[SOLVED] i7 7700 non-k poor single core performance

[leoj91]

I have an i7 7700 non-k processor. Using CPU-Z and running bench marks I'm seeing that my single performance core is way below average, about 50% less than other 7700s, I get about 293 benchmark score in Singlecore, where as in multi-thread my score is 2343, closer to the average stated (2383), I have tried undervolting, reverting to stock, not really sure what could be causing such poor single core performance..

 

[Darkbreeze]

What do you mean "reverting to stock"? Since that processor can't be overclocked, it would have to be AT stock settings no matter what. The only thing that might be a variable factor could be the memory configuration.

Maybe you meant, resetting the BIOS to default settings?

What memory are you running with that CPU and if it's faster than 2133mhz, did you enable the XMP profile in the BIOS?

Have you checked to see that you have the latest BIOS firmware version?

The latest chipset drivers available from the Intel website? What is your motherboard model number?

 

[leoj91]

Yes I meant that BIOS was reset to Default settings.

I have 1 8gb Gskill 2400, and 1 8gb Ballistic 2400.

I updated to latest BIOS firmware version before I reset the BIOS, CPU-Z says I am running version F8d which is the latest for my motherboard (Gigabyte Gaming B8 https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-Gaming-B8-rev-10#support-dl-bios)

I am not sure about latest chipset drivers, will check website.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Well, you have mixed memory, so that's going against you from the start.

Have you checked to see that you are actually SHOWING 16GB of memory, and that they are actually running at 2400mhz?

Most of the benchmarks you are pitting your configuration against are likely running much faster memory, since 3000-3200mhz is the most common speed for enthusiast configurations right now.

These are the most recent chipset drivers for your chipset, B250.

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/28182/Chipset-INF-Utility?product=98086

Post screenshots of the memory and SPD tabs in CPU-Z. You will need to select the slots in which you have memory installed on the SPD tab from the drop down menu in order to display information on those installed memory modules on the SPD information tab.

You can post images as follows:

*Click here for instructions on how to post images in Tom's hardware forums

 

[leoj91]

I am showing 16gb memory running with DRAM frequency 1200, attached are photos of CPU-Z.

Does memory factor into single core performance more than multi-threaded?

Am installing most recent chipset drivers, will report back if anything changes.

 

[leoj91]

All drivers appear to be up to date, after a reboot I found that both my multithread and singlecore performance increased slightly, my multithread performance beat out the average score by a few points but single core is still way behind sub-300, I also noticed the score went up after about 3 tests but then declined on each subsequent test... Temperatures are also good staying at about or below 60 degrees.

 

[Darkbreeze]

So, for those sticks, everything looks right. You show 16GB, full speed of 2400mhz and dual channel operation. So that's good.

Memory speed should not affect single core performance more or less than it does multicore performance. It should have an affect on both.

How EXACTLY are you testing single core performance?

 

[Darkbreeze]

Have you tried doing a HARD reset of the CMOS/BIOS? If not, I'd start there.

Power off the unit, switch the PSU off and unplug the PSU cord from either the wall or the power supply.

Remove the motherboard CMOS battery for five minutes. During that five minutes, press the power button on the case for 30 seconds. After the five minutes is up, reinstall the CMOS battery making sure to insert it with the correct side up just as it came out.

Now, plug the power supply cable back in, switch the PSU back on and power up the system. It should display the POST screen and the options to enter CMOS/BIOS setup. Enter the bios setup program and reconfigure the boot settings for either the Windows boot manager or for legacy systems, the drive your OS is installed on if necessary.

Save settings and exit. If the system will POST and boot then you can move forward from there including going back into the bios and configuring any other custom settings you may need to configure such as Memory XMP profile settings, custom fan profile settings or other specific settings you may have previously had configured that were wiped out by resetting the CMOS.


