i5 6600 massive frame drops and 100% usage when gaming

[Crumpet]

Now this may be hardware related, or it could be software related BUT.

Game in question: Tera (specifially EU version)

CPU specs:
Windows 10 Pro 64bit
i5 6600(non k)
16gb 4x4 Gskill ripjaws @3200
Gigabyte G1 Gaming GTX 970
ASRock Z170M Extreme 4

C drive and games running from 480gb SSD, but considering making a 120gb SSD into a slave boot drive and then using the 480gb SSD as a pure steam/game drive.

Current issue: After about an hour of gaming the cpu usage spikes from about 60% on all 4 cores to 100% on core 0, and down to 30% utilisation on the other cores.

At the same time GPU utilisation drops from 80% down to 35-40%

Solutions I have tried:
Drivers are updated
Bios is updated
Checked for Malware - 0 results
Windows 10 Bloatware removed
Forcing Tera affinity onto cores 3 and 4

I may have this problem in other games, I couldn't currently say, I have experienced a number of CPU slowdowns in cpu heavy games but always assumed i'd just hit the limit of what the 4 cores can do, as I often game at 5760x1080, though my current resolution is 2560x1080.

I know Tera is an old 32 bit application that only uses 2 cores and 3gb ram, but the fact that it runs fine for an hour before giving up says to me that something isn't right.

I have used HWMonitor whilst gaming and the temps are fine (under 50c cpu and gpu), the cpu voltage doesn't exceed 1.1v though the CPU only hits 3.8ghz out of its 3.9ghz turbo, despite 100% usage on core 0.

I am all ears, do I have a potential hardware issue, or is this game just really poorly optimised?
(I will note I used to play this on my Fx8350 and never experienced such slowdowns)

 

[XavierMace]

If you're seeing 100% usage, what's using it? Task Manager shows you what processes are using the CPU.

 

[Crumpet]

A combination of the game in question, and the system idle process (taking up to 40% of the load).

 

[XavierMace]

If the system idle is 40%, then your CPU isn't at 100% usage. Post a screenshot of your task manager screen.

 

[Crumpet]

Okay but it'll be in 1 hourish then, i'll need to log into the game and leave it running

EDIT - in absolutely true PC style, it's been good as gold tonight, and not a single stutter in sight..

Have I fixed the issue, or is this not even it's final form? Find out in tomorrow's episode of I HATE THIS FRIKKIN PC.

 

[tamz_msc]

The last time I had the system idle process eating up CPU cycles was years ago when I was still running IDE hard drives. The controller was failing and it was reverting to PIO instead of UDMA, causing the CPU to step in for every disk i/o related stuff. Hooray for SATA!

 

[Crumpet]

Hmm, that does make me think it might be time for a separate gaming SSD just to try.

Windows 10 boots up so fast anyway I could put it on a regular HDD.

 

[lopri]

System idle process eating up CPU cycles? I thought they were simply representing unused CPU resources. 100 - (whatever is actually eating CPU cycles) = System idle process.

 

[LTC8K6]

Windows was probably updating itself, causing the gaming problems. When it finished, the problems disappeared.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Now this may be hardware related, or it could be software related BUT.

Game in question: Tera (specifially EU version)

CPU specs:
Windows 10 Pro 64bit
i5 6600(non k)
16gb 4x4 Gskill ripjaws @3200
Gigabyte G1 Gaming GTX 970
ASRock Z170M Extreme 4

C drive and games running from 480gb SSD, but considering making a 120gb SSD into a slave boot drive and then using the 480gb SSD as a pure steam/game drive.

Current issue: After about an hour of gaming the cpu usage spikes from about 60% on all 4 cores to 100% on core 0, and down to 30% utilisation on the other cores.

