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DPete27
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Game Testing Help Needed

Fri Oct 28, 2016 9:58 am

** I haven't tried this yet, just wanting to get everything ready ahead of time**
I'd like to test AMDs Framerate Target Control (FTC) feature to see if there is any effect on framerate smoothness.  I know I'll need to graph a framerate log and a log of GPU clocks.  Two programs that come to mind are FRAPS and GPU-z.  The challenge is how to ensure the data points from each log are properly aligned if they're coming from assumedly two different programs.....or is there a single program that can log both sets of data concurrently?

I'm thinking of 2 or 3 testing scenarios:
1) FTC off (baseline data)
2) Set FTC at a framerate lower than observed in test 1 so that FTC is constantly keeping clocks below their max.
3) Set FTC at the average of FPS from test 1 so that FTC is only limiting clocks some of the time.
Main: i5-3570K, ASRock Z77 Pro4-M, MSI RX480 8G, 500GB Crucial BX100, 2 TB Samsung EcoGreen F4, 16GB 1600MHz G.Skill @1.25V, EVGA 550-G2, Silverstone PS07B
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DPete27
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Re: Game Testing Help Needed

Mon Oct 31, 2016 11:08 am

Bump:
I did a quick test of GPU-z log function.  It records a time stamp that can be used to align it's results with FPS data.  However, it only logs at 1 second intervals.  I'm not sure that will be frequent enough when FTC kicks in.  Any suggestions?
Main: i5-3570K, ASRock Z77 Pro4-M, MSI RX480 8G, 500GB Crucial BX100, 2 TB Samsung EcoGreen F4, 16GB 1600MHz G.Skill @1.25V, EVGA 550-G2, Silverstone PS07B
HTPC: A8-5600K, MSI FM2-A75IA-E53, 4TB Seagate SSHD, 8GB 1866MHz G.Skill, Crosley D-25 Case Mod
 
DPete27
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Location: Wisconsin, USA

Re: Game Testing Help Needed

Mon Nov 14, 2016 12:51 am

I got everything set up.  However, I can't seem to get AMD Frame Rate Target Control to actually work.  I'm doing the benchmark test in Rise of Tomb Raider @ 2560x1080 and max settings.  It doesn't matter if I turn FTC off, or set it to 45fps, it's always cranking out ~100fps in the first scene and ~60fps in the 2nd and 3rd scenes. My RX480 sits at 1305MHz core clock the entire benchmark.  PLEASE HELP!!

I was able to get some core clock throttling by enabling the "Power Efficiency" switch right above Frame Rate Target Control.  This dropped average GPU power usage (as reported by GPU-z) by 15W without having any noticeable effect on fps or frame rate consistency.  The FRAPS graphs with "Power Efficiency" on and off look basically the same.  In fact, of the last two scenes comprising of an average of 3777 samples, there were exactly 116 outliers in EACH test run.  The Power Efficiency - ON test had slightly (15) more outliers below the trendline and the Power Efficiency - OFF test had slightly (15) more outliers above the trendline.
Main: i5-3570K, ASRock Z77 Pro4-M, MSI RX480 8G, 500GB Crucial BX100, 2 TB Samsung EcoGreen F4, 16GB 1600MHz G.Skill @1.25V, EVGA 550-G2, Silverstone PS07B
HTPC: A8-5600K, MSI FM2-A75IA-E53, 4TB Seagate SSHD, 8GB 1866MHz G.Skill, Crosley D-25 Case Mod
 
juzz86
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Re: Game Testing Help Needed

Mon Nov 14, 2016 1:22 am

I found FRTC quite hit-and-miss on the old 295X2, for what it's worth.

Granted there's been a few driver revisions since I went Green, but when setting it it would occasionally work and introduce intolerable judder, or just plain not work and clocks/temps were as you're seeing them now.

I run Afterburner, so I switched to having RivaTuner do the work and it worked perfectly. I only ever used it for Bethesda titles, but I found v-sync off, FRTC off, RivaTuner locked at 60 produced a much more fluid experience than just v-sync on 60. RivaTuner also successfully dialled the card back accordingly.

I never did a lot more than that - my conclusion was that the AMD FRTC is a bit half-cocked and, as I already run Afterburner full time, I had a working replacement. I'm not sure what to suggest outside of a third-party app, other than try another application, in the (very unlikely) instance there's an FRTC bug with RoTR?
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