Lower FPS with better GPU

I don't play any really demanding games. Mostly CS:GO and Quake Live. Recently, I upgraded my old HD7770 to a HD7970.
I started getting serious drops in FPS, which I figured were down to the motherboard VRMs over heating cus it was an old board. I forget the exact model. i think it was an Asus M74 something or other.
Anyways, I was right about the FPS drops, and that is fixed, BUT, I can no longer get the same FPS as I could with my old setup. I get around 200 FPS on CS:GO with all the settings maxed out, which my old card couldn't do, BUT, I can't get any increase from turning the settings down. I understand that it's likely my CPU bottlenecking, but with my old card, on medium - low settings, I could get up to 400 FPS (And YES! There IS a noticable difference between 400 and 200 FPS) but turning down settings now, can't get me more than around 300 FPS even on minimum settings across the board.
I get the whole bottlenecking thing, but how on earth can that make the system perform WORSE than before at low settings?
The CPU is an AMD FX8350 and the mobo is a Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3. I got the latest GPU driver from AMD, and I've turned everything in CCC to "performance". Though...it's a different version to what I'm used to. I haven't played with the BIOS yet, cus none of the function keys, or the delete or escape work on my keyboard and I've ordered a cheapie just for when I need those keys, until I can be bothered to pull the caps and open it up to fix it.
Oh, I should add: I get way better FPS in Furmark now than before, so the card is fine. I fully expected the CPU to now be the bottleneck, but I'd have expected to get the SAME FPS as before in that case, not more on high settings and less on low settings.
 
Last edited:

Darren

Moderator
Staff member
For starters you're definitely not on the newest drivers if you're using CCC.

Chasing 400 FPS is useless. You won't notice anything over 150-200FPS, and that's only in regards to input lag and the like. Your monitor likely is only 60HZ so anything over that won't look visually better. Just screen tearing.
 
Yeah, I remember the latest driver for the 7770 coming with a replacement for CCC, (Radeon settings, i believe it was called) so I found it a bit odd that the latest driver on the AMD website came with CCC, and was from 2014. I know it's not a new card, but it's newer than the 7770 and surely they haven't already stopped releasing updates...
My monitor is 144hz, and I absolutely DO notice a difference between 200 and 300 fps. Not so much 300 to 400, but it's there.
Anyways, I can't even power the system on today, so maybe the PSU is dead. I'll try shorting the pins on the mobo first to rule out a dodgy switch, but I think the PSU has died.
I'd used a PSU calculator, and it said I needed 458 watts, and the PSU is a corsair 500 watt job, so it's a bit closer than I'd like. I need to double check the calculation. Maybe I mis-typed a model number, or maybe the PSU was just starting to fail anyway.
Sooo...not much I can do right now until I pull the PSU and test it, and replace if necessary. I need to see if there's a newer driver floating around too. Cus, regardless of gaming, if I'm getting lower FPS in a game at low settings than i was with a far less powerful card, then there is a problem that could affect more than just games. And even if it couldn't, it's still a problem, and problems are for solving.
 
Okay, so...When I searched for a driver before, I just googled hd7970 latest driver, but the page that topped the list was a kind of generic page for the whole 7900 series. I shoulda read that more carefully, but the website is badly designed. I found a specific driver for my card, that was released last month.
Hmm...paperclip test suggests a working PSU. Shorting the pins makes things come to life, so the power switch is faulty...BUT I get black screen and no POST screen. This had SO better be the CMOS battery.
Edit: Nope. 3.1 volts. Fresh as a daisy.
Weird how you can shut down a PC and it just dies in the night
 
Last edited:
You have the 7970 which requirements are around a 600 watt psu like the corsair cx600 What exact corsair unit do you have? Try resetting the cmos.

I tried reseting the CMOS, but I'm not sure if it reset, cus I don't have a jumper, and it's really hard to see or feel if I'm contacting both pins. I'll try again. I have a corsair CX500. I used a PSU calculator to make sure the new card wouldn't push things beyond what the PSU could handle, and my total requirement is 478 watts. Though, that's in total. It's possible that the PSU can't provide enough power to the PCI-E connectors. I should check that. Maybe I just burned out that part of the PSU. Though...surely, in that case, I'd still get HDD and processor activity, and hear windows starting up?
I've tried Removing and re-seating RAM modules in various orders, testing each stick individually.
I've unplugged all HDDs and the optical drive, leaving just the SSD with my operating system on.
I've swapped out the HD7970 for my old 7770. I get the same problem, but on that card the fan pulses, spinning up and down, rhythmically.
Right now, i suspect it's the motherboard, which would suck, because I really can't afford to replace it this close to Xmas. Hopefully, it's the PSU, but if I replace it and still have a problem, I still have a new mobo to buy. I'd assume that a PSU would fail while the PC was ON, not off, but then, I'd assume that about all the components. i guess I could buy a really cheapo 600w PSU just to determine if the PSU was the problem, and to tide me over until after Xmas, but first I'll keep trying to pin down the problem to avoid wasting £
 
Last edited:

johnb35

Administrator
Staff member
I used a PSU calculator to make sure the new card wouldn't push things beyond what the PSU could handle, and my total requirement is 478 watts.
That doesn't matter at all. If thats your total wattage, your pushing the psu to 96 percent usage which is not good(only want to be around 80 percent load on a psu max) and gonna put it at an early death causing problems with powering that video card. Get a new psu 600-650 watts. You still may have other damage but at least you'll already have a psu that will work for you.

tried reseting the CMOS, but I'm not sure if it reset, cus I don't have a jumper,
Reset cmos like this.

