Uncharacteristically Low Performance On New CPU

[WH_Thor]

Hey guys, so I'm having some weird and very frustrating issues getting DCS to just be playable at this point. I recently got a new CPU and memory hoping to increase my performance and decrease the incredible amount of stutter I was having. Instead it seems to have made the issue worse.

 

Here's my current system specs:

AMD FX-6350, Nvidia GTX 650 Ti Boost, Team Vulcan 8Gb DDR3 1600 RAM, Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 Motherboard, 2 Tb WD Black HDD, 128 Gb Crucial SSD Setup as a cache drive to the HDD, and an Antec Kuhler 620 in push/pull

 

I constantly see FPS between 4 and 14, peaking at 22 for very short periods, and stuttering almost constantly. Resolution has no effect on frame rate or stutter, as it's the same result windowed at 1440x900 or full screen at 1680x1050. Looking in the task manager under the Performance tab when DCS is active, the CPU core tasked with handling simulation events never rises above about 60% load, which I find odd. Does anyone have any ideas?

Edited February 26, 2015 by WH_Thor

[SkateZilla]

For Graphics:

Click on the LOW Preset,

Drop Everything to LOWEST Values,

 

and then go from there.

[SyntaxError]

My CPU also hardly goes above 60% if that helps at all.

[WH_Thor]

No, the graphics settings have seemingly no effect on performance. I suspected this was the case, my graphics card is having no trouble with the work it's being given. It seems that something is drastically reducing the amount of performance my CPU can give to DCS, which I find odd. I'm going to try reinstalling it and see if that fixes it.

[Gladman]

Click the "fullscreen" button in options to off. I had the exact same problem and that fixed it right away.

People will tell you it should be the opposite but it just aint so.

 

Dale

[WH_Thor]

Already tried windowing the game, didn't change a thing. That's how I tested the lower resolution to see if it would make a difference, it was windowed at 1440x900.

[NeilWillis]

I suspect you may have hardware issues somewhere.

[JST]

It might be some action taking place on the map. What do you usually play in terms of layout of vehicles and such? Do you have other games/programs that have similar behavior?

 

I have an i5-4690k overclocked to 4.4Ghz, and in multiplayer Ponies firing drop my framerate to 12-13 FPS for several seconds.

 

Also, when certain flak truck/howitzers are firing, they drop framerate to around 20FPS constant.

 

I'm quite sure the issue is with DCS itself, not your hardware.

[Random]

No, the graphics settings have seemingly no effect on performance. I suspected this was the case, my graphics card is having no trouble with the work it's being given. It seems that something is drastically reducing the amount of performance my CPU can give to DCS, which I find odd. I'm going to try reinstalling it and see if that fixes it.

 

DCS only uses 2 cores. One for the game one for the sound. You need to check individual core useage not overall CPU useage.

 

Also can you check you GPU load? I'm pretty sure you will discover a bottleneck... Either cpu core pegged at 100% or the GPU.

 

DCS currently doesn't much like AMD cpus.. at least older ones. I gained 20fps going from an old Phenom 2 at 4.2ghz to an i7 at 3.9!

[Demon_]

Thor, did you update the motherboard bios?

[fltsimbuff]

You should install CPUZ or some other utility to check your actual CPU clock rate, and temperature. If you just built this system and forgot thermal paste or didn't get the heatsink on quite right it could be throttling itself.

[King_Hrothgar]

In windows, pull up the task manager and open the resource monitor. This will show you each individual core. DCS puts practically everything onto just one core so if that is pegged at 100%, that's your problem. You didn't mention what your old processor was. Given that DCS uses 1 core + 1 for sound, a lot of modern processors are actually slower than some much older ones as far as DCS is concerned.

[NineLine]

Hey guys, so I'm having some weird and very frustrating issues getting DCS to just be playable at this point. I recently got a new CPU and memory hoping to increase my performance and decrease the incredible amount of stutter I was having. Instead it seems to have made the issue worse.

 

Here's my current system specs:

AMD FX-6350, Nvidia GTX 650 Ti Boost, Team Vulcan 8Gb DDR3 1600 RAM, Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 Motherboard, 2 Tb WD Black HDD, 128 Gb Crucial SSD Setup as a cache drive to the HDD, and an Antec Kuhler 620 in push/pull

 

I constantly see FPS between 4 and 14, peaking at 22 for very short periods, and stuttering almost constantly. Resolution has no effect on frame rate or stutter, as it's the same result windowed at 1440x900 or full screen at 1680x1050. Looking in the task manager under the Performance tab when DCS is active, the CPU core tasked with handling simulation events never rises above about 60% load, which I find odd. Does anyone have any ideas?

