reported One or more cores reaching 100%

[104th_Money]

I noticed some stuttering 2 updates ago and its only been getting worse. Checked Task Manager and found 2 P-cores consistently reaching 100% usage even with just the main DCS window open and it stays the same in game as well. W11 Pro, Nvidia drivers, mobo bios all up to date.

Removed all mods, ran long repair, confirmed core parking is off, hardware acceleration off, game mode off, high performance power plan on, setting priority or affinity, nothing makes a difference, all pc temps are pretty low so no thermal throttling... As soon as I hit launch button and DCS starts, its happens. Even in completely empty SP mission with only a single client aircraft... 

Specs are i9-13900k/64gb DDR5 6400 ram/Z790E mobo/asus 4090oc/2tb gen5 ssd

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated

Edited February 1 by 104th_Money

[sleighzy]

Attach your C:\Users\username\Saved Games\DCS\Logs\dcs.log file here for review as well after starting a mission. Might just be a text document named "dcs" if your Windows is hiding file extensions.

[felipesm]

Same here.

 

[AKULA_OPTIMUS]

These things had been happening since the multithreading were released and never been fixed

The only thing that works for me is to turn the affinity of the 100% core OFF, and the ON again, and all cores stabilize at 80% or so and stuttering mostly goes away. But you have to do it everytime you jump into an new aircraft.

[104th_Money]

I’ll remove my mods again and start it up to get a fresh log. Special K took a look at it a few days ago as well when I posted in ED discord but didnt find anything concrete.

[VampireNZ]

Same here - affinity off and on does the trick.

null

[Flappie]

2 hours ago, AKULA_OPTIMUS said:

These things had been happening since the multithreading were released and never been fixed

To my knowledge, it had been fixed in October 2024. Users in the main thread were unanimous (unfortunately, this thread is gone since it was part of the MT bugs temporary subsection).

[VampireNZ]

2 hours ago, Flappie said:

To my knowledge, it had been fixed in October 2024. Users in the main thread were unanimous (unfortunately, this thread is gone since it was part of the MT bugs temporary subsection).

Sorry - but did you not see the screenshot I just took and posted above with CPU Core 3 maxed out for the entire duration DCS is open after loading an aircraft??

Disable then re-enable Affinity and it stops maxing out. This side-stepping/ignoring of faults/problems in DCS is getting a little out of control? 

[Flappie]

15 hours ago, VampireNZ said:

Sorry - but did you not see the screenshot I just took and posted above with CPU Core 3 maxed out for the entire duration DCS is open after loading an aircraft??

Disable then re-enable Affinity and it stops maxing out. This side-stepping/ignoring of faults/problems in DCS is getting a little out of control? 

I think you're the guy getting a little out of control here. I said "it HAD been fixed". English may not be my first language, yet I remember pretty well that "had" + "been" + "fixed" equals "was fixed in the past, may have changed later on". Please correct me if I'm wrong.

One more thing: when I take time to answer a bugs and problems thread, it means I care. You're obviously barking up the wrong tree.

Edited February 3 by Flappie
barking "up", not "at", i'm still learning

[Flappie]

A fellow tester who had been experiencing this issue before October tells me the issue is back for him too. I'll report the return of this issue.

[104th_Money]

Thanks for reporting Flappie, I thought I was going crazy...

[VampireNZ]

14 hours ago, Flappie said:

I think you're the guy getting a little out of control here. I said "it HAD been fixed". English may not be my first language, yet I remember pretty well that "had" + "been" + "fixed" equals "was fixed in the past, may have changed later on". Please correct me if I'm wrong.

One more thing: when I take time to answer a bugs and problems thread, it means I care. You're obviously barking up the wrong tree.

Thanks for taking the time to explain english to someone who has been speaking it for 50 years. English may not be your first language, but I see you are taking the time to learn patronising sarcasm, please correct me if I am wrong.

Coming from an aircrew and aircraft maintenance background, if I told the Captain of our aircraft after he informed me of a current fault that "it had been fixed in October"...I can guarantee the answer would have been along the lines of 'Congratulations, do you want a cookie or something? It's broken now as I have just told you - would you mind doing something about it"

But obviously we can't respond like that in the real world. So sorry - was just a bit confused at your response. Several examples of how it is 'currently' broken, and the response from the ED side of things is how it 'had' been fixed. Um ok - well now it is broken again.

Maybe something lost in translation, and no I am not barking up anything...just trying to help by adding some more info. I apologise.

[Flappie]

Apologies accepted.  I was answering another user who said it had never been fixed.

