My 980's adaptive overclocking...

[dima_]

Okay, so my GPU seems to have some adaptive over/underclocking feature to it. When it's running a game, it overclocks (to a maximum of 1405Mhz I believe) and when the game is closed, it underclocks itself (idk to what level) to save energy, not heat up, you know, the works. I like that feature a lot. The problem is, I've noticed FPS drops in my games. After well over a week of looking for all the possible issues, I considered that it could be my new shiny 980. And I noticed a pattern; demanding games like Witcher 3 and GTA V run fine, but easy games like Killing Floor 2, CS:GO, and No More Room in Hell (in particular) have 1-3 second FPS drops before returning to my desired 144fps. It was suggested by someone that it could be thermal throttling, even though that wouldn't make sense because they're easy as fuck to run and my GPU doesn't even have to break a sweat. Using the MSI Afterburner/Rivatune overlay, I noticed that, as expected, my CPU and GPU temps were fine, but that around the time my FPS drops, my GPU clock drops with it and they rise in unison again after a few seconds.

 

Okay, so, it's that adaptive clocking feature, I presume. I used nVidia Inspector to underclock my 980 by 200Mhz and played CS:GO again, at a solid, unchanging 1205Mhz. Guess what happened? Ran fucking fine. So I need some help, I want it to be at a higher clock while gaming, even if it's a simple game like CS:GO, heat and power aren't really an issue unless that would significantly affect my card's lifespan (less than a month old so far)? Would it affect performance in those more demanding games if I just underclocked by like, a single megahert, since manually underclocking at all seems to make it stay at a static position? But my idea is that if I did that, it would STAY at 1404Mhz (in this case) when I'm not playing games, and wouldn't that make it keep a high temp etc like it was in a game or is that based on GPU load? Or if anyone has experience with EVGA's cards or cards that have this feature in general, is there a way to set a threshold for this feature? Like I said, even if it's a simple game like CS:GO, I'd be fine with it running at its full 1405Mhz and then having it automatically downclock when I'm not in a 3D application.

 

Thanks so much in advance!

[SpecTre12345]

Go into NVIDIA Control Panel, set Power management mode to Prefer maximum performance.

[sgloux3470]

Go into NVIDIA Control Panel, set Power management mode to Prefer maximum performance.

 

This may not be necessary yet. (And if you do this, do it on a per application basis and not a global setting.)

 

 

Raise the power limit on the card to max.  This should prevent it from downclocking.  

[dima_]

This may not be necessary yet. (And if you do this, do it on a per application basis and not a global setting.)

 

 

Raise the power limit on the card to max.  This should prevent it from downclocking.  

 

Uh... how do? And the only other option in that control panel variable is "adaptive." Just leave it at that? I usually leave it on prefer maximum performance.

[SpecTre12345]

Uh... how do? And the only other option in that control panel variable is "adaptive." Just leave it at that? I usually leave it on prefer maximum performance.

 

If it is already on prefer maximum performance then there is no reason to change it. What he is suggesting is to download an overclocking program like MSI Afterburner or EVGA Precision and increase the power target.

 

[dima_]

If it is already on prefer maximum performance then there is no reason to change it. What he is suggesting is to download an overclocking program like MSI Afterburner or EVGA Precision and increase the power target.

 

 

On Afterburner. Power limit (%) is at 100, and the temp limit "priority" changes alongside with it. It's in celsius, and when power limit is at 100, temp limit is at 79. At power limit max, which is 124, the temp limit is at 91. I've never actually seen my gpu go past the 79 that's normally there, so would this be alright? To change the power limit and leave this?

[SpecTre12345]

On Afterburner. Power limit (%) is at 100, and the temp limit "priority" changes alongside with it. It's in celsius, and when power limit is at 100, temp limit is at 79. At power limit max, which is 124, the temp limit is at 91. I've never actually seen my gpu go past the 79 that's normally there, so would this be alright? To change the power limit and leave this?

 

Yeah it will be fine, I doubt you will get anywhere close to 91.

 

I'm not really familiar with Afterburner, but in EVGA Precision you can manually change the temp limit to whatever you want even if you increase your power limit to max. 

[sgloux3470]

On Afterburner. Power limit (%) is at 100, and the temp limit "priority" changes alongside with it. It's in celsius, and when power limit is at 100, temp limit is at 79. At power limit max, which is 124, the temp limit is at 91. I've never actually seen my gpu go past the 79 that's normally there, so would this be alright? To change the power limit and leave this?

 

Yes.

 

Basically what it does is increases the threshold for GPU boost to start thinking about downclocking.  (Which is usually an issue of power usage, not so much temperature or utilization)

 

It doesn't always fix problems, but it can't really hurt anything and might resolve the issue.

[dima_]

Yes.

 

Basically what it does is increases the threshold for GPU boost to start thinking about downclocking.  (Which is usually an issue of power usage, not so much temperature or utilization)

 

It doesn't always fix problems, but it can't really hurt anything and might resolve the issue.

 

It didn't resolve the issue. I'll leave it as it is, though. Here's what resolved the issue: underclocking by one megahert. That way, the card doesn't adaptively underclock or overclock, so it remains at a constant 1255Mhz. Is this alright for gaming? It's boost clock is 1405Mhz. Can I game without it superclocking itself to that automatically?

 

Edit: making this look like I'm asking if gaming is even possible at a lower clock, lmao. I mean, is performance significantly affected?

[Cheddle]

It didn't resolve the issue. I'll leave it as it is, though. Here's what resolved the issue: underclocking by one megahert. That way, the card doesn't adaptively underclock or overclock, so it remains at a constant 1255Mhz. Is this alright for gaming? It's boost clock is 1405Mhz. Can I game without it superclocking itself to that automatically?

Edit: making this look like I'm asking if gaming is even possible at a lower clock, lmao. I mean, is performance significantly affected?

My 980 used to declock as temp went up. At 68deg it would declock, then more as the temp increased... bios flash sorted that

[sgloux3470]

It didn't resolve the issue. I'll leave it as it is, though. Here's what resolved the issue: underclocking by one megahert. That way, the card doesn't adaptively underclock or overclock, so it remains at a constant 1255Mhz. Is this alright for gaming? It's boost clock is 1405Mhz. Can I game without it superclocking itself to that automatically?

 

Edit: making this look like I'm asking if gaming is even possible at a lower clock, lmao. I mean, is performance significantly affected?

No if anything performance is improved. 

 

This is really weird though.  It doesn't even really make sense for your framerate to spike when the clocks change to begin with.

[Monarch]

My 980 used to declock as temp went up. At 68deg it would declock, then more as the temp increased... bios flash sorted that

 

What did you modify in the bios?

[Cheddle]

I used a pre-made one, called "gamestable 24/7" from overclock.net - the thread is gone now however... You need to flash the right bios for the rigth card.

 

Mine basically has modified GPUboost2.0 tables to not drop the voltage and clock speed as well as higher core voltage limit and higher TDP