CPU Overclock and FPS

[brown_257 0]

Hello everyone I need some advice.

 

So in march I built my own gaming computer and it is very good for playing games on. The main intention was to get the most out of FSX that I could on the budget that I had at the time. So I was flying with scenery addons, which were mainly airports and cities i.e. Aerosoft Manhattan and Heathrow etc. This would be in a PMDG B744 or 748 and I would get frame rates of around 20-30 with quality set fairly high. This lasted until the 30th August when I brought GEX, UTX, REX and PMDG B737. I would fly form default airports (e.g. East Midlands) with these on and again at fairly high quality to get the most out of REX and GEX etc. I would get FPS of about 15-30 outside the plane and in the VC so the system was not struggling too much but obviously this was a lot to add in. Flying in the 747 out of heathrow would see a huge hit and I would get around 8-15. This is when I decided it was time for some overclocking.

 

So I spent last night to my surprise increasing the clock fairly easily to 4GHz. When testing out of heathrow and a 747 I saw an increase but not by much to 8-20, with it spending most the time at around 12-15. This was an increase but not by as much as I though, but then again this area is the max I will have in terms of scenery in my sim. Then I decided to finish a flight that I had saved before overclocking at the top of a decent (flying into East Midlands), now at cruise I was getting a max FPS of 80 in VC (av:40-60 FPS) and 100+ (av:50-70) outside so it obviously had an improvement. So I start the decent and I get to about FL100 when my frame dives down (as expected with more detail, but I was getting it jumping down to 3 or 4 at times and I just down understand why? I tried a take off afterwards and I tended to be ok and then dive down to around 5-6 and this is in default scenery, when before the overclock I was getting 18 at a minimum. Does anyone have any idea why it is slightly inconsistent?

 

My Spec is:

 

CPU: I7-960 @ 4GHz (Stock 3.2GHz) (Runs at load at a max temp of about 65C)

MOBO: Asus Sabertooth X58

Cooling: Corsair H100

RAM: Corsair Vengeance 16GB

Case: Antec Lanboy

PSU: Corsair 750W

GPU: Asus nVidia 560Ti

SSD: 60GB for Operating Sys

HDD: 500GB 7200rpm Sata 3 for programs

 

FSX GOLD

PMDG - B737(800,900),747(400,400F,400LCF,800i/f)

REX 2.0 essentials

GEX Europe

UTX

Multiple Aerosoft scenery packages

WOAI

[BimmerCop 332]

Follow this to the "T" and most of your issues will be gone:

 

http://forum.avsim.net/topic/370594-read-before-posting-software-hardware-guide-for-fsx/

[brown_257 0]

Follow this to the "T" and most of your issues will be gone:

 

http://forum.avsim.n...-guide-for-fsx/

 

Thank you very much for pointing me in the right direction got it spot on now, 100% traffic and really high graphics and a solid frame rate. Can't moan at that.

[ZachLW 37]

Thank you very much for pointing me in the right direction got it spot on now, 100% traffic and really high graphics and a solid frame rate. Can't moan at that.

 

Glad you're happy, now! I know my last rig was nearly identical to yours, and I managed to get it to 4.2GHz 24/7.

 

65C seems toasty to me for your cooler and case, even for that relatively warm CPU. What's your voltage? Do you have HT enabled (leave it disabled for FSX)?

[brown_257 0]

Glad you're happy, now! I know my last rig was nearly identical to yours, and I managed to get it to 4.2GHz 24/7.

 

65C seems toasty to me for your cooler and case, even for that relatively warm CPU. What's your voltage? Do you have HT enabled (leave it disabled for FSX)?

 

Hi Zack,

 

I would be able to get higher but for now not been wanting to push it since I only OC'd for the first time last night so was a little worried about getting it completely wrong. Having said that I did actually get to 4 really easy. Did a short 2 hour flight earlier and my max temp was 62 and that would have been just hitting it for a very short period of time. With the processor OC'd and just browsing the net and watching a VATSIM video on youtube I have temps of about 29-31 at the min. My Vcore is 1.32.

 

I have a question for you since you have had a similar set up. First is it the 960 you had? If so what temps and Vcore where you at when at 4.2? Secondly, how bad does HT affect FPS or in general FSX? The reason I ask is that I am a Mechanical engineering student and regularly use my PC for CAD as well as playing other games so I would like to have it on if it isn't going to cause me issues. If not then I'll just have to turn it on when I would need it.

 

I used to play fs9 a lot when I was younger and had a lot of addon's for that but when I got my new computer in 2009 (the one I still use as an entertainment hub now) I couldn't get it to work well in vista or win7 so I moved to fsx but then I found the system just wasn't good enough to run it, so when I started having problems with this one I was very very disappointed since I spent so much on it. I then got it right like I said above and then I obviously wanted to take it much further and splashed out this weekend, so thanks for all the advice!!

 

Mike

[ZachLW 37]

Hi again, Mike,

 

I had the 960 with the same Sabertooth MOBO. What HT does is increase required voltage for stability, and therefore also increases heat substantially. We're talking 5C here (and the difference between stable and unstable). With my CPU overclocked to 4.2GHz, I was seeing something in the ballpark of the low 60s (with this H50 I still use). My voltage then was 1.35v or so.

