Question PC underperforming RTX 3070 & intel i7-11700kf

[N4T3D0G]

Hi, I have a intel i7-11700kf CPU and a RTX 3070 GPU. Ever since my pc crashed recently during games the cpu usage would stay under 30% with no more than 1.8 GHz speed and GPU around 40% staying around 50 - 60 C temp with high memory usage with high fan speeds almost constantly (big drop in frames). Its a prebuilt so I'm honestly clueless, what should I do?

 

[rgd1101]

full system spec? include brand and model of the psu
what the cpu/gpu temp?

 

[Nighthawk117]

Sounds like you have something seriously wrong with your setup if the CPU isn't running higher than 1.8Ghz under load. Things to check would be, are the CPU temps high and if they are is the cooler seated properly. Is the CPU power connector plugged in correctly. Also what pre-built do you have?

 

[N4T3D0G]

Sounds like you have something seriously wrong with your setup if the CPU isn't running higher than 1.8Ghz under load. Things to check would be, are the CPU temps high and if they are is the cooler seated properly. Is the CPU power connector plugged in correctly. Also what pre-built do you have?

Name of prebuilt:
DESKTOP PC MSI MAG CODEX X5 11TD-435
It seems my cpu is overheating after further inspection. 90 + Celsius

 

[Nighthawk117]

Name of prebuilt:
DESKTOP PC MSI MAG CODEX X5 11TD-435
It seems my cpu is overheating after further inspection. 90 + Celsius

That makes more sense, I would say either the cooler isn't installed properly or it cannot handle the heat of the 11700KF. First of all do you know what sort of cooler it has? It looks like a 120mm AIO from the pictures but it seems there are multiple configurations.

 

[N4T3D0G]

Here is the model: APA1225H12 from silverstone which I believe is a 120mm AIO cooler like you said

 

[N4T3D0G]

I just tried disabling my intel turbo boost to stop overclocking the cpu as from my guess it may be a problem. Cause although I said 1.8Ghz previously it would first overclock even while watching youtube reaching 4 + Ghz which is overheating the cpu.

 

[Nighthawk117]

Here is the model: APA1225H12 from silverstone which I believe is a 120mm AIO cooler like you said

It's not a bad AIO but 120mm is really pushing it for a 11700KF. So things to check:

1. Is the water block secured to the CPU correctly? If you have a thermal paste handy, then I would unscrew the water block, clean off the current paste and reapply.
2. Check CPU voltages - Download HWinfo and see what you max vcore is for the CPU, just in case it's being set too high.
3. What is the idle CPU temp?
4. If the above is fine then it could be the cooler simply can't cope, in which case you'd need either a better cooler or to reduce CPU clocks to a manageable level.

 

[Nighthawk117]

I just tried disabling my intel turbo boost to stop overclocking the cpu as from my guess it may be a problem. Cause although I said 1.8Ghz previously it would first overclock even while watching youtube reaching 4 + Ghz which is overheating the cpu.

I'd be interested to know idle temps and the vcore, if idle temps and cpu vcore are within the normal range then to me it would suggest an inadequate cooler. I have a i9 10850K which is similar in power consumption to the 11700KF, running at stock it's extremely hot even with a 240mm AIO. What I did on mine was configure it to run at 4.5Ghz on all cores instead of 4.8Ghz under load. This drops the heat and power consumption significantly but the performance drop to me isn't noticeable.

 

[Nighthawk117]

Without turbo boost it will run at it's base frequency of 3.6Ghz, which is then quite a bit lower of what the 11700KF is capable of. A 120mm AIO should handle it fine at that frequency though. If the temps are good and you have a Z590 motherboard you could manually set the CPU multiplier to something higher. I would have thought you would be fine at 4Ghz with 120mm possibly even a little bit more. Normal boost speeds are up to 5Ghz on a single core and 4.6hz on all cores which will stress a 120mm.