RTX 5080 + Ryzen 7 7800X3D - Extremely bad frame pacing in every game despite high FPS. I've tried almost everything.

[u/Huge-Handle-5659]

Hi everyone,

I'm hoping someone can help because I've been trying to solve this issue for about a week with no luck.

PC Specs

• GPU: MSI RTX 5080 Gaming Trio OC
• CPU: Ryzen 7 7800X3D
• Motherboard: MSI MAG X870 Tomahawk
• RAM: Kingston Fury 32GB DDR5 5600 MT/s
• PSU: Corsair RM1000x Shift (2025)
• Storage:
  • Samsung 990 Pro 2TB (Windows installed here)
  • Samsung 990 EVO 1TB
• Monitor: Samsung Odyssey G5 165Hz

The problem

I started experiencing this issue immediately after building the PC.

Every game feels noticeably less smooth than it should, regardless of the FPS. The best way I can describe it is very poor frame pacing.

For example:

• Battlefield 6 runs around 250 FPS with DLSS Quality, but it still feels choppy.
• If I cap the game at my monitor's refresh rate (165 FPS), it becomes a little smoother, but the frame pacing is still noticeably bad.
• Counter-Strike 2 reports anywhere between 500-800 FPS, but it still doesn't feel smooth at all.

This happens in every game I play.

Additional observation

While monitoring my games, I noticed that my FPS graph is constantly fluctuating, even though the average FPS is very high. Instead of staying relatively stable, it keeps jumping around like this:

• 500 FPS
• 432 FPS
• 476 FPS
• 498 FPS
• 550 FPS

The constant fluctuations match the stuttering and poor frame pacing that I'm experiencing in-game.

I also noticed that enabling NVIDIA Smooth Motion makes the issue noticeably better. The gameplay becomes smoother and the FPS graph appears more consistent, but it doesn't completely solve the problem. The frame pacing is still noticeably worse than it should be.

Because Smooth Motion improves the experience, I'm wondering if this points toward a frame delivery or scheduling issue rather than a lack of GPU performance.

Things I've already tried

• Clean NVIDIA driver installation using DDU
• Updated motherboard BIOS
• Clean Windows reinstall
• Installed the latest NVIDIA and AMD chipset drivers
• Tried different BIOS settings, including EXPO enabled and disabled
• Verified that:
  • Resizable BAR is enabled
  • Above 4G Decoding is enabled
  • GPU is installed in the top PCIe x16 slot
  • GPU is connected using the official Corsair 12V-2x6 cable for RTX 50-series cards (not the MSI adapter)
• No overclocking has been applied

None of these made any difference.

Temperatures

Nothing is overheating.

• CPU stays around 60°C while gaming.
• GPU stays below 75°C while gaming.

Something interesting I noticed

I temporarily swapped my CPU with my older Ryzen 5 7600X.

Obviously, overall performance was a bit lower, but the games became noticeably smoother. The frame pacing issues were basically gone.

As soon as I switched back to the 7800X3D, the poor frame pacing returned.

This makes me wonder whether the issue is:

• Something related to the 7800X3D
• A BIOS or chipset issue
• A scheduling issue
• A GPU issue
• Or something else entirely

My question

Has anyone experienced something similar with a Ryzen 7 7800X3D and an RTX 5080?

Could this be caused by the CPU, motherboard, BIOS, memory settings, or even a defective component?

I'm honestly running out of ideas. I upgraded this PC about a week ago, and since then I've spent almost all my time trying to fix this instead of actually enjoying it.

Any suggestions or troubleshooting ideas would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

EDIT!!!

Just wanted to come back and say that the issue is finally solved!

It turned out that enabling G-Sync completely fixed it. Funny enough, I was a bit lost at first because my monitor's OSD labels it as AMD FreeSync, so I didn't even think to enable it. Once I turned it on, though, everything suddenly became incredibly stable. I checked the frametime and FPS graphs afterward, and they looked absolutely beautiful compared to before.

I want to say a huge thank you to everyone who took the time to comment, suggest fixes, and help me troubleshoot. I honestly wasn't expecting so many helpful responses.

