Huge GPU upgrade fails to increase performance

[hypnopaedia]

Hey guys, I upgraded my GPU from an ASUS GTX 650 Ti to an NIVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 and, across multiple games, have seen little-to-no increase in graphic performance. I've noticed a number of problems since the swap that should help point someone in the right direction.

The fans on the new GPU only cycle during boot-up, then they shut off. I have a lot of airflow to the unit and a standalone fan, so overheating is not the issue. Since the card itself is working (though not to what should be it's full potential), I'm assuming the issue is not power-based. Instead I'm wondering if there are any compatibility issues between the gpu and the motherboard. I'm not sure, and I'm anxious about overclocking until I get a better handle on the issue first. All relevant specs are below. Any help is appreciated!

OS: W10 / Ubuntu Dual-boot
Motherboard: ASRock N68C-GS FX
CPU: AMD FX-6300 Hexcore Processor
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960
RAM: 8 GB
PSU: SeaSonic M12II 620 Bronze (620W)

 

[jr9]

I start with booting into safe mode with Display Driver Uninstaller, booting into normal Windows, and then installing the newest display driver. Only install the display driver and Physx, leave everything else unchecked.

You should be seeing large performance gains with that upgrade. Sounds like the drivers aren't working properly.

Updating the BIOS on the motherboard may help.

 

[boju]

After reinstalling drivers just double check your gpu temps. Some gpus its normal for fans to stop spinning when not required, they should start spinning when temps increase playing a game.

Where did you buy the 960 from?

 

[Karadjgne]

You probably have an eco setting on the gpu. My Asus 970 has one, soon as the boot is over, the fans shut down and don't start up again until the gpu hits @65°C. Can be a mechanical switch on the gpu or can be software switched (mine is software through asus gpu tweak)

There's more to fps than changing the gpu. You could have added a gtx1080 and may not see much (if any) improvement. The main cause of this is the cpu and its usage according to the game engine. For instance, amd cpus bomb with Skyrim, no matter what FX was used or even any OC, an intel 3rd gen i3 would beat them all. This is cpu bottlenecking and when that happens, the gpu can only put the frames on screen according to how fast the cpu can give it to them. If your cpu cores are maxing out usage, it won't matter what gpu is used, it'll only do what it can do. Check in game cpu usage, AMD Afterburner has an overlay.

Cpu throttling due to temps is also a good possibility, good airflow is essential, but if the cooler itself can't handle the load temps, airflow won't matter.

 

[SoNic67]

The CPU (AMD FX-6300) is your bottleneck.
My GeForce GTX 960 was running cool too (compared to the present RX590), that's why you hear no fans. Especially when the CPU is not able to "push" the GPU usage to 100% (the GPU waits for the CPU to create work).
Use GPU-Z while in a game, you will see the usage of GPU, temperature and fan RPM

 

[boju]

@ SoNic67

https://www.3dmark.com/fs/10630438
Gtx650, cant pick ti for some reason but wouldn't be that much difference.

https://www.3dmark.com/fs/13173648 Gtx960

960 system is about the stock turbo level. Big difference in score hey. 6300 wouldn't bottleneck a 960, not at all.

Regarding gpu fan, we don't know yet if fans kick in while gaming, just on boot.

 

[SoNic67]

Well. OK. If he runs the test he might get good results too, but the complain is for specific games. Those might be more CPU-bound than that test...

 

[boju]

Yes your right, does depend on game and 6300 is mediocre. But apparently there is no change at all.

Why i asked where he bought the 960 from. We'll see. If its from ebay/china, a good chance its fake.

 

[The Paladin]

You probably have an eco setting on the gpu. My Asus 970 has one, soon as the boot is over, the fans shut down and don't start up again until the gpu hits @65°C

get MSI afterburner and set your own fan curve, mine runs 40% @ 40c and 70% @ 70c then 100% @ 80c, loud yes... cool, never goes over 76c (GTX 970 SSC + OC)


hypnopaedia
where did you get the video card from?

 

[SoNic67]

Yes your right, does depend on game and 6300 is mediocre. But apparently there is no change at all.
Why i asked where he bought the 960 from. We'll see. If its from ebay/china, a good chance its fake.

Yep, that's true!

 

[hypnopaedia]

Updates!

@jr9 Booted into safe mode with driver uninstaller, went through the cleanup, then reinstalled just core gpu drivers and physX; checked my bios for latest version (which it was), no changes in performance after the cleanup.

@boju you're right, the fan spinning is correlated to gpu temp. I was able to manually turn the fans on and off with MSI afterburner, but I don't know at what temp they auto on.

@everybody: As far as where I got the GPU, it was purchased through newegg, which I assume to be 99.9% reputable. Sometimes they sell used as new, but no knockoffs as far as I'm aware. Also, according to msi afterburner overlay, the cpu is not bottlenecking performance. The GPU is active anywhere from 30-50% at all times, and the CPU is active at a lower percentage. So now the problem seems to be why the components are not operating at closer to full capacity. It's not temp related, they both actually stay under 40° C with the Hyper Evo 212 and the fans on the 960. Should I be OCing the CPU? I would think not since it's not operating anywhere near 100% anyway. To be honest, I'm more confused than when I started.

