Inexplicable MASSIVE FPS drops in games

[DebatED Nothing]

Description of problem:

Whilst gaming (in a variety of games, so it's not one game or one engine's fault) I will get quite frequent framerate drops from 60 or so down to anywhere south of 10, sometimes even as low as 2 or 3 FPS for a few seconds. After the FPS drop, the performance will return to normal for a while, sometimes only about 15 seconds, other times several minutes can pass before another FPS drop. The problem sometimes takes a while from game launch to begin, but once it starts happening it does not stop. As you can imagine, this renders most of the games it affects completely unplayable so I -really- could use some help on this now. As you may see by looking at my profile, I have come here with this problem before, but to no avail, the problem seemingly died down for a while but has now returned. It's really bad, so bad it's making me seriously consider moving my plans for a new PC forward about 8 months because I can barely use this one at the moment.

 

Signs and symptoms of problem:

The FPS tank will, when monitored in MSI afterburner, correspond to a few things: a massive drop in GPU utilisation, a massive spike in CPU utilisation across all 8 cores, no change in RAM or GRAM usage, weird fluctuations in temperature of the CPU. Below are some screenshots graphs of these things when the issue occurs:

(Spikes in this next image line up in time with the drops in the previous image)

Graph showing CPU Temp behaviour:

 

Hardware list:

CPU: FX 8350 stock speed (Cooled with Noctua NH-D9L)

RAM: 8 GB Corsair Vengeance which MOBO refuses to run at more than 1333 MHZ

MOBO: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-D3

GPU: EVGA GTX 770

PSU: Corsair HX 750

OS: Windows 7 SP1

Games are all stored on Samsung 850 pro 250 GB SSD.

 

Steps attempted so far:

Completely reinstalling Graphics drivers (newest version, uninstalled using DDU in safe mode)

Cleaning GPU heat sink, and CPU Heat sink (neither were dusty), re applying both's thermal paste.

Storing games on different SSD and on HDD.

 

I could seriously use some help guys. Thanks for any tips you can give.

 

[ZeusXI]

3 minutes ago, DebatED Nothing said:

Description of problem:

Whilst gaming (in a variety of games, so it's not one game or one engine's fault) I will get quite frequent framerate drops from 60 or so down to anywhere south of 10, sometimes even as low as 2 or 3 FPS for a few seconds. After the FPS drop, the performance will return to normal for a while, sometimes only about 15 seconds, other times several minutes can pass before another FPS drop. The problem sometimes takes a while from game launch to begin, but once it starts happening it does not stop. As you can imagine, this renders most of the games it affects completely unplayable so I -really- could use some help on this now. As you may see by looking at my profile, I have come here with this problem before, but to no avail, the problem seemingly died down for a while but has now returned. It's really bad, so bad it's making me seriously consider moving my plans for a new PC forward about 8 months because I can barely use this one at the moment.

 

Signs and symptoms of problem:

The FPS tank will, when monitored in MSI afterburner, correspond to a few things: a massive drop in GPU utilisation, a massive spike in CPU utilisation across all 8 cores, no change in RAM or GRAM usage, weird fluctuations in temperature of the CPU. Below are some screenshots graphs of these things when the issue occurs:

(Spikes in this next image line up in time with the drops in the previous image)

Graph showing CPU Temp behaviour:

 

Hardware list:

CPU: FX 8350 stock speed (Cooled with Noctua NH-D9L)

RAM: 8 GB Corsair Vengeance which MOBO refuses to run at more than 1333 MHZ

MOBO: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-D3

GPU: EVGA GTX 770

Games are all stored on Samsung 850 pro 250 GB SSD.

 

Steps attempted so far:

Completely reinstalling Graphics drivers (newest version, uninstalled using DDU in safe mode)

Cleaning GPU heat sink, and CPU Heat sink (neither were dusty), re applying both's thermal paste.

Storing games on different SSD and on HDD.

 

I could seriously use some help guys. Thanks for any tips you can give.

 

Try re-installing your drivers for gpu. clean install, not find folder and just delete.

