7970 99% usage low fps

[jennr246]

I have a sapphire 7970 ghz edition which I just recently sent in because I had problems with the first one. This is the replacement, and since I have received it I have noticed when launching a game sometimes my GPU usage will be 99% and the fps will be approx. 20. The only thing that solves the problem is restarting the computer and then everything runs fine again(restarting the game does not work). I have already tried updating the driver several times, which doesn't seem to make a difference. Here are the rest of my specs:

 

msi 990fxa gd80v2

corsair vengeance 2x4GB DDR3 1600

fx8350 w/h100i

WD 1tb hd(7200rpm)

sapphire 7970 ghz

corsair ax 850 gold ps

Windows 8 64bit

 

The only other issue that I notice is that my sound options are not that responsive and take a little longer to come up than they should, and the default device seems to disappear when I restart.  When I had my 6850 this did not happen, and I had no other issues.

 

Any help would be much appreciated! Would hate to have to send this card in again, I've only had it a few months now.

[Morpheus]

wait so your fps is 20 when you play games or just when you launch?

[Bonsai99]

Try re-installing your graphics drivers with the latest 13.8 Beta release. (Uninstall completely first, restart, then reinstall)

[jennr246]

When I am playing the game it is 20. 

[jennr246]

already tried the 13.8 same results

[Dravic]

I have a sapphire 7970 ghz edition which I just recently sent in because I had problems with the first one. This is the replacement, and since I have received it I have noticed when launching a game sometimes my GPU usage will be 99% and the fps will be approx. 20. The only thing that solves the problem is restarting the computer and then everything runs fine again(restarting the game does not work). I have already tried updating the driver several times, which doesn't seem to make a difference. Here are the rest of my specs:

 

msi 990fxa gd80v2

corsair vengeance 2x4GB DDR3 1600

fx8350 w/h100i

WD 1tb hd(7200rpm)

sapphire 7970 ghz

corsair ax 850 gold ps

Windows 8 64bit

 

The only other issue that I notice is that my sound options are not that responsive and take a little longer to come up than they should, and the default device seems to disappear when I restart.  When I had my 6850 this did not happen, and I had no other issues.

 

Any help would be much appreciated! Would hate to have to send this card in again, I've only had it a few months now.

 

Maybe your GPU is trying to keep 2D clocks during 3D rendering work-time? Try manually overclocking it to stock clocks.

[IGJoe2192]

Something seems off. Have you touched any settings in CCC?

[jennr246]

no OC, no changes to CCC

[Godlygamer23]

What are your clocks during gaming? You can just use MSI Afterburner or Precision X to give us the maximum reading. You can also give us a live reading if you wish.

[jennr246]

I will monitor the clock speeds the next time i run into this problem and then post that here, thx.

[jennr246]

I took a ss of msi afterburner and gpu-z when I opened gw2 earlier, I had the 99% usage and low frames again. I can't seem to relate it to anything specific for the cause.

 

http://i.imgur.com/K62ugpo.jpg

 

[Godlygamer23]

Does it do it with all games? Including it being fixed temporarily when restarting the computer.

[jennr246]

Oddly enough when I play battlefield 3 the usage does go up to about the same, but the fps is extremely high... I normally get around 60% usage and 60 fps on this game as I limit it to 65.

 

http://i.imgur.com/jqizhcS.jpg (I don't know why the pic looks blurry, but thats 91% usage)

 

I'm not sure on all my games without testing it out....

[Godlygamer23]

If you can, test all your games.

[SkilledRebuilds]

So no1 noticed his PCIE link width. Under the BUS INTERFACE

Card Supports PCI-E 3.0 16x, Currently running in PCI-E 1x 2.0, should be running in at least PCI-E 2.0 16x

Your starving the card of bandwidth via the PCIE slot.

 

This is the problem, I do not know the fix, motherboard bios settings may allow you to select PCIE speeds, but motherboards CAN and DO get stuck into slower PCI-E lanes due to bad contact between the metal fins, driver corruption and such..

 

Take the card out, blow out the PCI-E slot nintendo cartidge style and re-insert the GPU.

You'll note people may say its a power saving option, thats true, however when that kicks in your going to be stuck in PCI-E 1x 1.0.......... not 2.0 or 16x 2.0

[jennr246]

Ok, thanks I see now this is the problem... what I am still wondering is when I reboot it starts out as PCI-E x16 v1.1, which is why most of the time things run like they should, but why does it change randomly to x1 2.0? I can and will reseat the card np, just wanted to know why it would even change to begin with. 

