Low frame rates with r9 280x

[zyklon]

So recently I have put one r9 280x in my main PC (pulled off from my mining rig) to play some games. At first all was good...getting adequate frame rates on different games such as Thief, Bioshock Infinite, Cyrsis 3 etc. Then all of a sudden I started experiencing a massive constant frame drop: for example I launch Crysis 3 and instead of getting the usual 50fps, I am getting 15fps at most on Very High settings. Turning the settings to low will only gain me 5 fps. I replaced the card with another one and same thing. After 2 days of playing with drivers the problem was gone...until today I launched Crysis 3 and BAM...the problem is back. Same thing on other games...e.g. Bioshock getting around 40fps instead of the usual 80fps and so on.

 

I monitored the activity level on the VGA during gaming and it is in the normal level of 99% and therefore it is not being underutilised.

 

FYI, Cpu is i5 [email protected] and 8GB 1600mhz RAM. AMD Driver is 14.4 (also tried with 13.12)

 

Any suggestions before I go crazy? Thanks

Edited May 7, 2014 by zyklon