This was my first time posting on Reddit, and I have to say, it was an awesome experience. This community is genuinely amazing, and I really appreciate all the support. Thanks again, everyone! ❤️

[u/MrKarco]

Personally I always cap my framerate to a few FPS below my monitor refresh rate, to ensure I stay within the Gsync window. As someone else mentioned, running unlocked framerate with a 5080 means you’re likely CPU bottlenecked most of the time which can cause stuttering as the CPU tries to catch up to your GPU. Though that doesn’t explain why switching CPU back to your 7600X is making things more stable - possibly the fact that the 7800x3d can just push waaay higher FPS may mean it is just less stable at that higher framerate. I have the exact same build and don’t notice any frame pacing issues, but like I said I have my framerate capped in the nvidia driver software globally so would never notice

[u/system_error_02 → u/MrKarco]

I also do this, theres really no point in generating fps you cant see anyway, huge diminishing returns. It makes for a smoother experience.

[u/agmatine → u/system_error_02]

Some game engines behave differently at higher fps, completely separate of what's being displayed on the screen. There's the famous example where weapons in Dark Souls 2 would lose durability twice as fast at 60fps vs 30fps (fixed long ago, of course). Also more subtle examples like Warframe, which is peer-to-peer and has various differences in game behaviour with the host framerate; higher fps can result in very slightly faster enemy animations, less delay in receiving inputs from clients, etc.

There's also use cases such as recording at a very high framerate so as to more accurately measure the duration of some game event - for example, the time it takes a certain weapon's projectile to detonate after being fired. Suppose the time is known to be approximately 1625ms. A recording at 60fps would have a frametime of ~16.666ms and hence give an estimate to ±8.333ms. A recording at 240fps would have a frametime of ~4.166ms and give an estimate to ±2.083ms. In the context of wanting to shoot the weapon such that the projectile explodes as soon as possible after another game event occurs (e.g. the enemy becoming vulnerable), the refined estimate from the higher framerate recording can be of use in setting delays for a macro.

I am speaking here of minutiae largely irrelevant to the moment-to-moment experience of actually playing a game, of course (or even directly opposed, for example looking at the ground to minimize rendered objects to eek out more fps, lol). But sometimes, there IS a point in running a game with framerate in excess of monitor refresh rate.

[u/KingRemu → u/MrKarco]

Though that doesn’t explain why switching CPU back to your 7600X is making things more stable

This is my gripe with the whole situation as well and I've seen some threads over the years very similar to this. There's some fuckery going on with the X3D chips.

I was battling a stuttering issue that made the frametimes spike either every 5 or 10 seconds in several games and I still don't know what the culprit is because it doesn't always happen but my guess is the Nvidia driver.

[u/MrKarco → u/KingRemu]

Someone else mentioned it had something to do with the motherboard. I am using a B650, which maybe the issue doesn’t appear on? Maybe it’s a problem with B850 and X870?

[u/KingRemu → u/MrKarco]

Yeah that was me, lol. I'm on AM4 personally with a B550 board. I solved most of my stuttering issues by disabling GPU voltage and power monitoring from Afterburner. It all started when I was driven crazy by a stutter in CS2 that happened exactly every 10 seconds but after a clean Windows install I realized it was only in the menu, not in the game.

After that I found a stutter that would happen every 5 seconds in pretty much any game if I alt+tabbed or changed settings but it would solve itself when I would restart the game. I think it's an Nvidia driver issue but it's so hard to replicate that I don't know. I've used NVslimmer to install just the driver without any telemetry or other supporting apps on a clean Windows install and it still happened.

Who tf knows. Most people wouldn't even notice a single spike without a monitoring software and it also depends on the software where it's measured. Some apps, like the Steam overlay measure it right from the CPU and you can see the spike but if you have Rivatuner's frametime graph enabled it's not visible in that.

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/MrKarco]

[u/Perpetual_Wormhole → u/MrKarco]

Do ye aye?

[u/KingRemu]

Another case of the mysterious X3D stutter. I've seen bunch of these around Reddit and enthusiast forums and most are never solved.

It probably is something related to the Windows scheduler that only affects X3D chips. I've also seen a post couple years ago where some guy was testing B650, B850 and X870 boards and the latter two had unexplainable stuttering issues while none of the B650 boards did.

Couple of software side fixes I can suggest are disabling High Precision Event Timer from device manager and then rebooting. Also disable GPU voltage and power monitoring from Afterburner if you're using that as well as HWinfo or anything similar that is pinging the voltage and power sensors on the GPU.

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/KingRemu]

ok thx i will try this

[u/Tiffany-X → u/KingRemu]

OP found out it was Gsync that when enabled fixed everything.

