# GPU Usage drops to 0%



## Baner (Jun 29, 2017)

After 20 min of gaming every 1 minute (IMAGE INCLUDED) gpu usage drops to 0% for 1 sec.VID drops to 0. Fps drops from 50 to 1fps. Gpu clock drops from 1137  to 1072 MHz. CPU usage drops from 40% to 15%. Voltage seems ok. It appears for 1 sec and after that it's working fine for ~1 min.
Played Outlast 2 everything was fine. Games with less requirements as cs go are working properly. FPS drops in Hitman, Sniper Ghost warrior 3, Mass Effect Andromeda.
ITS NOT TEMP ISSUE. PC is stable (benchmarking for over 30 mins). Drivers up to date.

Specs : (DxDiag INCLUDED)
GTX 760 by evega
Intel 2600k
RAM 8 GB 1333
PSU Modecom MC 620 carbon 620w
Asustek p8z68-v vx

What I tried:

Underclocking, undervolatege/overvoltage, forcing fan to 100%
Update/reinstall drivers
Opening case (PCI slot, cables, dust etc. check)
BIOS (fixed voltage (tried auto also), C1E is disabled, turbomode disabled)
Diagnostics - mdsched (ram), dxdiag, viruses
Closing all background applications
To see monitor stats press "Copy image address" there you can see things or press "Open in new tab"


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## jboydgolfer (Jun 29, 2017)

open an elevated CMD prompt, and run *sfc/scannow* , see if it finds any issues with your OS


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## Toothless (Jun 29, 2017)

I wouldn't trust that PSU to hold certain loads.


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## Baner (Jun 29, 2017)

jboydgolfer said:


> open an elevated CMD prompt, and run *sfc/scannow* , see if it finds any issues with your OS


It "did not find any integrity violations"


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## Baner (Jun 29, 2017)

Toothless said:


> I wouldn't trust that PSU to hold certain loads.


I can try to use my ancient Asus Exda40rc0 (400w) to drive my gpu, but it has only one 1x 6 pin. I could use one 6pin from old and new psu, but I think that is unsafe. Should I try?


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## Toothless (Jun 29, 2017)

Baner said:


> I can try to use my ancient Asus Exda40rc0 (400w) to drive my gpu, but it has only one 1x 6 pin. I could use one 6pin from old and new psu, but I think that is unsafe. Should I try?


No. Get a real PSU.


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## Vayra86 (Jul 5, 2017)

^ listen to this man, before things crash and burn


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## xorbe (Jul 5, 2017)

nv control panel -> prefer max performance
windows -> control panel -> power -> high perf -> min cpu state -> 100%
then report back


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## Vayra86 (Jul 5, 2017)

xorbe said:


> nv control panel -> prefer max performance
> windows -> control panel -> power -> high perf -> min cpu state -> 100%



If the above will give you bluescreens, thats another confirmation that this PSU needs replacing, because the above settings will definitely increase power draw at any given time.

Other than that I doubt it'll do much.


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## xorbe (Jul 5, 2017)

Vayra86 said:


> If the above will give you bluescreens, thats another confirmation that this PSU needs replacing, because the above settings will definitely increase power draw at any given time.
> 
> Other than that I doubt it'll do much.



It stops some games from having mysterious cyclical performance drops.


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## Baner (Jul 6, 2017)

xorbe said:


> nv control panel -> prefer max performance
> windows -> control panel -> power -> high perf -> min cpu state -> 100%
> then report back


It was on 100%. I replaced pci-e slot and fps droped from 40 fps (medium settings) to 17 fps (medium settings). I tried low settings and it became stable. But Ghost warrior still not stable even on 800x600. Tried the surge(max), get even (max), prey (medium) these were stable. As i figured out lack of ram is causing drops, I lowered textures and raised other setting to med-high and I got normal fps and it was stable. Not sure why GW3 is not stable, most probably of open-world and bad render system.


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## eidairaman1 (Jul 6, 2017)

How old is that PSU?


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## Vayra86 (Jul 7, 2017)

Baner said:


> It was on 100%. I replaced pci-e slot and fps droped from 40 fps (medium settings) to 17 fps (medium settings). I tried low settings and it became stable. But Ghost warrior still not stable even on 800x600. Tried the surge(max), get even (max), prey (medium) these were stable. As i figured out lack of ram is causing drops, I lowered textures and raised other setting to med-high and I got normal fps and it was stable. Not sure why GW3 is not stable, most probably of open-world and bad render system.



