Question GPU Usage Drops in Games and Other Oddities

[lbwilliams44]

Hello,

Specs:
GPU: RTX 5080 OC
CPU: AMD 9950X3D
RAM: GSKILL Trident Neo RGB 6000MT\s CL30
Motherboard: ASUS ROG Strix X870E-E - Bios version 1605 (Current as of 722)
CPU Cooling: Silverstone IceMyst 360mm w/3 Support Mobo cooling fans, with Thermalright TF9 Past and V2 contact frame.
Case: Phanteks XT Pro Ultra with 4 M25-120 additional inlet fans.
Storage: Crucial T705 2TB on a dedicated Gen5 m.2 slot. 911 GB free
PSU: NZXT C1500 Platinum ATX 3.1
Monitor: ASUS Rog Swift OLED 34" pg34wcdm 240hz, current firmware installed. 3440x1440

Hardware Accelerated GPU Scheduling: Enabled so I can run DLSS Framegen
Optimizations for Windowed Games: Enabled
HDR: Disabled
Display Refresh Rate: Set to Max (239.98 hz)
Currently have all BIOS settings to default, no PBO or Expo currently enabled, but I was also having these issues with the options enabled as well. GPU is not being overclocked at the moment.

I recently built this new PC, and have had some strange issues with it. I originally was having most of these issues with the old Motherboard, switched to new one listed above, and did a clean windows installation. Updated all drivers, chipsets, bios, firmware etc. Here are the consistent issues that I run into, and the games I experience them in. All games run on their highest settings:

Space Marines 2: Sometimes in the middle of a match, the GPU usage will drop down to 40-60%, and the game will begin to lag and stutter around 40fps at a nearly unplayable rate.
Dune: Awakening: Monitor flickers quite a bit in game, turning on the Anti-Flicker setting on my monitor seemed to help this a ton, I believe it disables GSYNC. The stranger issue I have in this game is that anytime I attempt to use their in game bug reporting system (pops up a little window with a screen shot and dialog boxes for me to fill with information, while also collecting current system info) the game freezes, and stays frozen for about 5 minutes before the game crashes and gives me the Crash Report window. This game also suffers from the same GPU usage drop as I get in Space Marines 2, but it happens way less, 10x less.
Dota 2: Dota 2 freezes the moment I move my mouse after a match is found, preventing me from joining. If I do not touch the mouse, the game will not freeze? Initially I fixed this problem by disabling EXPO, but after updating the BIOS to the current version (default settings), it started happening again.

I have verified all game files, I have reinstalled the games, I have tried using older drivers, I have bench tested with OCCT with no errors, tried shader cache at 100gb, and I have run out of ideas. CPU Usage usually floats around 20-28% during gameplay, will spike when loading games, but nothing abnormal when these errors occur. GPU and CPU temp very rarely go over 65C, motherboard rarely over 40C

Any ideas?

 

[Lutfij]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Disable the iGPU in BIOS. Then use DDU to remove all GPU drivers(intel, AMD and Nvidia) in Safe Mode, then manually install the latest GPU driver sourced from Nvidia's support system in an elevated command, i.e, RIght click installer>Run as Administrator.

and did a clean windows installation
Where did you source the installer for your OS? Did you recreate the installer to rule out a corrupt installer? Did you install the OS in offline mode?

 

[lbwilliams44]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Disable the iGPU in BIOS. Then use DDU to remove all GPU drivers(intel, AMD and Nvidia) in Safe Mode, then manually install the latest GPU driver sourced from Nvidia's support system in an elevated command, i.e, RIght click installer>Run as Administrator.

and did a clean windows installation
Where did you source the installer for your OS? Did you recreate the installer to rule out a corrupt installer? Did you install the OS in offline mode?

I will give those things a go, I didn't think to run DDU since it was a fresh install. I created a Media Creation Tool, downloaded everything direct from Microsoft. I mostly did it because I switched motherboards and should have done that in the first place. I don't recall online or offline, I know I did something to skip the PIN reset because it was being weird. Dialog window to set the pin wouldn't open.

 

[beyondlogic]

I will give those things a go, I didn't think to run DDU since it was a fresh install. I created a Media Creation Tool, downloaded everything direct from Microsoft. I mostly did it because I switched motherboards and should have done that in the first place. I don't recall online or offline, I know I did something to skip the PIN reset because it was being weird. Dialog window to set the pin wouldn't open.

Best thing to do is download drivers to usb.
I tend to always run windows on a local account no WiFi or internet for driver installs just to stop conflicts it shouldn't happen. Nvidias drivers are also shockly bad