Graphics card dipping in GPU %?

[McDoogle]

Ok, this has been annoying me for a little while now, and i still cant sort it. My GTX 460 started to have a bad tendency to drop its core and shader clocks dramaticly during game, almost every game except battlefield 3. While i fixed that problem, the card has now decided to drop how much of its GPU its using, i can see it dropping to 8-10% during game, before rising back to 90-100% again for a small time. Ive already changed my drivers to an older version, and i can see through afterburners in game display when its doing it and that its by far, not over heating, it barely rises in temp at all in fact, only reaching around 63C in BF3 and other games on maxed out settings. Its not that the games are restricting the FPS rate, because they wouldnt go to dramaticly higher when the card finally decides to use what its given.

Does anyone have any ideas?

 

[alienware]

Right click your desktop.

Nvidia control panel.

Manage 3D settings.

Find BF3 in the drop down list. If it isn't there click ADD and browse to the game's launch EXE. Pick it.

Power Management mode - Prefer Maximum Performance.

Hit apply. Now try your game.

 

[McDoogle]

BF3 is the only game its NOT doing it in. Ive already been through nvidia control panel and optimised for best performance, doesnt make a difference.

 

[janiashvili]

Try setting Windows to maximum performance(maybe it thinks incorrectly and lowers power usage when it should give it more power?)

 

[McDoogle]

Thanks for the replies, but its already set to maxiumum performance, the only thing i can do really is roll back the drivers further until it resolves the problem, if it does at all. I noticed that it started happening when nvidia released the battlefield 3 drivers.

 

[SmoulderingCircuits]

Unless you're seeing obvious deficits in game then have you tryed updating the probe tool you're using or using a different one - may just be a misread

 

[McDoogle]

I am seeing obvious deflicts in the game, the FPS drops dramaticly to sometimes lower than 10 fps depending on the game before rising backup to 60+fps.

 

[janiashvili]

I am seeing obvious deflicts in the game, the FPS drops dramaticly to sometimes lower than 10 fps depending on the game before rising backup to 60+fps.

maybe your card becomes so hot that it can't "play"??

 

[McDoogle]

maybe your card becomes so hot that it can't "play"??

As i said in the origonal post, the card never overheats, its Gigabytes 1GB Overclocked card that has the twin frozer cooler on it, overheating was my first guess but it barely heats up to begin with.

I rolled back the drivers even further, to pretty much the first released, and the problem still persists, the only games i can play are the ones which are so old, they wouldnt tax my onboard card. in those sitatuons its fine because the performance drop doesnt give any noticble effects.

The only thing i can think of is that after 2 or so years, the card has started to pack in, luckily, it has a 3 year warentee so ill be RMA'ing it soon. Probably get the extra cash together for a 570.

 

[marsey99]

sounds like its the driver dude, i have that same card and had the same issue with bc2 last year but later driver versions sorted it out.

 

[McDoogle]

Forgot to mention, aswell as rolling back the drivers, ive also upgraded to the latest beta drivers, same problem.

 

[marsey99]

got a windows disk?

try a clean install with the latest whql driver dude.

 

[McDoogle]

Ill give it a try first thing tomorrow, but i would be very suprised if it fixes the problem, ill keep you up to date, thanks.

 

[KING_OF_SAND]

if your GPU is dipping in intense action scenes it means the program was poorly coded.

 

[Rastalovich]

When you notice this next, exit the game and open the taskmanager and check if the process "sppsvc.exe" is running, and report back.

.. well you can terminate the process and see if the game then runs properly and then report back if you like.

 

[SmoulderingCircuits]

Also are you running in windowed mode or fullscreen. Classic mistake is to run in windowed and the game chugs

 

[McDoogle]

When you notice this next, exit the game and open the taskmanager and check if the process "sppsvc.exe" is running, and report back.

.. well you can terminate the process and see if the game then runs properly and then report back if you like.

Well ive noticed that it doesnt run in the background while im gaming and for obv reasons, cant end the progress.

And i always run in full screen mode in every game, i find it takes you away from the imersiveness of the game if u have the background on.

 

[SmoulderingCircuits]

Well ive noticed that it doesnt run in the background while im gaming and for obv reasons, cant end the progress.

And i always run in full screen mode in every game, i find it takes you away from the imersiveness of the game if u have the background on.

The only other thing I can say is do you have the latest Forceware and BIOS for the card and your board?

Might want to run DriverSweeper