I dont think my PC is running games as well as it should

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Andrikaz

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Jun 19, 2013
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Hey Guys. So as the title says, i dont think my computer is running as good as it should. what i mean by this is i feel like its being lazy lol.
so i wanted to post this question for im REALLY new to computers but i want to learn more about them because i absolutely loved building my first
computer, and im a technology freak. but i was curious if there was someone out there who might be able to help me incase if i forgot or im missing
something with my computer.
I'll start with my specs.


Case: NZXT Phantom

Operating System: Windows 7 Premium 64Bit

MotherBoard: MSI Z77A-GD65

CPU: Intel Core I7 3770k

GPU/Graphics card: AMD Radeon HD Twin Frozr 7950

RAM: 16GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 1600 MHz

SoundCard: Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium HD (which i dont even use. i'll explain later)

PSU: Corsair TX 750 Watt Enthusiast Series
http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Enthusiast-Certified-Compatible-platforms/dp/B004LB5AZY/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1371645931&sr=8-6&keywords=Power+Supply

Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO

So those are my specs, or at least most of them.

some information that might help.

1. after i put all my parts together and installed my OS on it, i installed all of my graphics card. i also believe i updated them, or at least most of them. if you guys have a place you recommend me checking out that will tell me which parts need updating, let me know and i'll check it out =).

2. after installing my OS, i instantly installed some games and started playing.

3. the only thing that i have tweaked with that relates to OverClocking, is that i've made my GPU's Fan work 46% instead of 40%. but thats it.

4. so why i use my motherboards sound instead of my soundcard, is because as you might have read earlier, im new to computers lol, and the soundcard was really confusing to get to work, so im holding off on trying to get it to work. i was too eager to get my games into action to see what my computer could do so i didn't try to play with it too much lol. so pretty much the only thing i did was plug my stereo's audio cord into the soundcards audio jack but i wasn't getting sound. so lol thats all i tried.

But yeah, i hope someone can help me with this. thanx guys.

if anyone needs more information let me know and i'll be glad to help.

 
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Okay, well you need to provide more information. Your system is a really good one, and should be able to play games very well :)

What exactly is the problem, you say it's 'lazy' but that not enough for us to go on. What games are you playing, what resolution, and what exactly do you think is wrong. Are you getting enough fps (frames per second), is it showing artifacts, funny lines on your screen? The more info you can give, the more we can help.

 
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Use the Windows Experience Index to get an idea if your components are running as they should. With your specs you should score in the 7.x range for all of them. Access it by pressing WinKey+Break on keyboard and click to test the system.

The one component you didn't mention was your HDD. I'll assume it is SATA 3.0.
If you did not already you should visit the website for MB manufacturer and make sure you get all drivers related to your board. Especially one that allows the SATA 3.0 speeds to work.

Next, make sure your are using a XMP profile for your RAM and that it is running at DDR3 1600 speeds.
Without more info those are the two things that could make your PC feel like its running "lazy".
 
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Keith12

Hey, thanx for the reply Keith12. so, what i mean by "lazy" is that i feel like it could be running games better and smoother, but its not for some reason. but i wanted to let you know before hand that it could actually be running at its best and i just expected it to do better.

I play alot of Planetside 2, Dayz and Guild wars 2.
guild wars 2 ranges between 30-45 FPS
Planetside 2 Ranges between 35-65 FPS (Depends on how many online players are around me)
Dayz ranges between 40-60 FPS

im playing both Games on a Resolution of 1800x900 (btw i have a new monitor coming in soon with 144Hz and a 1Ms response time. also in 1920x1080. my current monitor running 60Hz and a 2Ms response time)

as far as funny lines, i got to say that the only thing i notice about that is when i record (Fraps), looking around too fast i will sometimes notice this disoriented line in the center of my screen, from the left side of my monitor stretching all the way to the right side.
something else, when playing DayZ, my game will freeze for .2miliseconds at random through out the day. each freeze happens between 15 seconds of each other.
-------------------------------------
Dhamiltion

Thanks Dhamilton for the reply! as for your answer, im installing all updates to my MB right now. i actually have 2 Hard Drives:

First: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0036Q7MV0/ref=pe_175190_21431760_M3T1_ST1_dp_1
(i use this to store my OP, installed games, music, movies, ect. i still have 742GB left in this)

Second: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148840
(I use this harddrive to store my Fraps recorded Clips. the GB on this hard drive change throughout the day cause i record, and delete alot of videos)

hey uhm, you mentioned something about making sure my RAM's are using XMP profile and thats its running DDR3 1600 Speeds. is there a specific way of doing this? or do i just simply google it and i'll find out? xD (SORRY! im still new to computers!)

*Update*
here are what my computer scored my Performance Index. i hope this helps!
Processor-------Calculations per second -------------- 7.7
Memory(RAM)-------Memory Operations Per second-------7.7
Graphics-------Desktop Performance for windows Aero --------7.9
Gaming Graphics -------3D business and gaming graphics performance-------7.9
Primary Hard Disk------ Disk data transfer rate ------- 5.9
Base Score ----- 5.9 (determined by the lowest subscore)

again guys, thanks for the replies! i will do my best to give you guys the information you need! but i want to apologize for i dont know exactly every piece of information you guys need to help me but i'll try my best.
 
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Okay first things first :) Windows Experience Index, is only a MS gimmick to indicate a level of performance. It's not indicative of stability in anyway, and should not be looked as a tool to help diagnose problems.

