Dual Monitor FPS Drops (144hz, 60hz), two GPU's

[Snoffles]

I recently purchased a second monitor (ASUS VS248H-P) which is 60hz to accompany my main monitor (ASUS VG248QE) which is 144hz. The VS248H-P is connected to my GTX970, while I've connected the VG248QE to a brand new GTX1080. The problem I'm having is that whenever I am playing a game on my main monitor, and have something happen on my secondary monitor, such as a video playing, a webpage loading new content, or someone posting an image in my discord chat, my framerate drops drastically on both monitors and there is huge input delay. The same goes if I'm even just watching a youtube video on my main screen (becomes choppy). Something I noticed was that the game would usually report a normal, high framerate even though it was actually significantly less. I've seen several threads on this but have only found a really brief fix (which I hope isn't the only solution) which was to set my computer's performance settings to adjust for Performance, which makes it look like I'm working on a Windows 98. Although I believe this helps a lot, I hope that this isn't the only thing I can do. Does anyone have any other suggestions as how I can fix this?

I pretty much bought the GTX1080 because I was having this problem before, and thought it'd fix it by having two different GPU's on two different monitors, rather than 1 GPU. Is there perhaps a way to dedicate the GPU's to different applications or something of that sort? I believe there's already a way to do so using the integrated GPU, but how about two separate video cards? I checked the NVidia control panel and there's no option.

Some thing's I've already tried or had noticed:
Disable hardware acceleration in the secondary application (helps the second monitor a lot but problem still stands on my main monitor)
Disable Windows transparency and all of those other settings in the performance menus (Temporary fix?)
Change the performance scaling to GPU for both monitors (didn't help)
Turned VSync on or off in the game (tried both, no difference)
EDIT: Use one GPU at a time (same issue persists)
EDIT: Disable secondary monitor and have the same application run (fixes the framerate issues but I want to use my second monitor...)
CPU and RAM look like they're not under too heavy of a load so I doubt that's the issue

 

[feelinfroggy777]

I am confused. Do you have the 970 and the 1080 both connected to the same PC?

If so, this is your problem. Pull out the 970 and leave the 1080 and hook both monitors up to your 1080 making sure the 144hz monitor is hooked up by display port. The 1080 will have no issues pushing a game while 2D content is on the secondary monitor.

 

[Snoffles]

I am confused. Do you have the 970 and the 1080 both connected to the same PC?

If so, this is your problem. Pull out the 970 and leave the 1080 and hook both monitors up to your 1080 making sure the 144hz monitor is hooked up by display port. The 1080 will have no issues pushing a game while 2D content is on the secondary monitor.

That would be correct. I totally forgot to add this to the list of things I've already tried, but yeah this was already a problem I had with the 970 alone, which also should've been able to handle both just fine, which is why I purchased a second GPU. I had submitted this problem when I only had a 970 in this thread [here] which led me to buy the 2nd GPU in an attempt to resolve this. I believe the refresh rate differences is what is causing the issue, but I would really rather see if there is a solution to this rather than having to spend $200+ on a secondary monitor for 144hz. While that might sound slightly counter-intuitive, I spent the money on the 1080 because it would be an actual performance upgrade in the long run.

EDIT: Just for clarification, the driver recognizes both graphics cards just fine. The nvidia control panel lists both and I'm able to configure both without issue.

 

[feelinfroggy777]

I am confused. Do you have the 970 and the 1080 both connected to the same PC?

If so, this is your problem. Pull out the 970 and leave the 1080 and hook both monitors up to your 1080 making sure the 144hz monitor is hooked up by display port. The 1080 will have no issues pushing a game while 2D content is on the secondary monitor.

That would be correct. I totally forgot to add this to the list of things I've already tried, but yeah this was already a problem I had with the 970 alone, which also should've been able to handle both just fine, which is why I purchased a second GPU. I had submitted this problem when I only had a 970 in this thread [here] which led me to buy the 2nd GPU in an attempt to resolve this. I believe the refresh rate differences is what is causing the issue, but I would really rather see if there is a solution to this rather than having to spend $200+ on a secondary monitor for 144hz. While that might sound slightly counter-intuitive, I spent the money on the 1080 because it would be an actual performance upgrade in the long run.

EDIT: Just for clarification, the driver recognizes both graphics cards just fine. The nvidia control panel lists both and I'm able to configure both without issue.

No, the difference in refresh rate or resolution does not matter. I have a 4k 60hz panel and a 1440p 100hz panel and the GPU pushes them at their respective refresh rate and resolution.

What CPU do you have?

What drivers are you using? You know the drivers for Pascal (1080) are different from Maxwell (970). I would probably start over with the 1080 by its self. Do a fresh install of the drivers and hook everything up to your 1080. When you install the drivers, do a custom install. At the bottom of the page will say do a clean install of the drivers, select that choice.

Don't hook any video through the motherboard. I would probably do at least a reset of windows or maybe even a clean windows install because your integrated graphics drivers you installed might be messing things up some.

You will have some performance loss running dual screens with one gaming and the other showing 2D content. But you wont lose very much. If you have a weak processor, that may be your issue as at 1080p the bottleneck moves from the GPU to the CPU. So if the processor is busy gaming and then has to start other PC task then there will be a loss of performance, especially if it is not a great processor.

 

[Snoffles]

I am confused. Do you have the 970 and the 1080 both connected to the same PC?

If so, this is your problem. Pull out the 970 and leave the 1080 and hook both monitors up to your 1080 making sure the 144hz monitor is hooked up by display port. The 1080 will have no issues pushing a game while 2D content is on the secondary monitor.

