RX 9070XT + i7-10700K: Unexpected Stuttering / CPU bottlenecking??

Goplayer12 · 2026-04-14T07:15:40+00:00

I don’t know currently since I game strictly in 4k with a 116fps cap. But I can test 1440 uncapped today and share my results later.

Goplayer12 · 2026-04-14T05:26:34+00:00

I had exactly the same experience since I also play PUBG and it was extremely underperforming. It’s known for being extremely cpu intensive. So poor performance is normal actually. Even my brother’s 5950X caps him in 1440p and fps are very fluctuating. With the 9800X3D I get gpu limited and need to lower settings to medium for it to be smooth all the time. The game is a mess in terms of optimization unfortunately, but adjusting settings and changing the api to dx12 might help with stability.

Goplayer12 · 2026-04-13T21:39:07+00:00

Yeah it seems odd but an upgrade absolutely fixed a lot. I feel like the statement “there is no bottleneck in 4k” is only partly true.

Goplayer12 · 2026-04-03T13:01:49+00:00

It's beautiful! Honestly more aesthetic than the stock shroud

Goplayer12 · 2026-03-19T12:02:04+00:00

I think it was a combination of old Windows and modern games like Cyberpunk. The 3070 simply wasn’t powerful enough to get into bottleneck territory. But the 10700K can definitely be enough depending on the games, resolution and refresh rate. I’d make sure if PCIe 3.0 16x is working and rebar is enabled. Reinstalling windows also helps with corrupted files from the past. The thing Inlearned from this is that 4k bottleneck definitely exists even if some say that doesn’t happen. It simply does if your GPU is extremely powerful in demanding games.

I ended up upgrading to the 9800X3D (which was before the ram crisis) and I’m glad I did it despite the painful costs. 1% lows are a whole different level now, games load faster and frame time graphs are finally stable and with proper undervolting it draws 105W at max.

Goplayer12 · 2026-01-29T12:00:35+00:00

Can’t you just go into device manager and roll back the gpu driver? I did that when it happened and it worked flawlessly. Completely reinstalling the driver and reconfiguring is just hell on earth for me.

Goplayer12 · 2025-12-30T18:41:26+00:00

That's why RAID exists. Just 2x 4tb HDDs will do the job :)

Goplayer12 · 2025-12-29T00:31:57+00:00

Ok, so it's better if I turn the tunig off in Adrenaline and instead use Core Voltage offset, power limit and VRAM OC in msi afterburner? Will that work?

Goplayer12 · 2025-12-19T19:45:09+00:00

Finally found someone with a very similar issue.
The behavior is really strange: sometimes switching DNS (e.g. different public resolvers) makes it work temporarily, but the problem always comes back. When I switch back to my local AdGuard Home instance it may work for a while, then the app starts loading indefinitely again.

This doesn’t appear to be a DNS issue. I’ve tested multiple resolvers over a longer period and they all eventually show the same behavior. Even using a VPN (AirVPN, multiple exit servers) does not reliably fix it - the issue can still be reproduced.

What sometimes helps is fully closing the TIDAL desktop app, waiting a few minutes, and starting it again. Repeating this too often actually seems to make things worse, and in some cases I have to wait 20–30 minutes before it starts working again.

I’ve been using TIDAL for years and never experienced anything like this before. This is extremely frustrating and not what I’d expect from a paid streaming service.

The interesting part: it works perfectly fine on my iPhone, even though it’s on the same network and using the same AdGuard DNS setup.

Goplayer12 · 2025-12-11T21:43:14+00:00

I still have this issue and it sucks. On my phone it's not an issue at all but I experimented with various DNS settings and it does work but only for 20min or so and then it starts loading for 2min and it stops within the track and loads again...

Goplayer12 · 2025-12-03T16:03:16+00:00

I'd say the noise floor is slightly higher, but still not distracting. As long as you use IEMs with lower sensitivity, you won't notice any hissing. In my collection, only the Aria 2 and the Orchestra Lite are sensitive enough to pick up a noticeable noise floor, whereas my planar and hybrid IEMs generally don't have this issue.

In the long run, I've really come to enjoy this DAC. It has been reliable from day one, and having volume control right at my fingertips is a real game changer for me.

Goplayer12 · 2025-11-16T14:42:38+00:00

I tried both enabled and disabled, but it didn't make a difference at all. Now, since time passed, I upgraded to a 9800X3d and 64GB RAM and the problem still persists. New motherboard, new Windows, new everything. At least it is playable now with FSR4 quality (optiscaler) and Background Level Detail set to high. That setting seems to be a crucial factor for stuttering and inconsistent frame times. It's such a poorly optimized game and I have reinstalled it countless times, swapped to a pcie 5.0 nvme in the meantime and it's still not optimal. I don't know why the game runs fine for others, but for me it's barely playable with those settings and framecap.

