9900K - Down clocking while Stress Testing...

[DADDYDOM]

Hi all,

 

So Ive read a few other threads about similar issues but Im not sure if mine is the same (or even if ot IS an issue) so I thought Id post.

 

 

Motherboard is ASUS Prime Z390-A

 

Recently updated system to 9900k 

 

XMP Profile in BIOS set to on for 2 Sticks (2x8GB) RAM - 16GB Total

 

Sync All Cores set to on in BIOS and is supposed to only be boosting to max boost of 4.7GHZ

 

 

So, what is happening here is when I boot into windows and run a Stress Test with these settings (using OCCT), the stress test starts out at 4.7GHZ for like 2 seconds and then down clocks itself to sit at only 4.3GHZ while reporting at 100% CPU load for the remaining time of the test (in this case 15 minute intervals). This hapens when I have the test set to 1 core to test or to all 8 cores and it never reaches the full 4.7GHZ.

 

I have also tried to set the clocks to 5GHZ with the same settings as bove and see what happens and in this case, when I start OCCT, the test starts out a 5GHZ for like 2 seconds and then down clocks to 4.8GHZ at 100% CPU load for the remaining time of the same 15 minute test. Again, regardless of if I am running the test on all 8 cores or just 1.

 

Now the reason I said that I didnt think my issue was like the others is because in those threads, their cpu wouldnt boost up to anything higher than say 4.3GHZ (as an example) no matter what settings the used in the bios but mine DOES change frequency as I change BIOS settings but just does not reach maximum boost while under stress test / load.

 

I should also say that as soon as the tests are done, my monitoring software shows the clocks boost back up to their set values (4.7 / 5.0, etc) with no issues and again, these drops only seem to happen while under the load of the stress test.

 

Can anyone provide an explanation and / or some guidance on this?

 

 

Thanks in advance,

 

John 

 

[DADDYDOM]

PS... I have now just booted into Cyberpunk 2077 and my monitoring software shows that it has downclocked all the way down to 3.6GHZ in game (in the settings menu if that matters).

 

Again, even as I type this, my monitoring software shows currently at 4.7GHZ (plus or nimus a few either way) and this is while on HIGH PERFORMANCE Windows Power Plan.

 

Its almost as if it is clocking backwards under load?...

 

Any info / advice is appreciated.

 

 

John 

[Zomeguy]

Almost sounds like thermal throttling. What temps are you getting when you stress test?

[DADDYDOM]

6 minutes ago, Zomeguy said:

Almost sounds like thermal throttling. What temps are you getting when you stress test?

Steady Temps end up at about 61 degrees and the test never says its thermal throttling at all. also, I am cooling with an NZXT Kraken X63 280mm AIO - top mounted as exhaust if that helps matters...

 

As I type this, I have reset BIOS to default and then gone back in and reset all settings and have synced all cores to 48 (4.8GHZ) and my monitoring software (NZXT CAM) shows the clock at 4800MHZ with a fluxuating temp of 36 to 38 degrees with between 6 and 11% load. 

 

I am just about to run another OCCT test for 15 minutes. I will advise the results when done... 

[DADDYDOM]

9 minutes ago, DADDYDOM said:

Steady Temps end up at about 61 degrees and the test never says its thermal throttling at all. also, I am cooling with an NZXT Kraken X63 280mm AIO - top mounted as exhaust if that helps matters...

 

As I type this, I have reset BIOS to default and then gone back in and reset all settings and have synced all cores to 48 (4.8GHZ) and my monitoring software (NZXT CAM) shows the clock at 4800MHZ with a fluxuating temp of 36 to 38 degrees with between 6 and 11% load. 

 

I am just about to run another OCCT test for 15 minutes. I will advise the results when done... 

So I just ran OCCT again with the new settings I applied with all cores synced to 4.8GHZ and Multi Core Enhancement turned on and like 3 minutes into the test it showed seriously like a sh!t ton of errors so I stopped the test. It never thermal throttled but it did shoot up to 91 degrees at one point.

 

I shut it all down and went back into bios and put the core sync to AUTO and turned off the Multi Core Enhancement. Now the monitoring software is reporting 5GB as I type this with between 36 and 38 degrees and a light load of 2 to 6%

 

I should state that I ran the test only on core 1 and I am not sure if you are supposed to run the stress test on the 1 core or across all 8, Can you please advise?

