Bottleneck?
Bottleneck?
I played Atomic Heart at 4k 144hz with all settings turned up. My GPU was handling most of the workload at 90-100% usage, while the CPU was only using 10-25%.
I own an i9-10850k and an RX 9070 X, which provides ample power with a 1200w Corsair PSU.
I’m concerned the GPU might be limiting performance and might need a new CPU. Are these usage levels normal? Should I consider upgrading to a 1440p monitor? I think I made a poor choice with the RX 9070 X. Even though Nvidia GPUs are pricey, everything else is costly too—I’m not sure if I’m overanalyzing.
Meet or surpass the suggested system requirements to launch the game; Atomic Heart on Steam
Immerse yourself in a chaotic and beautiful utopian setting, engaging in intense battles. Tailor your combat approach to each adversary, leverage your surroundings, and enhance your gear to achieve your goal. To uncover the truth, you’ll need to invest in blood.
store.steampowered.com
Have you noticed any shifts in your CPU usage when lowering the game’s resolution?
When sharing a troubleshooting thread, it’s standard to provide detailed system specifications. List them clearly as follows:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:
Monitor:
Add the age of your PSU along with its make and model. Also, note the current BIOS version for your motherboard.
I believe I made a poor decision by selecting the 9070 xt.
What GPU did you use before? Did you run DDU to eliminate all GPU drivers (Intel, AMD, Nvidia) in Safe Mode, then manually install the newest GPU driver from AMD’s support site using an elevated command?
Averages might not tell the whole story.
Your CPU has 20 threads, but only one might be restricting your performance, accounting for most of your 10-25% usage.
Usually, when gaming at 4k resolution, the GPU becomes the main bottleneck.
How do you feel about your gaming experience?
Do you wish for improvement?
Do you have a budget?
To better understand your requirements, try this simple test:
Play your games, but reduce the resolution and visual complexity.
This can slightly ease the load on your graphics card.
If your FPS improves, it suggests your CPU can handle a higher graphics setting.
If your FPS remains unchanged, you’re likely more constrained by your CPU.
Sorry about that
Processor: i9-10850k
Cooler: Lian Li Galahad 360 aio
Motherboard: MSI Z490 gaming plus
Memory: 32GB 3200Mhz gskill ddr4
Storage: Samsung Evo 980 1Tb NVME
Graphics: Sapphire Nitro+ RX 9070 XT 16GB
Power Supply: Corsair HX Series HX1200 fully modular
Case: Corsair 5000D Airflow mid-tower
Operating System: Windows 11 Pro
Display: Acer Predator XB3 - 31.5 3840x2160 144hz IPS panel
The PSU was purchased on November 11th, 2022, making it two years and four months old.
Bios version: E7C75IMS.AE0
Before this model, I owned an MSI RTX 3090 Ti with 24GB RAM, which had significant display issues. I upgraded to the 9070 XT as it matched the performance of the Ti. Current Nvidia GPUs are quite expensive, so I opted for AMD instead. I used the latest DDU uninstaller, choosing the “Clean and Shutdown” option during a safe mode switch. For additional safety, I removed all games and Steam, then reinstalled everything.
Is this a problem? I was using amd adrenaline and AMD software tends to favor AMD. I can't see temperatures or core/thread utilization. It's just utilization stats, not MSI Afterburner because it conflicts with adrenaline. I still get decent frames in some scenes, but I notice stutters without any frame drops. It seems like lower resolution is the issue. What about render resolution? I plan to test Hogwarts Legacy for that.
Render quality is at 3840x2160, which is 2560x1440 at 67%. All configurations are set to low, and AMD FSRC 2 is enabled. I expect around 120-144 frames per second. Every time I change the settings, I get between 85 and 115 fps. My GPU usage is currently between 80-90%, while the CPU usage is about 35-45%.
You will always be bottlenecked by something, and at native 4k it will most likely (and should) be your GPU, unless you have a very week CPU.
If you get 80-90% GPU utilization when you use FSR (so not native 4k), it means that you might be moderately CPU bottlenecked (ideally, you want your GPU to run at 98-99% to get the max performance from it).
CPU utilization is not relevant since games never use all the cores, so you never get 100% even when you are CPU bottlenecked. But if your GPU usage is low (<90%) it means that it's waiting for something, most likely the CPU.
Try to disable FSR to run at native 4k and you should see your GPU usage going very close to 100%. Also make sure that frame generation is disabled when you do tests like these.