Frame rate issues, help please!

[Douglas Aird]

Help needed with a really big issue. I have a decent self build pc which I put together about 4 months ago. I run a triple screen setup but get decent frame rates on medium settings in games. That is, I did until about 6 weeks ago.

I had a few weeks of not gaming and fired up the pc which proceeded to do various updates. After reboot my frame rates went through the floor. The Far Cry 5 benchmark, for example, went from 39 fps average to 13!

Checked cpu and gpu temperatures, clean installed amd graphics driver, turned off Game DVR and the like but no joy.

Last week, after doing the latest amd driver install I had a full evening of high fps gaming and all was fine. Next day, back to slide show.

Since then I have tried a few registry edits and tweaks, but no luck.

Now thinking my next step is a backup and full reinstall of Windows and all drivers.

I really want to avoid that so if anyone has a suggestion, let me know.

Core i5 8600k
16gb 3200mhz ddr4
Rx580 8 gb
Gigabyte Aorus Gaming motherboard

 

[Durge Driven]

Hi

Sorry I can only speak for myself, I would take your last option as seems you have tried most things

Have you done stress tests, temperature and voltage monitoring, etc. ?
Rolled back drivers
Run defender / malware scans ?
Check program features for anything odd ?

I am partial to fresh install, I use retail W10 Home on a small partition and use Trueimage for
backup and for new OS I manually save most everything else to drop back in

What is your OS ? If W10 download MS Media Tool Build 1803 so to bypass most updates
that have have caused issues lately when updating the OS rather then fresh

If you do a fresh Build1803 unplug/disable internet and skip activation for now
Install all drivers manually
Do custom install for any driver has the option and disable unused features
Don't install anything you don't need to run your sims
Make sure you disable automatic driver update in System properties
Connect to internet and activate OS and either do Window updates or disable for now
Run your sims and check performance

Run Mad Onion 3DMark free demo on Steam
A good benchtest to randomly checking PC performance
run test 5 times and make sure to jot down marks you get, they should be very close
Take a average from 5 tests.
A good running PC should be no more then 1% +/- off that mark anytime you run the test

Slowly add back all apps but still nothing you need right now
Spreading out installs may help finding the fault if one exists

 

[Douglas Aird]

Yes, Windows 10. Thanks for your reply, some valuable advice in there.

 

[Bjarne Hansen]

I had something similar happen last year.
Had a program that hijacked my GPU every time I tried to run a game.
Think is made Crypto currency for somebody else.
Malwarebytes cleared it out while several other anti-virus programs failed to detected it

 

[DND]

Since you achieve acceptable FPS on occasion I would avoid drastic measures such as reinstalling windows. I too have experienced random frame drops when starting R3E. If frame rate is below 60 once game starts I shut down game and reboot, more often than not that works. I have incorporated a routine in starting my rig, no science behind it but again, more often than not I have no issues.
1. Turn on PC, log in and give it a minute to do it's stuff
2. I start GPU Tweak by ASUS and run Boost PC, or something like that, and it turns off unnecessary apps
3. Then I click on OC in GPU Tweak to get max performance from GPU
4. Start Fanatec gear
5. Start Steam
6. Start Game, if FPS is not as mentioned I repeat

One last thing is between each step I ensure the spinning wheel/hour glass is complete. And if problem persists I check the Properties in Steam and run the Validate Files app.

Good Luck

 

[Durge Driven]

I did give him about half a dozen things to try first ?

Reinstalling windows does not need to be drastic it is users make it that way
It takes no time with USB to install OS and using image software takes me 3 minutes
to backup or restore a old OS if needed

So maybe a hour to do OS, install basic drivers and test sims when he has been battling with this for weeks ?



If people don't want to reinstall OS because they fill up a big C drive and don't use image software they ask for trouble

The main advantage with a new OS is you can very carefully add back only software you absolutely need and after each install session check and watch for problems

 

[Terry Rock]

Given those PC specs, that thing should be a 'monster' at gaming.
You said you have fiddled with a few registry tweaks.
Have you looked at the taskbar or the registry for background running programs at startup?
I'd shutdown all of those and then do a gaming session, to see if that has an effect.

 

[Douglas Aird]

Thanks all. I didn't actually check for malware, I will check that, too.

 

[Flameshades]

one thing that sounds counter productive to do, but in my case and the case of a friend, turning off Hyper-threading in the BOIS made a massive difference to FPS, on both an X99 5930k and the new 8700k. Race rooms, RF2 and Assetto all had big gains from doing this, its simple enough and you will know straight away if it has helped.

 

[anton_Chez]

In many cases, deciding to reinstall windows straight away can be quicker and less frustrating than trying to find that one issue giving you grief. Best way to do this is keep a seperate drive for OS install, and games on another drive. That way you don't need to redownload anythinng apart from a few programs you install to your OS drive.

I've done it many time. Tried for hours and even days sometimes trying to hunt down that one thing, only to nuke the system, start from scratch with a new OS, and all good after that.

It's probably been mentioned already but I haven't read all the thread so just my advice. I agree with those suggestions if that's the case.

 

[maelstrom]

one thing that sounds counter productive to do, but in my case and the case of a friend, turning off Hyper-threading in the BOIS made a massive difference to FPS

Doesn't apply as he's using an 8600k.