At the same time GPU utilisation drops from 80% down to 35-40%

Solutions I have tried:
Drivers are updated
Bios is updated
Checked for Malware - 0 results
Windows 10 Bloatware removed
Forcing Tera affinity onto cores 3 and 4

I may have this problem in other games, I couldn't currently say, I have experienced a number of CPU slowdowns in cpu heavy games but always assumed i'd just hit the limit of what the 4 cores can do, as I often game at 5760x1080, though my current resolution is 2560x1080.

I know Tera is an old 32 bit application that only uses 2 cores and 3gb ram, but the fact that it runs fine for an hour before giving up says to me that something isn't right.

I have used HWMonitor whilst gaming and the temps are fine (under 50c cpu and gpu), the cpu voltage doesn't exceed 1.1v though the CPU only hits 3.8ghz out of its 3.9ghz turbo, despite 100% usage on core 0.

I am all ears, do I have a potential hardware issue, or is this game just really poorly optimised?
(I will note I used to play this on my Fx8350 and never experienced such slowdowns)

Are you actually seeing anything happening in-game, like reduced framerates, hitchyness, etc? This just sounds like you shifted to an area in-game with reduced utilization on your hardware, or alternatively Tera is coded to load tons of the game as you play initially, which then tapers off after a few minutes.

Windows was probably updating itself, causing the gaming problems. When it finished, the problems disappeared.

Idle means idle, not updating. If it was updating, another process (System I think on w7/10) would have been eating up cycles.

 

[LTC8K6]

This desktop I am using seems to "go slow" once in a while in the morning. IIRC I can never see anything large in Task Manager, but the slowdown seems to coincide with Windows Update being busy.

 

[Burpo]

Agreed, typical Windows 10 behavior during updates..

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Agreed, typical Windows 10 behavior during updates..

60% cpu usage in-game and 40% idle is not 'typical windows 10 behavior during updates'. That's in no way, shape, or form indicative of Windows updating.

 

[sm625]

Windows 10 boots up so fast anyway I could put it on a regular HDD.

No. I tried this. You dont want it. Boot time to usable desktop went from 25 seconds to over a minute.

 

[Crumpet]

Lots to reply to.

I doubt it was windows updating as I have the thing disabled in services. Though you never know in Windows 10.

In game I notice extreme stuttering, we're talking frame by frame action that doesn't cease, once it begins it doesn't seem to stop. Sound starts to jitter and sometimes crackle. Mouse is jittery too. This extends to the desktop too if I alt tab out, restarting the game fixes the problem.

Noted - will not go back to HDD

I will try again tonight to see if SOMETHING i've changed has taken effect, though I expect last night was a lucky draw.

edit: forgot to say I downloaded AIDA64 extreme and whilst I only ran it for 30 minutes I saw temps of 62c (current room temp is around 10c) the usage stayed at 100 and didn't report any cpu throttling. I was also stressing the gpu and no issues.

 

[DaveSimmons]

The game itself could have a slow leak of memory and/or resources. Bethesda games used to crash reliably when you can them "too long"

System idle process = idle = not actually doing anything or loading the CPU. If you look at it before starting a game it will usually be at 90 - 99%.

Windows Update can peg a core at 100% if something goes wrong with it, but it shows as a svchost process.

 

[Crumpet]

Interestingly my system idle process is doing nothing at the moment. It probably should be... But this is a pretty fresh install. But my full cpu utilisation just browsing chrome (with about eleventythree tabs open) is 4%.

I ran SFC/Scannow and it didn't find anything out of the ordinary.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Interestingly my system idle process is doing nothing at the moment. It probably should be... But this is a pretty fresh install. But my full cpu utilisation just browsing chrome (with about eleventythree tabs open) is 4%.

I ran SFC/Scannow and it didn't find anything out of the ordinary.

For system idle process are you looking in the Details tab of task manager? Under 8.1 that shows the normal 99% for system idle.

 

[Crumpet]

Roger that, I was just in the processes tab. Whoops, yes system idle in the details tab is picking up the slack as normal under general use.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

I doubt it was windows updating as I have the thing disabled in services. Though you never know in Windows 10.

Don't do that. Let windows update.

