Question Warzone 2.0 and GTA V—CPU and GPU capped at 50%?

[Flieppa]

Hi, I have noticed when playing Warzone 2.0, my CPU and GPU both sit at around 50% usage. No matter what graphics preset I use, I get around 100 FPS with 50% usage. My brother on the other hand gets 100% usage on his GPU (3060 Ti) with an average of 160 FPS when playing warzone 2.0.

The only other game this happens in is GTA V. Most other games I have play don't even require 50% usage, so I never really noticed this. The only time my GPU and CPU run at 100% is when I do a bench mark like Fire strike or Time spy.

I have the latest drivers for my card. So I don't know what the issue is. Its almost as if my GPU is capped at 50% in games and my CPU then chills at around the same because it doesn't need to work harder than that to provide data to the GPU. If I understand correctly, if there was a bottleneck, doesn't that mean my CPU would be at close to 100% usage while the GPU isn't or vice versa?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!!

PC Specs:

-Ryzen 9 3900x
-RTX 3070
-32GB 3600Mhz

[Mod edit: added Warzone 2.0 and GTA V— to title for clarity.]

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Hi and welcome

Most games don't use more than 6 threads or CPU cores. The 3900x is a slightly older 12 core CPU and GTA V online and Warzone are some of the more CPU intensive games available.

It seems youre maxing out 6 cores of the CPU, thats why youre seeing 50% usage on the CPU. I strongly suspect that CPU limit (bottleneck) is why youre not maxing out usage on your GPU in these games as well.

Having said that, theres always either CPU or GPU 'limiting' the amount of frames you achieve, its only a problem if that amount of frames is not enough to play a game well. 100FPS doesnt sound too bad to me, but ymmv I guess.

 

[Flieppa]

Thanks for the reply, I understand what you are saying and appreciate the help.

Just another quick question. My CPU usage is at 50% and my GPU is at 50%.

But my brothers' CPU usage is at 50% and his GPU is at 100%. (He has an I7 13700kf and a 3060 Ti). Is his GPU usage just higher because he has a better CPU that then allows his GPU to have more usage?

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Thanks for the reply, I understand what you are saying and appreciate the help.

Just another quick question. My CPU usage is at 50% and my GPU is at 50%.

But my brothers' CPU usage is at 50% and his GPU is at 100%. (He has an I7 13700kf and a 3060 Ti). Is his GPU usage just higher because he has a better CPU that then allows his GPU to have more usage?

Each of your brothers CPU cores is quite a bit faster than each of yours, so basically yes. Also his graphics card is a bit slower than yours so it reaches its limit earlier. There will likely be games more limited by graphics power where your system is faster, but in online games that make use of faster CPU's he has a good advantage.

13700K gaming performance. You'll find the 3900X on there too, its about 66% of the performance on average in the tested here games when CPU limit is forced to the surface by this type of testing.

Its possible you can improve your performance a bit by closing down any apps or CPU processes you arent using while gaming using Task Manager. Also by updating your motherboards BIOS and chipset drivers. It wont be a huge amount but if every frame counts for you then its worth trying.

 

[Flieppa]

Each of your brothers CPU cores is quite a bit faster than each of yours, so basically yes. Also his graphics card is a bit slower than yours so it reaches its limit earlier. There will likely be games more limited by graphics power where your system is faster, but in online games that make use of faster CPU's he has a good advantage.

13700K gaming performance. You'll find the 3900X on there too, its about 66% of the performance on average in the tested here games when CPU limit is forced to the surface by this type of testing.

Its possible you can improve your performance a bit by closing down any apps or CPU processes you arent using while gaming using Task Manager. Also by updating your motherboards BIOS and chipset drivers. It wont be a huge amount but if every frame counts for you then its worth trying.

Ok thank you very much! I appreciate the help and clarity you provided. Have a good rest of your day.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

No problem, you too.

 

[Flieppa]

No problem, you too.

