[SOLVED] Is my CPU limiting my graphic card ?

[Bakakumaho]

Hi, everyone !

https://flic.kr/p/2ivpXzz

So, this is my CPU's percentage of utilization while I was playing. I read that if your CPU's utilization is too high, it means that your CPU is limiting your GPU, which is something I don't want, obviously. And the % of Utilization is quite high, nearly hitting the 100% and almost always being higher than 80%.

So I was asking myself if my GPU, a GeForce GTX 1070 was being limited by my Intel core i5-7400.
Does someone have the answer, by any chance ?

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

Yes it is. The slow CPU is holding it back.
Not a great pairing,

 

[Darkbreeze]

It depends on what you are playing. For some games, that CPU is perfectly fine for that graphics card, because most of them are GPU limited titles. Some games are heavily CPU dependent and on those titles that i5-7400 is probably going to be holding you back somewhat. If you could find a used Kaby lake i7 for a good price, that might be a worthwhile investment IF you have a motherboard with a good enough VRM and power delivery design to handle it.

Your utilization theory is completely skewed though. CPU intensive titles are going to show high utilization while GPU bound games will likely show much lower CPU resource usage. There are too many variables to factor things in that way.

Bottom line is, if you cannot configure your in game settings as high as you would like without frame rates tanking then you need a more capable graphics card. If you can reduce the in game quality settings and your frame rates DON'T go UP, then either it is a game that is not using the CPU much or you have a CPU that is too weak to handle the increase in frame rates.

 

[Bakakumaho]

So, I tried to play The Division 2 with the "High" graphism configuration. Here is how much my CPU is used :

https://flic.kr/p/2ivnJ6A

And when I have the "Low" graphism configuration, it's exactly the same.

I get around 50 to 60 fps in High, and I get around 90-100 fps in Low. The weird thing is, with Low graphism, the game tends to take more time to load everything, sometimes A LOT of time. To spawn, it literally took me MINUTES with Low graphism, while it only takes less than a minute with High graphism. Also, even if I get around 95 fps in Low, it doesn't feel smooth at all because of the game freezing everytime, because it's trying to load textures.
It feels smoother at 50 fps with no freeze than at 95 fps with a lot of freeze...

To show you how much it takes time to load textures in Low, here is an exemple of a building that took something like half a minute to load :

https://flic.kr/p/2ivrFXZ

 

[Karadjgne]

Cpu sets the fps limit according to the game code. Gpu sets the fps on screen according to detail levels and resolution.

So if a game allows the cpu to set a 100fps limit, then it's on the gpu to live upto that limit or fail. If the detail levels are too high on a weaker gpu, you may only see 60fps at ultra, but 100fps at low.

In your case, you have a strong gpu, so it's capable of more than 100fps at ultra, capable of more than 100fps at low, but limited to 100fps either way, by the cpu.

The cpu always works at 100%. It'll pre-render as many frames as the game code allows per second. The usage % is the amount of resources the cpu needs to use to get that 100%. So if the cpu is at 60% utilized, that means it's using @ 60% of its bandwidth per core used, maybe 2 cores at full 100% bandwidth and 2 cores at 30% etc. It's not so much a matter of how much the cpu is used, but how much OF the cpu is being used to get every frame possible per second.

 

[Darkbreeze]

The division 2 was a poorly coded piece of crap. Obviously. I don't think the problem is your CPU at all, it's the game. Seems it was never properly fixed either. There are literally hundreds, if not thousands, of similar 100% CPU usage complaints out there with no apparent resolution that was ever forthcoming from what I'm seeing. I never played the game myself, but that's a lot of conviction from a lot of forum members across the web to be wrong.

https://www.google.com/search?safe=active&sxsrf=ACYBGNQb1puy4dwVwfOszs5LSo7SllGc9A:1582179919183&ei=TyZOXrfKCtGytgWgmKBo&q=Is+The+division+2+high+CPU+usage&oq=Is+The+division+2+high+CPU+usage&gs_l=psy-ab.3..33i22i29i30.25595.27537..27699...0.2..0.228.1576.9j3j2......0....1..gws-wiz.......0i71j0j0i22i30.C8BpkuDA6sw&ved=0ahUKEwj3rbbAv9_nAhVRma0KHSAMCA0Q4dUDCAo&uact=5

 

[herrwizo]

Long story short - yes, you are CPU limited. 4 threads simply doesn't cut it anymore, except for older titles. At the very least, you need an i7 from the same generation to give your CPU some room to breathe. It has the same number of cores, but twice the threads. They tend to be quite expensive, though, even 2nd hand....

 

[Bakakumaho]

4 threads isn't enough ? How much would be enough ?

 

[Karadjgne]

8. That means i7-7700 / i7-7700k. Even some older games lije GTA:V much prefer upto 8 threads, and find 4 threads very limiting.

 

[Darkbreeze]

I think you guys are missing the point. There are literally hundreds, perhaps thousands, of threads with people reporting the EXACT same 100% CPU usage behavior on that game even with i7's or Ryzen processors that have six or eight cores. It is, I assume, something a lot more due to being badly coded and lacking the necessary optimizations than it is to due with not having enough cores ALTHOUGH I will agree that in many of the reports I looked at those with more cores didn't have AS MANY problems, but they still had problems.

There are plenty of very high end, CPU intensive games that run just fine on a Kaby i5, and while upgrading it is a really good idea, there should not be 100% usage if the quality settings are high enough unless you're rocking a 1080 ti or higher at 1080p and are now seriously beyond the requirements of the game to support those settings. Yes, it's older with few cores, but there are clearly other problems in this scenario as well.