Then, try running User Benchmark, and see where things look to be after doing the hard reset.

https://www.userbenchmark.com/Software

Or, try running the Passmark benchmark.

https://www.passmark.com/products/pt.htm

 

[leoj91]

Well, let me start from the beginning I noticed in games I would get some micro stuttering, everything will be smooth for the most part but every couple of seconds and sporadically I will have a huge dip for a second, I picked up the Ballistic stick (was looking for an identical GSkill stick but RAM is scarce and sold out everywhere in my country so picked up a used Ballistic), that helped somewhat but noticed that problem persisted (not sure if it's actually me or just the optimization of what I'm playing but it seems odd that it happens in almost everything I play).

Out of curiosity I decided to check to make sure everything was working right in CPU-z and stress testing the CPU with Intel Tuning program.

Those are the only programs I have used to check performance of my processor.

Running CPU-Z benchmark and submitting results to website, that is where I saw my 7700 consistently performs way below average in singlecore, I have also noticed in both HWmonitor and Intel app that it does not boost to 4.2 in singlecore benchmark but rather stays pegged at 4.0, as far as I saw in BIOS single core should turbo to 42.

Late last night I ran cpu.userbenchmark.com benchmarking tool and it came up at above average, now I am even more confused as to what to believe.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Try the CMOS reset.

Also, make sure your control panel power plan is set to performance, and then go into the advanced power settings for the performance power plan and set the processor power state min setting to 8% and make sure the max is set to 100%. Save settings and exit.

In the BIOS, make sure that the XMP profile is set for your memory, usually Profile 1 if it asks that.

Then try your games again.

If you don't see a change, then try ALL of these steps.

Here are the first steps to take when trying to solve these kinds of hardware problems. If you have already tried these steps, all of them, exactly as outlined, we can move along to more advanced solutions.

If there are any you have NOT done, it would be advisable to do so if for no other reason than to be able to say you've already done it and eliminate that possibility.


First, make sure your motherboard has the MOST recent BIOS version installed. If it does not, then update. This solves a high number of issues even in cases where the release that is newer than yours makes no mention of improving graphics card or other hardware compatibility. They do not list every change they have made when they post a new BIOS release.

Second, go to the product page for your motherboard on the manufacturer website. Download and install the latest driver versions for the chipset, storage controllers, audio and network adapters. Do not skip installing a newer driver just because you think it is not relevant to the problem you are having. The drivers for one device can often affect ALL other devices and a questionable driver release can cause instability in the OS itself. They don't release new drivers just for fun. If there is a new driver release for a component, there is a good reason for it. The same goes for BIOS updates.

IF you have other hardware installed or attached to the system that are not a part of the systems covered by the motherboard drivers, then go to the support page for THAT component and check to see if there are newer drivers available for that as well. If there are, install them.

The last thing we want to look at, for now anyhow, is the graphics card drivers. Regardless of whether you "already installed the newest drivers" for your graphics card or not, it is OFTEN a good idea to do a CLEAN install of the graphics card drivers. Just installing over the old drivers OR trying to use what Nvidia and AMD consider a clean install is not good enough and does not usually give the same result as using the Display Driver Uninstaller utility. This has a very high success rate and is always worth a shot.

If you have had both Nvidia and AMD cards installed at any point on that operating system then you will want to run the DDU twice. Once for the old card drivers (ie, Nvidia or AMD) and again for the currently installed graphics card drivers (ie, AMD or Nvidia). So if you had an Nvidia card at some point in the past, run it first for Nvidia and then after that is complete, run it again for AMD if you currently have an AMD card installed.

Here are the full instructions on running the Display driver uninstaller and CLEAN installing new drivers.

*Graphics card CLEAN install tutorial using the DDU*

 

[leoj91]

Tried the CMOS Test, booted up, tested again and got about the same results.

Installed all the latest drivers for my motherboard off of Gigabytes website, as well as cleaning video card drivers (was on outdated Nvidia Drivers!)