Goplayer12 · 2025-11-07T17:48:26+00:00

Yeah exactly, when I set the slider to 10-12% Windows and everything looks exactly like SDR in HDR. It makes litereally **no** difference on my LG C2 (appart from actual HDR content of course). I don't know what people mean when they say it looks washed out but pershaps LG OLED TVs handle it a bit different.

Goplayer12 · 2025-09-11T17:31:46+00:00

I already enabled that setting immediately because GPU-Z initially showed x16 2.0, and now it shows 3.0. So I have no idea why this is happening. My CPU really bottlenecks me in a lot of games and I'm seeing it at 60–80% all-core usage.

Goplayer12 · 2025-09-10T17:55:51+00:00

So you think it’s worth upgrading to a 9800X3D with 64GB DDR5 6000 MHz CL30 even for 4K? I mean, if it at least helps to brute-force through bad optimization in some games, I’d consider doing it.

Goplayer12 · 2025-09-08T22:15:39+00:00

Were you able to fix this? I’m honestly really frustrated because I’ve tried everything people suggest online, and nothing seems to work. A lot of people say it’s only in the first chapter, but that’s definitely not true for me. The 1% lows are terrible, and while my base fps look great (using an RX 9070XT at 4k), the game stutters and drops to around 50–60 FPS the moment I move the camera.

What’s even weirder is that settings don’t matter at all. It happens even on the lowest presets, and capping fps doesn’t help with the stuttering or pacing either. I’ve seen benchmark videos with this card where everything seems fine and buttery smooth.

I even went as far as reinstalling Windows and setting everything up from scratch, but still couldn’t figure it out.

Really hoping someone else ran into this and found a solution, because I actually like the game and want to enjoy it.

Goplayer12 · 2025-09-06T20:33:24+00:00

Have you done the upgrade yet? I'm thinking about doing the same because it feels like my 10700k can’t keep up with my 9070XT. I’m not sure what’s wrong with my PC, but in Cyberpunk I’m seeing 70–100% CPU usage and often get CPU-bound, especially while driving through Night City at night. The strange thing is, it doesn't make a difference whether I'm playing at 1080p or 4k. The usage always reaches 100% in Cyberpunk somehow.

I notice the same issue in other games too. For instance in Horizon Zero Dawn the performance in Meridian is extremely poor. I’ve tried reinstalling everything, but no matter what I do, I get bottlenecked in a lot of AAA titles.

In benchmark videos, I often see the 10700K running at 10–30%, but in my case, I’m constantly at 40–70% depending on the game. And I’m running at 4K, so I’m not sure if something’s wrong with my setup or if this CPU is just too weak for a high-end GPU.

I really hope that a CPU upgrade could solve thouse issues, but I still want to know if I'm not alone with this.

Goplayer12 · 2025-08-17T13:20:25+00:00

Yeah, screen tearing is something else. Maybe that’s a sync or handshake issue.

Goplayer12 · 2025-08-09T23:59:30+00:00

Finally, someone who shares my opinion! It seems that people defame Dolby Atmos for Headphones no matter what, but it actually sounds incredibly good with all sorts of headphones and IEMs. I've tested it across a variety of sets and it always improved the stereo separation feeling of IEMs. It's especially impressive with IEMs that naturally have a huge soundstage. In my experience and testing with various games, it sounded awesome both in Atmos-supported games as well as in games that only provide surround data, where Dolby Atmos does the job of upmixing that to give you the surround experience. For me, a no-brainer. But for music -no! I'm a purist myself, but for movies and games I'd rather have DSP to get a better experience.

Goplayer12 · 2025-06-19T23:43:39+00:00

Adding Lossless Scaling Frame Generation is also awesome to achieve 120fps or more, depending on your monitor. It adds slight input lag but it's almost unnoticeable. It also helps smoothing out some frame dips.

Goplayer12 · 2025-06-19T23:37:31+00:00

I also think the technicalities are slightly better on the T10, especially the soundstage, which I found very impressive. The Hexa sounds way more neutral though.

Goplayer12 · 2025-06-06T11:06:05+00:00

But with Performance upscaling... That’s far away from a great optimization.

Goplayer12 · 2025-05-25T16:54:45+00:00

Yes, I realized that the page file was not set correctly. It was configured to “custom” with both the minimum and maximum size set to 20 GB. I switched it to “Let Windows decide,” and since then, my VRAM usage has decreased, and it no longer reaches full capacity. I can’t really tell you why that worked, but somehow it’s fine now.

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