Low GPU Usage R9 390 Sapphire Nitro

[Ferrum Master]

I bought my motherboard, psu, cpu and gpu 2 weeks ago so no upgrading soon
I will buy 16GB of RAM next year.
What frequency do you recommend and what CL ?

The one that is written in the SPD. View it in bios or aida64 engineer.

If you plan to OC it... well... just read around. Start somewhere learning the basics. Start with shitty CL 11-11-11-34 and 1866 or 2000 @ 1.55V. Do OCCT test for cpu. It will show errors if it is really unstable. If it is stable, make the CL more tight by one step. Very time consuming. But... it is a cheap RAM... I don't know it, looks like a tomato brand. It won't OC a bit I guess. It even won't post at 1600MHz... well... it is a playground... you have to learn bit by bit it by yourself.

Well I would still chose the anniversary pentium over this one... Two ~ 4.6GHz horses move a powerful GPU much better than 4 low 3.3GHz clocked ones, tested on a R9 290 combo... no problems. Monkey coders, blame them.

 

[MorpHeer]

The one that is written in the SPD. View it in bios or aida64 engineer.

If you plan to OC it... well... just read around. Start somewhere learning the basics. Start with shitty CL 11-11-11-34 and 1866 or 2000 @ 1.55V. Do OCCT test for cpu. It will show errors if it is really unstable. If it is stable, make the CL more tight by one step. Very time consuming. But... it is a cheap RAM... I don't know it, looks like a tomato brand. It won't OC a bit I guess. It even won't post at 1600MHz... well... it is a playground... you have to learn bit by bit it by yourself.

Well I would still chose the anniversary pentium over this one... Two ~ 4.6GHz horses move a powerful GPU much better than 4 low 3.3GHz clocked ones, tested on a R9 290 combo... no problems. Monkey coders, blame them.

What brand of RAM do you recommend ?
I am thinking about Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB DDR3 1600MHz CL9 Dual Channel Kit, its Intel XMP Ready and the cheapest i can get.
My CPU and motherboard can support max 1600MHz frequency so i can't go 1866.
CAS 9 is also nice.

 

[Ferrum Master]

I am thinking about Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB DDR3 1600MHz

If using @stock... any of them. The sport ones ain't the best ones for OC. I actually prefer VLP ram size due to the fact I can use behemoth sized coolers. There are 2400MHz Kingston Savages cheap, they will work fine on lower freqs too.

 

[MorpHeer]

If using @stock... any of them. The sport ones ain't the best ones for OC. I actually prefer VLP ram size due to the fact I can use behemoth sized coolers. There are 2400MHz Kingston Savages cheap, they will work fine on lower freqs too.

I will be using at stock because of the 1600MHz limit that i have on my CPU and motherboard.

 

[EarthDog]

Then you should get 1600MHz ram. there isn't a point to buying more expensive ram if you can't touch it. Just get the lowest timings you can.

 

[Ferrum Master]

Well yeah... but afterwards it will be harder to sell them if they are such low ones... you know... the noob will see just the plain number 1600 vs 2400... and the price difference is around 5-10Euros for each stick actually... those are not Dominators he seeks for lol. If you dig you can even find cheaper. Real low DDR3 CL7 ram is extinct also.

 

[EarthDog]

If resale value is important, sure. But I wouldn't put any more out just for the POTENTIAL for a partial return on the back end. That makes no sense to me...

You are essentially saying to buy a Nissan Skyline but only drive it in school zones because when you are done with it, you can sell it for more. Now, that is being a bit dramatic, but, that is the underlying point there. You will never make up for the outgoing on the back end... especially with DDR3 being lame duck already.

 

[Ferrum Master]

If resale value is important, sure. But I wouldn't put any more out just for the POTENTIAL for a partial return on the back end. That makes no sense to me...

You are essentially saying to buy a Nissan Skyline but only drive it in school zones because when you are done with it, you can sell it for more. Now, that is being a bit dramatic, but, that is the underlying point there. You will never make up for the outgoing on the back end... especially with DDR3 being lame duck already.

Skyline is the Dominator... if we are choosing in between ballistix sport and savage... it is like more like charger vs camaro...

 

[EarthDog]

MEH... Honda Civic and Honda Accord (Charger and Camullet are in the same class). The point being you don't get the money back on resale so why pay more out of the gate?

 

[Ferrum Master]

MEH... Honda Civic and Honda Accord (Charger and Camullet are in the same class). The point being you don't get the money back on resale so why pay more out of the gate?