So far everything appears to be about the same, except I noticed running User Benchmark that pretty much all my hard drives are performing poorly as well as video card below average (Results for storage drives and video card were about the same before and after cleaning drivers, card is reference 980ti no overclock which may explain below average score?), Also the SSD came up with this error "Relative performance n/a - sequential bench incomplete".

Have 1 240gb Kingston SSD with OS and a few games installed, 1 1TB Toshiba 3.5 7200 HD, 1 640gb WD 3.5 7200 HD and one very old 320gb 5200 hitachi drive which I installed to save photos on.

I will try cleaning out some space and seeing how things improve.

PS I very much appreciate you taking the time to respond and help me figure out what may be hindering performance!

 

[TJ Hooker]

I noticed that CPU-Z is saying your FSB: DRAM ratio is 1:18. Given that your RAM is 2400 MHz, this works out to an FSB speed of 133 MHz, which seems odd. Can you post a screenshot of the CPU tab of CPU-Z?

 

[leoj91]

Sure, here is a screenshot of the CPU tab

 

[leoj91]

I also forgot to mention that I have still not been able to find any XMP options in the Gigabyte BIOS, after looking over every single option several times.

 

[TJ Hooker]

Hmm, everything looks normal there, nevermind me.

 

[Darkbreeze]

That's the thing about a CMOS hard reset. It pretty much removes all those kinds of variables unless something is wrong with the motherboard or you have had a bad BIOS update. At the factory settings, there really shouldn't be able to BE a problem with the FSB. Weird that it said that though.

There probably aren't any XMP options on that board thanks to the B250 chipset, since it's fully locked and can't run beyond 2400mhz anyhow. Contrary to my earlier statement about memory speed, you couldn't run anything faster than 2400mhz on that board anyway. If you had an H270 or Z270 board, you probably could, even with a locked CPU.

So, not relevant anyway.

I'm not sure what else to tell you honestly.

 

[TJ Hooker]

Well, according to the mobo spec page it ought to support XMP (up to 2400 MHz). Maybe it's not labelled as "XMP" in the BIOS, could look for anything that refers to a "profile" that looks to be related to RAM. But given that you have non-matching sticks with different profiles (one of which doesn't even have any XMP profiles), it might not be an option.

 

[Darkbreeze]

one of which doesn't even have any XMP profiles

I've never seen a modern consumer grade memory module that didn't have an XMP, AMP or some kind of memory profile with the manufacturer recommended tables for JEDEC standard and recommended timings, voltage and speed coded onto it. And a lot of ECC memory modules, if not most, have them too. In fact, probably all memory has to have some kind of profile or the system would have no clue what it was supposed to be. Pretty sure it HAS to in order to be JEDEC certified.

 

[TJ Hooker]

I didn't say anything about other profiles. Just specifically that it doesn't have XMP. I've never tried combining disparate RAM, I don't know what sort of options the BIOS presents when you have two or more sticks with with non-matching profiles.

Yes, it has JEDEC profiles, as shown in the CPU-Z screenshot.

 

[jessylahaise]

I have the exact same issue with the exact same processor
The result for CPU-Z for single core speed is way below comparable and it seam only running at 4000mhz when doing the test multithread is fine at 4000 mhz
But when it goes for single thread portion of the benchmark it remain at 4000mhz I confirmed both that only 1 core is in use and validating the freq in afterburner
I have motherboard MSI Z270 gaming plus with disparate Ram over clock to 3200mhz

 

[jessylahaise]

Plus I noticed that in the CPU Tab of CPUZ and confirmed with the value of afterburner it seams that the clock of the PSU is stable at 4000mhz I think it should be going idle back to 3600 ang goin up to 4200 when under load but it doesnt
BTW my CPU is exacly the same as posted by leoj91 freq at 4000mhz

 

[Darkbreeze]

CPU-Z, much like the bios, does not show real time clock changes on the CPU from what I can recall. I would only use CPU-Z for verifying dual channel operation on memory anyhow. HWinfo (NOT HWmonitor), is a far superior option with much broader chipset accuracy and support. Plus, it has real time display for ALL system sensors.