Ryzen and After Effects don't like each other

[j.ssuarez]

Just recently finished building my new desktop with the following specs:

Ryzen 1700 - Air cooled with stock cooler

16GB G. Skill FlareX (running at 2400MHz because for some reason I can't edit the frequency on BIOS but it's advertised to run at 3200MHz)

2x EVGA 1070s

EVGA 850w PSU

500GB SSD + 1TB HDD

 

I've been noticing some weird performance issues. I am a seasoned Motion Artist so I use After Effects a LOT. Thing is that I've noticed that after a while of normal usage AE becomes laggy, specially while rendering with Adobe Media Encoder. This wasn't happening with my previous Intel PC or my Intel PC at work. I am able to render in the background using Adobe Media Encoder or Background Render for After Effects and continue working without problems on AE. Even rendering in Cinema 4D and continue working in AE plus doing the normal everyday browsing and having a bunch of apps open. Usually after Media Encoder finishes rendering I have to actually quit it so that After effects goes back to normal.

 

I've kept an eye on my processor to try and figure out the problem, but while rendering from Media Encoder it caps at around 30% usage, so what's going on? Granted I am working off the HDD but I don't suspect this is the issue since AE works fine when Media Encoder is not open.

 

I can only suspect the bottleneck is the memory then? I know I still have to figure out overclocking the memory and processor but still, this is an 8 core 16 thread processor running at 3.00GHz (stock) but still should be able to handle this. 

 

I would appreciate any suggestions or ideas as I really need this computer to perform like I was expecting.

 

 

[EunSoo]

Looks like I'm not upgrading to ryzen anytime soon.

[Jredmond]

When i use AE its off an NVME i dont have this problem even on a 4k file i have a 1700 i dont know why the HDD would be a bottleneck try reinstalling the software i do not have this problem

[j.ssuarez]

7 minutes ago, Jredmond said:

When i use AE its off an NVME i dont have this problem even on a 4k file i have a 1700 i dont know why the HDD would be a bottleneck try reinstalling the software i do not have this problem

Yeah I was thinking maybe it could be because i'm so used to working of an SSD, but doesn't make sense that the problems arises only when Media Encoder and AE are open. There have been instances where Media Encoder is just open and AE starts to lag, as soon as I close it, it performs normal. 

 

But just 5 minutes ago I rendered in AE directly and I had to restart AE to be able to continue working. It's like it's retaining some weird cache and continues to read it or something like that...

[Jredmond]

1 minute ago, Meet_Nomad said:

Yeah I was thinking maybe it could be because i'm so used to working of an SSD, but doesn't make sense that the problems arises only when Media Encoder and AE are open. There have been instances where Media Encoder is just open and AE starts to lag, as soon as I close it, it performs normal. 

 

But just 5 minutes ago I rendered in AE directly and I had to restart AE to be able to continue working. It's like it's retaining some weird cache and continues to read it or something like that...

Hmm how much ram do you have in that sucker, it shouldnt matter but the memory controller on Ryzen is so fucked up i figured i would ask. 

[j.ssuarez]

1 minute ago, Jredmond said:

Hmm how much ram do you have in that sucker, it shouldnt matter but the memory controller on Ryzen is so fucked up i figured i would ask. 

Yeah that's my main suspicion. I have 16gb @ 2400MHz...I've had only 32GB before this so I might be just feeling the consequences of low memory

[Jredmond]

Just now, Meet_Nomad said:

Yeah that's my main suspicion. I have 16gb @ 2400MHz...I've had only 32GB before this so I might be just feeling the consequences of low memory

Shouldnt. i ran AE and Animate at the same time with a 900 frame 60FPS montion tween playing and i only have 16 but its clocked at 2667 at 14 14 38 CAS timings. Try overclocking your memory if you have an MSI board just use (memory check it!) great utility on MSI's boards if you have any other brand your shit out of luck but 2400 is low for Ryzen like really low. I would have 2667 minimum you should be able to get that pretty easily with any kit. 

[j.ssuarez]

2 minutes ago, Jredmond said:

Shouldnt. i ran AE and Animate at the same time with a 900 frame 60FPS montion tween playing and i only have 16 but its clocked at 2667 at 14 14 38 CAS timings. Try overclocking your memory if you have an MSI board just use (memory check it!) great utility on MSI's boards if you have any other brand your shit out of luck but 2400 is low for Ryzen like really low. I would have 2667 minimum you should be able to get that pretty easily with any kit. 

Yeah I bought this RAM because it's supposed to be optimized for Ryzen, but guess what, I can't change the frequency of my memory in the BIOS, it's greyed out. I can't edit the timings or voltage either, everything is greyed out. I can only activate XMP profile, and I've tried it twice and the computer won't boot. It shuts off and on several times...Only way to boot into the BIOS after that is clearing the CMOS.

 

I have a Gigabyte AX 370 Gaming K7. Any ideas? 

[Jredmond]

4 minutes ago, Meet_Nomad said:

Yeah I bought this RAM because it's supposed to be optimized for Ryzen, but guess what, I can't change the frequency of my memory in the BIOS, it's greyed out. I can't edit the timings or voltage either, everything is greyed out. I can only activate XMP profile, and I've tried it twice and the computer won't boot. It shuts off and on several times...Only way to boot into the BIOS after that is clearing the CMOS.

 

I have a Gigabyte AX 370 Gaming K7. Any ideas? 

BIOS up to date? I was never very fond of Gigabytes boards i stick to MSI and Asus lol, if the BIOS isnt up to date you need to flash that sucker. I would give gigabyte an email explaining this issue because they will be the only ones who can really help with that but yeah thats weird about it running like shit. Are you on windows 10? if you are try re installing everything / Clean wipe and maybe try reseating the ram and the CPU it might just be your motherboard but im not sure. I knew the gigbayte boards had problems especially the B350 models but i didnt think these higher end ones did. I would send them an email 

[j.ssuarez]

9 minutes ago, Jredmond said:

BIOS up to date? I was never very fond of Gigabytes boards i stick to MSI and Asus lol, if the BIOS isnt up to date you need to flash that sucker. I would give gigabyte an email explaining this issue because they will be the only ones who can really help with that but yeah thats weird about it running like shit. Are you on windows 10? if you are try re installing everything / Clean wipe and maybe try reseating the ram and the CPU it might just be your motherboard but im not sure. I knew the gigbayte boards had problems especially the B350 models but i didnt think these higher end ones did. I would send them an email 

Yeah BIOS up to date and sent them an email yesterday, still waiting to hear back. This sucks man, I just finished building this pc and installed everything on it, would suck to have to start from scratch. Somebody else suggested to actually go back the previous BIOS update to see if I can Overclock, cause even the settings for the processor are greyed out. It's weird that I can only do XMP or nothing else. 

 

This board had very good reviews and Bitwit recommended it a lot...

[j.ssuarez]

UPDATE:

 

I just did a test and if I'm rendering in the background AE won't even let me RAM preview, it'll give me the "I need two or more frames to preview" famous message, so I'm thinking I either need more ram or faster ram