Low CPU & GPU usage + low FPS [Fixed]

I usually have very bad FPS drops during heavy teamfights but it sometimes occurs seemingly for no reason.

Here are some of my system specs:

GPU: NVidia GTX 1060 6GB
RAM: 16GB DDR3 @ 1600 MHz :frowning:
CPU: i7 4790K @ 4.3 GHz
OS: Windows 10

I have tried a lot of things to fix this. I have been playing on this specs for about 2 years now, but the FPS drops became noticeable after I got a 144Hz monitor. For what I have noted by using Rivatuner and watching a replay of one of my latest matches in which I complained about low FPS (lower than the refresh rate), my computer had both CPU and GPU usage below 40% most of the time.
I run the game on the lowest graphics settings except for resolution, render scale set to 75%.

Some of the things I have tried:

  • Change the power management of my GPU to ā€œprefer maximum performanceā€;
  • Checking if XMP was enabled in the BIOS (unfortunately, there isnā€™t even the option to enable it);
  • Disabling hardware acceleration in any applications running in the background;
  • Updating drivers;
  • Updating even the BIOS;
  • Monitoring GPU temperature to check for thermal throttling;
  • Setting the power limit in MSi Afterburner to the maximum I could;
  • Testing performance with HPET disabled and enabled;
  • Changing some values in the registry following a YouTube tutorial.

I have also started playing with Reduce Buffering set to off, but I havenā€™t noticed any significant changes.

Edit/Fix:
After some testing around, I figured out my performance is way better with Reduce Buffering set to off. Spectating the replays in problematic matches got 170 FPS average.

Youā€™re probably being bottlenecked by your RAM to be honest, with the rest of that hardware. If you drop your game settings to the lowest settings available to you and close all programs in the background, can you consistently keep high FPS? We donā€™t directly troubleshoot FPS issues like this usually since youā€™re getting over 60 FPS most likely with that rig, but based on that hardware Iā€™d expect your RAM isnā€™t fast enough to keep up with the rest of your hardware, hence them dropping to low usage. It could also be overheating at the CPU level - worth a look at HWMonitor for that.

Beyond that, maybe someone else on the forums can provide some more optimization advice.

Edit: one more thing to keep in mind - running the game at resolutions higher than 1080p becomes increasingly performance-expensive. If you also have a high resolution monitor in addition to high refresh rate, the hardware you have may not be quite enough to consistently keep high FPS at some settings levels.

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Thanks for the insights! Iā€™ll make some tests later today.

No prob, and good luck with it either way!

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After some testing around, I figured out my performance is way better with Reduce Buffering set to off. Spectating the replays in problematic matches got 170 FPS average.