Bottleneck in i7 6700K and GeForce GTX 970 system

[jquinones618]

I'm experiencing frame drops and overall low FPS performance in several games. I'm thinking there's definitely a bottleneck in my system, but I can't seem to figure it out.

This is the breakdown of my system:
Core i7 6700K OC'd to 4.4GHz
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 Windforce OC'd to 1.3GHz
Asus z170m Plus motherboard
Kingston SSDNow 120GB SSD as a boot drive
Sandisk SSD Plus 240GB SSD for apps
Western Digital 1TB HDD for games/storage
Corsair LPX DDR4-2133 16GB(2x8GB)
EVGA G2 Gold rated 550W PSU.

Both my CPU and GPU run cool (usually 50°C and 70°C respectively under full load).

I think I have a pretty decent system, but I got BIG frame drops (60+ down to 25-30) unexpectedly at times when playing Batman Arkham Knight, Assassin's Creed Syndicate, Skyrim, and even when I was playing The Division beta this past weekend. I play on a 1440p monitor which the 970 should be able to handle with little trouble at respectable FPS.

Can anyone help me figure out what's wrong with my system or if there's something I should be doing different.

 

[Rapajez]

Well, you're talking about 3 of the most demanding titles, on a 1440p monitor. Might be a bit tough on even a 970. You can simply fire up MSI Afterburner, or similar, and see which components are nearing 100% while you're gaming.

I'd probably start by lowering the Anti-Aliasing settings (AA) in-game, until I was averaging 60FPS. If that didn't do it, I'd continue investigating.

 

[alexoiu]

Here's what I'd do: remove the SSDs (leave only the HDD), install Windows on it, only the graphics driver, (no antivirus or other apps), a game that I'm experiencing issues when playing it and testing. This way you'd rule out a software and SSD related issue.

 

[jquinones618]

Here's what I'd do: remove the SSDs (leave only the HDD), install Windows on it, only the graphics driver, (no antivirus or other apps), a game that I'm experiencing issues when playing it and testing. This way you'd rule out a software and SSD related issue.

Hmm...that's sounds like an interesting test. I don't think my SSD is the issue because I have some games installed on my Sandisk SSD and some installed to my HDD and they have the same frame drop issue.

Something that I have noticed that a little strange is that I usually experience the massive frame drops when playing with a controller. I have played with the Xbox One controller (wired via USB cable) and a wired GameStop branded Xbox 360 controller. Same problem with both controllers, but it doesn't happen much, if at all, when playing with just mouse and keyboard. Can't quite figure out why that is.

 

[Hyboria]

Like Rapajez said, the GTX970 will probably struggle with a few titles on 1440p.

Batman - average 55fps, low 41fps
Assassin's creed - average 50fps, low 42fps

Seems odd that you are getting dips to 25 fps though. What settings have you got the games on?

 

[jquinones618]

Like Rapajez said, the GTX970 will probably struggle with a few titles on 1440p.

Batman - average 55fps, low 41fps
Assassin's creed - average 50fps, low 42fps

Seems odd that you are getting dips to 25 fps though. What settings have you got the games on?

I just ran the benchmark in Batman. Average 57fps, low 35fps at these settings

http://
(this is a link from my OneDrive)

Also, MSI Afterburner showed my GPU hit 99% usage at least twice while running the benchmark.

 

[Rapajez]

Like Rapajez said, the GTX970 will probably struggle with a few titles on 1440p.

Batman - average 55fps, low 41fps
Assassin's creed - average 50fps, low 42fps

Seems odd that you are getting dips to 25 fps though. What settings have you got the games on?

I just ran the benchmark in Batman. Average 57fps, low 35fps at these settings

http://
(this is a link from my OneDrive)

Also, MSI Afterburner showed my GPU hit 99% usage at least twice while running the benchmark.

Well, I think that pretty much settles it. No problem really, you're just pushing that card to it's limit. Since you're already running at 1440p, you won't miss much image quality lowering Anti-Aliasing (AA), and won't miss out on any cool effects. Try tuning down the Anti-Aliasing to 0, and then crank it up slowly until you're seeing drops again.

Also, fire up the GeForce Experience, and check out how it auto-sets things in-game, or at least compare the recommendations. It seems to be doing a decent job these days.

 

[fabiodrm]

i dont think you can get stable fps with 970 at 1440p. have you test with 1080p? same problem?

 

[Huntjoshua87]

I know I'm a bit late on this, but it was probably the GTX 970 topping out on VRAM. Once that happens, it isn't going to have the resources to use to get good frame rate. Also remember that the 970 only has 3.5GB to use of VRAM.
-Hope this helps some