On the gaming side of things. The FPS your getting at that res seem to be a bit lower than usual, but not too far out. If you research a little on Toms GPU articles you will see a lot of stuff in particular about AMD cards and a frame latency phenomena, were by some games can 'feel, slow and stutter' Its mostly associated with AMD higher end cards, and maybe this is what your experiencing.

I believe AMD are releasing a beta driver sometime later this month, which is supposed to help address such things, so maybe that will help you.

Asides from that, I would suggest re-installing the drivers,firstly making sure to completely remove the old ones, maybe drive sweeper to help with that, and do a fresh install and see if that helps.


edit: regarding ram, Dhamilton is right about one thing. I would set the timings for your ram modules as per the recommended specs from the manufacturer. You set them manually in the bios. This ensure the ram works as it should, and just rules out another reason why you could experience problems. Be sure to set the correct voltage for the dims in the bios too. That's also important.

 
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The most common problem in your situation are ram related or temperature related.
Get memtest and HWMonitor to test both.

There is a chance your cooling is not connected well enought (if you are new to computers this is a quite common mistake, i made it myself actually), and its underperforming due to that.

For CPU testing you will need Prime 95 and probably real temp/core temp (important note here: you run core temp/real temp first, keep it on and then run Prime 95. If temperature spikes over 80 C, the cooling is insuficient. If so, make sure you STOP prime95 ASAP. STOP not CLOSE with the X sicne that only drops prime95 to the task bar.).

FOr GPU testing, Hw Monitor, or even better RivaTunner (But riva is a bit more complex so read on it before you use it), and run any of those games. IF temps go over 80 as well, its a bad sign. If so, id replace the thermal paste for something better like arctic silver 5. In my case my old 4850 went from 109 C at load to 65 C, so it can be a huge difference if the thermal paste is dead.

Apart from that, i can only think of the HDD/Internet speed bottlenecking you. Have you tried in offline gaming? There is a diference?
 
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Ill still stand by that I believe he was using SATA 2 drivers
There was no mention of updating those drivers from OP

Find your XMP profile in the BIOS. Look for Memory heading and find the option
 
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I don't think your right. Lets say the OP has a standard 7200 rpm HDD....you will not get a higher score in WEI if you update drivers. Maybe .1 variance per run, but this is down to margin of error, or back round tasks running. The only things that will increase the HDD score is if he gets an SSD for his main drive. Then it will bump up. The WEI indicates only that the HDD although prob a good one, is the lowest scoring hardware part (in other words the lowest common denominator). And although standard HDDs have slow loading times in some games, they don't impact games that much whilst playing them. Yes there are times when data goes from the swap file on the HDD but that doesn't happen all that often, providing you have enough system ram which the OP certainly does. I do not think this is a HDD problem.
 
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Hey Guys, thanx you so much for all the replies. now time to respond to you all xD

@keith12
So, i dont want to try uninstalling my drivers and reinstalling, for i feel that the outcome will be more problems than solved. (i dont mean this in a way where im saying uninstalling the drivers and reinstalling them will screw things up, i mean this in a way where "I" will screw it up cause this honestly sounds like a very complicated process just to uninstall all the drivers, then reinstall them.)
im gonna be on the lookout though for the AMD update and hopefully i'll see the improvements. but if that fails, then i'll dig around on how to uninstall drivers and stuff.

@Cats_paw
so i took your advice and went ahead and got Prime95 and Hw Monitor. using Prime95 for 30 minutes, my CPU hit up to 58-63'c on all 4 cores. something tells me im in the clear on that xD.


as for Hw monitor, i wasn't sure if it was a program that will stress test my GPU, or if it just keeps an eye on the tempature, but my graphics card automatically came with a program called MSI Afterburner and MSI Kombustor 2.5, both giving me the ability to have a constant eye on my GPU's temperature. also, kombustor has a Stress Test built into its program which with test my GPU. running this stress test on my GPU with 960MHz/Core.......1250MHz/Memory....... for 10 minutes gave it a Tempature of 52-53'c. While playing planetside 2, 60-65'c (i was playing planetside 2 for about 40 minutes)

your comment on my internet speed being a problem though, i think that might actually be whats up. so, im the son of a military father and i live over here in germany. currently stationed at a base. the german internet is not the best i have to say. in fact, here's a snapshot of a speedtest.net result : http://www.speedtest.net/result/2788114642.png
i was not aware that internet speed could affect your FPS but now that i think of it, its very well possible.

@dhamilton
so i looked into my RAM in my bios, i found out that it was only working at 1333 speed. so i bumped it up to a full 1600. as for the XMP profile, would you mind going into a little bit more detail's as to what this will do?
also, i downloaded sata driver updates, this did not increase it from 5.9. idn if im answering this correctly btw, but both of my hard drives a plugged in through 3.0 Sata ports.


Again, thank you guys so much for the replies. its awesome knowing that people online actually take their time to post and help people with their problems. im actually learning more about my computer every suggestion you guys make so again, thank you.
 
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Its rather unlikely that it does, but its possible (if i remmber its becouse of packets lost, so the frames are about to be generated, but the information required dosent arrive, creating a downfall in frames, however this is very uncommon).

If your temps are fine, and the PSU seems to be fine as well, I think the most likely candidate is either your HDD/Ram or a software.

But at this point im almost totally out of ideas.
Perosonally when my PC starts acting up i just format my OS SSD and start over 😀. This happens every 6 months moreless, up to 1 year.
Main reason is becouse this way you totally rule out software problems, and reinstalling my stuff aint really that hard or takes long nowdays. Normally i can have my system running under 24 hours.
 
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