Image quality should not have an affect on application stability unless you don't meet hardware requirements and a GTX 760 + 2600k do meet requirements for all of todays' games. If you push the hardware with higher settings the game should simply run at lower FPS, and that is all. If a GPU is short on VRAM yes it can stutter, but 0% usage is not stutter, its a 'hang' and generally indicates either an issue with accessing storage, RAM, and more often than not: PSU.

The least you can do is check the +12V line voltage under load, and see if it exceeds ATX spec.


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## Vya Domus (Jul 7, 2017)

Baner said:


> It was on 100%. I replaced pci-e slot and fps droped from 40 fps (medium settings) to 17 fps (medium settings). I tried low settings and it became stable. But Ghost warrior still not stable even on 800x600. Tried the surge(max), get even (max), prey (medium) these were stable. As i figured out lack of ram is causing drops, I lowered textures and raised other setting to med-high and I got normal fps and it was stable. Not sure why GW3 is not stable, most probably of open-world and bad render system.



If you are talking about the lack of video RAM , then yes that can cause huge drops in performance , it looks like you're clearly running out of VRAM from the picture in your first post so that's most likely the cause of you problem . You have the 2GB 760 ?

PSU still could be not that great though.



Vayra86 said:


> Image quality should not have an affect on application stability unless you don't meet hardware requirements and a GTX 760 + 2600k do meet requirements for all of todays' games. If you push the hardware with higher settings the game should simply run at lower FPS, and that is all. If a GPU is short on VRAM yes it can stutter, but 0% usage is not stutter, its a 'hang' and generally indicates either an issue with accessing storage, RAM, and more often than not: PSU.



You are not entirely correct , running out of VRAM can cause pretty bad stuttering and can also definitely cause GPU usage to drop to 0%. As in with every piece of software when you run out of memory and have to copy/read from somewhere else that can result in a complete halt in execution. GPU architecture relies by design on constant flow of "work".


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## Crap Daddy (Jul 7, 2017)

In Hitman you can set a limit to VRAM so that it will use only what's available. Try that and see if you still get the FPS drop.


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## RCoon (Jul 7, 2017)

Baner said:


> As i figured out lack of ram is causing drops, I lowered textures and raised other setting to med-high and I got normal fps and it was stable.



Your GPU is hitting its VRAM cap. When a GPU runs out of VRAM it falls over to RAM. Unfortunately you only have 8GB of RAM, Windows probs uses about 2-3GB and the game itself will probably be eating another 3-4GB for general processing. That leaves you with 1GB free, which I imagine is in short supply if you have _any other programs running_. So when your GPU runs out of VRAM, it starts dumping things into your slower system RAM. When your system RAM runs out it falls over to Page File, which runs from the C:\ drive (aka your HDD/SSD) which has even _slower _access speeds. When your computer starts resorting to page file on the local drive, framerates will absolutely crash into oblivion.

I'd suggest more RAM, and lowering your texture settings so you don't saturate your entire GPUs VRAM pool.

Your PSU is also jank, made by the SAMA OEM (nasty cheap Chinese manufacturer).

EDIT: Here's how much system RAM MEA uses at 1080p:


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## Vya Domus (Jul 7, 2017)

RCoon said:


> Your GPU is hitting its VRAM cap. When a GPU runs out of VRAM it falls over to RAM. Unfortunately you only have 8GB of RAM, Windows probs uses about 2-3GB and the game itself will probably be eating another 3-4GB for general processing. That leaves you with 1GB free, which I imagine is in short supply if you have _any other programs running_. So when your GPU runs out of VRAM, it starts dumping things into your slower system RAM. When your system RAM runs out it falls over to Page File, which runs from the C:\ drive (aka your HDD/SSD) which has even _slower _access speeds. When your computer starts resorting to page file on the local drive, framerates will absolutely crash into oblivion.
> 
> I'd suggest more RAM, and lowering your texture settings so you don't saturate your entire GPUs VRAM pool.



Though I agree with most of what you wrote , I think adding more RAM it's not going to do much. The issues is that even if you have plenty RAM just the act of writing and reading to system memory and then to VRAM repeatedly is a huge performance wrecking action by itself.

If his issue is indeed VRAM , then the most practical solution is getting a card that has more.


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## RCoon (Jul 7, 2017)

Vya Domus said:


> Though I agree with most of what you wrote , I think adding more RAM it's not going to do much. The issues is that even if you have plenty RAM just the act of writing and reading to system memory and then to VRAM repeatedly is a huge performance wrecking action by itself.
> 
> If his issue is indeed VRAM , then the most practical solution is getting a card that has more.