I didn't wan't to use Prius as it would be gay Actually the thing is he currently has. They just have different engines that's the thing... one is 1.6GHz one is 2.4GHz

 

[Thentilian]

OP: I'm having similar issues with my XFX R9 390... the behavior being 'normal' is broken in my opinion. I understand what games I have that are CPU bound, so I expect no FPS improvement even on lower settings. But, when I'm getting 34 FPS sitting on a spot in Witcher 2, and the GPU load is going bonkers, zero to full, and anywhere in between, and the core speeds do the same, and my CPU is NOT bound, something is amiss. I'm pretty sure after looking at your PC specs, it could be the same thing I suspect, the PSU. Mine is a 700 watt, but it's 6 years old now, and it wasn't very high quality to begin with. So, I know it's not putting out very good power at this point of it's life.

I have an EVGA 850 G2 coming in the mail, so I'll be able to test this theory out and see if the GPU behavior changes any. Then I'll update here and on my thread as well.

 

[EarthDog]

Its not the PSU... and 850W is massive overkill.. wow.

 

[OneMoar]

 

[TechHands]

I have the exact issue and I'm using a brand new RM850 (PSU). Three of us so far has this issue, I've also spoken to a person on reddit and sapphire forums also. I've also tried garry's mod and my fps was like 22fps or something I don't know what to expect though. I'm playing just cause 3 so I can't comment to much on other games. Check this link out http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2833268/weird-gpu-usage-spikes-390x.html it's a person that's had the same issue but solved it. I think one of us should try and message this person. I've also seen another person saying his gpu usage was normal for almost day and then started to do the dropping down to 0% thing. I assume that any time my fps goes below 60fps now it's my cpu's fault so the gpu keeps doing about the same thing but if it was an intel cpu during those exact moments the gpu load maybe wouldn't actually drop to 0% (as much). The thing is for me the core clock not being max didn't bother me as much as the gpu load not being consistent. One more thing you can check "use unified gpu usage" in afterburner and it will make your gpu load look normal but I don't know what it all means and I don't trust it in that kind of way. I see no reason to overclock this gpu sense with most games it seems the core clock will not max.

 

[Thentilian]

Its not the PSU... and 850W is massive overkill.. wow.

If I decide to SLI/crossfire it won't be overkill. Not to mention, capacity of PSU's fall off as capacitors age. I don't plan on upgrading again for 4 or 5 years to a whole new platform.

 

[EarthDog]

If you use multiple GPUs, correct. The rest..... not so much (at least, people worry way too much about capacitor aging). The unit has a 7/10 year warranty for a reason.

 

[Dzamastagic Damir]

HII TO ALL WHO ARE HAVING THIS TWO PROBLEMS
I HAVE GOT THE SOLUTIONS FOR BOTH OF IT

As you might have noticed lot of people with the R9 390 are complaining to this problems
The first and easy one is with the MSI Afterburner
It shows that the gpu load is down and up or we call it the card has spikes going form 100% to down 0% and so on
This problem is solved by going to the MSI Afterburner settings
and check the box for ENABLE UNIFIED GPU USAGE MONITORING
NOW YOU WILL SEE THE REAL GPU LOAD

THE NEXT THING WHAT CAN HAPPEN TO YOU OR DONT HAVE TO BE
IS THAT YOU WILL NOW SEE THAT YOU HAVE GPU LOAD AT LIKE 55%
DEPANDING ON THE GAME YOU ARE MAYBE A BIT MORE A BIT LESS

THIS IS NOT A CPU BOTTLENECK
I HAVE THE i3 4130 and the R9 390 GIGABYTE AND HAD THIS PROBLEM
THAT ALL BENCHMARKS ARE GIVING ME 100% IF GPU LOAD
AND THE BENCHMARKS ARE GIVING ME THE RESULT AS IT SHOULD BE FOR
THE R9 390 IN HEAVEN OR VALLEY

BUT GAMES ARE JUST LIKE 50% GPU LOAD

THIS IS NOT AN DRIVER ISSUE OR A BAD GPU OR LIKE I SAID A BOTTLENECK BY THE CPU
YOU JUST GO TO THE SETTINGS OF THE NEW CRIMSON DRIVER
OR EVAN AN OLD CATALYST CONTROL CENTER
AND FIND THE SETTING OF ANTI ALIASING METHOD AND SET IT TO ADAPTIVE

THATS IT...NOW YOU WILL SEE YOUR GPU WILL BE FULLY USED..
IF YOU SET THE METHOD TO SUPERSAMPLING THE GPU WILL ALWAYS BE USED TO 100%
BUT YOU WILL LOSE ON THE FPS..