Thank you both for the screenshots. They were added to the internal report, and devs are now well aware that the issue has returned.

I won't be able to help a lot more on this issue since my CPU is too old to be affected (Ryzen 3700), but our fellow affected tester will be able to test potential fixes, hopefully soon enough.

[MoleUK]

On 2/3/2025 at 10:46 PM, Flappie said:

Apologies accepted.  I was answering another user who said it had never been fixed.

Thank you both for the screenshots. They were added to the internal report, and devs are now well aware that the issue has returned.

I won't be able to help a lot more on this issue since my CPU is too old to be affected (Ryzen 3700), but our fellow affected tester will be able to test potential fixes, hopefully soon enough.

I have noticed the same. But on my end, it only happens infrequently when starting DCS. Sometimes it will start with a core pegged to 100% usage, sometimes not.

When it's pegged to 100%, it seems to react to mouse movement. While the mouse is moving, that core will drop below 100% usage. The moment the mouse is idle, it pegs to 100% again.

Conversely, when the game doesn't start with 1 core pegged at 100%: Moving the mouse keeps a core pegged to 100%. As long as the mouse is moving even slightly, the core is stuck at 100%. The moment the mouse is idle, CPU usage on that core drops again.

It may be a different issue, but I would guess it's related to the mouse polling bug that came up previously. The polling rate may have just been reacting badly with whatever underlying bug there was idk.

Again this may be irrelevant but I suspect something is off with mouse polling/movement again.

Edited February 5 by MoleUK

[Special K]

If any of you guys would be so kind and provide a simple dcs.log, that would help a ton. Screenshots unfortunately don't help at all.

=> For the guys using E-Core CPUs, please make sure that you are on Windows 11 and that core parking is disabled.

=> For the guys using Ryzen CPUs, please make sure that you do not have MSI afterburner installed.

Happy to look at any log, if provided.

[Flappie]

Here's an example of a Process Lasso user who had forgotten to unpark cores. Core unparked, performance issue solved. Please give it a go if your dcs.log shows such warning:

2025-02-25 05:07:46.799 WARNING EDCORE (Main): CPU HAS PARKED LOGICAL CORES (this can be source of stuttering and reduced performance especially on hybrid CPUs with P/E-cores)

 

[Flappie]

@104th_Money@felipesm@AKULA_OPTIMUS@VampireNZ@MoleUK 

Hey, I've been talking to SpecialK who's been helping a lot of people over here and on Discord. He's pretty sure the MT issue was fixed for good when it comes to W11 users, because he has helped a number of them get rid of stutters. He showed me an example and it was 104th_Money's case. @104th_Money Can you please confirm your P-core issue is gone for good?

If you gents keep having performance issues caused by a core stuck to 100%:

• If you have Windows 10 and an E-core CPU (Intel 12th, 13th or 14th gen), upgrade to Windows 11 (Microsoft will stop supporting W10 by October 14th 2025).
• If you have Windows 11:
  • Ensure Core Parking is completely turned off ; see link
  • If you still have issues, please attach your DCS log (Saved Games/DCS/Logs/dcs.log) AND your dxdiag log.

[Grindmetal]

for me this has never been solved it has always been 100% 1 core on amd
I used to use W10 it happened I formatted it and I use W11 I downloaded DCS again the same thing persisted and I use AMD I had a 3600 and then I got the 5700X3D which also remained the same thing

Edited March 1 by Grindmetal

[jnr4817]

On 2/28/2025 at 3:25 PM, Flappie said:

@104th_Money@felipesm@AKULA_OPTIMUS@VampireNZ@MoleUK 

Hey, I've been talking to SpecialK who's been helping a lot of people over here and on Discord. He's pretty sure the MT issue was fixed for good when it comes to W11 users, because he has helped a number of them get rid of stutters. He showed me an example and it was 104th_Money's case. @104th_Money Can you please confirm your P-core issue is gone for good?

If you gents keep having performance issues caused by a core stuck to 100%:

• If you have Windows 10 and an E-core CPU (Intel 12th, 13th or 14th gen), upgrade to Windows 11 (Microsoft will stop supporting W10 by October 14th 2025).
• If you have Windows 11:
  • Ensure Core Parking is completely turned off ; see link
  • If you still have issues, please attach your DCS log (Saved Games/DCS/Logs/dcs.log) AND your dxdiag log.

Still an issue for making cores 0 and or 1 go 100% on amd products. Only way to manage is take 0 and 1 affinity off dcs with PL.

 

On 2/21/2025 at 3:59 AM, Special K said:

If any of you guys would be so kind and provide a simple dcs.log, that would help a ton. Screenshots unfortunately don't help at all.