[soulrider95]

I had the same problem with my nVidia card a while back. The problem seems to be windows 8 and the dynamic clock speed on the FX series processors. In your bios if you turn off dynamic clock (no idea where it is on your mobo). Windows 8 seems to have a problem where it will randomly downclock the CPU during intensive moments (I guess to "save power" on mobile devices?) Try this and let me know if it works!

[leipero]

When my old GPU started to go wrong..., it did the same, only difference is, it goes to x8 1.1, then changing to x8 2.0, than x16 1.1/2.0 depending on reboot ONLY. Eventually, it got stuck to x8 1.1, but since that was enough even for today GPU's, let alone 9800GT, it didn't had any influence on performance whatsoever. But eventually, GPU died...

 

It can be mobo, but i suspect on another bad card. Try to update BIOS (be careful when updating!).

[TTesla]

Why is core voltage on min?

[jennr246]

I don't see an option in my bios for dynamic clock. If the problem still persists and I find a solution other than reseating the gpu and changing the bios I will post it here. Thanks for you help everyone!

[sof006]

You know... GW2 is very poorly optimised. I can barely hit 40 FPS on my GTX 560 Ti on medium settings. I wouldn't be surprised if it was GW2 and your card was fine.

[SkilledRebuilds]

You know... GW2 is very poorly optimised. I can barely hit 40 FPS on my GTX 560 Ti on medium settings. I wouldn't be surprised if it was GW2 and your card was fine.

Yet the EVIDENCE of the pictures shows the actual problem is his PCI-E slot speeds.

Even with power saving, they should be at 16x 1.1, then moving to 16x 2.0 or 3.0

Not his Idle PCI-E 1x 1.1 and PCI-E 1x 2.0 in load.

 

 

I wish people would read the actual info instead of the first post then making a reply, read the whole thread.

[sof006]

Sure thing. But the fact he can get plenty FPS on other games makes no sense. Anyway. I highly doubt that just because its saying in PCIE 2.0 mode shouldn't make a difference since most cards still can't saturate the PCIE 2.0 slots yet. So no significant evidence. Sorry to burst your bubble.

[SkilledRebuilds]

Sure thing. But the fact he can get plenty FPS on other games makes no sense. Anyway. I highly doubt that just because its saying in PCIE 2.0 mode shouldn't make a difference since most cards still can't saturate the PCIE 2.0 slots yet. So no significant evidence. Sorry to burst your bubble.

Some games don't push as hard as others, not all games are equal... Obvious is obvious.

This bubble dont burst.

Your right in the saturation regard...but in this case...your still wrong.....

True that most cards cannot saturate the PCIE 2.0, but he's not running PCIE 2.0, he's stuck in 1.0, RE-READ GPUZ

 

LOOK closer at the pic... clearly says PCIE 1x 1.1/2.0, WHICH IS FUBAR and Under performing by a HUGE margin!

IE: He's not Limited to PCIE 2.0 2x, He's on PCIE 1.0 2x

FTR - My 7950 cripples down with dips to 30fps from over 100fps in PCI-E 1x 2.0 mode, sure its "playable", but hardly idealistic considering the loss of performance.

 

PCIE 1.0 - per lane data rate of 250 MB/s

PCIE 2.0 - per-lane throughput rises from 250 MB/s to 500 MB/s

PCIE 3.0 - 8 GT/s bit rate effectively delivers 985 MB/s per lane

 

PCIe 1.x is often quoted to support a data rate of 250 MB/s in each direction, per lane. This figure is a calculation from the physical signaling rate (2.5 Gbaud) divided by the encoding overhead (10 bits per byte.) This means a sixteen lane (×16) PCIe card would then be theoretically capable of 16×250 MB/s = 4 GB/s in each direction. While this is correct in terms of data bytes, more meaningful calculations are based on the usable data payload rate, which depends on the profile of the traffic, which is a function of the high-level (software) application and intermediate protocol levels.

He's at least seeing half of his card go to waste in its current condition.

[jennr246]

after reading the following thread: http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1684684&highlight=7970+getting+stuck+at+1x+pcie which seems to be very similar to the problem i am having, i have determined that when I let my monitor go off into power save mode it drops the GPU to x1, and this is the cause. I can use screen saver instead, but not sure if there is a real solution.