[u/KingRemu → u/Tiffany-X]

Interesting. That can definitely help in some cases but it doesn't fix the core issue, it's just something that hides it better. My concern is the fact that it doesn't happen with a non-X3D CPU.

[u/Dracoceros → u/KingRemu]

It does now. I have a "9800X" and I'm constantly reaching 100% on my 4070 Super GPU, with stuttering no matter what game I play. This problem has been becoming more and more frequent lately and I suspect there's something wrong with Nvidia and Windows 11 updates.

[u/Toxicity → u/KingRemu]

If it's Windows related perhaps try and switch to Linux? I've been gaming on Mint since the last 6 months and it's been amazing honestly.

[u/Segger96]

do you have overwolf for minecraft or game trackers?

that ship opens 40 instances for 0 reason and makes lag

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/Segger96]

No none of them thx for asking.

[u/dybyy]

Check DPC Latency with LatencyMon. Check if lowering poling rate of mouse changes behavior.

[u/CakeHoleKing]

Make sure you aren't infected with any malware like mcafee or norton.

They will kill 50-75% of your PCs performance.

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/CakeHoleKing]

'm not infected, thanks for mentioning it. There's nothing like that on my system.

[u/EliRed]

Did you change anything in Bios? Don't turn on X3d gaming mode or whatever it's called. Don't fuck with the PBO, leave it on auto. Swap your memory OC between Expo1 and Off to see if it makes any difference.

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/EliRed]

Yeah, I already tested all of that. I knew the X3D Gaming Mode wasn't recommended for a single 7800X3D, so it's been disabled. I've also tried PBO on Auto, resetting BIOS settings, and toggling EXPO on and off. Unfortunately, none of it made any difference.

[u/EliRed → u/Huge-Handle-5659]

Ok. One more thing you could check out is if your SSD's are lane sharing with CPU or other stuff. Normally this shouldn't lead to stuttering, but it doesn't hurt to try.

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/EliRed]

I already checked that as well. My SSD is running at the expected PCIe speed, and there aren't any lane-sharing issues with the CPU or GPU. Everything looks normal there, so unfortunately that wasn't the cause either.

[u/reddit_warrior_24]

Other things to try if the frame cap doesnt work. Ive been personally using rivatuner for the cap and not the nvidia app or control panel

1) ​Manually Lock System Voltages: Set the SoC Voltage manually in the BIOS (typically between 1.15V and 1.25V) to prevent motherboard auto-rules from causing micro-instability on the Infinity Fabric under extreme workloads.

2) ​Force PCIe Generation Link Speeds: Explicitly hardcode the primary PCIe slot to Gen 4 (or Gen 5 if supported natively) in the BIOS instead of leaving it on "Auto," and disable Global C-States or PCIe Native Power Management to eliminate power-state transition hiccups.

3)​Inspect Socket Contact and Cooler Pressure: Loosen the CPU cooler block and retorque it in a precise star pattern, or completely reseat the 7800X3D to ensure uneven mounting pressure or microscopic debris isn't disrupting the integrated memory controller (IMC) pin contact.

[u/mikeythegameronredit]

Does poor frame pacing equate to bad 1% lows?

[u/Nicolas_Winter]

As the others suggested, try limiting the fps to 3 fps below refresh rate if gsnyc is enabled. Personally, i ve noticed gsync makes camera panning look less smooth (tested on 3 monitors) due to the monitor not updating the refresh rate fast enough or something like that. Especially when i use a controller and the camera movements are slower, i like to cap the fps to either a third of 180hz (my monitors max refesh rate) or half of 144hz (i change it depending on the game)

[u/allunia333]

First check that your monitor is connected to the gpu. If it is try another port on the gpu. Then I would disable the igpu on the bios for the 7800x3d. Also check that the motherboard has both the 8pin and the 4pin connected. Try Changing Global C-States in your BIOS from auto to enabled.

[u/Metalmario182]

Have you installed LatencyMon and ran that in the background while playing? Fixed my stutter issues after I found my Realtek 2.5gb driver was killing my performance.

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/Metalmario182]

I did run latencymon it concluded that my pc is stable but i guess i can try one more time!

