How you can protect your GPU during this shortage explained

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I’ve decided to create a thread after countless of players stated that the game has killed their GPU. Of course, if you are already tech savvy, then this isn’t for you.

Firstly, please understand that the game is both CPU and GPU demanding.

It is able to leverage and push modern GPUs to 100% usage, this is assuming you do not have an existing bottleneck from your CPU/RAM. If you have at least a one gen old 8 core or modern 6 core CPU (Ryzen 3700x/5600x etc or above). it will likely be capable of pushing your GPU to 100% usage. Otherwise, you would be facing CPU bottleneck instead.

Bonus Info

(I had a 3500x that was hitting 100% CPU usage in this game during the busiest moments, when it hit 100% CPU usage I would encounter lag spikes. After upgrading to a 5800x, CPU usage stayed below 50% and I’ve never encountered a spike caused by CPU bottleneck anymore). This is how to know if you have a CPU bottleneck.

The good thing about this is that you can be sure the game is fully taking advantage of your GPU and is obtaining every FPS possible from your machine, the bad thing is that running it at 100% usage for prolonged periods daily is NEVER RECOMMENDED as it can deteriorate the lifespan of your GPU. This needs no explanation.

The solution to this is to cap your FPS at a point that prevents your GPU from hitting 100% all the time.

Here are a few examples:

FPS UNCAPPED (Goes to 130 FPS) - 100% GPU USAGE, 75C

FPS CAPPED to 90 - 73% GPU USAGE, GPU TEMP: 69C

FPS CAPPED to 60 - 49% GPU USAGE, 66C

As mentioned, cap your FPS at a point where it isn’t at 100% GPU usage all the time… play and experiment with the numbers while also monitoring the GPU usage using an OSD. In addition, avoid setting a cap that is above your monitor’s refresh rate.

Lowering in game settings can also lower the GPU usage and Setting a good fan curve can help keep temps in check as well. These are all simple methods on how you can reduce the stress on your GPU and not burden its lifespan.

All tools used were MSI Afterburner and RTSS…

Protect your GPU and stay safe my fellow gamers.

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In any game except some cases in competitive FPS you should cap your FPS at the Hz of your monitor and turn in Vsync.

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For people with weaker GPU, they might never hit the fps that matches the refresh rate (HZ) of their monitor… so that will not do anything to protect their GPU…

I have a 144hz monitor but as you can see @ uncap it isn’t hitting 140+ fps at all :slight_smile:

For this case, setting a cap of 140 FPS would be the same as leaving it at uncapped, allow my GPU to push itself to 100% usage for majority of time.

This is why I decided not to mention it in this guide :slight_smile:

It’s good knowledge to know… for those that are reading.

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Then cap it to 60. There is a toggle for that.

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If you had a 60Hz display 59 might work better in some cases, also good to keep in mind. Vsync should do the same thing as setting it to 60 but more reliably.

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Running your GPU at 100% even with an intentionally designed stress test can’t make it fail, if it does, you should get warranty service. If not because you don’t have a warranty or don’t want to risk it, yeah maybe do what it takes not to stress it.

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Of course, it will not be failing immediately, going 100% usage for prolonged periods daily is exactly what you can do to reduce the lifespan of your card. The worse thing you want to do to any hardware is to run HOT and HARD for prolonged periods daily…

Even if you had warranty, do note that there is a shortage now… the best advice is to do what you can atm… I still have another year warranty for this but I would seriously not count on it with the given situation.

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I want my pc to last for as long as possible

Running it on capped even though I don’t need to do that to keep it nice and cool

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The difference between vsync and just setting to 60fps is vsync should afaik also take trametimes into account. Since 58 frames in 0.1s + 2 frames in 0.9s still would be 60fps. With vsync enabled it should evenly push a frame every 1/60s exactly when monitor is ready to draw a new frame.

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Yes. Many people do not see the long term benefits of doing this… having built PCs for 13 years and worked professionally in the industry as a tech for a couple years, I have repaired and troubleshooting a wide variety of consumer electronics.

I have then retired from the industry of consumer electronics and started working as a software engineer for 2 years. I am also experienced in other aspects of IT such as Data Science and IT Infrastructure.

This is the best advice I could give for people looking to protect their beloved hardware during this shortage.

Again… this is not a thread on how people can sync their fps with their monitor, some people got to stay on topic :sweat_smile:

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If you have actually read the post… that is what was Illustrated…

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I don’t see which comment of theirs you are replying to.

You can run a GPU at 100%. Like I said, if you don’t want to risk it, cap your FPS or reduce your power limit (which Jay showed in his video). I am extremely skeptical that there is something about this particular game - it goes for any game.

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Yeap, there is no need to be skeptical… with my experience I can assure you that the issue isn’t with this particular game. There are many games that could leverage the capabilities of modern GPU and I guess that is what the people meant by the games killing their gpu (lol).

As I mentioned, this is meant to be a simple guide for people that aren’t familiar with hardware. I have avoided including any methods that would involve tinkering with power related tweaks.

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I turned the setting on in game setting to cap fps to 60 and it made a mess. I was getting a weird lighting flicker from the in game lighting sources such as the sun which was also flickering while I had map up. It was like capping the fps at 60 fps was making it worse.

I reset the game settings back to default and the flickering etc went away and picture was crystal clear again.

I also did get some artifacting and crashing in the rainy areas of morningdale but I have since cleaned my GPU fans and contacts and reseated it and touch would its been okay.

Never had a problem in 130hrs until I went into Morningdale. That zone is a card killer.

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Ummm… How do you do this?
How do you ‘cap’ your FPS?

I already play the game on low settings… (to be honest, I dont see much difference between low setting and high).

Nevermind… I found it… lol :upside_down_face:

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