Another BF4 SLI thread

[OCGuy]

Its not the PSU...

A quick google search will show you plenty of examples of other gamers dealing with the same thing. There does seem to be a common solution.

 

[RaulF]

I know i read somewhere that origin wakes up once in a while in the middle of games to check in with the EA server, and some people have experience slow downs when that happen.

There's a program that you can run BF4 without origin i would try that and see if getting rid of that background program makes the issues go away. BF4 is jacked up a bit though, i posted in the BF4 PC thread, for me the last few patches has made the game worse.

Also running SLI here.

 

[Carfax83]

Assuming the PSU is the v2.3 model, then it should be capable assuming it's not defective.

And did the OP say that this only occurs in BF4? Do you have another strenuous game you can test, like Crysis 3? Crysis 3 is significantly more punishing than BF4 on a system, so that would be the best option.

If it's just occurring in BF4 and nowhere else, then it's probably safe to assume something is wrong with the game, whether on your end or on DICE's.

I don't have BF4 installed anymore, but when I did, I had no problems running it in SLI..

 

[TH3R4POR]

Its not the PSU...

A quick google search will show you plenty of examples of other gamers dealing with the same thing. There does seem to be a common solution.

I've done plenty of Google searches, and tried plenty of solutions, care to elaborate?

Assuming the PSU is the v2.3 model, then it should be capable assuming it's not defective.

it is.

Downloading Crysis 3 now to check that out, cheers for the advise

 

[moonbogg]

I have a friend with the same issue with two 680's. He has an 850watt PSU. He tried everything and like you, only BF4 doesn't work but everything else does. Sorry I don't have a solution, but I suspect this is game related because your issue is exactly the same.
Are you on windows 7 or 8? If it were me having this issue, I would install windows 8.1 to see if that's fixes it. If it doesn't, then I'd start buying new parts like crazy. That's just me.

 

[TH3R4POR]

I have a friend with the same issue with two 680's. He has an 850watt PSU. He tried everything and like you, only BF4 doesn't work but everything else does. Sorry I don't have a solution, but I suspect this is game related because your issue is exactly the same.
Are you on windows 7 or 8? If it were me having this issue, I would install windows 8.1 to see if that's fixes it. If it doesn't, then I'd start buying new parts like crazy. That's just me.

Hi, yeah I had the same thought about Windows 8.1 and was going to install it over the weekend, but I need my PC for work at the moment so couldn't afford the downtime.

I've also thought about a new install of BF4 on my SSD.

The Mobo, PSU, CPU, SSD and one of the cards are new

edit:

like Crysis 3

OK, installed Crysis 3, all was fine for the first 5 minutes running at 70+FPS (everything set to Very High), then I got the same drop, down to 10FPS, and Afterburner shows the same drop on both GPU1 and GPU2 usage.

 

[Carfax83]

OK, installed Crysis 3, all was fine for the first 5 minutes running at 70+FPS (everything set to Very High), then I got the same drop, down to 10FPS, and Afterburner shows the same drop on both GPU1 and GPU2 usage.

OK so now we've ruled out it being a game issue, and for now, it's looking like it's definitely system related.

I've been thinking. I play BL2 a lot, and one of the things about BL2, is that it's horribly CPU bound. It being CPU bound is a result of it being both a DX9 title, and not being very well coded.

Even with a 3930K overclocked to 4.5ghz, I still experience frame rate drops every now and then with PhysX enabled, as PhysX increases the amount of draw calls due to the extra particle effects.

Anyway, the frame rate drops I get in BL2 are similar to what you're experiencing. Basically, it lasts for a few seconds, then corrects itself. When I look at the MSI Afterburner output, I see decreases in GPU usage during the drop outs..

So what I'm thinking, is that you could be CPU bottlenecked. The 8350 is a robust CPU, but it's nowhere near as good as a Core i7 in IPC, and especially for feeding SLI'd GPUs.

