8800gtx and cpu usage

[patentman]

Anyone had an issue with CPU usage and an 8800GTX? I am having an issue where 1 core of my CPU is pegged (100% usage) while playing many different games, some of which are not all that graphically intensive (i.e. Titan Quest; Space Rangers) relative to others out there (i.e. FEAR).

The card is definitely functional, as I am seeing a big speed bump in most games over my old x1900xtx and I am scoring ~8600-9000 in 3dmark06, which is consistent with other users who have a similar setup. However, I am now seeing a lot of "chugging" in many games due to the excessivlely high CPU usage. Specfically, games now stutter periodically when when I move from one area to another or when the CPU has to pull new texture, animations etc.

I expected some amount of increased CPU usage, but this is ridiculous in my opinion. I am running these games at the same resolution as my old X1900xtx (1680x1050) and at the same settings. While I am seeing a performance increase with this card, I did not have the "chugging" or cpu usage problem with my old x1900xtx. Further, the 8800GTX is well powered (Coolmax 600CU with well over 30A on the 12V+ rail). I'm running the 96.89 drivers after a clean install of XP. I've even run the card on an entirely separate PSU (a 650 watt enermax) while running the remainder of the system on the Coolmax to rule out PSU issues.

Further, I note that I am seeing exceedingly high CPU usage, even when I am not doing anything in the game. I.e. if I do not move my character, the CPU usage of the first core of my 4800+ is still pegged at 100%.

Finally, I have updated my chipset driver, AMD dual core driver, AMD dual core optimizer to the latest drivers. I have the latest non-beta bios on my Asus A8N-SLI deluxe board.

I'm almost certain this is a driver issue, as the newest drivers on the nvidia site are borfed and the ones that shipped witht the card aren't exactly great, but I figured I would ask and see if anyone has any other thoughts.

Thanks for the help in advance.
_________________________________________________________________________
UPDATE:

I asked this same question to NVIDIA Support technicians. I received the following response:

"We will be releasing a new driver update very soon which will address many of the Geforce 8800 series issues reported to us. Please subscribe to be notified when the driver is released from the following URL:

http://lyris01.nvidia.com/NvRegister/frmLoginRegister.asp

Regards,
NVIDIA Customer Care"

Looks like it is a driver issue after all.

 

[SynthDude2001]

That's pretty standard...I had an Opteron 170 (dual-core) for a year and 99% of games just aren't written to make use of multiple processors/cores yet. 100% usage of one CPU is completely normal for a game...

 

[patentman]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001
That's pretty standard...I had an Opteron 170 (dual-core) for a year and 99% of games just aren't written to make use of multiple processors/cores yet. 100% usage of one CPU is completely normal for a game...

Except for the fact that this issue did not arise with my x1900xtx. And 100% of CPU usage when you are doing nothing in a game and there is nothing going on in the game is not "normal." Looking at the floor in a level of fear when you have killed all AI elements in the level should not result in 100% cpu usage. It didn;t with my x1900xtx, but it does with the 8800GTX. It seems obvious that once all data has been sent to the graphics card and there are no AI or other elements in a level for the CPU to deal with, CPU usage should not be 100%. Only thing I can think of is that maybe the drivers such so bad that they are forcing the CPU to repull textures as the graphics card redraws the same scene over and over again.

 

[Raider1284]

games love using 100% cpu power, I think it will be hard for you to find a game that doesn't use 100% when playing fullscreen.

 

[Sentry2]

While your sitting on the desktop check your processes and see if something is using 50% of your cpu all the time. I noticed you had an X-Fi card and with the newest drivers it seems to have a bug with the DLLML.EXE.....

So basically just check and see if there's a DLLML.EXE eating 50% of you cpu while you're just sitting idle on the desktop. The only way I've found to fix this stupid issue is to download the newest X-Fi drivers and re-install them until the problem goes away. Just reinstall...do not uninstall and then reinstall....

1. Install the latest X-Fi drivers
2. Reboot
3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 until the problem goes away...only...took me 5 tries

I thought there was something wrong with nVidia's 97.02(not saying they're perfect) drivers until I found out it was the Creative drivers.....YAY CL!!!!!

 

[patentman]

Thanks for the tip sentry. I checked but I have no issue with the dllml.exe service taking 50% of the CPU.

 

[Sentry2]

Ok, well you'll know if it happens to you. Games will run like @ss

 

[McArra]

100% usage of one core is normal while gaming, and doesn't matter if there's action or not.That has been happening since I can ramenber. Also yo may see 60% overall use since Nvidia driver optimizations for multi-core usethe otrher core for improoving performance a little.

 

[the Chase]

Originally posted by: McArra
100% usage of one core is normal while gaming, and doesn't matter if there's action or not.That has been happening since I can ramenber. Also yo may see 60% overall use since Nvidia driver optimizations for multi-core usethe otrher core for improoving performance a little.