 

[boju]

Run an instance of Firestrike and post results. We'll see if any ideas stem from it.

Post a link to the result page after validating so we can compare numbers

 

[SoNic67]

The GPU is active anywhere from 30-50% at all times, and the CPU is active at a lower percentage. So now the problem seems to be why the components are not operating at closer to full capacity. It's not temp related, they both actually stay under 40° C with the Hyper Evo 212 and the fans on the 960.

The 8GB memory might be the limiting factor - Task Manager, Performance tab or the "Resource Monitor" can also help you see the RAM usage.

Also, some games don't scale well with number of cores, especially older ones, some are not programmed to multi-thread well.
On my 6 core (12 with HT) I can see lower "total" usage numbers for CPU, but if I look at utilization per cores, I see 1-2 cores maxed out in older games, up to 4 in newer.
So depending of your game, if it uses just one or two of your AMD cores, you will have weak performance, mainly because... it's an AMD. Again use Task Manager - Performance tab or "Resource Monitor".

For your CPU you have this performance results: https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+FX-6300+Six-Core&id=1781
6379 multi threaded, 1408 single threaded.
Not bad, but not stellar either, kind of like mine, and I know that's working well in games, with 24GB of RAM installed:
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+X5675+%40+3.07GHz&id=1309&cpuCount=2.
12704 multi thread, 1387 single tread.

Example for Sniper Elite 4 on my PC:
CPU usage for this game only is averaging a total of 18% over 12 cores - that means 0.18x12=2.16 cores.
But, in game, you can see that one of the cores is loaded at 80-90%. It might load partially other cores, but I have the feeling that the main one it's the one loaded almost to the max. If that was maxed out at 100% then I would have a single-core CPU bottleneck.
The rest of the cores deal with the other processes that I have running in background (I have lots of other things).
The RAM usage, at the highest graphic settings, is approx 10GB just for the game itself, and I have plenty of free RAM left in case that's needed.

 

[hypnopaedia]

@boju FireStrike Benchmark:

FireStrike showing that my driver is not approved, but it's downloaded from NVIDIA website. Not sure what this means.
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@SoNic67 Picture of CPU Core Performance from running TERA:

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Screenshot of Tera with Afterburner Overlay:

None of the 6 cores are maxed, nor the GPU, still only running @ 21 fps
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Strangely enough, I have two parked CPU cores which shouldn't be happening. Even with that fix I don't think I'd see much of an increase in performance, since we're not clocking in too high for the CPU anyway, unless I'm interpreting the information wrong. Finally, total RAM use for the whole system with games running is about 5 of my 8 GB's, so I don't think that has anything to do with the issue. Thanks for your continued help guys!

 

[boju]

@boju FireStrike Benchmark:

FireStrike showing that my driver is not approved, but it's downloaded from NVIDIA website. Not sure what this means.

It'll be just Firestrike not familiar with the driver revision i wouldn't worry about it but just in case what driver are you using, can you link to the driver page from Nvidia where you got it from. Is Nvidia control panel installed? Should be but just checking.

Firestrike score is good but i actually wanted the full report so we can have a look at your gpu and cpu core clocks etc. Never mind.

Have a look at this, see if anything here catches your eye.
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/faq/id-2322807/lags-spikes-full-core-unparking-tutorial.html

 

[maxalge]

None of the 6 cores are maxed, nor the GPU, still only running @ 21 fps

you will never max out your cores on games that dont support all your cores


most online games only use 2 cores at best

your low fps in that game is due to your obsolete cpu with its low IPC

 

[hypnopaedia]

@boju sorry, here's full detail report: https://www.3dmark.com/3dm/25797854?

@maxalge you seem to be right about the low IPC being the problem, considering nothing else is showing any particular result.

 

[avenge]

Your CPU is the bottleneck:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNsQKALO4nM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9jxEeIr_R0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrQmz97ajyU
Not much but still it does. Check if your CPU is not overheating and running constantly at maximum frequencies when gaming. You can use MSI Afterburner for real time monitoring.

 

[boju]

Your Firestrike score has improved over your old card thats for sure.

Curious on a couple of things.

Your max turbo clock is 3.5 should be 3.8. So something is gimping your turbo be it heat or power plan in Windows. 300MHz isn't a lot but i wonder what else is going on in tandem with not able to hit maximum. Or have you manually set it like that?

Running single channel memory. Dual channel allows cpu to access twice the bandwith. Increase in fps wont be drastic but overall system response should be smoother.

 

[hypnopaedia]

@avenge thanks for the videos, it seems you're right about that and I may end up switching out some components.

@boju I haven't manually modified any power settings, and I can tell you that the temp is not the issue. I've checked this with multiple software with in-game overlays. Any ideas as to how I could implement dual channel memory? I will check my Windows power settings.

 

[boju]

Any ideas as to how I could implement dual channel memory?

By looking into getting another 8GB stick identical to the one you have and run dual channel with both sticks. At the moment 1 stick = single channnel.