So here's what I recommend to test if you are CPU bottlenecked. Overclock your CPU as high as it will go whilst remaining stable. Those CPUs are admirable overclockers from what I hear, although I've never tried it personally as I only run Intel. You should be able to hit at least 4.5ghz.

If you are CPU bottlenecked, then increasing the CPU speed will definitely mitigate the drop outs, if not eliminate them completely.

And since you are running on Windows 7, it would compound the issue. Windows 8/8.1 has a much more intelligent thread scheduler, which uses the CPU more effectively than Windows 7. For a low IPC multicore processor like the 8350, using Windows 8/8.1 would help a lot I would think in CPU bound situations.

 

[Hitman928]

snip

An 8350 wouldn't bottle neck him down to 15 fps and wouldn't be so precisely periodic.

OP, have you tried contacting nVidia to see if it is a known issue by them? Also, how much space do you have between your cards in your motherboard (do you have enough ventilation between cards)? Like I said earlier, it looks like your cards are briefly dropping to non-3d clocks which to me would indicate either a driver issue or some kind of auto-protection kicking in. Have you tried playing the games in windowed mode? SLI works in windowed mode, right?

edit: Just to rule it out, have you monitored cpu clocks while gaming?

 

[OCGuy]

Something is throttling since it works at first.

Either your CPU/GPU is thermal throttling, incorrectly applying power saving/ 2D states on the cores, or..... (someone else may chime in )

 

[Silverforce11]

It is thermal related, the symptoms now in another game confirms it. The only reason your GPU would throttle down to idle clocks is to prevent the VRMs from overheating and exploding. AMD cards have had this feature for a long time now, noted in the 7900 series with XFX DD cards and their 115C VRMs. NV may have added some protection mechanism, since their old 570 and 590 had exploding mosfets due to being pushed hard.

When you SLI reference 670 with the short pcb and crap cooler, you are asking for this sort of trouble. As I've said, they already ran hot WITH a single card.

Without hot exhaust air from the GPU heatsink blowing on it, the VRM heatsink burns your finger when you touch it.

When you SLI this setup, the intake air temp especially for the top card is much higher, that gets heated by the GPU heatsink, then gets blown over and out across the VRM heatsink... not good. If you live with higher ambient temps it would exacerbate the problem.

 

[SolMiester]

I dont know how well SLI is supported on an AMD system, if at all....

 

[RampantAndroid]

I dont know how well SLI is supported on an AMD system, if at all....

The 990FX does support it, but how well is a good question. From what I'd read, it wasn't worth it.

Either way, I don't have this issue on my 670s, but they run with the ASUS custom cooling. Have you considered a custom cooling solution?

 

[Carfax83]

An 8350 wouldn't bottle neck him down to 15 fps and wouldn't be so precisely periodic.

It's not bottlenecking, it's just dropping frames. Basically the CPU can't feed the GPUs data fast enough to render frames, causing the frame rate to drop catastrophically for a while until it resumes..

Anyway, one other thing it might be is that the C states are enabled, which could cause the CPU to enter lower power states during gaming under certain conditions.. If V-sync is enabled, it could cause that because V-sync limits the frame rate output and so the CPU likely isn't running at full speed as it doesn't need to.

Thats how it is with Intel chips at least. Between Speedstep and the C states, the CPU is rarely ever running at full speed.

Do AMD CPUs have something similar to Speedstep?

 

[Rangerjr1]

Your description of the FPS drop to 15 and back up sounds like when i would run out of vram. But if everything is on low i doubt you would be running out of vram.

I would suggest different drivers, not sure which ones you are using. I am using 332.21 and they run bf4 good for me on SLI. Still have a weird slow down now and then but is nothing bad.

Also make sure you resolution scale is at 100% and not higher, install evga precision x or msi afterburner and monitor what your cards are doing.

This.

 

[Silverforce11]

This.

Except it wont use that much vram unless its higher res and ultra.. and the same thing occurs in other games. GPU dropping to idle clocks is helped/fixed by setting higher fan speed = thermal throttling. Core is fine, therefore, VRM throttling.

