New GPU not reaching full load

[Shiboh]

I just bought a Gigabyte gtx 1660 oc as well as an Asus micro atx mobo (B85M-G I think). My problem is that the gpu never reaches full load, sometimes dropping down to less than 90% load, when under an uncapped load. It doesn't reach it's full boost speed either (2055 mhz), usually sitting at 2025-1980 mhz. I have tried disabling any and every power saving option I see in bios and nvidia control panel. Tried reinstalling drivers for everything, tried over clocking and underclocking the GPU which both just made it worse.  I will post a screenshot I took when having this issue, you can see my CPU and GPU are near full load but neither is boosting nor bottlenecking. Framerate is capped to 60 in the photo. Ram and Mem usage is well below the limit. it's the same case with any game. I just have no idea anymore, I tried everything I can think of. I would like to be able to run my gpu to it's fullest potential.

 

System Specs;

 

i7 4770

Asus Micro Atx B85M-G

16gb DDR3 @1600mhz

Gigabyte GTX 1660 OC

EVGA 500w PSU

 

 

[WereCatf]

12 minutes ago, Shiboh said:

My problem is that the gpu never reaches full load, sometimes dropping down to less than 90% load, when under an uncapped load. It doesn't reach it's full boost speed either (2055 mhz), usually sitting at 2025-1980 mhz. I have tried disabling any and every power saving option I see in bios and nvidia control panel

CPU-bottleneck.

[Shiboh]

Just now, WereCatf said:

CPU-bottleneck.

Look at my CPU usage in the photo. My CPU is getting nowhere near bottlenecking anything. Highest it gets is 80% usage on that game specifically.

[WereCatf]

Just now, Shiboh said:

Look at my CPU usage in the photo. My CPU is getting nowhere near bottlenecking anything. Highest it gets is 80% usage on that game specifically.

You are looking at the average of all the cores. You need to look at each core individually.

[Shiboh]

6 minutes ago, WereCatf said:

You are looking at the average of all the cores. You need to look at each core individually.

If anything my GPU is bottlenecking the CPU. No core is above 90% usage.

[Shiboh]

My GPU is definitely bottlenecking, but I'm trying to figure out why it wouldn't be at 100% load if it is the bottleneck. It would have to be something else but  I have no idea what would be limiting my GPU.

[Shiboh]

I have also tried setting temp goals as high as they can go which made it worse somehow.

[OSBK]

13 minutes ago, WereCatf said:

CPU-bottleneck.

I doubt its a CPU bottleneck, the i7 4770 is still solid and probably enough for the 1660.

Forget Assassin's creed for a bit, and run a benchmark like heaven or valley and check the numbers, you can't rely on games to tell the numbers as there are many variables; game optimization, drivers, windows being windows, some hardware issue, etc... . You can't know which one is which using a game, especially not AC, they're not known for the best optimization, I even had issues with it when I played it with my 980 and 1070ti.

[OSBK]

4 minutes ago, Shiboh said:

My GPU is definitely bottlenecking, but I'm trying to figure out why it wouldn't be at 100% load if it is the bottleneck. It would have to be something else but  I have no idea what would be limiting my GPU.

Don't use the game to check for bottlenecks, at least not AC.

[Shiboh]

Just now, Salazar said:

I doubt its a CPU bottleneck, the i7 4770 is still solid and probably enough for the 1660.

Forget Assassin's creed for a bit, and run a benchmark like heaven or valley and check the numbers, you can't rely on games to tell the numbers as there are many variables; game optimization, drivers, windows being windows, some hardware issue, etc... . You can't know which one is which using a game, especially not AC, they're not known for the best optimization, I even had issues with it when I played it with my 980 and 1070ti.

Well I have been running tests back and forth between AC and 3D Mark. Same results with a benchmark.

[Shiboh]

Even with a GPU heavy/CPU light load the GPU won't sustain boost.

[Shiboh]

I'm starting to think I bought a busted GPU. I'm going to try reinstalling the driver for the third time today I guess.

[OSBK]

9 minutes ago, Shiboh said:

Well I have been running tests back and forth between AC and 3D Mark. Same results with a benchmark.

