Question My PC is underperforming, what should I do?

[Juan Camilo Uribe Villa]

It's been some time since my pc has lost a lot of performance, I've had this PC (i5 6600, GTX 1070, 16GB RAM) since november of 2016, I noticed the performance loss when I opened GTA V a few days ago and my pc was running at 30fps on minimum settings and 1080p, months ago I was able to play at 60+ on high - very high settings, comparing to a youtube video doing the benchmark, using his same settings I was getting an average of 50 fps less, other games like CS:GO perform noticeably worse than they did before.

If this helps, recently I had a clean Windows install, dusted the case, temps are alright (CPU is usually at 60° as well as the GPU), the usage of the cpu and gpu in CS:GO is at 70% which is strange, but in GTA V the GPU is at 100% when usually it was the one holding back, my PSU is 700w and certainly not a cheap one (i can't find the box with the exact model right now), system is set at high performance mode.

A benchmark at userbenchmark.com showed that my GPU was performing about 8% worse than the average.

I've tried looking for information everywhere but nothing has worked for me, so I would like to know what do you guys recommend, I will provide more information if you need it.

 

[Shektron]

Are you on the latest GPU drivers? If yes, uninstall your current GPU drivers using Display Driver Uninstaller, then download and install the latest drivers again, and also update the BIOS to the latest version from your motherboard manufacturer's official website.

Please list your full system specs in list form, including the names of all the parts you know the names of.

 

[Juan Camilo Uribe Villa]

Are you on the latest GPU drivers? If yes, uninstall your current GPU drivers using Display Driver Uninstaller, then download and install the latest drivers again, and also update the BIOS to the latest version from your motherboard manufacturer's official website.

Please list your full system specs in list form, including the names of all the parts you know the names of.

Ok, reinstalled drivers and the BIOS already was at the latest version.

CPU: Intel Core i5-6600, 3600 MHz (36 x 100)
MOBO: MSI Z170A Gaming M3 (MS-7978)
RAM: G.SKILL Aegis DDR4 2400 C15 1x16GB
Storage: Toshiba DT01ACA200 2TB (Games are installed here)
Sandisk SD8SBBU120G1122 120GB (Boot device)
OS: Windows 10
PSU: can't remember the brand but it is 700w


I can't think of any other important component, if you need it just tell me

 

[Shektron]

Try resetting the CMOS. You can search how to do that on Google, you basically just need to set a jumper on the motherboard to position 2 and 3 instead of 1 and 2. Again, you can Google for specific instructions.

 

[Juan Camilo Uribe Villa]

Try resetting the CMOS. You can search how to do that on Google, you basically just need to set a jumper on the motherboard to position 2 and 3 instead of 1 and 2. Again, you can Google for specific instructions.

Done, the performance hasn't changed at all

 

[Shektron]

Use MSI Afterburner's OSD to check for CPU and GPU usage while you are in-game(if that is not what you were doing previously), and use it also to monitor your temps while playing games. Try running a CPU stress test like AIDA64 to check for thermal throttling, and run Heaven Valley benchmark with MSI Afterburner to check for GPU thermal throttling.

 

[Juan Camilo Uribe Villa]

Use MSI Afterburner's OSD to check for CPU and GPU usage while you are in-game(if that is not what you were doing previously), and use it also to monitor your temps while playing games. Try running a CPU stress test like AIDA64 to check for thermal throttling, and run Heaven Valley benchmark with MSI Afterburner to check for GPU thermal throttling.

Did all of them plus Intel's xtreme tuning utility which allows you to stress the cpu.

The CPU kept at about 48°C and the GPU never went above 65°C, there was not thermal throttling whatsoever

 

[Shektron]

Okay, this may sound weird, but uninstall your current GPU drivers and try to go BACK a few drivers versions(go to a driver from a time when your FPS was better), see if your performance increases again. This is mostly just a conspiracy theory, but sometimes Nvidia might slow down past GPU's with newer drivers to pressure people into upgrading. Again, just a conspiracy theory, not an allegation on Nvidia or anything.

 

[Urzu1000]

Is this related to GTA V specifically, or across the board? Even if your GPU is 8% below average performance (which isn't that big of a deal considering how many overclocked cards are going to be in the testing pool), that's a GTX 1070 running a 1080p game. That sort of performance is abysmal if you're struggling to get 30 FPS on low settings.

Make sure the game isn't running DSR or anything silly like that through GeForce Experience. And if that fails make sure the game is utilizing DX11 instead of DX9.

DSR is essentially a big waste of performance since it tries to render the game at a higher resolution then downsamples it back to 1080p.

 

[Juan Camilo Uribe Villa]

Okay, this may sound weird, but uninstall your current GPU drivers and try to go BACK a few drivers versions(go to a driver from a time when your FPS was better), see if your performance increases again. This is mostly just a conspiracy theory, but sometimes Nvidia might slow down past GPU's with newer drivers to pressure people into upgrading. Again, just a conspiracy theory, not an allegation on Nvidia or anything.

Tested multiple drivers (not the recent ones but neither the oldest) and performance didn't change that much between most of them, maybe like 5 fps dependeing on the game

 

[Juan Camilo Uribe Villa]

Is this related to GTA V specifically, or across the board? Even if your GPU is 8% below average performance (which isn't that big of a deal considering how many overclocked cards are going to be in the testing pool), that's a GTX 1070 running a 1080p game. That sort of performance is abysmal if you're struggling to get 30 FPS on low settings.

Make sure the game isn't running DSR or anything silly like that through GeForce Experience. And if that fails make sure the game is utilizing DX11 instead of DX9.

DSR is essentially a big waste of performance since it tries to render the game at a higher resolution then downsamples it back to 1080p.

Across the board, another game I didn't mention is Black ops 2 where I used to reach de 200 fps cap almost all the time, now I can get below 100 pretty often

 

[Shektron]

Run UserBenchmark, a program that runs a few quick benchmarks that test the performance of various parts in your PC, and compares their performance to other people having similar parts. It might detect which part it is that is underperforming. Post your results here.

 

[Juan Camilo Uribe Villa]

Run UserBenchmark, a program that runs a few quick benchmarks that test the performance of various parts in your PC, and compares their performance to other people having similar parts. It might detect which part it is that is underperforming. Post your results here.

https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/17962004

As always I closed any program that could be running and didn't use the computer while the benchmark was running

 

[Shektron]

Your PC seems to be performing as it should be, maybe the performance decrease was due to updates installed on the games that improved visuals. Maybe try making sure there isn't any application having an FPS limiter or see if Vsync is enabled. A 1070 should not be playing GTA V at minimum settings, but the userbenchmark eliminates the possibility of the actual part underperforming(at least not much), so it's probably a game-related problem. Maybe try reinstalling the game.

 

[Urzu1000]

Overall your PC seems to be working well. I concur with Shektron and think that it might just be game related. Try reinstalling and see if that fixes the issue.

Another potential issue that's worth testing is temps. It could be that your GPU has insufficient cooling and is throttling itself down to protect the hardware. This is why it might not show up in a simple benchmark but could be affecting you ingame. You can either run a stress test on your GPU and check the temps while it runs, or you could try limiting the FPS in these games to 60 and see if that helps improve stability.

Leaving it set to unlimited basically says "Hey, use 100% of my GPU even if it only needs part of it." Also close any browsers you have open while running it, since most modern browsers use GPU acceleration, and games/browsers like to bicker over GPU allocation, which can sometimes cause brief stuttering if you're pushing it to 100% all the time.