Radeon 6850 gaming stutters

[uninformedpcgamer]

i am using a month old system thats basically made out of

a radeon HD 6850
an Intel i5 quadcore 3.3 ghz processor
and 8 gigs ddr3 ram

i basically wanted a reasonably priced, stable gaming machine

i'm having some issues when playing almost any game.

basically there are stutters like when i move the camera in crysis or click on an enemy to attack in the witcher... even older games like far cry will have a couple substantial stutters when this happens i'm not running any background programs or anything

these are not game breaking at least not so far, but they are annoying even if they only last as long as it takes to blink (there have been a few times when i was playing stalker shadow of chernobyl when the game froze for several seconds before moving again... but i'm aware its a buggy game anyway)

all the games were purchased either on steam or on good old games (gog) so they're not weird pirated versions or anything like that

i'm new to gaming on pc, so i know that i might be missing something obvious, i tried uninstalling the newest AMD drivers and then installing older drivers (i read that can help sometimes) and then i reinstalled the newest driver package (11.12). i made sure to

i've gone into the catalyst software and turned on the high performance, but the thing is even when i have the games (newer or older) set their own 'optimal settings' there are still regular hiccups and stutters whether high performance is on or not.

believe me, i'm not trying to do anything crazy, i just want to have my games run smoothly and look decent.

something that i wondered about was the driver for my wireless mouse of which there were two because i had to return and replace a defective one and when i plugged in the replacement it installed the driver again... i went into the device manager and removed the older install but it didn't seem to help much... i don't know

i'm very frustrated and cold

 

[uninformedpcgamer]

or possibly this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817152035

 

[inzone]

if anyone is still out there, tell me if i should get this guy:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182200

No. I'm sorry but Rosewill just does not have that dependable , reliable Brand name , they sell to many other things so power supplies is just one of the things it sells and it really doesn't make anything it just buys them and puts thier name on it and resells it.

 

[inzone]

or possibly this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817152035

No. There is no 80+ certification and it only has 22amps on the 12v rail.

 

[inzone]

ha ha ha! you're right it runs like a dream when i'm navigating the old desktop.
i've been such a fool.

i guess the next question would have to be this:

what's the possibility i've done any damage to my gpu or my computer in general by putting this 420w horror in charge of its fate?

i did a couple of quick tests with crysis and stalker soc with CCC running and it showed the gpu heating up to about 60 C

i know thats not the worst temperature for it to be, but when i was trying to understand the problem i turned up the GPU clock to 900mhz (the default is 820 i think) while starting an stopping a number of games (the usual: crysis, stalker, borderlands) on high specs for about an hour.

is there anyway of telling if the card or any other component is damaged (besides a burning smell which i thankfully haven't experienced)

by the way
thanks for all the assistance, inzone (and others). i'm really getting schooled here.

I don't tkink you would have done any damage to any of the components in your computer , There were no shut downs or blue screens or "burning smell" so you basicly only had the stuttering which leads me to believe that you were right on the edge of not having enough power , but there was enough to supply most of the cards functions but not to make it shut down.

 

[inzone]

I do realize that you may have a low budget and you really don't want to spend a lot of money on this power supply but while you are deciding which one to get think about what you are going through and how much it annoys you. Do you really want to take a chance of this happening again with the new psu. I would go with a proven brand name that is known for quality power supplies , Antec ,Seasonic , Enermax , and Silverstone are a few of the top ones that would be good to look at. Try to catch a sale or rebate offer and set a budget amount that you want to work with and try not to go too low with it.

Antec NEO ECO 620C 620W Continuous Power ATX12V v2.3 / EPS12V 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Power Supply
$64.99 and free shipping
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371031

SeaSonic S12II 620 Bronze 620W ATX12V V2.3 / EPS 12V V2.91 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply
$69.99 and free shipping
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151096

SILVERSTONE Strider Essential series ST60F-ES 600W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Power Supply
$69.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817256071

Here are a few good power supplies to look at and there are a lot that are not very good , reliable psu makers that I would stay away from just because they don't really specialize in makeing psu's and they sell a lot of other products. One company that I see that makes power supplies and nothing else to my knowledge is Seasonic , so that would be a good company to look at for power supplies. I don't have one right now but I do have an Antec and if I should need to get a replacement for what aI have I will be getting a Seasonic.

