Locked At 30 FPS No Matter What.. Why?

[Silibant]

Even on ultra, even on low, even with VSync off, I can't get more (or less) than 30 FPS on both Hawken and Mirror's Edge. I am running with PhysX off as well as VSync. Here's my specs: 8GB DDR3 1600mHz RAM, 4GHz AMD FX 4150, ASUS Radeon HD 7770 with 2GB GDDR5 VRAM. OS is Win8.1, if that makes a difference. I also have my monitor set to 75 hertz, should that help. Thanks, and happy gaming.

 

[Supernova1138]

Are you using any software that includes a framerate limiter eg. RadeonPro, or MSI Afterburner? If you are go digging around those settings to make sure it doesn't have any sort of global framerate limitation enabled. If using RadeonPro, make sure that it is not forcing double Vsync on all 3D programs, doing that will lock your framerates to 30FPS.

If not, go into your Catalyst Control Center/AMD Vision Control Center, and under Gaming>3D Application settings, make sure that 'Wait for Vertical Refresh' is set to 'Off unless application specifies'.

 

[Silibant]

Are you using any software that includes a framerate limiter eg. RadeonPro, or MSI Afterburner? If you are go digging around those settings to make sure it doesn't have any sort of global framerate limitation enabled. If using RadeonPro, make sure that it is not forcing double Vsync on all 3D programs, doing that will lock your framerates to 30FPS.

If not, go into your Catalyst Control Center/AMD Vision Control Center, and under Gaming>3D Application settings, make sure that 'Wait for Vertical Refresh' is set to 'Off unless application specifies'.

I have MSI afterburner, but it's not in use. It doesn't run in the background, does it? I also had the AMD CCC set to what you said, but changed it to always off. It's not my refresh rate, is it? Minecraft runs at 75+ FPS with VSync ON or OFF, so it seems to be limited to heavy PC games.

 

[Supernova1138]

By default, MSI Afterburner starts with Windows, and runs in the background, you can see the little F-16 icon in your system tray if it is on. Bundled with Afterburner, is the RivaTuner Statistics Server, which should also be in your system tray, go into that, highlight global, and check the number in the 'Framerate Limit' box. If that number is anything other than 0, then it will limit your framerate, and if that number is 30, then that's the likely source of your problem.

 

[Silibant]

By default, MSI Afterburner starts with Windows, and runs in the background, you can see the little F-16 icon in your system tray if it is on. Bundled with Afterburner, is the RivaTuner Statistics Server, which should also be in your system tray, go into that, highlight global, and check the number in the 'Framerate Limit' box. If that number is anything other than 0, then it will limit your framerate, and if that number is 30, then that's the likely source of your problem.

I've disabled it the second I installed it as it was useless to have running, so we're back where we started.

 

[Supernova1138]

Well, this seems to only really effect DirectX games by the looks of it, as I think Minecraft uses OpenGL. Are you certain you don't have any programs running that could be putting a framerate cap on Direct3D applications eg. Direct3D Overrider? The only other thing I can suggest is maybe setting your display back to 60Hz, there could be a driver bug that is causing this when running those games on an odd refresh rate for an LCD screen.

 

[Silibant]

Well, this seems to only really effect DirectX games by the looks of it, as I think Minecraft uses OpenGL. Are you certain you don't have any programs running that could be putting a framerate cap on Direct3D applications eg. Direct3D Overrider? The only other thing I can suggest is maybe setting your display back to 60Hz, there could be a driver bug that is causing this when running those games on an odd refresh rate for an LCD screen.

It's certainly possible. I'll set it to 60 hertz and update the thread with results. ASUS drivers for my GPU are pretty meh, so I am not discounting the possibility.

 

[Silibant]

Well, this seems to only really effect DirectX games by the looks of it, as I think Minecraft uses OpenGL. Are you certain you don't have any programs running that could be putting a framerate cap on Direct3D applications eg. Direct3D Overrider? The only other thing I can suggest is maybe setting your display back to 60Hz, there could be a driver bug that is causing this when running those games on an odd refresh rate for an LCD screen.

Didn't help. What could be the problem? Does it lie in DirectX / Direct3D? Thanks for your help so far, by the way.

 

[Supernova1138]

The only other thing I can suggest is to try updating your drivers from the AMD website, with 13.12 being the latest stable version. If you are using the driver from the CD that came with your graphics card, it's probably pretty outdated at this point.

I can only guess there is something screwy going on with your Direct3D driver that you have currently installed if you have no software imposing a framerate limit, and hopefully a driver update will fix that.

 

[Silibant]

The only other thing I can suggest is to try updating your drivers from the AMD website, with 13.12 being the latest stable version. If you are using the driver from the CD that came with your graphics card, it's probably pretty outdated at this point.

I can only guess there is something screwy going on with your Direct3D driver that you have currently installed if you have no software imposing a framerate limit, and hopefully a driver update will fix that.

Attempted to update drivers, but they're all good.

 

[Supernova1138]

Did this problem start after a recent driver update? If so, you may need to rollback your driver to fix the problem. I don't know what else it could be, it looks almost as if you have something running in the background applying a framerate cap despite you apparently not having any of that software installed. You might need to go through your Windows Services and look for some of these programs and disable them if you find any, and make sure they aren't in your startup routine using the Msconfig utility. Look for anything that says RadeonPro, MSI Afterburner, RivaTuner, and D3DOverrider. Maybe MSI Afterburner or something else that got bundled in with it didn't get disabled or uninstalled for whatever reason.

 

[Silibant]

Did this problem start after a recent driver update? If so, you may need to rollback your driver to fix the problem. I don't know what else it could be, it looks almost as if you have something running in the background applying a framerate cap despite you apparently not having any of that software installed. You might need to go through your Windows Services and look for some of these programs and disable them if you find any, and make sure they aren't in your startup routine using the Msconfig utility. Look for anything that says RadeonPro, MSI Afterburner, RivaTuner, and D3DOverrider. Maybe MSI Afterburner or something else that got bundled in with it didn't get disabled or uninstalled for whatever reason.

No, the problem has been in existence ever since I reset my Win8.1 copy to fix some registry errors. No programs running like that in the background. There's some display driver running around called Hydra, but no program other than that.

 

[Supernova1138]

Okay, try uninstalling your AMD display drivers and doing a clean reinstall of them. Maybe System Restore did something a bit screwy with your display driver that is causing this issue.

 

[Silibant]

Okay, try uninstalling your AMD display drivers and doing a clean reinstall of them. Maybe System Restore did something a bit screwy with your display driver that is causing this issue.

I did that already. Keep in mind, this is System Reset, not Restore. Everything was wiped. I re-installed all the AMD stuff on this PC. I am really baffled by this, and want to thank you for sticking with this issue. Note: I was playing some L4D earlier, and my screen would blink black and sound would glitch out.

 

[Supernova1138]

There must be a problem with the driver revision you are using and your particular card, or your card is dying, but let's hope it isn't. You may have to do a rollback to an earlier version, try to avoid the latest beta drivers unless you really need Mantle support for BF4 right now.

 

[Silibant]

There must be a problem with the driver revision you are using and your particular card, or your card is dying, but let's hope it isn't. You may have to do a rollback to an earlier version, try to avoid the latest beta drivers unless you really need Mantle support for BF4 right now.

Highly doubt card death is at hand, the system is just over a few months old. Got any links for a rollback from the most current version of AMD catalyst control center? I sure haven't.

 

[Supernova1138]

I don't know which version you are running right now. here is the 13.10 driver from late October, I think that was the first stable driver release for Windows 8.1. Here is the link for Catalyst 13.12, which is the latest stable driver available.