BUT IF YOU JUST SET IT TO ADAPTIVE...YOU WILL GET THE GPU LIKE IN BETWEEN 80 AND UP TO 100% USED
BUT WILL NOT BE LOOSING ON THE FRAMES
AND OF COURSE THE SETTINGS IN THE GAME YOU PLAY ITSELF DEPENDS IF IT NOW WILL BE LIKE ALL TIME 100%
OR IF YOU WILL GET MORE FPS BUT HAVE IT GOING FROM 80% TO 100%

TRY IT
IT WILL WORK
NO BAD GPU
NO BOTTLENECK
JUST SOME GPU SETTINGS
NOTHING MORE

GOOD GAMING AND GOOD LUCK

 

[Machinematrix]

HII TO ALL WHO ARE HAVING THIS TWO PROBLEMS
I HAVE GOT THE SOLUTIONS FOR BOTH OF IT

As you might have noticed lot of people with the R9 390 are complaining to this problems
The first and easy one is with the MSI Afterburner
It shows that the gpu load is down and up or we call it the card has spikes going form 100% to down 0% and so on
This problem is solved by going to the MSI Afterburner settings
and check the box for ENABLE UNIFIED GPU USAGE MONITORING
NOW YOU WILL SEE THE REAL GPU LOAD

THE NEXT THING WHAT CAN HAPPEN TO YOU OR DONT HAVE TO BE
IS THAT YOU WILL NOW SEE THAT YOU HAVE GPU LOAD AT LIKE 55%
DEPANDING ON THE GAME YOU ARE MAYBE A BIT MORE A BIT LESS

THIS IS NOT A CPU BOTTLENECK
I HAVE THE i3 4130 and the R9 390 GIGABYTE AND HAD THIS PROBLEM
THAT ALL BENCHMARKS ARE GIVING ME 100% IF GPU LOAD
AND THE BENCHMARKS ARE GIVING ME THE RESULT AS IT SHOULD BE FOR
THE R9 390 IN HEAVEN OR VALLEY

BUT GAMES ARE JUST LIKE 50% GPU LOAD

THIS IS NOT AN DRIVER ISSUE OR A BAD GPU OR LIKE I SAID A BOTTLENECK BY THE CPU
YOU JUST GO TO THE SETTINGS OF THE NEW CRIMSON DRIVER
OR EVAN AN OLD CATALYST CONTROL CENTER
AND FIND THE SETTING OF ANTI ALIASING METHOD AND SET IT TO ADAPTIVE

THATS IT...NOW YOU WILL SEE YOUR GPU WILL BE FULLY USED..
IF YOU SET THE METHOD TO SUPERSAMPLING THE GPU WILL ALWAYS BE USED TO 100%
BUT YOU WILL LOSE ON THE FPS..

BUT IF YOU JUST SET IT TO ADAPTIVE...YOU WILL GET THE GPU LIKE IN BETWEEN 80 AND UP TO 100% USED
BUT WILL NOT BE LOOSING ON THE FRAMES
AND OF COURSE THE SETTINGS IN THE GAME YOU PLAY ITSELF DEPENDS IF IT NOW WILL BE LIKE ALL TIME 100%
OR IF YOU WILL GET MORE FPS BUT HAVE IT GOING FROM 80% TO 100%

TRY IT
IT WILL WORK
NO BAD GPU
NO BOTTLENECK
JUST SOME GPU SETTINGS
NOTHING MORE

GOOD GAMING AND GOOD LUCK

Proper bench scores for that particular card, but 50% usage in games? looks like a bottleneck to me. Antialiasing only puts load on the gpu, so the gpu usage will go up regardless of what cpu you have, it's like increasing the resolution, the usage will go up but the bottleneck is still there.

 

[dorsetknob]

Dzamastagic Damir
Your capslock Stuck on your keyboard
that should be the 1st thing you might want to sort out

 

[chuck216]

Hate to add to a necro of an old thread but the Issue described here was fixed long ago when they added the "Power Efficiency" toggle to Crimson and suggested the R9 390 and Fury series owners disable Power saving mode.

I was having the exact same limited clock speeds in some games, but turning the toggle off once they put it in the panel fixed that issue.

 

[TechHands]

I submitted a ticket to AMD describing the issue, I told them locking the clock speed helped smooth out the major stuttering and actually made my games more playable or how they "should be" given the resolution and such that I was using (1920X1200). They quickly added that power efficiently toggle to their gpu driver package which was needed. I felt like they listened and quickly made a change which in return made me a more happier customer.

 

[chuck216]

I submitted a ticket to AMD describing the issue, I told them locking the clock speed helped smooth out the major stuttering and actually made my games more playable or how they "should be" given the resolution and such that I was using (1920X1200). They quickly added that power efficiently toggle to their gpu driver package which was needed. I felt like they listened and quickly made a change which in return made me a more happier customer.

I did the same thing on their forums