Unplug power from power supply, remove cmos battery from motherboard, press and hold power button on case to discharge any remaining power on board, then wait 10 minutes. Then reinsert battery, reconnect power and try booting up.
 
That doesn't matter at all. If thats your total wattage, your pushing the psu to 96 percent usage which is not good(only want to be around 80 percent load on a psu max) and gonna put it at an early death causing problems with powering that video card. Get a new psu 600-650 watts. You still may have other damage but at least you'll already have a psu that will work for you.


Reset cmos like this.

Unplug power from power supply, remove cmos battery from motherboard, press and hold power button on case to discharge any remaining power on board, then wait 10 minutes. Then reinsert battery, reconnect power and try booting up.

The power button doesn't work. Which is odd, cus it did last night. i cut the wires and tried shorting them together, and that didn't work, but when i short the pins on the board, it powers up, so the wire going to the switch prolly has a break in it, or the connector on the end is messed up. I'll get in there with a torch and make sure I'm getting good contact on the pins. Though...If I'm doing that, surely I can just do the same with the clear CMOS pins? Hell, I'll just do both.
I hear the corsair PSUs have low quality caps and are prone to failures, so..hopefully the PSU died and not the mobo. Plus...I have had the pulsing fan problem on that old card before and fixed it. I just don't remember if that was the problem I fixed by getting a new PSU. I think it was.
Can anyone recommend a good 600Watt PSU? It's top-mounted in my case, so the SATA power cables from the corsair were all the wrong way up, making things hard to fit. I don't remember what stopped me from just mounting the disks upside down. If I get a modular PSU, is there the option to attach the cables either way?

Edit: I'm getting 0.12 volts at pin 10, so, yeah. Looks like PSU. Thank Thor for that
 
Last edited:

johnb35

Administrator
Staff member
I hear the corsair PSUs have low quality caps and are prone to failures,
Not sure where you are hearing that from. The CX series is ok, wouldn't get the VS series. I've had a tx650 now for about 5 years or more with no problems. I have corsair CX series psu's in all my other pc's as well with no issues. Power supplies can fail at any time whether a good brand or not, just the way electronics work.
 
I just ordered a CX600m cus it was cheap. Now I just gotta hope that the PSU was the problem. Meanwhile, I downloaded the newest driver for my GPU on this laptop, and i'll fix the power switch while I wait for the GPU to arrive. I'll post back and update if I fix the FPS issue. Hell, it may have been the PSU failing that caused that.
 

Geoff

VIP Member
My monitor is 144hz, and I absolutely DO notice a difference between 200 and 300 fps. Not so much 300 to 400, but it's there.
With a 144Hz monitor, the screen can only be updated 144 times per second, so anything over that is just adding to the screen tearing. You are better off increasing the quality of the graphics as there is no improvement with increasing the FPS as long as the lowest isn't below your refresh rate.
 
Last edited:
With a 144Hz monitor, the screen can only be updated 144 times per second, so anything over that is just adding to the screen tearing. You are better off increasing the quality of the graphics as there is no improvement with increasing the FPS as long as the lowest isn't below your refresh rate.
If I played COD, I might believe that, but I'd be wrong. Oh yes, I went there! There absolutely IS a difference, but the fact remains: Better GPU, LOWER FPS at anything but maxed settings. Something isn't right there. Like I said: Surely if the CPU was bottlenecking, I'd still get the SAME 300 - 400 FPS at low-medium settings that I got before, not less. (Significantly less, too. I only get 300 MAX at all the lowest settings)
And yeah, I found a much newer driver..from last month rather than 2 years ago, but I still have the same issue. I had the problem before I upgraded the MOBO, too, so I don't think it's a BIOS setting. It happened as soon as I installed the new GPU, But I know it's not the GPU, cus of the 3X better Furmark score. I know CS:GO is CPU heavy, but again...why LOWER FPS than before? I rarely get more than 60c CPU temp at max load, so there's room to overclock, but I'd rather figure out what's going on first.
 

Intel_man

VIP Member
Oh yes, I went there! There absolutely IS a difference
There really isn't a difference.
I'd be wrong
Yes.. you are wrong. Very wrong about fps above the refresh rate being better. It's like a car that has a max speed of 125 mph. But your speedo has numbers that go to 150mph. Then you get into another car that also has a top speed of 125 mph, but has a speedo that goes to 300mph. You then proceed to say that the car with the 300mph speedo is the faster car and is better because the speedo goes higher.
 
It doesn't matter if I'm wrong. I'm not, but it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if I'm a member of a cult of goat worshippers who found a holy book in a cave in the desert, and the ancient text said more FPS was better. It's not relevant. What's relevant is that I'm getting FEWER FPS with a much better GPU and the exact same CPU. I'm getting about the same on the lowest graphics settings as on the highest. With my old card, settings that low gave me about double the FPS I get now on the same settings. And, since I always used fairly medium settings, at which I now get fewer FPS than I did with a significantly less powerful card in the same system, that indicates that something isn't quite right
 

Darren

Moderator
Staff member
You're just as likely to have had a game patch that impacted performance, particularly if this is the only game and instance of performance not correlating.

And no, framerate at those numbers literally is irrelevant except MAYBE input latency. Your eye really starts having trouble distinguishing smoothness after 140-150 FPS and even if you're over your monitor's refresh rate you're not going to notice anything except like I said maybe input lag. Even then I don't think their servers tick at a high enough frequency for that to matter. You're just working yourself up over a non existent difference that is likely unrelated to your hardware anyway.
 
Top