 

FSX doesn't benefit from HT, and some like to argue that performance is actually hurt. In fact, HT doesn't even help texture loading.

 

I remember I had an "HT on" and "HT off" MOBO profile I could quickly switch between. Perhaps that's an option for you?

[brown_257 0]

Hi again, Mike,

 

I had the 960 with the same Sabertooth MOBO. What HT does is increase required voltage for stability, and therefore also increases heat substantially. We're talking 5C here (and the difference between stable and unstable). With my CPU overclocked to 4.2GHz, I was seeing something in the ballpark of the low 60s (with this H50 I still use). My voltage then was 1.35v or so.

 

FSX doesn't benefit from HT, and some like to argue that performance is actually hurt. In fact, HT doesn't even help texture loading.

 

I remember I had an "HT on" and "HT off" MOBO profile I could quickly switch between. Perhaps that's an option for you?

 

Possibly, I'll look into it. This is my first build PC and I as good as I am with computers, I had never properly delved into the BIOS side of things and changing parameters in which my computer actually runs. Was that low 60s at load in a stress test? Also at the min I have stock thermal paste, which I am told will help a lot as well?

[ZachLW 37]

Possibly, I'll look into it. This is my first build PC and I as good as I am with computers, I had never properly delved into the BIOS side of things and changing parameters in which my computer actually runs. Was that low 60s at load in a stress test? Also at the min I have stock thermal paste, which I am told will help a lot as well?

 

That was under Prime95 stress testing for 3 hours. In regards to paste, I wouldn't go as far to say it doesn't make a difference, but in most cases it's more application technique and less actual compound choice.

 

I could show you some benchmarks, but I think they're inaccurate at best considering the many variables in compound application.

[Ben Cap 89]

65C seems toasty

 

Toasty....? I think not. Maybe 80....

[ZachLW 37]

Toasty....? I think not. Maybe 80....

 

Given that voltage and that cooler, I'd say so. I can't remember: Did you own a 1st gen i7 system?

 

Seriously, that he had on HT tells me I was spot on with thinking the temps were high.

[Ben Cap 89]

Given that voltage and that cooler, I'd say so. I can't remember: Did you own a 1st gen i7 system?

 

I ran mine at 1.36V @ 4GHZ for almost 2 years. Max temps were around 75-85C and I never had any issues.

 

This was run on some no-name random air cooler.... lol

[Illegitimi non carborundum 4]

Brown etc

I'd be checking your RAM as I recall an i7-960 runs in DDR3 Triple channel RAM mode in modules of (3GB) 6GB, 12 GB (and 24 GB if the BIOS/mobo supports it). 16GB suggests that the RAM is possibly running in dual channel mode and may be well be "throttling" the cpu as it is no longer matched to the memory bus.

Just a thought.

PeterH

[alainneedle1 97]

Brown etc

I'd be checking your RAM as I recall an i7-960 runs in DDR3 Triple channel RAM mode in modules of (3GB) 6GB, 12 GB (and 24 GB if the BIOS/mobo supports it). 16GB suggests that the RAM is possibly running in dual channel mode and may be well be "throttling" the cpu as it is no longer matched to the memory bus.

Just a thought.

PeterH

 

:good:

[ZachLW 37]

Brown etc

I'd be checking your RAM as I recall an i7-960 runs in DDR3 Triple channel RAM mode in modules of (3GB) 6GB, 12 GB (and 24 GB if the BIOS/mobo supports it). 16GB suggests that the RAM is possibly running in dual channel mode and may be well be "throttling" the cpu as it is no longer matched to the memory bus.

Just a thought.

PeterH

 

For the price, I would wager that would be a big ol' waste of time and money! I remember screwing around with my dual and triple channel kit on my old 960 rig. No discernible difference.

[Illegitimi non carborundum 4]

Zach

Its not a "kit" per se all modern RAM is dual, triple or quad but it is the way that the motherboard and cpu (memory controller) interpret what you install and how you install/position the RAM sticks. In an i7 960 there are usually 6 RAM slots if you use 3 or 6 you get Triple channel DDR3 use 2 or 4 slots and you get dual channel. My issue was how is that 16GB installed it is probably 4 x 4GB sticks in which case the memory (now installed in 4 slots) is not optimised for the mobo/memory controller etc, and was the memory installed in the correct RAM slots. {I don't thing that it would 3 x 4GB + 1 x 2GB + 2 x 1GB!! or any other combination to 16GB filling all 6 slots which still wouldn't function as triple channel RAM} Plus, to get real performance out of the i7 9xx series most experts tell you that RAM speed and timings can significantly affect performance in FSX.

 

Me, I tend to agree that there would be little performance difference in real terms between dual and triple cannel, but if the system is unbalanced its not likely to perform as it should. But, there's always a but. The "E" series SB and IB (vastly different memory controllers to the i7 960) use quad channel RAM. FSX can't utilise quad channel RAM, (nor can many other apps) which was developed for high end servers, but look at the forum posts and simmers using these machines don't see any performance issues when compared to the plain vanilla SB/IB's which use dual channel DDR3RAM. So it could be all theoretical.

 

Regards

PeterH