That would be correct. I totally forgot to add this to the list of things I've already tried, but yeah this was already a problem I had with the 970 alone, which also should've been able to handle both just fine, which is why I purchased a second GPU. I had submitted this problem when I only had a 970 in this thread [here] which led me to buy the 2nd GPU in an attempt to resolve this. I believe the refresh rate differences is what is causing the issue, but I would really rather see if there is a solution to this rather than having to spend $200+ on a secondary monitor for 144hz. While that might sound slightly counter-intuitive, I spent the money on the 1080 because it would be an actual performance upgrade in the long run.

EDIT: Just for clarification, the driver recognizes both graphics cards just fine. The nvidia control panel lists both and I'm able to configure both without issue.

No, the difference in refresh rate or resolution does not matter. I have a 4k 60hz panel and a 1440p 100hz panel and the GPU pushes them at their respective refresh rate and resolution.

What CPU do you have?

What drivers are you using? You know the drivers for Pascal (1080) are different from Maxwell (970). I would probably start over with the 1080 by its self. Do a fresh install of the drivers and hook everything up to your 1080. When you install the drivers, do a custom install. At the bottom of the page will say do a clean install of the drivers, select that choice.

Don't hook any video through the motherboard. I would probably do at least a reset of windows or maybe even a clean windows install because your integrated graphics drivers you installed might be messing things up some.

You will have some performance loss running dual screens with one gaming and the other showing 2D content. But you wont lose very much. If you have a weak processor, that may be your issue as at 1080p the bottleneck moves from the GPU to the CPU. So if the processor is busy gaming and then has to start other PC task then there will be a loss of performance, especially if it is not a great processor.

My CPU is a Intel Core i7-4790K. The drivers I'm using were installed automatically using the GeForece experience installer. I'll go ahead and try again using only the 1080 and post an update tonight when I'm back to my computer. Thanks for the help so far! Meanwhile, if anyone else also has suggestions, I'd be glad to hear.

 

[Snoffles]

Alright I got home and tried what you said with nearly no difference in performance when testing the same problem.
In addition to that, I've also tried the following:
Change refresh rate of 144hz to 120hz
Running game in full screen (worked for like 30 seconds until I alt tabbed. I tested this by running a 1080p 60fps youtube video on my second screen and playing world of warcraft on the main screen, which was running at around 70-80fps which isn't bad).

 

[soeski]

Alright I got home and tried what you said with nearly no difference in performance when testing the same problem.
In addition to that, I've also tried the following:
Change refresh rate of 144hz to 120hz
Running game in full screen (worked for like 30 seconds until I alt tabbed. I tested this by running a 1080p 60fps youtube video on my second screen and playing world of warcraft on the main screen, which was running at around 70-80fps which isn't bad).

Did you ever solve this issue? I had the same, but I believe I finally solved it now. My 144Hz monitor besides a 60Hz monitor also gave stutters and issues with many games. Sometimes I did not even have anything showing on my 60Hz screen except the desktop, and it would still lag on my 144Hz G-Sync. Games felt... "so so" for months until I figured out what to do. Now my GTX1070 pushes out more fps then ever. Mind you, I even had this problem when using my GTX1070 on my 144Hz and my other screen on my iGPU. It's a Windows issue, not nVidia. Using 2 desktops with different refreshes is just not handled correctly.
Many solutions were to set your primary screen to 120Hz or doing all of the things you've tried as well. None of them really fix it. What did fix it for me? Using nVidia Inspector!
There is a setting that's called: Multi-display/Mixed-GPU acceleration. Set this to "Single display performance mode".
Presto, after months and months I can now use my 60Hz screen to do whatever I want, without impacting the fps on my 144Hz screen G-synced. Finally!!

 

[Snoffles]

Alright I got home and tried what you said with nearly no difference in performance when testing the same problem.
In addition to that, I've also tried the following:
Change refresh rate of 144hz to 120hz
Running game in full screen (worked for like 30 seconds until I alt tabbed. I tested this by running a 1080p 60fps youtube video on my second screen and playing world of warcraft on the main screen, which was running at around 70-80fps which isn't bad).

Did you ever solve this issue? I had the same, but I believe I finally solved it now. My 144Hz monitor besides a 60Hz monitor also gave stutters and issues with many games. Sometimes I did not even have anything showing on my 60Hz screen except the desktop, and it would still lag on my 144Hz G-Sync. Games felt... "so so" for months until I figured out what to do. Now my GTX1070 pushes out more fps then ever. Mind you, I even had this problem when using my GTX1070 on my 144Hz and my other screen on my iGPU. It's a Windows issue, not nVidia. Using 2 desktops with different refreshes is just not handled correctly.
Many solutions were to set your primary screen to 120Hz or doing all of the things you've tried as well. None of them really fix it. What did fix it for me? Using nVidia Inspector!
There is a setting that's called: Multi-display/Mixed-GPU acceleration. Set this to "Single display performance mode".
Presto, after months and months I can now use my 60Hz screen to do whatever I want, without impacting the fps on my 144Hz screen G-synced. Finally!!

Hey there! So actually, it just randomly got better a few days after I posted this question. I'm running everything quite smoothly, but haven't done too extensive of testing when using both monitors. I don't recall changing any settings or updating drivers any between the time which is odd, but hey it's working alright now haha. Still though, I'm very curious about your solution and I'm definitely willing to try what you suggested to see if there's any increase in performance (though there's already not much left to improve on). I'll give it a shot some time soon and let you know, thanks for the suggestion!