Computer Bottlenecks Help?

[MutesToCry]

Hey there, been a while since I wrote on the forums, but I recently ran into a problem.

 

See I have a custom build Ive been working on for the last year and Im looking up videos, graphs and even some sheets on performance on each component of my Computer. I wanted to see what is bottle necking my Computer.

 

I have a Intel DQ67SW Motherboard (Which is LGA 1155).

a i5-2500k (Stock)

2 different sets of Ram kits both are 2x2GB kits. ONe set is a Corsair XMS3 ram kit. the other being a set of HyperX Blu. I have all 4 sticks in my motherboard. 

I have a GTX 960 EVGA SSC 2.0+

a 500W Powersupply

and a 500gb storage drive (HDD)

 

(If someone can please tell me what I can sell each one at for a great price (No lows and no outrageous highs please)

 

I feel like My ram is the bottleneck, but also looking at Userbenchmarks and other websites it seems like my Computer just isn't good in general.

 

[Origami Cactus]

I would say no ssd is the worst part.

What res are you playing at?

The i5 shouldnt bottlebeck the gtx 960, as they are both weak.

[Spotty]

It will depend on what tasks you are doing. Some tasks rely heavily on the CPU and don't use much RAM or GPU power. Other tasks can heavily rely on the GPU but not the CPU or RAM. Some tasks use low amounts of CPU and GPU resources, but require lots of RAM.

 

If you are talking about general gaming, then it will also depend on the individual game, as well as what graphical settings you are using, what resolution you are running at, and what framerate you are trying to achieve.
Playing at a low resolution such as 720p with low graphical settings is easy on the GPU, so it's likely any limitation would be CPU related.
Playing at a high resolution such as 4k with high graphical settings is very hard on the GPU, so it's likely any limitation would be GPU related.

 

8GB of RAM will limit you in some games, but RAM capacity is really only an issue when you don't have enough. It's only when you run out of available RAM that your system will begin to slow down as it starts using the SSD/HDD as a pagefile to perform memory tasks - which is considerably slower than RAM.

 

I would recommend downloading a program called MSI Afterburner. It has a built in on screen display that will show you information about your system in real time while you are in game. You can configure it to display a wide range of information, such as GPU usage, CPU usage, and RAM usage, as well as other things like temperatures.  I'd recommend enabling those to be displayed in the on screen display, and then loading up a few of your favourite games and watching how your system is being utilised in games.

 

An easy way to visualise a bottleneck is to think of a three-legged race (where two people have their legs tied together so they have to run together as a team). If you have one person who is a very fast runner, like Usain Bolt, and then you pair them with a really fat, overweight person - the fast runner can only go as fast as what the fat overweight person can run. As a result you are wasting the potential that the fast runner has. 
Ideally you want to pair two people together people of similar performance levels, so that way neither person is wasting their potential being slowed down by a fat person.

The same applies with computers and tasks that rely on both the graphics card processing and CPU processing, such as most games.

 

• CPU BOTTLENECK - If your graphics card usage is sitting at low usage (for example, 30-40%), but your CPU usage is stuck at 100%, then that means you have a CPU bottleneck where the CPU can't keep up with the graphics card. The graphics card isn't able to perform as fast as it can as it's waiting on the CPU to keep up. You might be able to increase the resolution or set the graphics settings to High/Very High to get more performance out of your graphics card. (**See note below)
• GRAPHICS CARD BOTTLENECK - If your CPU usage is low, but your graphics card is at 100%, then that means your graphics card is the limiting factor. In games this is probably the preferred option, but if you're unable to maintain an acceptable framerate then you should lower the resolution or lower some graphical settings so that your graphics card doesn't have to work as hard. (**See note below)
• RAM BOTTLENECK - If your total RAM usage is high, in your case with 8GB total RAM let's say above 7GB, then it's possible that your system is beginning to rely on pagefile for memory tasks which will slow down your system, and you will need to upgrade your RAM. You may be able to help lower the amount of RAM you are using by closing background programs while you are gaming, such as closing your web browser - as Chrome/Firefox can use up a lot of RAM when multiple tabs are open.

**Note: As mentioned earlier, some programs or games may rely more heavily on either the CPU or GPU than others. There are games that use lots of CPU power but don't require much from the graphics card, such as strategy games like Civilization. Inversely the same is true where there are games that are very graphically intense that don't rely a great deal on the CPU. In these situations then your CPU or GPU usage may be low just because it isn't needed by the task/game you are running.

[PatXioPC]

First, are you seeing any performance drop on each over-all computing and component-specific workloads, like in gaming(gpu, cpu raw speed) and general browsing, encoding and real-time editing(cpu, and memory bandwidth)? 

 

Imo tho, if you're doing simple modern tasks with Windows 10, and dx11 1080p casual gaming, the i5 shouldn't be a bottleneck in terms of core count but actual speed across all cores. You do want to overclock that cpu to actually see improvements because faster clock speeds across all cores will certainly handle in-game processing of physics or other logics to keep up with the 3d frames that the gpu renders. And I guess as long as you're not going up from the 960, you will not certainly get CPU bottlenecked.