 

[uninformedpcgamer]

thats very sound advice, you are wise in all things, inzone
i absolutely want to stop thinking about the problem and start enjoying my computer and i guess if i have to throw some $$ at the problem, it's probably worth it to do so...

i think i'll probably get either the antec or seasonic but i came across this and wanted to know you're opinion:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341017

i have a feeling it may be one of the 'not very good' ilk, but it I thought I'd just double check. thanks for being a great shopping buddy.

i hope some years in the future i can be as awesome as you are in this nasty business of rig building... and maybe then i can teach some dingbat cheapskate (like me now) to be reasonable

 

[inzone]

I'm not usually a big fan of OCZ power supplies but if you look at the feed back a lot of people have bought this psu and the feedback is pretty good and it does have the 80+ certification so it might not be that bad to go with it. Naturally I would prefer a different one but that's just me and sometimes I can be very picky with what I want. I wouldn't put it at the top of the list of recomendations but it would be in the middle and not at the bottom , so going with something from the middle of the pack is not necessarily a bad thing.
When you get to my age and you do a lot of computer building and repairing you run into a lot of situations and gain experience with what you see and do. I really enyoy building a computer and tinkering with it to get to where I'm happy with it.

 

[spasmolytic46]

I'm not usually a big fan of OCZ power supplies but if you look at the feed back a lot of people have bought this psu and the feedback is pretty good and it does have the 80+ certification so it might not be that bad to go with it. Naturally I would prefer a different one but that's just me and sometimes I can be very picky with what I want. I wouldn't put it at the top of the list of recomendations but it would be in the middle and not at the bottom , so going with something from the middle of the pack is not necessarily a bad thing.
When you get to my age and you do a lot of computer building and repairing you run into a lot of situations and gain experience with what you see and do. I really enyoy building a computer and tinkering with it to get to where I'm happy with it.

↑ +1

 

[uninformedpcgamer]

i am going to get a 600w antec this afternoon and hopefully all of my problems will disappear

 

[inzone]

Well I do hope so as well and I think that will solve your issue that you are having with the stuttering.
Let us know how you make out.

 

[uninformedpcgamer]

so i installed the new psu (i ended up getting a corsair gs600 for 80 dollars less than what newegg sells it for)...

anyway, I've observed that several games (crysis, witcher 2) run much better albeit with occasional hiccups, but maybe that's just related to areas loading or something, but in most cases the games run smooth... i can also adjust my clock speeds to noticeable effect which is a big thrill for me.

my friend who helped me install the psu told me that those last bits of stuttering were probably due to my using an older hard drive (a 160 gig hard drive I pulled out of a laptop back in 2009) which makes a lot of sense i guess...

But here's the thing(s): several older games (the original witcher and the original far cry) still have numerous jumps and stutters. i can't figure it out.

ALSO the two stalker games i have now cause this odd squealing sound to come out of what i assume is my gpu. the sidepanel of my tower is off so maybe i'm just noticing some sound that was muffled before.

i looked around about the sound and it doesn't seem to be a harmful thing, but it is annoying.

thoughts?

 

[inzone]

Put the side panel back on.

 

[uninformedpcgamer]

yessir

 

[inzone]

so i installed the new psu (i ended up getting a corsair gs600 for 80 dollars less than what newegg sells it for)...

anyway, I've observed that several games (crysis, witcher 2) run much better albeit with occasional hiccups, but maybe that's just related to areas loading or something, but in most cases the games run smooth... i can also adjust my clock speeds to noticeable effect which is a big thrill for me.

my friend who helped me install the psu told me that those last bits of stuttering were probably due to my using an older hard drive (a 160 gig hard drive I pulled out of a laptop back in 2009) which makes a lot of sense i guess...

But here's the thing(s): several older games (the original witcher and the original far cry) still have numerous jumps and stutters. i can't figure it out.

ALSO the two stalker games i have now cause this odd squealing sound to come out of what i assume is my gpu. the sidepanel of my tower is off so maybe i'm just noticing some sound that was muffled before.

i looked around about the sound and it doesn't seem to be a harmful thing, but it is annoying.

thoughts?

Without being there it would be hard to tell what it could be. It may be a fan , or the hard drive , or a capacitor on the video card or motherboard. If when you put the side panel back on you can still hear it from your normal position then it could be the power supply since that would be the only new thing.

I'm thinking now that you have said that the hard drive is a reclaimed drive that it could be the cause of some of your problems. Something to think about is a SSD for the OS drive.

 

[uninformedpcgamer]

do you think i should return the psu?

 

[uninformedpcgamer]

never mind... i was up until 3am running different games and they all looked great (except for the original witcher and original far cry: they are very choppy) far cry 2 especially runs crazy good.

i will probably not get a new hard drive for a while as i would very much like to get an SSD but don't feel like dropping another $100 on another component. i'm happy to see the results from my new psu and to know that i'm not murdering my graphics card.

thanks for all the help, inzone and everyone else!

 

[inzone]

I'm happy that you have reached a point to where you are somewhat satisfied and who knows you may be able to save up and redo your computer to where you have an awsome gaming machine that chews up any game.

P.S. Don't forget to select a best answer.

 

[uninformedpcgamer]

Best answer selected by uninformedpcgamer.