 

Was this a clean install with the new parts, or an upgrade to your original system with your original install?

[WH_Thor]

Hello all, sorry for the late replies.

 

I suspect you may have hardware issues somewhere.

 

Actually, this CPU replacement was enacted to address the exact issue you pointed out (that is, a hardware failure).

 

It might be some action taking place on the map. What do you usually play in terms of layout of vehicles and such? Do you have other games/programs that have similar behavior?

 

I have an i5-4690k overclocked to 4.4Ghz, and in multiplayer Ponies firing drop my framerate to 12-13 FPS for several seconds.

 

Also, when certain flak truck/howitzers are firing, they drop framerate to around 20FPS constant.

 

I'm quite sure the issue is with DCS itself, not your hardware.

 

Yes I have a feeling it was indeed a software problem (not, as I have found, directly DCS related, I'll detail further below), although it was originally introduced by a hardware failure, I suspect (PSU went out some months ago and took the old ASUS motherboard with it).

 

DCS only uses 2 cores. One for the game one for the sound. You need to check individual core useage not overall CPU useage.

 

Also can you check you GPU load? I'm pretty sure you will discover a bottleneck... Either cpu core pegged at 100% or the GPU.

 

DCS currently doesn't much like AMD cpus.. at least older ones. I gained 20fps going from an old Phenom 2 at 4.2ghz to an i7 at 3.9!

 

Yes, I did some benchmarking before I started this thread to see if I could determine that as the problem. As I said in my original post, the CPU core seemingly assigned with processing the simulation events wasn't pegging over 60% usage, and my GPU was giving similar utilization even at highest settings, only topping out at around 70% usage, and never rising above about 50°C. This I found incredibly odd given my in-game performance.

 

Thor, did you update the motherboard bios?

 

Yes, the current UEFI version I have is the most up to date I could find from Gigabyte.

 

You should install CPUZ or some other utility to check your actual CPU clock rate, and temperature. If you just built this system and forgot thermal paste or didn't get the heatsink on quite right it could be throttling itself.

 

Actually, I'm a big fan of CPU-Z. No need to recommend, already have it installed. No, this is no where near a new build. This build is from Feb. 2012, although you couldn't tell by looking at the parts now. The only thing that's left from the original build is the case and CPU cooler, and (until last night) the disk image. No chance I forgot thermal paste, I'd never be so daft with a computer, lol. Got a good healthy amount of Arctic Silver 5 under the hood. Throttling was not a problem, and my 620 has no problem meeting the TDP of this new FX-6350, as well as my old 960T.

 

In windows, pull up the task manager and open the resource monitor. This will show you each individual core. DCS puts practically everything onto just one core so if that is pegged at 100%, that's your problem. You didn't mention what your old processor was. Given that DCS uses 1 core + 1 for sound, a lot of modern processors are actually slower than some much older ones as far as DCS is concerned.

 

See as above, I was getting abnormal utilization for my in game performance.

 

Was this a clean install with the new parts, or an upgrade to your original system with your original install?

 

Upgrade.

 

So, enough foreshadowing. One critical aspect that I had failed to mention or even take into account, and you may have extrapolated from reading above, is that the disk image I was using was, until last night, almost 4 years old. Also, the performance impact seemed to be growing greater, and affecting Windows as a whole. After scanning for malware, looking for rootkits, and clearing as much digital cellulite as I possibly could, I gave up. I had deduced that the problem most likely lie in years of code built over code, then half washed away and built back up again. The digital catacombs of my hard drive were most likely so filled to the brims with skeletons of programs past that it had finally run out of CPU overhead to give the rest of the computer while active applications ran. So I did what any one sensible person would do.

 

I nuked it all from orbit. I backed up what I cared to keep, got out my Win 7 disk, formatted the HDD and the SSD, and reinstalled Windows. Thus far, it's going great. Unlike before, performance is on par with what you would expect from a hex core, 8 gig, mid-range card, purpose built gaming tower again. I pull a constant 30 FPS in Arma 3 with vsync on, and am very happy to report that the framerate on DCS is once again playable. At moderately high settings I pull between 30 and 50 fps now. Thank you all for your help, I have squashed this one thoroughly.

Edited February 28, 2015 by WH_Thor