Question Microstuttering issue on brand new PC

[nkneshev]

I have been trying to fix this for 3 months now and I am really at a loss. I built a new PC fairly recently, excluding GPU and storage.
Full PC Specs:
Motherboard: ASROCK Z790 Pro RS DDR5
CPU: i5-12600k(running at stock speeds)
RAM: Kingston Fury Beast DDR5 6000mhz, 2x16gb, CL36
GPU: Gigabyte GTX1080 Xtreme Gaming
Cooling: beQuiet! Pure Rock 2 (it cools the CPU fine, idle 30-36C, under load 60-65C max.My case also has 3 front fans and one in the back, so airflow is decent)
PSU: Cougar GEX 750W 80+ Gold, fully modular
Storage: Kingston A400 120gb(boot drive, only used for windows), WD Blue SATA SSD, a Samsung generic NVME SSD
Case: 1stPlayer T7-P

I have posted a thread before asking for help regarding my RAM issues - what happened is, when set to XMP 6000mhz, the PC crashed randomly(once a day usually, after which I could use it for like 8 hours without issues)with Event Viewer showing a "Kernel Power" error. Setting the RAM at 5600mhz via XMP solved the issue, as well as manually setting it to 6000mhz. I even managed to set it to 6000 via XMP and it seemed to work when RAM was set to "Gear 2" mode, but I have not tested long enough to besure, as the PC went to the repair shop the next day since it is still under warranty.

Since the RAM issue was pretty much solved, since I do not mind running it at 5600mhz, I can talk about the main issue I have - troubleshooting it has been a ride for sure.
In pretty much every game I have microstutters which do not feel like FPS drops, but more like a brief stall/freeze. In more CPU-intensive games(Hell let loose, Squad, Escape from tarkov) the stutters are more frequent and last for a second, while in lighter games(CS2, R6 Siege) they are millisecond stutters.I also have these in Windows, but they are very rare.

What I have tried so far:
-BIOS update and clearing CMOS; ***The mobo came with the latest BIOS version at the time(, however as of JAN2025 there has been a BIOS update which mentions Intel microcode update and memory compatability. I have not yet updated to that BIOS version, as my PC is still at the repair shop and I hope they do that there.
-Disabling E-Cores in BIOS and ProcessLasso;
-Fresh reinstall of GPU drivers, trying older NVIDIA drivers as well;
-Disabling GPU scheduling in windows;
-Switching from WIN10 to WIN11, since 11 handles 12th gen and up better apparently;
-Disabling Windows/XBOX Game Bar, disabling discord hardware acceleration;
-Making sure I have every driver for my mobo updated;
-Setting 1080 to "Max performance" in the NVIDIA control panel, as well as additional settings;
-Disabling/enabling C-States in BIOS;
-Using Latencymon to see if there are any issues - it showed no problems;

At this point I believe it might be a hardware problem and I have been trying to pinpoint which component causes this.My storage is fine, my GPU works fine as on my previous setup it worked as intended and I had no such issues.The i5-12600k had good results when benchmarking, so I am excluding it from the potential culprit list.
I read that my Cougar GEX PSU might potentially be the issue, as it's voltage regulators are not that great. Since 12th gen and above have these so-called "transient spikes", the PSU might not keep up very well and fail to provide clean power to the CPU/GPU, causing these brief stalls/stutters. Lastly, my other suspect is the motherboard, but I do not really have a way to test that.

Could this be a PSU issue or a motherboard issue? Am I on the right track to discovering where these stutters come from? I am almsot out of ideas.

​

 

[helpstar]

did you reinstall Windows or just updated it to 11?
check the temperatures of GPU
check storage by manufacturer's tool and eventually update firmware
check RAM by memtest

 

[nkneshev]

did you reinstall Windows or just updated it to 11?
check the temperatures of GPU
check storage by manufacturer's tool and eventually update firmware
check RAM by memtest

I updated to Windows 11 first, then did a fresh re-install via USB with the ISO from the Microsoft website - I also have a key, it is a legitimate copy.
GPU runs at 62C when under load, I have capped my FPS in every game, since my monitor is 75hz. I have tried uncapping the fps, but the issue remains.Forgot to mention, I have also tried with another NVIDIA gpu(borrowed a gtx1650 from a friend) just to be 100% sure it is not my 1080, but the issue was still there.
Storage has the newest firmware/drivers available.
I ran memtest86 on both sticks separately, took about 2hrs for each stick as I went with the longer test - RAM returned 0 errors.

 

[Eximo]

DDR5 is ECC, not completely like actual ECC memory, so it can recover from minor memory errors. These could be the stutters you are seeing and you still may really have a memory problem.

