R9 290 GPU usage and Fps drops.

[indexcow]

to start off here are my PC specs: 

intel i5 4670k (4.0ghz) h100i cooler

8 gigs of 2133 RAM

2 reference R9 290s (1 sapphire and 1 XFX) 

120 gig SSD boot drive 

1TB storage drive 

a 750w PSU. 

a BenQ 144HZ monitor 

a Asus 60hz 1080p monitor

im running Windows 8.1 

im also running the latest beta drivers from AMD 

 

Im running crossfire R9 290 to try and hit 144fpz in game to feed my 144hz monitor but i just cant. Here is a picture of my Gpu usage while i was playing a game. im using mantle. 

When im playing on the test range both of my GPU's will hit 100% usage but not on any other map. They benchmark just fine so i dont know whats up. Ive been posting this problem to other forums for about a month and havent gotten anywhere, any help is greatly appreciated! 

[Archangel1994]

It hits 85 degrees so it might be throttling and that's causing less usage/lower fps. However it might also be a power limit issue. Try upping the power limit to +20% to see if that work. Also I would try using stable drivers as opposed to beta.

[Guest]

BF4 is horribly optimized and strains most i5's pretty hard. With a crossfire setup you might be limited by your CPU, actually. Then it would make sense that you reach 100% usage on both cards on the testrange and start dropping as soon as there are tons of players on the map. You should also try different drivers and using directx instead of mantle. At 85°C it really shouldn't throttle, so that's my guess.

[winningsince1337]

I'm inclined to believe the gentleman above me. what's your CPU usage on a 64 player metro/lockers server?

 

snip

 

[Guest]

a lot of people in the battlelog forums have been reporting many issues with crossfire since the last bf4 patch, but i'm not sure if thats the issue because I've seen people with the 290 in particular reporting the gpu usage issue in bf4 even with a single card, such as this user: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/198125-playing-bf4-wtf-is-bottlenecking/

 

I've got an older i5 (i5-2500 non k) and a 280x, and I get consistent 95-100% gpu usage when using mantle, and can play without dropping below 60 fps on high settings at 1080p (usually around 70-85 fps) in 64p multiplayer, so your cpu should certainly be able to handle the game without any severe frame drops with mantle. What kind of framerates are you getting in game? are frames dropping significantly when you see those gpu usage drops?

[Briggsy]

did you switch to dx11 to see if the same problem occurred? if its the cpu then dx11 will be worse. if its better with dx11, than its a driver issue with mantle or even with bf4. its also possibly a % power limit problem, but only if you are overclocking. either way, that 750 watt psu is definitely getting its' exercise if you know what I mean.

[indexcow]

I'm inclined to believe the gentleman above me. what's your CPU usage on a 64 player metro/lockers server?

As far as I know I'm at 100% usage

[indexcow]

did you switch to dx11 to see if the same problem occurred? if its the cpu then dx11 will be worse. if its better with dx11, than its a driver issue with mantle or even with bf4. its also possibly a % power limit problem, but only if you are overclocking. either way, that 750 watt psu is definitely getting its' exercise if you know what I mean.

Mantle give me better performance but not by much

[Briggsy]

I guess the other thing is, lower graphic settings will put more strain on the cpu, while higher graphic settings shift the balance onto the gpu(s). you will get lower frame rates with higher settings, but you may see a more consistent frame rate. this is true for any directX/Mantle game, but for xfire/SLI even more so I would think. combine that with how much multiplayer taxes a cpu, and you probably have a recipe for what you are seeing.

[indexcow]

I guess the other thing is, lower graphic settings will put more strain on the cpu, while higher graphic settings shift the balance onto the gpu(s). you will get lower frame rates with higher settings, but you may see a more consistent frame rate. this is true for any directX/Mantle game, but for xfire/SLI even more so I would think. combine that with how much multiplayer taxes a cpu, and you probably have a recipe for what you are seeing.

So right now I'm running everything on ultra but I have AA turned off, should I try out like high?

[Briggsy]

So right now I'm running everything on ultra but I have AA turned off, should I try out like high?

 

Can't hurt. if its a cpu bottleneck, it would make the gpu's work a lot harder. 

 

do you have cpu monitoring on in afterburner, and is cpu load consistently maxing out when your gpus are throttling down?

