I upgraded from an RX 6600 to an RTX 3070, but my performance in Fortnite and CS2 has barely changed. In Fortnite using DX12, I get around 80 FPS regardless of whether I use low or epic settings. CS2 usually runs between 100 and 144 FPS, but can drop to 80–100. Benchmark videos using the same i5-11400 and RTX 3070 show noticeably higher frame rates.
In CS2, CPU usage is around 50% and GPU usage is roughly 40%, so neither appears to be fully utilized. I have already tried setting the game and Windows power plan to high performance. XMP is enabled, temperatures are good, and the graphics card is definitely connected to the GPU rather than the motherboard. I also used DDU in safe mode to remove the old graphics drivers before installing the latest NVIDIA drivers.
My system has an i5-11400, 32GB of DDR4-3200 memory, an RTX 3070, a 650W power supply, an MSI H510M-A Pro motherboard, and a Peerless Assassin 120 cooler. Could the CPU be limiting performance even though total CPU usage is only around 50%? If so, why do systems with the same listed hardware perform better in benchmark videos?
4 Answers
It is still worth checking the usual configuration items: confirm XMP is active, enable Resizable BAR if your BIOS supports it, verify the GPU is running in the correct PCIe slot and link mode, and check that the monitor is connected to the RTX 3070. Your driver cleanup was a good step, so repeatedly reinstalling drivers is unlikely to solve this by itself.
Fortnite and CS2 are heavily dependent on CPU performance, especially the speed of the main game thread. A game can be CPU-limited even when total CPU usage is only 50%, because one core may be running at or near full capacity while the other cores are less busy. When that happens, upgrading the GPU will not raise the frame rate much, but you can often increase visual settings without losing many FPS.
Since your GPU is only around 40% utilized and lowering settings does not improve your FPS, this strongly suggests a CPU or game-engine limit rather than a graphics-card problem. Make sure V-Sync, frame limits, and any monitor or driver refresh-rate limits are disabled. Also compare benchmark videos carefully, since their memory timings, BIOS settings, background processes, game version, map, and exact settings can all affect the result.
The i5-11400 can limit very high frame rates in CPU-heavy games, particularly at 1080p with competitive settings. The benchmark videos may also be using faster RAM, lower-latency settings, different maps or scenes, overclocked power limits, or a cleaner background environment. Try monitoring per-core CPU usage, CPU clock speed, GPU power, and frame-time graphs rather than relying only on total CPU usage.
I have already checked XMP and the other BIOS settings, and I used DDU before installing the NVIDIA drivers. One of my SSDs also benchmarks slower than expected, although Fortnite is installed on a faster drive and still has the same issue.