 

In the meantime I am going to try and run OCCT again with these settings on core 1 and if it passes then I will run across all 8 cores.

 

I will post my results for assistance.

 

 

[DADDYDOM]

7 minutes ago, DADDYDOM said:

So I just ran OCCT again with the new settings I applied with all cores synced to 4.8GHZ and Multi Core Enhancement turned on and like 3 minutes into the test it showed seriously like a sh!t ton of errors so I stopped the test. It never thermal throttled but it did shoot up to 91 degrees at one point.

 

I shut it all down and went back into bios and put the core sync to AUTO and turned off the Multi Core Enhancement. Now the monitoring software is reporting 5GB as I type this with between 36 and 38 degrees and a light load of 2 to 6%

 

I should state that I ran the test only on core 1 and I am not sure if you are supposed to run the stress test on the 1 core or across all 8, Can you please advise?

 

In the meantime I am going to try and run OCCT again with these settings on core 1 and if it passes then I will run across all 8 cores.

 

I will post my results for assistance.

 

 

Running the test on core 1 as we speak and it is downclocking again to 4800MHZ at 100% load  with a seemingly steady 72 - 75 degrees.

 

Can it be that I just have lost the silicon lottery bigtime? I mean it IS pushing past the 4.7GHZ factory turbo by about 100MHZ but why does it read as 5GB before the test and then drop to 4800 during the test and then why does it drop to 3.6 when I open Cyberpunk 2077? 

 

Again, I was only on the settings screen when I noticed that and never went any further but shouldnt it stay at the highest freq. possible when on high performance? I also have both the min and max processor speeds set to 100 in the power plan itself...

 

[Zomeguy]

Well from what I've found "The Core i9-9900K boosts to 5GHz with up to two cores loaded, but it drops to a maximum of 4.7GHz with all eight CPU cores loaded." as per ExtremeTech website. Though why it's not boosting when playing Cyberpunk 2077 is odd unless the game doesn't need that much CPU horsepower. But usually games boost a couple cores to max and sprinkle less usage to the other cores.

[DADDYDOM]

21 minutes ago, DADDYDOM said:

Running the test on core 1 as we speak and it is downclocking again to 4800MHZ at 100% load  with a seemingly steady 72 - 75 degrees.

 

Can it be that I just have lost the silicon lottery bigtime? I mean it IS pushing past the 4.7GHZ factory turbo by about 100MHZ but why does it read as 5GB before the test and then drop to 4800 during the test and then why does it drop to 3.6 when I open Cyberpunk 2077? 

 

Again, I was only on the settings screen when I noticed that and never went any further but shouldnt it stay at the highest freq. possible when on high performance? I also have both the min and max processor speeds set to 100 in the power plan itself...

 

Ok so... I have completed both tests in OCCT. One with only core 1 selected and one with all 8 cores selected and passed both tests. Temps in both tests flattened at about 75 degrees so NOT thermal throttling and no errors about power limit throttlimg or anything like that either. I should also mention that this is doing the LARGE DATA SET test in OCCT which they recommend for best error detection.

 

During both thests the clocks dropped to 4800MHZ and again, now that the tests are done CAm and CPU-Z both show the clocks sitting at 5000MHZ...

[DADDYDOM]

2 minutes ago, Zomeguy said:

Well from what I've found "The Core i9-9900K boosts to 5GHz with up to two cores loaded, but it drops to a maximum of 4.7GHz with all eight CPU cores loaded." as per ExtremeTech website. Though why it's not boosting when playing Cyberpunk 2077 is odd unless the game doesn't need that much CPU horsepower. But usually games boost a couple cores to max and sprinkle less usage to the other cores.

 

[DADDYDOM]

Well then that could make sense then (the part about the core boost you mention) but then why does it show as the full 5GHZ now / during normal web browsing, etc.? Am I missing something?

 

And ya... I dont get why while on high performance power plan that the cpu would drop all the way down to 3.6GHZ (again, was only the settings screen so MAYBE it will boost during game play?).

 

[DADDYDOM]

Ok so now I am really concerned...