 

8 minutes ago, Shiboh said:

Even with a GPU heavy/CPU light load the GPU won't sustain boost.

Even tho I don't like running it a lot but you can try Furmark, its pretty much prime95 for the GPU. Run it for couple of minutes and check the usuage, if its hits 97-99% then your gpu is good, the boost clock is more related to power and temperature instead of usage.

From the AC screenshot, I can see the CPU isn't hitting a 100% but again that's the overall usage, check individual cores usage as not every game can make use of the whole CPU, if one or two cores are always 100% while the rest are like 20% or something, then it might, just might be a cpu bottleneck, again! I would recommend you to use valley or heaven to test instead of game (especially AC, I really mean it, you never test with this).

One more thing to mention, the gaming mode vs oc mode vs rgb mode vs idk whatever (I really hate those terms) cycle between them and check which one is supposed to provide a higher frequency (its supposed to be OC mode but idk, every OEM is different), I would also recommend using msi after burner even if its a gigabyte card, its just a better software for the job.

[Shiboh]

2 minutes ago, Salazar said:

 

Even tho I don't like running it a lot but you can try Furmark, its pretty much prime95 for the GPU. Run it for couple of minutes and check the usuage, if its hits 97-99% and your gpu is good, the boost clock is more related to power and temperature more than usage.

From the AC screenshot, I can see the CPU isn't hitting a 100% but again that's the overall usage, check individual cores usage as not every game can make use of the whole CPU, if one or two cores are always 100% while the rest are like 20% or something, then it might, just might be a cpu bottleneck, again! I would recommend you to use valley or heaven to test instead of game (especially AC, I really mean it, you never test with this).

One more thing to mention, the gaming mode vs oc mode vs rgb mode vs idk whatever (I really hate those terms) cycle between them and check which one is supposed to provide a higher frequency (its supposed to be OC mode but idk, every OEM is different), I would also recommend using msi after burner even if its a gigabyte card, its just a better software for the job.

I ran furmark for a few minutes. GPU usage was maximum 99% but sat at 97% for most of the run. Clock speed was only 1900 mhz on the GPU. Shouldn't the card be boosting? It feels like it boosts as soon as you start rendering then disables boost immediately. Checked CPU usage too, no core was higher than 87% usage. And for some reason the gigabyte controller app crashed and I can't reopen it. This all just feels really buggy/ unstable honestly.

[Shiboh]

 

1 minute ago, Shiboh said:

I ran furmark for a few minutes. GPU usage was maximum 99% but sat at 97% for most of the run. Clock speed was only 1900 mhz on the GPU. Shouldn't the card be boosting? It feels like it boosts as soon as you start rendering then disables boost immediately. Checked CPU usage too, no core was higher than 87% usage. And for some reason the gigabyte controller app crashed and I can't reopen it. This all just feels really buggy/ unstable honestly.

Temps were also fine, nothing over 70c.

[OSBK]

1 hour ago, Shiboh said:

 

Temps were also fine, nothing over 70c.

As I said, refrain from using the gigabyte app msi afterburner is the better solution even for non msi cards.
Since the GPU usage can go up to +97% on furmark then its probably fine, and since your CPU usage is fine as well then there is probably no bottleneck, as I said the 4770 is still a solid option, Im personally using a 4770K which is probably the same thing just overclockable.

For AC I can assure you its a game issue, I played it back when it was released, and like a year ago after all the updates for both the drivers and the game itself. It ran better than when back it was just released but it still sucked, and yes the GPU usage fluctuated quite a bunch, and this is quite known for many AC titles.

Adding insults to injuries, the buggy windows being windows, drivers, support for the new architecture as I highly doubt ubisoft will fix anything in an old game to run better for newer hardware.

If you have other games, that are known to be quite stable and perform well, you can try running them (in exclusive full screen) and compare your FPS to someone with similar hardware online, if there is no more than lets say 8/10 fps difference then you're probably fine, if there is a severe difference then, and just then I might start blaming the hardware.

