-Bad pc performance?-

[buttermanscotch]

Hello community of Tom'shardware,

This is my very first topic on this forum so if I made any mistakes on where to ask questions and/or grammer I'm sorry in advance. 😀

My question:

I have the feeling my pc is not performing has it should.
Specs:

Res: 1680 x 1050
Antec earthwatts 500W
Asus DirectCU HD6870 OC from 915 to 940
Q66600 2,4ghz OC to 3,3ghz
ZALMAN CNPS 9900A CPU cooler
Kingston 4GB ddr2 RAM
2 Harddrives 750gb and 250gb
Mobo: P5k


Gta IV gives me everything maxed except Draw distance: 37FPS on the benchmark
But ingame it runs with frames between 15-38 in the city
On the airport around 40-60
Framedrops is also common when I rotate the camera. It drops to 10fps most of the time

Battlefield 3 runs on high settings between 30-60 frames.
But starts to give framedrops after a few min of playing.

I checked if it was a heating problem but my Cpu stays at a solid 50 degrees under load. Gpu is around 55 degrees.

Crysis 2 is the same. It gives everything maxed except Vsync around 50-60 frames but can sometimes drop to 30.
Also sometimes when I turn around.

Stable frames is a little bit rare on my pc system I think

So my question is: Is my pc performing has it should or do I maybe have a bottleneck? Hope you guys can make some sense out of it,

Thanks

 

[AntiZig]

what's the vram amount on your GPU?

if there's a bottle neck I would think it's your CPU

 

[buttermanscotch]

My Video ram is 1GB.

Would be a problem if my cpu is bottlenecking.
That means I have to buy a new mobo + ram because I still use Socket 775 IF I'm going to buy a new one 😛

 

[americanbrian]

Draw distance at max is wildly unrealistic.

What are you AA settings? no way @ 16x , 4x is really all you can expect.

I don't think the CPU @3.3 quad will realistically bottleneck your single mid range GPU.

 

[olin9]

I have not played GTA, However, Battlefield 3 I get 60+ and never drop any amount to notice. I run on high, keep aa down low. I do not remeber all of the settings.

On Crysis 2, I only played the demo and it was smooth on the highest settings.

Do you have enough power for that GPU? Like others have already said lower your AA.

Keep in mind I am not a benchmarker, I check my FPS to setup the game and then play. As long as the game plays smooth, i never check the config again.

My Specs:

Res: 1920 x 1200 on 27"
Antec 900W
XFX Radeon HD 6950 Graphics card - 2 GB - GDDR5 SDRAM
Q6600 2,4ghz OC to 3 ghz
ZALMAN CNPS 9900A CPU cooler
Crucial 4GB ddr2 RAM
2 Harddrives 500gb each
MB MSI

 

[buttermanscotch]

Draw distance at max is wildly unrealistic.

What are you AA settings? no way @ 16x , 4x is really all you can expect.

I don't think the CPU @3.3 quad will realistically bottleneck your single mid range GPU.

Gta IV has no AA option. And draw distance is set to 30
BF3 AA is off but set to high only

Like you said, a 3.3ghz overclock is acceptable.
I did a test and overclocked from 3.3ghz to 3.6ghz and got a boost from 37fps to 44fps in Gta IV benchmark.

 

[buttermanscotch]

I have not played GTA, However, Battlefield 3 I get 60+ and never drop any amount to notice. I run on high, keep aa down low. I do not remeber all of the settings.

On Crysis 2, I only played the demo and it was smooth on the highest settings.

Do you have enough power for that GPU? Like others have already said lower your AA.

Keep in mind I am not a benchmarker, I check my FPS to setup the game and then play. As long as the game plays smooth, i never check the config again.

My Specs:

Res: 1920 x 1200 on 27"
Antec 900W
XFX Radeon HD 6950 Graphics card - 2 GB - GDDR5 SDRAM
Q6600 2,4ghz OC to 3 ghz
ZALMAN CNPS 9900A CPU cooler
Crucial 4GB ddr2 RAM
2 Harddrives 500gb each
MB MSI

On BF3 my AA is off and set to high. The rest is also set to high.
Is it even possible not my pc is not getting enough power from the PSU?

 

[olin9]

Get GPU-Z and CPU-z Record your temps and % usage of both. If if one of the items is at 100% and the other is not. The item at a 100% is the bottleneck. If they are close, like one is 92% and one @ 100% that is pretty good.

Fof the power. 500 W should be good, but you do not have a lot of extra power.

With everything 2 HDD, CD-rom, ram, CPU, GPU, fans, network, and sound. you could be pulling 350-475w. I like the brand of the PSU. 500w PSU sometime do not put out 500w.

 

[HEXiT]

if your getting fps drops after playing smoothly for a while it normally points to high temps... so get some sensor apps and keep an eye on your thermals...

 

[americanbrian]

Gta IV has no AA option. And draw distance is set to 30
BF3 AA is off but set to high only

Like you said, a 3.3ghz overclock is acceptable.
I did a test and overclocked from 3.3ghz to 3.6ghz and got a boost from 37fps to 44fps in Gta IV benchmark.

Keep in mind that GTA4 is highly CPU bound...

Most other games are not quite as sensitive