Sorry, just one more quick question. Why do I get the same FPS and usage on higher settings as well? Wouldn't the usage be more because the graphics settings are higher, or the FPS less because the usage doesn't change?

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Thats actually how you find out for sure if you are CPU bottlenecked, set all in game graphical options as low as possible, and if theres little to no improvement over higher ones its the CPU thats the problem.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1n5hh0NDn-g

 

[Flieppa]

Thats actually how you find out for sure if you are CPU bottlenecked, set all in game graphical options as low as possible, and if theres little to no improvement over higher ones its the CPU thats the problem.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1n5hh0NDn-g

Yes I did this, I set my settings to the lowest possible and then slowly increased them (low vs extreme), but the FPS remained at around 120 and the usage for GPU and CPU at 50%. So if I understand correctly my CPU is limiting my FPS at 120 in 1080p, so I assume my "sweet spot" will be at around 1440p and after that I will be GPU limited and then my FPS will start to decline?

 

[Flieppa]

Yes I did this, I set my settings to the lowest possible and then slowly increased them (low vs extreme), but the FPS remained at around 120 and the usage for GPU and CPU at 50%. So if I understand correctly my CPU is limiting my FPS at 120 in 1080p, so I assume my "sweet spot" will be at around 1440p and after that I will be GPU limited and then my FPS will start to decline?

I think I just found a fix, sort of.

My "render worker count" (in warzone) was set to "12", I found a guy on youtube that tested 1 to 16 and he found that 7 yields the best results. I changed mine to 7 and now I have an average of 150 FPS, 30% CPU usage and 90% GPU usage. He said that everything from 11 and up yields terrible results with bad 5% lows and 1% lows. And from 11 and up there is a lot of CPU bottleneck, which then prevents the card from performing well.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3upM3FpNj-k&t=300s

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Yes I did this, I set my settings to the lowest possible and then slowly increased them (low vs extreme), but the FPS remained at around 120 and the usage for GPU and CPU at 50%. So if I understand correctly my CPU is limiting my FPS at 120 in 1080p, so I assume my "sweet spot" will be at around 1440p and after that I will be GPU limited and then my FPS will start to decline?

No sounds like your misunderstanding. The video was just to demonstrate how bottlenecks work. If you have the same FPS at low settings 720p as you get at high settings 1440p (for example) then you know its a CPU bottleneck, because the CPU perofrmance is unrelated to resoluton and graphical settings.

I think I just found a fix, sort of.

My "render worker count" (in warzone) was set to "12", I found a guy on youtube that tested 1 to 16 and he found that 7 yields the best results. I changed mine to 7 and now I have an average of 150 FPS, 30% CPU usage and 90% GPU usage. He said that everything from 11 and up yields terrible results with bad 5% lows and 1% lows. And from 11 and up there is a lot of CPU bottleneck, which then prevents the card from performing well.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3upM3FpNj-k&t=300s

Nicely done! I dont play any online games so I only know that Warzone likes a lot of fast RAM and is CPU intensive. I'll make a note of that for the future.

Do you have something similar you can do in GTA online? Part of the reason I assumed you couldnt get rid of the bottleneck is that you were experiencing the same across two games known to be CPU demanding.

 

[Flieppa]

No sounds like your misunderstanding. The video was just to demonstrate how bottlenecks work. If you have the same FPS at low settings 720p as you get at high settings 1440p (for example) then you know its a CPU bottleneck, because the CPU perofrmance is unrelated to resoluton and graphical settings.


Nicely done! I dont play any online games so I only know that Warzone likes a lot of fast RAM and is CPU intensive. I'll make a note of that for the future.

Do you have something similar you can do in GTA online? Part of the reason I assumed you couldnt get rid of the bottleneck is that you were experiencing the same across two games known to be CPU demanding.

Ohhh ok I understand the bottleneck now. I haven't found a fix like this for GTA V yet, but Ill keep looking and Ill update you once I do. Once again thank you very much for the help and info you provided, I really do appreciate it!!