=> For the guys using E-Core CPUs, please make sure that you are on Windows 11 and that core parking is disabled.

=> For the guys using Ryzen CPUs, please make sure that you do not have MSI afterburner installed.

Happy to look at any log, if provided.

Whats wrong with msi afterbruner" I have 9800x3d and use afterburner for OC gpu. I have turned monitoring off as i use another program.

 

[jnr4817]

dcs.log

[Flappie]

@Grindmetal Do you have MSI Afterburner installed on your PC?

@jnr4817 Browse to "Saved Games\DCS\Scripts\Hooks", then rename "gunner_export_hook.lua" to "gunner_export_hook.lua.bak". This is part of the OH-6 mod. Its creator says this file can cause performance issues. See if you keep having issues after the renaming of this file.

[sleighzy]

@jnr4817 I see you also have the web editor moving map in your logs. This is also another export. There is a new feature released a couple of days ago whereby in the browser view you can click a button to have it refresh units every few secs/mins/never, vs. constantly. This can also help reduce performance issues and stutters etc. Same applies to tacview which you're running. You could uninstall that as that will also be hitting performance.

Note, not saying that this will help the CPU pegging, just general observations from your log for other performance issues.

Edited March 1 by sleighzy

[jnr4817]

9 minutes ago, Flappie said:

@Grindmetal Do you have MSI Afterburner installed on your PC?

@jnr4817 Browse to "Saved Games\DCS\Scripts\Hooks", then rename "gunner_export_hook.lua" to "gunner_export_hook.lua.bak". This is part of the OH-6 mod. Its creator says this file can cause performance issues. See if you keep having issues after the renaming of this file.

done will report back.

3 minutes ago, sleighzy said:

@jnr4817 I see you also have the web editor moving map in your logs. This is also another export. There is a new feature released a couple of days ago whereby in the browser view you can click a button to have it refresh units every few secs/mins/never, vs. constantly. This can also help reduce performance issues and stutters etc. Same applies to tacview which you're running. You could uninstall that as that will also be hitting performance.

I saw that, i have it at 30 now.

[Grindmetal]

@Flappie NO , i hate this hhahaha

 

I don't use mods, 
I simply need the video driver already updated and DCS  
tested by changing power plan
uncore cpu but does not change works only if I disable the core at 100% then it falls 

Edited March 2 by Grindmetal

[Special K]

vor 14 Stunden schrieb jnr4817:

Still an issue for making cores 0 and or 1 go 100% on amd products. Only way to manage is take 0 and 1 affinity off dcs with PL.

 

Whats wrong with msi afterbruner" I have 9800x3d and use afterburner for OC gpu. I have turned monitoring off as i use another program.

 

MSI Afterburner has known issues with the 9800x3d (you can google it also), where it causes stutters due to slow reading of sensors on this CPU.

In all fairness, many measuring solutions have the same issue. As people tend to run these solutions in parallel to their normal day to day use, I just want to make you guys aware that that can be already the cause of your stutters.

vor 8 Stunden schrieb Grindmetal:

@Flappie NO , i hate this hhahaha

 

I don't use mods, 
I simply need the video driver already updated and DCS  
tested by changing power plan
uncore cpu but does not change works only if I disable the core at 100% then it falls 

Can you send your dcs.log please, while recreating the issue. Thanks.

This is an interesting comment of the developer of MSI Afterburner about the issues btw:
 

Zitat

Each sensor requires some CPU time to be read, some are extremely fast and eat just a few microseconds of CPU time per polling iteration (mostly on-die ones like CPU temperatures or GPU temperatures), some are slower and require accessing external chip via slower I2C protocol (e.g. power sensor on GPUs), such sensors may require a few milliseconds of CPU time per polling iteration. Some sensors are not intended (and not tuned by hardware vendor) for realtime high perforomance monitoring at all (e.g. SMART temperature attribute or any other SMART attribute in general), such sensors may eat a few dozens millisecond per polling iteration. Total polling time for all sensors you enable and polling time to polling period ratio is the key factor defining performance hit, for example if total polling time is approximately 50 milliseconds and you poll sensors once per second (i.e. each 1000 milliseconds), it means that monitoring eats roughly 5% on one CPU core. MSI AB monitoring module contain status bar (accessible via context menu), which is showing you all you need to configure it properly: total sensors count, total polling time and polling period. Additionally, there is a performance profiler panel, which is displaying sorted diagram of per-sensor polling times, allowing you to identify the main performance offender (or the slowest sensor) if necessary. HwInfo also provides similar monitoring performance profiling features.