# To upgrade or not to upgrade video cards?



## sonny_c (Nov 20, 2015)

My current PC consist of:



Windows 7 Pro 64-bit
Intel i5-3570k @3.40GHz
ASUS Sabertooth Z77 motherboard
16GB Corsair PC3-10700H (667MHz)
256GB Samsung SSD 850 Pro
(2) XFX Radeon HD 6670 1GB
Monitor #1: NEC MultiSync LCD2490WUXi2‑BK
Monitor #2: NEC MultiSync EA241WM-BK
Monitor #3: ASUS VS238H-P

I am currently experiencing performance issues when I am editing photos in LR CC and watching a movie using VLC.  Sometimes LR will freeze for a minute or two, sometimes VLC will get choppy, and sometimes my keyboard will be unresponsive.  The video cards are not very current, I'm guessing older than two years.  Do you guys/gals think upgrading video cards will solve these issues?


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## clee01l (Nov 20, 2015)

sonny_c said:


> ...Do you guys/gals think upgrading video cards will solve these issues?


Three monitors?  If you are watching video while working in LR, you might consider adding a second video card not replacing a video card. Using two GPUs (one for movies and one for LR) would probably help with the stutter.


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## sonny_c (Nov 20, 2015)

clee01l said:


> Three monitors?  If you are watching video while working in LR, you might consider adding a second video card not replacing a video card. Using two GPUs (one for movies and one for LR) would probably help with the stutter.



Hi Cletus,

Thank you  for replying.  I actually do have two video cards in my PC.  If I'm not mistaken on one vid card I have the NEC MultiSync EA241WM-BK connected via DVI and the ASUS VS238H-P connected via HDMI.  On the other video card I have the NEC MultiSync LCD2490WUXi2‑BK connected via  DVI.


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## clee01l (Nov 20, 2015)

Sorry, I missed the "(2)" in your initial post.   So, would you be replacing both with 2 new GPUs?

Do you need to do something in Windows settings to force Windows to use BOTH GPUs?


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## sonny_c (Nov 20, 2015)

clee01l said:


> Sorry, I missed the "(2)" in your initial post.   So, would you be replacing both with 2 new GPUs?
> 
> Do you need to do something in Windows settings to force Windows to use BOTH GPUs?



Correct, I would be replacing both GPUs.  I do not know much about GPUs so I am not sure if there is such a setting.  The reason I am using 2 vid cards is because it allows me to use a 3 monitor setup.


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## Linwood Ferguson (Nov 20, 2015)

Before spending money on the new card, try tuning off GPU in LR.  My GUESS is that it's getting competing or conflicting orders, and if you have LR not try to use it, it might not freeze.  At least it's a free check.

I have yet to hear anyone rave about astounding improvement in LR speed by having a good video card.  I've seen a lot of people have issues, and some that said it worked fine, but I keep hoping someone will say "off it's very slow, on it just flies".   Haven't seen that.  I'm not sure a lot of people will even say they can tell the difference, except when "on" has problems.


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## sonny_c (Nov 21, 2015)

Ferguson said:


> Before spending money on the new card, try tuning off GPU in LR.  My GUESS is that it's getting competing or conflicting orders, and if you have LR not try to use it, it might not freeze.  At least it's a free check.
> 
> I have yet to hear anyone rave about astounding improvement in LR speed by having a good video card.  I've seen a lot of people have issues, and some that said it worked fine, but I keep hoping someone will say "off it's very slow, on it just flies".   Haven't seen that.  I'm not sure a lot of people will even say they can tell the difference, except when "on" has problems.



Linwood,

I appreciate the feedback.

My issues were much worse before I turned off 'Use Graphics Processor' options in LR.  I could barely edit a few photos before LR would crash and shut down.  I later learned my graphics card was not supported for 'Use Graphics Processor'.  I was hoping that a more powerful graphics card would lighten the load when I was multitasking.


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## acquacow (Nov 21, 2015)

I'd drop into your bios and disable speedstep and processor c-states. This will prevent your CPU from cycling frequency and will run your system at max performance. I had a lot of random glitches with stuff years back and traced it all to speedstep and c-states.

Try it for a week and see if it solves it.


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## sonny_c (Nov 21, 2015)

acquacow said:


> I'd drop into your bios and disable speedstep and processor c-states. This will prevent your CPU from cycling frequency and will run your system at max performance. I had a lot of random glitches with stuff years back and traced it all to speedstep and c-states.
> 
> Try it for a week and see if it solves it.



Interesting.  I've already made the changes in my bios and I'm excited to see how well the changes work.  Thank you for your advice.


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## tspear (Nov 22, 2015)

If you already have the GPU turned off, new video cards are likely not going to help.
Look at using Task Manager as a first step to see where you are performance constrained. I am inclined to thin you are I/O bound at some point, this could be the disk, network, or the main bus on the mother board used to access memory and talk to the video cards. You are moving a massive amount of information around.

Speedstep and C-States are energy saving technologies. Sort of like the new automatic engine shutoff (C-States) when you stop a car at traffic lights, or the over drive in an automatic transmission (Speedstep). When running a video, you need a really powerful machine to allow the CPU to engage either technology.

Tim


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## sonny_c (Nov 24, 2015)

tspear said:


> If you already have the GPU turned off, new video cards are likely not going to help.
> Look at using Task Manager as a first step to see where you are performance constrained. I am inclined to thin you are I/O bound at some point, this could be the disk, network, or the main bus on the mother board used to access memory and talk to the video cards. You are moving a massive amount of information around.
> 
> Speedstep and C-States are energy saving technologies. Sort of like the new automatic engine shutoff (C-States) when you stop a car at traffic lights, or the over drive in an automatic transmission (Speedstep). When running a video, you need a really powerful machine to allow the CPU to engage either technology.
> ...



My current video cards are out of the recommended 2 year range of compatibility as suggested by Adobe.  That's why I had to turn off the GPU option in LR.  Adobe listed a few cards that are compatible with the GPU option.

Just as a side note, my Windows 7 Experience Index is as follows
- Processor: 7.6
- Memory(RAM): 7.6
- Graphics: 7.1
- Gaming Graphics: 7.1
- Primary hard disk: 7.9

According to Windows this index assesses key system components on a scale of 1.0 to 7.9.  The numbers would say my graphics cards are the bottle neck.  Not sure how much stock I put into those numbers but it is a start.

Before I thought about upgrading the video card I wanted to upgrade the memory to 32GB of DDR 2400 (PC3 19200).

Thanks Tim for your feedback.


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## acquacow (Nov 24, 2015)

I racked all 7.9 on my last setup with a GTX970 as my GPU... but I've used LR for years w/o GPU accel and I don't really notice a difference now with a new 980Ti vs not having it.

My CPU is a 5930k though, so I have lots of cores for Camera Raw to consume.


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