So do you use the "threaded optimization" thing in the control panel options for all your games? Does it seem to help performance wise? It made 3D Mark05 go down a little for me so I'm unsure on whether to use it in games or not.....

 

[McArra]

I've use it since it was first introduced. To be honest, I can`t tell wether it works faster or not, I haven't paid atention to that since first reviews showed a little increase of around 3-5%.
When I get my ram I will test it

 

[patentman]

Threaded optimization seemed to help some in certain games, i.e. fear. Still having the issue in less graphically intensive games however, e.g., Titan Quest.

 

[betasub]

Originally posted by: the Chase
It made 3D Mark05 go down a little for me so I'm unsure on whether to use it in games or not.....

Does 3DMark2005 benefit from multi-threading? Try 3DMark2006, which definitely does.

 

[Genx87]

Originally posted by: patentman

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001
That's pretty standard...I had an Opteron 170 (dual-core) for a year and 99% of games just aren't written to make use of multiple processors/cores yet. 100% usage of one CPU is completely normal for a game...

Except for the fact that this issue did not arise with my x1900xtx. And 100% of CPU usage when you are doing nothing in a game and there is nothing going on in the game is not "normal." Looking at the floor in a level of fear when you have killed all AI elements in the level should not result in 100% cpu usage. It didn;t with my x1900xtx, but it does with the 8800GTX. It seems obvious that once all data has been sent to the graphics card and there are no AI or other elements in a level for the CPU to deal with, CPU usage should not be 100%. Only thing I can think of is that maybe the drivers such so bad that they are forcing the CPU to repull textures as the graphics card redraws the same scene over and over again.

What games are you playing that dont give you 100% CPU use?? I have games that are years old and still peg my A64 3000+ at 100% for the duration of the game.

 

[Munky]

Games always use 100% cpu even when there's nothing happening, because the game engine continuously runs the message loop (basically an infinite while loop) until you exit the game. I've coded some 3D games myself and that's just how it's done. That alone will not cause any "chugging" unless there's some other issues.

 

[flexy]

>>>
And 100% of CPU usage when you are doing nothing in a game and there is nothing going on in the game is not "normal."
>>>

yes it is.Actually the majority of games do this.

 

[geo1]

Its a wildy different architecture than their previous, the biggest generation to generation change for them since. . . hell, maybe ever? It's pretty amazing that the drivers are as stable as they are at this point.

So, two predictions --there are more landmines out there to step on, and a few body parts will be temporarily strewn around the landscape before the situation settles down. . . and still some performance headroom to come for the patient, probably a significant amount.

But man mine kicks ass at what I've asked it to do so far. 1920x1200 at 8xaa and 16xaf is schweet.

 

[patentman]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: patentman

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001
That's pretty standard...I had an Opteron 170 (dual-core) for a year and 99% of games just aren't written to make use of multiple processors/cores yet. 100% usage of one CPU is completely normal for a game...

Except for the fact that this issue did not arise with my x1900xtx. And 100% of CPU usage when you are doing nothing in a game and there is nothing going on in the game is not "normal." Looking at the floor in a level of fear when you have killed all AI elements in the level should not result in 100% cpu usage. It didn;t with my x1900xtx, but it does with the 8800GTX. It seems obvious that once all data has been sent to the graphics card and there are no AI or other elements in a level for the CPU to deal with, CPU usage should not be 100%. Only thing I can think of is that maybe the drivers such so bad that they are forcing the CPU to repull textures as the graphics card redraws the same scene over and over again.

What games are you playing that dont give you 100% CPU use?? I have games that are years old and still peg my A64 3000+ at 100% for the duration of the game.

oblivion for one. Fear for two. They both use ~50% of each core when running full out.

 

[SergeC]

With a better video card, it may be that it's your CPU that is the bottleneck now, no longer the video. Easy explanation.

 

[Munky]

Originally posted by: patentman

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: patentman

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001
That's pretty standard...I had an Opteron 170 (dual-core) for a year and 99% of games just aren't written to make use of multiple processors/cores yet. 100% usage of one CPU is completely normal for a game...

Except for the fact that this issue did not arise with my x1900xtx. And 100% of CPU usage when you are doing nothing in a game and there is nothing going on in the game is not "normal." Looking at the floor in a level of fear when you have killed all AI elements in the level should not result in 100% cpu usage. It didn;t with my x1900xtx, but it does with the 8800GTX. It seems obvious that once all data has been sent to the graphics card and there are no AI or other elements in a level for the CPU to deal with, CPU usage should not be 100%. Only thing I can think of is that maybe the drivers such so bad that they are forcing the CPU to repull textures as the graphics card redraws the same scene over and over again.

What games are you playing that dont give you 100% CPU use?? I have games that are years old and still peg my A64 3000+ at 100% for the duration of the game.

oblivion for one. Fear for two. They both use ~50% of each core when running full out.

It only appears that way. In reality they switch really fast between core 1 and core 2 at 100%. On a single core cpu, those same games will keep it pegged at 100%, even with all the settings turned down and when nothing is happening in the game.