[Shiboh]

1 hour ago, Salazar said:

As I said, refrain from using the gigabyte app msi afterburner is the better solution even for non msi cards.
Since the GPU usage can go up to +97% on furmark then its probably fine, and since your CPU usage is fine as well then there is probably no bottleneck, as I said the 4770 is still a solid option, Im personally using a 4770K which is probably the same thing just overclockable.

For AC I can assure you its a game issue, I played it back when it was released, and like a year ago after all the updates for both the drivers and the game itself. It ran better than when back it was just released but it still sucked, and yes the GPU usage fluctuated quite a bunch, and this is quite known for many AC titles.

Adding insults to injuries, the buggy windows being windows, drivers, support for the new architecture as I highly doubt ubisoft will fix anything in an old game to run better for newer hardware.

If you have other games, that are known to be quite stable and perform well, you can try running them (in exclusive full screen) and compare your FPS to someone with similar hardware online, if there is no more than lets say 8/10 fps difference then you're probably fine, if there is a severe difference then, and just then I might start blaming the hardware.

I use mainly MSI Afterburner but after these issues I decided to try out Aurous or whatever it's called, definitely won't again unless I need to. 

 

It must be an issue with compatibility for certain applications. I played Apex Legends for a few and performance was great, gpu stayed at 99% load 2025+ mhz (very stable), however I noticed a lot of glitchiness in the shaders and certain textures missing (could have just been my game though.) I ran the game Steep for a while and had the same issue as AC, usually not even running above 90% load. Other than that all my games are pretty old.

 

You are very right about running a 5 year old game for benchmarks on new hardware, just the first game I felt like playing/ first game I noticed this problem with. My 1050ti would sit at a solid 100% usage, stayed at the boost clock no matter what, and never bogged. That thing was a trooper.

 

The thing that really got me stressed in the first place was the fact that I ran a firestrike benchmark and comparing my results, people have the same GPU yet lower clock speeds/different brands and are getting better scores. I guess I'm really stressing about something very minimal but I'd rather figure out whether this is something I did wrong, something normal, or whether I should get my money back before it's too late.

 

I have reinstalled GPU driver and mobo firmware, still same behavior.

[OSBK]

17 hours ago, Shiboh said:

I use mainly MSI Afterburner but after these issues I decided to try out Aurous or whatever it's called, definitely won't again unless I need to. 

 

It must be an issue with compatibility for certain applications. I played Apex Legends for a few and performance was great, gpu stayed at 99% load 2025+ mhz (very stable), however I noticed a lot of glitchiness in the shaders and certain textures missing (could have just been my game though.) I ran the game Steep for a while and had the same issue as AC, usually not even running above 90% load. Other than that all my games are pretty old.

 

You are very right about running a 5 year old game for benchmarks on new hardware, just the first game I felt like playing/ first game I noticed this problem with. My 1050ti would sit at a solid 100% usage, stayed at the boost clock no matter what, and never bogged. That thing was a trooper.

 

The thing that really got me stressed in the first place was the fact that I ran a firestrike benchmark and comparing my results, people have the same GPU yet lower clock speeds/different brands and are getting better scores. I guess I'm really stressing about something very minimal but I'd rather figure out whether this is something I did wrong, something normal, or whether I should get my money back before it's too late.

 

I have reinstalled GPU driver and mobo firmware, still same behavior.

Your GPU ran fine with furmark, you also mentioned Apex did well. I won't say your card is a 100% pure and works fine, I can't judge if I can't test myself but it seems to be running fine in my opinion.

For the firestrike benchmark score difference, again if its a minor difference then you're okay cause even the slightest difference in hardware can lead to either a jump or a step, forward or backward in score, even a simple restart of the OS can effect the score. Also as its a benchmark, a 1000 score difference isn't as bad as 20FPS difference, its pure luck whether you can find someone with exactly same build to compare to but if the hardware is performing as advertised in most cases then in my opinion, its actually fine.

Windows can go nuts when it wants to, drivers can crash, a random background process whether its a user program or a windows hidden one can make a difference in some cases, its really hard to get an exact or accurate value cause there is so many variables, so you just have to average it! try some games, some software, if you're averaging acceptable results for the hardware you have then all good.