A400 boot drive might be part of the problem, particularly if it is full. Is that where your page file lives? Move the page file to the Samsung if it has free space, and leave about 20% of the drive empty for TRIM tasks.

Games these days do a lot of on the fly decompression of game files and textures. (Some games use the GPU to decompress things, and while the 1080 is still a decent card, it isn't amazing) If you have drives that are slow enough, you can observe problems there as well. Now I understand you were running the same hardware before, but Windows 11 does store a lot more things in memory (for performance) so you may have less system memory bandwidth available for other things. It could be the system is relying more on the drives than loading everything into memory.

Power supply should be replaced just generally. Particularly if it is as old as the GTX 1080, you want to replace it with something that has a 10 year warranty from the likes of Corsair, Thermaltake, MSI, ASUS, etc.

 

[nkneshev]

DDR5 is ECC, not completely like actual ECC memory, so it can recover from minor memory errors. These could be the stutters you are seeing and you still may really have a memory problem.

A400 boot drive might be part of the problem, particularly if it is full. Is that where your page file lives? Move the page file to the Samsung if it has free space, and leave about 20% of the drive empty for TRIM tasks.

Games these days do a lot of on the fly decompression of game files and textures. (Some games use the GPU to decompress things, and while the 1080 is still a decent card, it isn't amazing) If you have drives that are slow enough, you can observe problems there as well. Now I understand you were running the same hardware before, but Windows 11 does store a lot more things in memory (for performance) so you may have less system memory bandwidth available for other things. It could be the system is relying more on the drives than loading everything into memory.

Power supply should be replaced just generally. Particularly if it is as old as the GTX 1080, you want to replace it with something that has a 10 year warranty from the likes of Corsair, Thermaltake, MSI, ASUS, etc.

I went back to windows 10 once I saw that upgrading to win11 did not solve my problem. On my boot drive, I have about 50-55gb free. On my last build that had a budget MSI am4 board paired with a ryzen 7 2700 and 2x16gb@3200mhz, I had no microstutters in games like Witcher 3, CS2 and R6 Siege for example.(not mentioning squad or hell let loose, as i could not really maintain a smooth 75fps since my cpu was bottlenecking my 1080).
My power supply is brand new and I got it with the new build, however if it turns out to be the issue I will most likely replace it with the Corsair RM850x.
If the PSU is not the issue, I will test a new mobo - most likely the MSI - MAG B760 TOMAHAWK WIFI.
If all of that fails as well, I will probably bite the bullet and sell the mobo/cpu/ram combo at a slight loss and get myself a MSI B550-A PRO paired with a ryzen 7 5700x3d and my old ddr4 ram.

 

[helpstar]

check motherboard's cpu socket for bent or discolored pins. be sure the cpu cooler is not overtightend on the cpu.
check which frequency the cpu is running, maybe it clocks down and up all the time
in which slots did you install the RAM?

which pcie slot did you install the gpu in?
in which m.2 slot the boot/system storage?

 

[nkneshev]

check motherboard's cpu socket for bent or discolored pins. be sure the cpu cooler is not overtightend on the cpu.
check which frequency the cpu is running, maybe it clocks down and up all the time
in which slots did you install the RAM?

The PC was assembled in the shop I ordered it from, but the cooler seems to be set up right since I opened it up to install my storage and made sure all the cables were set up right. If they do not manage to fix it there, I will check the cpu/socket when they send it back.
The frequency does change a lot, yes - when playing games it goes up and when the PC is idle, it goes as low as 1ghz to save power. It goes all over the place basically, adapting itself to whatever I am doing. What I have not yet tried is to disable this feature via BIOS, since my PC is not with me atm, but I will def try it once I get it back(again, if they do not fix it at the shop and figure it out there).I would be surprised if that fixes the issue, since these CPUs are designed to behave that way and work normally.RAM is installed in the correct slots(B2 and A2).

 

[helpstar]

what I meant was, is the frequency while under load and while stuttering appears changing a lot
did you install any tuning tools like afterburner or similar?
check cpu with intel diagnostic tool, when you get it back

 

[nkneshev]

what I meant was, is the frequency while under load and while stuttering appears changing a lot
did you install any tuning tools like afterburner or similar?
check cpu with intel diagnostic tool, when you get it back

I have tested the CPU with intel diagnostic tool and it passed the test. I had installed afterburner and rivatuner before and monitored the cpu core frequency and everything looked alright.During gaming, it can vary from 3.7ghz to 4.2, depending on the game and what is happening, but when observing the stutters did not appear as the frecuency was changing.Will check again when I get it back just to be sure.