps your usage and FPS low, then revert back to 12.10. 12.11 was supposed to be out a while ago but I'm guessing that they are still having issues.
 
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okay so did the OC with the +20 power limit, and it was very stable, sitting at 80degress on stress test, with the fans set to auto, didnt seem like they went past 60%

EDIT:
okay when i try run a game, it will crash... thats strange consider 100% gpu test running full screen was stable..
 
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Signed up because I have exactly the same issue where I'll only get around 60 - 70% GPU usage in battlefield 3 but my frames will dip quite low.

I play at 1920x1080 120HZ


First rig was:

i7 920 @ 4.0ghz cooled with 120 extreme ultra
asus p6t
gb DDR 3
7970 OC in crossfire
windows 7
850W silverstone PSU

I tried reinstalling drivers, formatting , all of those things ect but nothing worked.

I decided it may be my CPU so I built an entirely new rig which is

i5 3570k @ 4ghz
Asrock extreme 4 mobo
16gb DDR3 2133mhz
7970 OC in crossfire
silverstone 850W PSU

exactly the same issue happens with this rig. Disable UPLS ect, nothing works.

Because my GPU's were voltage locked (gigabyte) I sold both online and grabbed a pair of sapphire 7950's OC'd to 1175/1400 MHZ

The issue is still there for battlefield 3 with only around 60% gpu usage.
All of the cards have worked fine on their own at 99% but crossfire seems to cause issues.

Because I"ve tried two different sets of cards on two completly different rigs it leads me to believe its either just poorly optimized for ati cards in bf3 or a software issue.

I score 14,000 3d marks and everything else runs fine so I think it's optimization or crappy drivers.

Hopefully we can find a fix to this....
 
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Waddawada, yes we did play with the oc on your gpu but like you said, it was a little higher level. The reason I want to re-investigate that part is because we now have your powerplay setup properly and now your oc will work much easier. Gpu lock after a few minutes of game play sounds like they are either getting hot (you would need to look at memory temps and vrm temps) or your voltages are just a little too low. I can't remember, but can you adjust your clock and memory voltages in afterburner?

But before you adjust voltages, manually set your fans to 80% in afterburner and play a game...yes it will be annoying to hear the fans, but it will help rule out temp issues. If it doesn't crash, then we need to do some changes to the fan profile. If it does crash, then we need to work on the voltages.


I really would prefer to get your cards working at the clock speeds I posted above, I've found that level really helps with usage and FPS. It's a mild overclock that shouldn't degrade the life of your cards.

Another thing to play with is the power level but I don't want to mess with that right now. Basically that slider is a limiter in how much power your cards can draw from the psu.

Oh just an FYI on those asus 7970 cards...one nice thing about them is that you can actually tie them into your motherboard to control voltages from a ROG board. I wouldn't mess with that at all while on air and def would require someone with a good bit of overclocking knowledge to mess with. Just a cool feature to have, but don't use it lol.

Huey, can you make a new post for your problems? I'll be happy to help but I don't want to confuse anyone (especially myself lol) by trying to work two problems in the same thread.
 
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I could make a new thread but we've both got exactly the same issue so I thought it'd be more useful to stay to the same thread because I have a feeling we're suffering from the same issue, so hopefully the same solution.
 
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