Pretty much yeah, depends if he has the funds to do such a thing - judging by the choice of PSU I'd guess not.


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## DRDNA (Jul 7, 2017)

Toothless said:


> No. Get a real PSU.


His GPU uses 155 watts max
His CPU uses 240 watts max

I doubt his PSU is the issue unless it is malfunctioning.

I agree with Vram running out and then bog down when harddrive is transferring the needed new Vram ....stuttering is the outcome.


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## eidairaman1 (Jul 7, 2017)

And he is gone.


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## Vya Domus (Jul 7, 2017)

eidairaman1 said:


> And he is gone.



What can you do. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


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## Baner (Jul 7, 2017)

eidairaman1 said:


> How old is that PSU?


Its 6 years old.


Vya Domus said:


> You have the 2GB 760?PSU still could be not that great though.


Yes, it's 2gb. Yes, i know its not well know manufacturer and they could use bad internals, but its working for my current system.


Crap Daddy said:


> In Hitman you can set a limit to VRAM so that it will use only what's available. Try that and see if you still get the FPS drop.


As i mentioned before i lowered textures and now it's stable.



Vya Domus said:


> Though I agree with most of what you wrote , I think adding more RAM it's not going to do much. The issues is that even if you have plenty RAM just the act of writing and reading to system memory and then to VRAM repeatedly is a huge performance wrecking action by itself.
> 
> If his issue is indeed VRAM , then the most practical solution is getting a card that has more.


It also could be VRAM, but it's less likely.


DRDNA said:


> His GPU uses 155 watts max
> His CPU uses 240 watts max
> I doubt his PSU is the issue unless it is malfunctioning.


As i calculated my system should require ~360w. Even if my psu can provide only 65% (422 of 620) of power it's should be enough.



RCoon said:


> Your GPU is hitting its VRAM cap. When a GPU runs out of VRAM it falls over to RAM. Unfortunately you only have 8GB of RAM, Windows probs uses about 2-3GB and the game itself will probably be eating another 3-4GB for general processing. That leaves you with 1GB free, which I imagine is in short supply if you have _any other programs running_. So when your GPU runs out of VRAM, it starts dumping things into your slower system RAM. When your system RAM runs out it falls over to Page File, which runs from the C:\ drive (aka your HDD/SSD) which has even _slower _access speeds. When your computer starts resorting to page file on the local drive, framerates will absolutely crash into oblivion.


Yes, you discribed this process correctly (relying on my knowledge of how it works). As i said earlier it's most probably lack of DRAM is causing drops it just chokes on amound of data. I also tried to boost pci-e bandwidth, which speeds up the flow of data, but I stoped at 105 (if i set more it's not working properly) and 105 was is not enough.



RCoon said:


> Pretty much yeah, depends if he has the funds to do such a thing - judging by the choice of PSU I'd guess not.


Yes, I will not add 4gb of ram or buy new gpu. Most likely i will wait for Ice lake or die shrink to 6 nm (if we consider a ~35% dicrease every macroarchitecture) 1st optimisation also known as "tock". And build completely new system for another 5-7 years.


eidairaman1 said:


> And he is gone.


As i mentioned before I lowered textures and now it seems stable, for now at least.
Thank you all for responses.


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## eidairaman1 (Jul 7, 2017)

The least you can try is replace the tim on the gpu die and thermal pads, dust it thoroughly and replace the psu with a reputable model.

Otherwise replace gpu and psu...


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## xorbe (Jul 10, 2017)

The DDR3-1333 hurts for sure, especially if it's a single stick.


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## Vya Domus (Jul 10, 2017)

xorbe said:


> The DDR3-1333 hurts for sure, especially if it's a single stick.



This has been demonstrated over and over (for this platform at least) : RAM speed doesn't affect performance in any significant way. His issue is lack of VRAM most likely.


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## Laki89 (Jul 10, 2017)

xorbe said:


> The DDR3-1333 hurts for sure, especially if it's a single stick.


Stock ram speed has nothing to do with system stability and fps drops
Only overclocked Ram memory modules can cause that

@Baner : I also recommend you to change psu to some reputable manufacturer: Chieftec, Cooler Master, Seasonic, etc. with at least 650 watt

Edit: Believe it or not but cleaning PSU and GPU with compressed air may solve problem for 2-3 months


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