In game I notice extreme stuttering, we're talking frame by frame action that doesn't cease, once it begins it doesn't seem to stop. Sound starts to jitter and sometimes crackle. Mouse is jittery too. This extends to the desktop too if I alt tab out, restarting the game fixes the problem.

That *sounds* a lot like overheating, though you said you weren't seeing that... those temps you noted, is that CPU or GPU? Did you test both to verify one's not overheating?

If no issues with temp, you might check out the RAM with some RAM tester (just pick one), verify there's no errors, try with 2 sticks in varying slots, etc. Board could have an issue with one of the memory slots as well. I'd start there.

Don't chase issues with CPU/SSD just yet, they're much less prone to failures (at least ones like you're describing).

 

[Crumpet]

I'm not a fan of letting windows update whenever it wants to, I only enable the service when I want it to update, or I need a driver automatically found for something.

Tested both CPU and GPU, neither went much over 60c even under AIDA64 stress testing.

I will get my hands on Memtest86+ now and give it a go. This memory was second hand from a good friend who hadn't used it very long before upgrading to 32gb, but you never know.

I'm wondering if my PSU is being a bit shady, though I went out of my way to make sure it was from tier 1/2 when I purchased it. 650W EVGA GQ Gold Hybrid.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

I'm not a fan of letting windows update whenever it wants to, I only enable the service when I want it to update, or I need a driver automatically found for something.

Tested both CPU and GPU, neither went much over 60c even under AIDA64 stress testing.

I will get my hands on Memtest86+ now and give it a go. This memory was second hand from a good friend who hadn't used it very long before upgrading to 32gb, but you never know.

I'm wondering if my PSU is being a bit shady, though I went out of my way to make sure it was from tier 1/2 when I purchased it. 650W EVGA GQ Gold Hybrid.

That's fine, just make sure to actually run the updates occasionally (once a week or so). Also, have you configured defender to snag defs on its own since it won't get them via WU? Make sure you aren't boning yourself there.

The mem could be fine, it's just kind of a guess. That board isn't terribly high-end though ASRock's boards were pretty good this cycle. Go ahead and test it though.

If nothing, try yanking two sticks and mess with it a while. Whether it continues or not, try it in the other two slots (different RAM if you want as well), see if it happens again. If it happens with 2x in either channel then it's prolly not the ram/board.

Does it consistently happen after x-y timeframe? Within 5 minutes of starting? In a common location in-game? Can you go somewhere out of the way and just park it for an hour to see if it happens there too?

You've got a 970 which suffers from the "fake memory past 3.5GB" thing. Get something to monitor your VRAM usage, see if it's fluttering over 3.5. I saw very odd stuff happening on my old 970 when I purposely stressed it past that limit.

 

[Crumpet]

Lots of good stuff to mull over there. Thank you.

The motherboard isn't the best no, but it was the best available to me at the time of purchase (I was an early skylake adopter and that was about as good as it got on the mATX size).

The time frame was almost exactly 1 hour after each restart, and in different areas under different levels of load, I didn't notice any kind of regularity outside of the time frame, but after running the memtest I will try again, I didn't get a chance to test yesterday due to attending a family bereavement.

Using HWMonitor I didn't see the GPU VRAM usage going over 2gb, but I could do with retesting. I've recently swapped from 3x1080p to a single 2560x1080 ultrawide, so in theory significantly less load. I'm trying to arrange the purchase of a second hand R9 390 8GB to tide me over until Vega arrives, as I feel like I could use the extra VRAM in other titles, plus I want to see the benefits of freesync on this new ultrawide.

 

[Crumpet]

So I ran Memtest86+ for a single complete pass with 100% pass and 0 errors. That's good to know. I'll test again for 3 passes at another date.

I'll do another gaming run tonight including some high intensity dungeon runs to really push it.

 

[PontiacGTX]

install process hacker and sort by CPU usage and take a screenshot or go to details into tasks manager annd check which process has the highest usage