[DebatED Nothing]

Just now, ZeusXI said:

Try re-installing your drivers for gpu. clean install, not find folder and just delete.

Try reading my post, I did that already.

[Tieox]

Just now, DebatED Nothing said:

Try reading my post, I did that already.

What PSU are you using? also, what OS? 

 

 

[DebatED Nothing]

Just now, Kierax said:

What PSU are you using? also, what OS? 

 

 

I'll add these to the post as well, but I'm using a Corsair HX 750 and Windows 7 SP1.

[ZeusXI]

Just now, DebatED Nothing said:

Try reading my post, I did that already.

Im suggesting clean install. When you say completely uninstall, i dont know if your just deleting the folder, using control panel, or the uninstall option when installing a new driver version. But thats up to you. Try just deleting the drivers all together and not install a driver. 

 

 

[DebatED Nothing]

1 minute ago, ZeusXI said:

Im suggesting clean install. When you say completely uninstall, i dont know if your just deleting the folder, using control panel, or the uninstall option when installing a new driver version. But thats up to you. Try just deleting the drivers all together and not install a driver. 

 

 

It says in the post I used DDU, display driver uninstaller which completely removes the drivers and all related files and folders. I'll try with no drivers.

[Tieox]

I am concerned the issue could lie within the motherboard itself, you mention that you cannot run the ram faster than 1333mhz which is strange, have you tried checking for any BIOS updates which perhaps improve stability?

 

 

[Tieox]

10 minutes ago, DebatED Nothing said:

It says in the post I used DDU, display driver uninstaller which completely removes the drivers and all related files and folders. I'll try with no drivers.

 

 

Quoting to notify.  You may find this interesting.

 

 

 

[DebatED Nothing]

11 minutes ago, Kierax said:

I am concerned the issue could lie within the motherboard itself, you mention that you cannot run the ram faster than 1333mhz which is strange, have you tried checking for any BIOS updates which perhaps improve stability?

 

 

I will give this a go, however I've not had the issues the whole time I've had the computer, they just started seemingly randomly at some point (no hardware changes before it startes)

8 minutes ago, Kierax said:

Quoting to notify.  You may find this interesting.

 

 

 

My motherboard is Rev 1.1 of the GA 990FXA-D3 not UD3 but thanks for suggestion. Just touched the VRM heatsink and it's fucking scorching hot...

[LeStringMan]

25 minutes ago, DebatED Nothing said:

Try reading my post, I did that already.

Try going into the bios and disabling Turbocore and APM.

[Tieox]

Just now, DebatED Nothing said:

I will give this a go, however I've not had the issues the whole time I've had the computer, they just started seemingly randomly at some point (no hardware changes before it startes)

My motherboard is Rev 1.1 of the GA 990FXA-D3 not UD3 but thanks for suggestion. Just touched the VRM heatsink and it's fucking scorching hot...

 

Given what sounds like throttling is occurring on your system, my suspicions are you found your culprit. 

 

One solution in the meantime would be getting a fan setup like Linus has for his test bench with a Noctua Fan, to direct cooling air onto the VRM heatsink. 

 

 

[DebatED Nothing]

4 minutes ago, LeStringMan said:

Try going into the bios and disabling Turbocore and APM.

Okay, I can't do it today because I'm not at home anymore, but I'll try these recommendations tomorrow.

2 minutes ago, Kierax said:

Given what sounds like throttling is occurring on your system, my suspicions are you found your culprit. 

 

One solution in the meantime would be getting a fan setup like Linus has for his test bench with a Noctua Fan, to direct cooling air onto the VRM heatsink. 

 

 

Come to think of it there was one time when I removed the MOBO to so something and accidentially lifted it by the VRM heatsink which might (I honestly don't know the chronological order of these events) be a cause. I might try reseating that heat sink.

[Tieox]

Just now, DebatED Nothing said:

Okay, I can't do it today because I'm not at home anymore, but I'll try these recommendations tomorrow.

Come to think of it there was one time when I removed the MOBO to so something and accidentially lifted it by the VRM heatsink which might (I honestly don't know the chronological order of these events) be a cause. I might try reseating that heat sink.