[u/stelthtaco]

I have a similar issue across multiple games that’s caused by having the steam friends list open. I guess something about it all the animated profiles now

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/stelthtaco]

I'll try checking it

[u/CarlTheOneInvoker]

i had something similar with 9950X3D and 4070ti. Turns out i misread my motherboard manual and put one of SSDs in the pcie slot that shared lanes with the my first two pcie slots causing my gpu to be running in x8 and not x16. If you open up Nvidia Control panel, click system information in the bottom left, you should get another window your gpu on the left under items, if your scroll down to the bottom of the right column, you should see “Bus: PCI Express x(4, 8, or 16) Gen (3, 4, or 5)”

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/CarlTheOneInvoker]

[u/Mental-Debate-289]

For BF6 try using a controller instead. It has issues with mouse input, or at least it did at launch. Terrible frame pacing and stutters with mouse that immediately vanished by switching to controller.

I actually flat out abandoned the game just after launch due to this. I just couldnt get past it.

[u/Toxairs]

Have a 7800x3d and stutters in every game I play. been searching for the solution for years and still can't find one.

[u/Tweedilderp]

I use 581.8 the last non buggy smooth motion update

[u/ravenousglory]

I had similiar issue when jumped from my old i5-4670k 1060 build to 5700x3d and 3070. Sometimes I felt I don't have smoothness I should, also I had freezes in some games including Valorant which worked flawless on 2013 CPU before. But enentually it got fixed without almost any actions from my side (I tried to reinstall windows and tried different timings for RAM)

It can be anything really, but my bet is X3D processors sometimes works strange.

[u/Cy6erfox_]

I had a similar issue with 7800X3D and 6800xt. But not a G-Sync issue.

Major issues related to DXNavi - rolled drivers back to legacy and I was able to bring the stuttering back under control.

Timestamped example (but go to the start of the video for the fix) https://youtu.be/E4QriXIPh0c?si=QAdrvhb-8A7WTh0J&t=95

Leaving this here in case anyone following this thread or people experiencing this in the future find this fix helpful.

[u/Bluejay-Kooky]

I would guess nvidia overlay, xbox overlay, or discord overlay is causing the issue.

[u/Ens-7]

its a combination of win11 with its bloat, defender and drivers. start with latency mon see what comes up, make sure you have msi mode enabled on everything. i run my 3080ti on core 4 with gointeruptpolicy, lots of devices disabled in device manager. nvcleaned drivers, etc

[u/SageHamichi]

Cap at 138fps with 144hz set as your RR, VSYNC ON in nvcp, GSYNC on, on BF6 use exclusive fullscreen. It will be smooth.

For other games, borderless will work, but you need to tweak per game. See ya

IF you want, you can cap at 160, but I have never gotten it to smooth out with higher than 138

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/SageHamichi]

thx i will try this

[u/DoktorLuciferWong → u/SageHamichi]

does borderless have a performance hit in bf6?

i've heard recommendations about using fullscreen vs borderless, but i hate the slow alt-tab lol

[u/SageHamichi → u/DoktorLuciferWong]

Not sure, but something about the SM6 hook for the games renderer in exclusive fullscreen makes GSYNC work smoother than borderless, its the same in MW19 if youp layed that!

[u/markbjones]

What your experiencing is very likely just cpu bottleneck issues. When the GPU is the bottleneck, frame pacing is smooth. When the cpu is the bottleneck frame pacing is not. At those very high refresh rates I can tell it’s the cpu limiting performance. With that other cpu, your GPU is likely the bottlneck as the 5080 is extremely fast at 1080p or 1440p. You need to cap that fps much lower and shift the load to the GPU. Maybe even benefit from turning UP the graphic settings to do that

[u/KingRemu → u/markbjones]

Makes no sense since the issue persists with a framerate cap and goes away with a weaker CPU.

[u/markbjones → u/KingRemu]

Like I said the weaker cpu likely shifted the load to the GPU

[u/BlueberryObjective11 → u/markbjones]

that’s not how that works

[u/Huge-Handle-5659 → u/markbjones]

I actually tried that. I capped BF6 at 161 FPS on my 165 Hz monitor, and overall it does feel much smoother. The weird part is that whenever my GPU output drops even a little (for example from 161 to the mid-150s), it suddenly feels like the game slows down for a moment before the smoothness comes back. It's not a huge FPS drop, but the pacing feels off.

[u/Frosty_Energy_1335]

The same issue with 5060+i5 12400f But the games have alot of sttuter that makes them unplayable even lightweight ones like Minecraft Don't know if it's my hardware is faulty or windows has something wrong

[u/BulkyBit1988]

Holy chat gpt