 

I went into game play in Cyberpunk 2077 and it showed my cpu useage go up to like 70% but my cpu clock dropped all the way to 800MHZ?! And now instead of 5GHZ during normal use it now shows at 4700MHZ?!

 

 Im gonna reset the bios and only enable XMP but this is ridiculous and frustratiing as hell...  My i5 9500 (the cpu I swapped from NEVER did any of this sh!t even with sync all cores and everything else enabled that I could (since it is not an unlocked cpu) and it sat constantly and properly at 4400MHZ at ALL TIMES...

[DADDYDOM]

27 minutes ago, DADDYDOM said:

Ok so now I am really concerned...

 

I went into game play in Cyberpunk 2077 and it showed my cpu useage go up to like 70% but my cpu clock dropped all the way to 800MHZ?! And now instead of 5GHZ during normal use it now shows at 4700MHZ?!

 

 Im gonna reset the bios and only enable XMP but this is ridiculous and frustratiing as hell...  My i5 9500 (the cpu I swapped from NEVER did any of this sh!t even with sync all cores and everything else enabled that I could (since it is not an unlocked cpu) and it sat constantly and properly at 4400MHZ at ALL TIMES...

So... Found a thread about people dropping cpu clock speed in games but it was mainly for MSI mothetboards. That being said, the issue was resolved by shutting off GAMING MODE in MSI Dragon Center. I have Dragon center myself as my 3070 is MSI and so are my monitors and low and behold... I turned off GAME MOPDE in Dragon Center and now I am not "clock dropping" anymore in games.

 

gonna try the OCCT test again with game mode off in dragon Center and see IF MAYBE it was the culprit there as well...

[-rascal-]

5 minutes ago, DADDYDOM said:

So... Found a thread about people dropping cpu clock speed in games but it was mainly for MSI mothetboards. That being said, the issue was resolved by shutting off GAMING MODE in MSI Dragon Center. I have Dragon center myself as my 3070 is MSI and so are my monitors and low and behold... I turned off GAME MOPDE in Dragon Center and now I am not "clock dropping" anymore in games.

 

gonna try the OCCT test again with game mode off in dragon Center and see IF MAYBE it was the culprit there as well...

 

The advertised Turbo Boost frequency is "UP TO". It it's not sustained frequency. If the i9-9900K were to stay boosted up to 4.7GHz+ on all cores, it will VIOLATE Intel's "95W" spec rating.

 

If you look at reviews, if you have all cores running at 4.8GHz+, you are looking at 250W+ power draw from the CPU alone.

 

The "up to" 4.8GHz or 5.0GHz is only for a sort time, determined by PL1 and PL2 time settings. They are usually I Ky for a few seconds, and then the CPU will drop frequency back down to meet the marketed "95W" spec. It is only 200W+ for short bursts.

 

Manually do an all-core overclock if you want sustained / permanent 4.8GHz+. Make sure your motherboard's VRM and CPU cooling can handle it though. Like I said, 250W+ is a lot for the motherboard and cooling.

[DADDYDOM]

1 minute ago, -rascal- said:

 

The advertised Turbo Boost frequency is "UP TO". It it's not sustained frequency. If the i9-9900K were to stay boosted up to 4.7GHz+ on all cores, it will VIOLATE Intel's "95W" spec rating.

 

If you look at reviews, if you have all cores running at 4.8GHz+, you are looking at 250W+ power draw from the CPU alone.

 

The "up to" 4.8GHz or 5.0GHz is only for a sort time, determined by PL1 and PL2 time settings. They are usually I Ky for a few seconds, and then the CPU will drop frequency back down to meet the marketed "95W" spec. It is only 200W+ for short bursts.

 

Manually do an all-core overclock if you want sustained / permanent 4.8GHz+. Make sure your motherboard's VRM and CPU cooling can handle it though. Like I said, 250W+ is a lot for the motherboard and cooling.

Thanks for the reply on this man but IF you can believe it, the downclocking seems to have also stopped in the Stress Testing by turning off the GAME MODE in MSI Dragon Center.

 

I am running a test as we speak with balanced power plan active and it is NOT downclocking the cpu from its max boost anymore. I will test more with other settings in BIOS as well to be 1000000% sure but it seems as if Dragon Center was / is somehow the culprit both for GAMING and STESS TESTING.

 

WEIRD!!!