 

Lets hope so!

[Flobberknock]

6 minutes ago, DebatED Nothing said:

Okay, I can't do it today because I'm not at home anymore, but I'll try these recommendations tomorrow.

Come to think of it there was one time when I removed the MOBO to so something and accidentially lifted it by the VRM heatsink which might (I honestly don't know the chronological order of these events) be a cause. I might try reseating that heat sink.

I have an Asus P8P67-LE and had a very similar problem. 

 

I found the cause of mine was that the frequency of my CPU was dropping from it's OC'd turbo speed (4.5Ghz) down to its stock speed (3.3Ghz)

 

My 'fix' was I bought a Corsair H115i instead of air cooling. This brought my processor temps right down and must have had a knock-on effect on the VRM also as I haven't had this issue since

 

During my investigation I found out that the "LE" in the mobo name stood for something like lightweight edition which in essence had a much more limited BIOS and wasn't nearly as good at OC'ing than its better counterparts. 

 

Try the idea with the fan, if that works, it might be worth investing in an AIO water cooler like I did

[LeStringMan]

4 minutes ago, DebatED Nothing said:

Okay, I can't do it today because I'm not at home anymore, but I'll try these recommendations tomorrow.

Come to think of it there was one time when I removed the MOBO to so something and accidentially lifted it by the VRM heatsink which might (I honestly don't know the chronological order of these events) be a cause. I might try reseating that heat sink.

What game are you playing when this happens? FX cpus can only turbo half of their cores to the advertised turbo speed so for instance the FX-6300 is advertised as 3.5 ghz/ 4.1 ghz turbo, in practice though all 6 cores can only boost to 3.8, and only 3 can hit 4.1, however to do that it must lower the clockspeed of the other three cores, and they must be under 25% or so load so you will have 3 running at 4.1 and 3 running at 1.4, when it turbos for a split second clockspeeds drop to 3.0 then cores change speed, this is why obviously the FX line is notorious for dropping fps, make sure when you disable turbocore you also disable APM, as that is what changes voltages and drops clockspeeds. So the 8350 has 5 P-States 1.4 ghz (idle), 3.0, 4.0, 4.1(8 cores) 1.4 volts, 4.2(4 cores) 1.4275 volts, it does this to stay in its power envelope. Or of course it could be overheating VRMs.

[DebatED Nothing]

15 hours ago, LeStringMan said:

What game are you playing when this happens? FX cpus can only turbo half of their cores to the advertised turbo speed so for instance the FX-6300 is advertised as 3.5 ghz/ 4.1 ghz turbo, in practice though all 6 cores can only boost to 3.8, and only 3 can hit 4.1, however to do that it must lower the clockspeed of the other three cores, and they must be under 25% or so load so you will have 3 running at 4.1 and 3 running at 1.4, when it turbos for a split second clockspeeds drop to 3.0 then cores change speed, this is why obviously the FX line is notorious for dropping fps, make sure when you disable turbocore you also disable APM, as that is what changes voltages and drops clockspeeds. So the 8350 has 5 P-States 1.4 ghz (idle), 3.0, 4.0, 4.1(8 cores) 1.4 volts, 4.2(4 cores) 1.4275 volts, it does this to stay in its power envelope. Or of course it could be overheating VRMs.

Interesting. I get it in a lot of games, the worst culprits are DOTA 2 and Mirror's Edge Catalyst, which is completely unplayable with the lag.

[DebatED Nothing]

On 7/25/2016 at 4:30 PM, Kierax said:

Given what sounds like throttling is occurring on your system, my suspicions are you found your culprit. 

 

One solution in the meantime would be getting a fan setup like Linus has for his test bench with a Noctua Fan, to direct cooling air onto the VRM heatsink. 

I've just looked again and realised that what I thought was the vrm cooling was actually the north bridge heat sink, I don't think there is a VRM heatsink on this motherboard that I can find.

On 7/25/2016 at 4:29 PM, LeStringMan said:

Try going into the bios and disabling Turbocore and APM.

I -think- this has fixed it, but as I said I can only be sure after a few hours of testing which I've not done yet.