Games get choppy/laggy after approximately 1 hour of play

[FusionNM]

In November I built a new rig and decided to go with Win 10 pro.

Since then, every 3d game I play works great for about 1 to 2 hours, then begins to frame skip / distort sound and over the next 30 minutes it works it's way up until it becomes unplayable.

If I get out of the game, and get back into that one, or any others, it continues lagging like it did when I exited, even if it's hours later.
The only way to fix it is to restart my machine. Logging out and back into windows doesn't fix it.

I have spent months trying to solve this, reading post after post trying to figure out something that works.

I have uninstalled my video card drivers, reinstalled them. Same with sound. I tried using windows HD audio driver as opposed to mine, since Realtek drivers have been known to cause issues.

I've tried VSync fixes. Running any of the games at the lowest setting doesn't really help. The lagging may go down, depending on the game, but it's always there. I've done memory checks, and I've done system performance checks before and after the lagging begins. In 3d benchmark programs there is no difference before the lag in games starts and after I've exited the games. I've updated my bios, windows, everything I can think of, and it's all Win 10 compatible. It doesn't matter if I play my game through Steam, Uplay, or off of a disc, there is no difference.

I have tried stopping or restarting every service that is running after the game begins to lag, and there seems to be no change.

Games I have confirmed this with are Fallout 4, Fallout 3, Rebel Galaxy, Rise of the Tomb Raider, The Evil Within, FarCry 3, FarCry 4, and several others.

My system specs:

Windows 10 Pro
Asus ROG Maximus VIII Hero Motherboard
Intel I7 6700k
16 GB Ram (2x8GB Corsair Vengeance LPX 3000MHz)
Asus Strix GTX 960 4GB
500 GB M.2 SSD Samsung 850 EVO
2 TB WD Drive
750W EVGA Power Supply

Any help that anyone could provide would be extremely appreciated.
I've had this issue for months, and I'm getting tired of rebooting every hour.

Thank you!

 

[hfb242]

Maybe it's getting too hot so your CPU lowers its performance so it doesn't overheat.

 

[koffeeshop77]

turn off windows update, firewall, CortanA,...all that stuff that windows comes with, make sure you antivirus and malware n stuff is not scanning while your playing (most of them e.g. Avast come with a game mode to shut it off while your play games), windows has a scheduler but if it is updating or scanning it will just keep on till it finished that's why i turn it off completly and use third party apps.
also use samsung magician to set up your disk to performance. easiest way to do is to use that prog.
http://www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/minisite/SSD/global/html/support/server_downloads.html

alos will show if you need to up date you firm ware and will fix the unnecessary pagefiles for you. all at once

use high quality thermal past if you dont already.

and yeah make sure you have good air flow over /though your case and VRM that are sticking out there.

 

[FusionNM]

Thank you both for the quick replies!

I've been playing for about 2 hours now with all of Windows extra stuff turned off. I haven't setup a third party anti-malware/virus yet because I wanted to take care of this issue first.

As far as I can tell, all of my drivers are up to date, as is the firmware for everything that would need it.

I downloaded Samsung Magician and set that up. I appreciate that recommendation, I hadn't used that tool before but I'm glad I did. Sadly I don't think any of that fixed anything.

It's laggy again. My CPU is running at ~39c and my GPU is running at about 50c.
I used Arctic Silver when putting this together, and a Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo fan, and I have it wrapped in a Thermaltake Chaser MK-I case. I really don't believe that heat is the issue.

I really am lost on this. I feel almost as if there's a memory leak in a critical window service. Or maybe my RAM is bad and the checks just haven't detected it.

 

[koffeeshop77]

is your ram running duel channal?

XSplit Gamecaster x GPU Tweak
^^ =un in stall ^
records games /gaming idk the setting but this could be your problem.
and nvidia's shadow play so you don't need that.
if you need to to tweeak your gpu you can do that buy using msi after burner or EVGA tweaker(download through steam)

 

[FusionNM]

Thank you for the suggestion, I hadn't thought of it yet, but my RAM is running in slots A2 and B2, 8GB, 3000MHZ sticks in each, and yes, it is dual channel.

I did have Gamecaster and GPU Tweak installed, I wasn't using either of them though, as I had switched to Afterburner. I uninstalled both, and I'm not currently using Afterburner. Unfortunately that didn't fix it either.

I have also tried increasing voltage to my RAM, and running it at 2133MHZ (Bios default) just to see if that affects it, and it doesn't seem to.

Maybe I should clarify exactly what happens.

I'll get into any game that uses 3D. It'll run perfectly, no matter the graphics setting, for about 1-2 hours.
Then, I'll start hearing a slight sound distortion, a clicking sound, along with a few frame skips. As it goes on, the frame skips get more intense, and the sound gets more distorted. The two symptoms go hand in hand, so I can't tell if it's a graphic issue or a sound issue. The odd thing is, most cut-scenes will play sharp, even if the distortion gets really bad in game, and the menu's, even screens like Rise of the Tomb Raider's camp menu, run fine, but the second I exit those it starts lagging and the sound distortion starts again. The problem increases substantially over a period of about 5-20 minutes, from skipping just a frame here and there, to being so choppy I can't control anything.

 

[FusionNM]

Wow, so after 3 months of running around in circles, trying to figure out what was going on, I finally figured it out I think!

It turns out that, out of all things, it was the Windows 10 driver for the Xbox One controller.
After downloading and installing the "Microsoft Xbox One Controller" driver for previous windows versions the problem seems to have gone away.

Thank you all for the replies!