 

[moonbogg]

Except it wont use that much vram unless its higher res and ultra.. and the same thing occurs in other games. GPU dropping to idle clocks is helped/fixed by setting higher fan speed = thermal throttling. Core is fine, therefore, VRM throttling.

This sounds possible. Take your case cover off, aim a huge fan right at your mobo and try again with GPU fans pegged at 100%.

 

[OCGuy]

VRAM is not your issue, that I am sure of.

OP, have you confirmed there is no obvious reason you lose frames after time? Core/Mem speed monitoring? CPU core speed monitoring?

 

[TH3R4POR]

Hoi, OK, changes have been made.

I'm now on Win8, which helped, GPU fans are set to 100%, and I have the case open and fan across the IO end of the board (on the SLI bridge). Not sure how I can improve that cooling without sinking 100s into two full blocks and watercooling it.

Running on Ultra I see drops down to 50-60 now, from 100+. I get warping on maps, but no FPS drop when this occurs (different issue apparently, prolly packetloss).

CPU load varies between 62-78% whilst playing a full map, and never spikes/drops significantly whilst I'm experiencing an FPS drop.

I ordered a new (larger) case today, to get the overall temps down.

Oh, v-sync is off btw.

 

[Hitman928]

Which PCI-16x slots are you using for your cards, your board has three of them, doesn't it?

 

[Carfax83]

Hoi, OK, changes have been made.

I'm now on Win8, which helped, GPU fans are set to 100%, and I have the case open and fan across the IO end of the board (on the SLI bridge). Not sure how I can improve that cooling without sinking 100s into two full blocks and watercooling it.

Running on Ultra I see drops down to 50-60 now, from 100+. I get warping on maps, but no FPS drop when this occurs (different issue apparently, prolly packetloss).

CPU load varies between 62-78% whilst playing a full map, and never spikes/drops significantly whilst I'm experiencing an FPS drop.

I ordered a new (larger) case today, to get the overall temps down.

Oh, v-sync is off btw.

There was a thread about a week back where a guy asked if SLI was worth it. In my reply, I said SLI was worth it only if:

1) Play at resolutions above 1200p, or want to play games at very high IQ while maintaining high frame rates.

2) Have a very fast CPU; preferably an overclocked i7.

3) Have good airflow in your chassis, or use water cooling for the GPUs.

4) Play with V-sync turned on. Only applies to games where the frame rate is much higher than the monitor's refresh rate, which are most games provided you're using a 60hz monitor..

Number 3 is essential to SLI performance. Having multiple GPUs in a chassis without adequate cooling will lead to all sorts of performance issues..

 

[TH3R4POR]

Which PCI-16x slots are you using for your cards, your board has three of them, doesn't it?

The top two as they were the two fastest.

I'll shift everything into the big new case when it arrives tomorrow/Thursday, but I'm not expecting much improvement as the side panel is off and a fan is sat on the cards at the moment, but it's certainly better than it was before.

 

[moonbogg]

So your minimums are 50-60 on windows 8 and before they were around 15? Sounds about right.

 

[RampantAndroid]

I ordered a new (larger) case today, to get the overall temps down.

Oh, v-sync is off btw.

Maybe too late, but the Silverstone FT-02 allows me to run an OCed CPU, 4 HDs, ASUS Xonar Essence and 2x 670s in SLI with no heat concerns.

http://www.silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=242

Heat rises from the case quite well.

 

[TH3R4POR]

I ordered this - http://www.cmstorm.com/en/products/chassis/stryker/

(I'm a Cooler Master fanboy )

 

[TH3R4POR]

Hi guys, just wanted to update you, and thank you all for taking the time to respond and help me

After putting the fan directly on my GFX Cards with the side off of my old case the stability was great, I rang my ISP and got them to test my line and they reset it, and that cleared up the packet loss.

I received my new case this afternoon and shifted everything into it, I put a fan at the back of the 5.25" drive bays, had the fans on the GPUs turned up, and I have been playing stable for the last couple of hours!

Thanks again, I really appreciate your time and effort

Cheers,

-Thera`