[Guest]

As far as I know I'm at 100% usage

 

If your CPU is at 100% usage then the cards are probably getting bottlenecked.  Can you OC it a bit higher? You have a pretty high end CLC-unit after all. BF4 doesn't really have a right to demand more CPU power from you, but it's a poorly optimized mess after all. You basically have to power your way through that. You could also try messing around with the prerendered frame limit. The standard value is 2 or 3 usually, depending on the configuration you can take some stress off the CPU.

[indexcow]

If your CPU is at 100% usage then the cards are probably getting bottlenecked. Can you OC it a bit higher? You have a pretty high end CLC-unit after all. BF4 doesn't really have a right to demand more CPU power from you, but it's a poorly optimized mess after all. You basically have to power your way through that. You could also try messing around with the prerendered frame limit. The standard value is 2 or 3 usually, depending on the configuration you can take some stress off the CPU.

What I don't get is that with one card I can get around 120fps, why can't I get any more with a second card?

[indexcow]

Can't hurt. if its a cpu bottleneck, it would make the gpu's work a lot harder.

do you have cpu monitoring on in afterburner, and is cpu load consistently maxing out when your gpus are throttling down?

My GPUs aren't throttling at all they run at 947 constantly but I'll monitor the CPU usage when I get home

[Briggsy]

My GPUs aren't throttling at all they run at 947 constantly but I'll monitor the CPU usage when I get home

 

my bad, poor choice of words.

[indexcow]

my bad, poor choice of words.

Oh did you mean when the usage falls?

[Guest]

What I don't get is that with one card I can get around 120fps, why can't I get any more with a second card?

 

Because you're limited by the CPU. If you put double the horsepower behind the same CPU you might experience a bottleneck, especially if a game is CPU dependent. You have to power through that bottleneck in order to take advantage of the additional performance that the second card provides.

[indexcow]

Because you're limited by the CPU. If you put double the horsepower behind the same CPU you might experience a bottleneck, especially if a game is CPU dependent. You have to power through that bottleneck in order to take advantage of the additional performance that the second card provides.

So I should start looking for a 4770k?

[Guest]

So I should start looking for a 4770k?

 

You could try overclocking your i5 a bit further before you spend money on a completely new CPU. And even if that doesn't work, it's not worth upgrading for one game, and it's never worth upgrading for an unoptimized mess. After all it is not guaranteed that an i7 will actually solve your problem. See if you can fix the problem with the hardware you have, and if you can't then move on to a game that isn't broken as hell.

[indexcow]

You could try overclocking your i5 a bit further before you spend money on a completely new CPU. And even if that doesn't work, it's not worth upgrading for one game, and it's never worth upgrading for an unoptimized mess. After all it is not guaranteed that an i7 will actually solve your problem. See if you can fix the problem with the hardware you have, and if you can't then move on to a game that isn't broken as hell.

Either I'm not very good at over clocking or i have a dud but I can't go over 4.0 without instability

[Guest]

Either I'm not very good at over clocking or i have a dud but I can't go over 4.0 without instability

 

Downclock your RAM to 1600MHz and standard CL9 timings. Make sure to set the cache frequency manually and stick to the stock frequency here as well (3.8GHz maximum) then you can start overclocking on haswell. Core clock is king, if you have to sacrifice faster ram and the cache frequency for it then so be it. What voltage are you running for the 4.0GHz?

[indexcow]

Downclock your RAM to 1600MHz and standard CL9 timings. Make sure to set the cache frequency manually and stick to the stock frequency here as well (3.8GHz maximum) then you can start overclocking on haswell. Core clock is king, if you have to sacrifice faster ram and the cache frequency for it then so be it. What voltage are you running for the 4.0GHz?

I have it set to auto but in CPU z its like 1.27 or something

[Guest]

I have it set to auto but in CPU z its like 1.27 or something

 

Try doing the things I told you, set the voltage to manual and see how far it goes with 1.25V or 1.3V. Temperatures should be fine with your cooler after all.

[indexcow]

Try doing the things I told you, set the voltage to manual and see how far it goes with 1.25V or 1.3V. Temperatures should be fine with your cooler after all.

I'll try that when I get home:)

[Guest]

I'll try that when I get home:)

 

I hope I'm not being rude, but have you read up on overclocking properly? Setting the voltage to auto is usually not the best idea that's why I was guessing. If you want to overclock on haswell properly there are some very good and indepth guides out there, way better than my 2 sentence rundown on the basics. Just make sure to read up on those and learn the quirks of haswell to get a good OC. Of course it's also completely possible that you just got a bad chip, but 4.0GHz seems very low tbh.