Help with 100% CPU use.

[juliusgeeza]

I ran through a lot of issues getting to play the game in an acceptable state. Achieving 60FPS average and happy with the state of the game.

Now after a windows update and an Nvidia update, I have 100% CPU utilisation and high temps even in the loading screen. I could play the game but I’m not willing to burn out my CPU for a 20 year old game.

I’ve rebuilt the shaders, I’ve waited in the menu screen for 10 mins. After rebuilding shaders the CPU until drops and is acceptable, however the CPU temp is still consistently 98deg… The only other option I have is to do a clean install, or stop playing the game.

Has anyone else experienced this? And if so, does anyone know of a fix?

[drakeloreroar]

Well for starters what are your specs? Can't do much without knowing that. Are you using a 13th or 14th generation Intel? And if so have you installed the BIOS patch?

[AmaiAmai]

If your CPU temp is 98 degrees, then just disable turbo mode when playing the game.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufacture/desktop/create-a-custom-power-plan-technicalreference?view=windows-11

1. Create power plan using instructions at the link above, below if the one above is too hard for you. It's got pictures:

https://www.windowscentral.com/how-create-and-manage-power-plans-windows-11

2. Change the power plan settings and change CPU maximum to "99%" (will disable CPU turbo mode in Windows). Link directly above you literally shows you how to open the advanced options on a power plan.

If your PC still overheats after turning off turbo mode then you have a cooling issue that needs to be addressed. You will lose performance, but most of the time games aren't limited by overall clock speed anyway which is why overclocking is next to useless in 2025 besides inflating benchmarks and egos.

Oh and creating a space heater.

[★REM★]

The game might be 20 years old, but the rendering engine is THE most demanding on the market. No surprise your old CPU is used 100%.
The best advice you can get? upgrade your CPU.

Another advice, repaste your cpu. No matter how demanding the game is, you should never reach temps close to dying point, unless your paste dried out.

[AmaiAmai]

Oh here we go, an UE 5 shill has appeared. Just amazing how many people will excuse lazy development in 2025. It's why gamers get what they deserve

[LawrenceOfUrLabia]

Originally posted by juliusgeeza:

I ran through a lot of issues getting to play the game in an acceptable state. Achieving 60FPS average and happy with the state of the game.

Now after a windows update and an Nvidia update, I have 100% CPU utilisation and high temps even in the loading screen. I could play the game but I’m not willing to burn out my CPU for a 20 year old game.

I’ve rebuilt the shaders, I’ve waited in the menu screen for 10 mins. After rebuilding shaders the CPU until drops and is acceptable, however the CPU temp is still consistently 98deg… The only other option I have is to do a clean install, or stop playing the game.

Has anyone else experienced this? And if so, does anyone know of a fix?

You're having this problem with the original 20 year old game still? Why are you posting in the remastered forum if your playing OG?

Also, if your PC is running 100% util playing OG don't even bother with the new remastered version for this game they just released, this year, in 2025. The game that's not even 2 months old on the new Unreal 5 engine.

[dulany67]

Specs? Resolution? You say you're at 60, with or without upscaling and FG?

[FatalError]

If your temp is at 98C EVER, you have serious cooling issues my guy. If you're talking fahrenheit it's cool af so whats the issue? 60fps sounds like you have old hardware, but no one can know without your specs and settings.

[AmaiAmai]

Originally posted by LawrenceOfUrLabia:

Originally posted by juliusgeeza:

I ran through a lot of issues getting to play the game in an acceptable state. Achieving 60FPS average and happy with the state of the game.

Now after a windows update and an Nvidia update, I have 100% CPU utilisation and high temps even in the loading screen. I could play the game but I’m not willing to burn out my CPU for a 20 year old game.

I’ve rebuilt the shaders, I’ve waited in the menu screen for 10 mins. After rebuilding shaders the CPU until drops and is acceptable, however the CPU temp is still consistently 98deg… The only other option I have is to do a clean install, or stop playing the game.

Has anyone else experienced this? And if so, does anyone know of a fix?

You're having this problem with the original 20 year old game still? Why are you posting in the remastered forum if your playing OG?

Also, if your PC is running 100% util playing OG don't even bother with the new remastered version for this game they just released, this year, in 2025. The game that's not even 2 months old on the new Unreal 5 engine.

Not sure if this is a troll attempt or serious. If serious, the educational system is really frightening and needs some work.

OP is saying that it is this game causing an issue, but that it shouldn't be happening because the game's underlying tech is 20 years old.

Though they are wrong about that because UE 5 was added to the game and UE 5 is not 20 years old, the subject is still this game...

[GER420est.1996]

Every GPU driver update will make your shader config incompatible. A workaround for that is to recompile shaders each time you install new GPU drivers. In order to do so, go to

C:\Users\%YOUR_USER_NAME%\Documents\My Games\Oblivion Remastered\Saved\SaveGames

and delete

Save_Setting.sav

When you start the game shaders will recompile and the "issue" will be fixed. You will have to adjust some settings, because they will be reset to defaults though.

[IchigoMait]

Increase your graphics settings, so you get gpu bottlenecked instead.
Or get a better cpu, so you get gpu bottlenecked that way.
Either your gpu or cpu is a bottleneck depending on the game, graphics settings and hardware, no way around it.

There is nothing wrong about having 100% cpu utilisation. Means your graphics card is too good or graphics settings are too low or both. Or your cpu is garbage for the game, or could be actually a good cpu, but you're just barely hitting the 100% mark, the only difference being between a good cpu hitting 100% vs a bad cpu hitting 100%, is that performance is way worse for the latter obviously, or if your cpu is extremely good, there is barely any cpu usage % wise.
Sad that can't see how much you can be missing in terms of % wise to get the max potential from a cpu, when you're hitting the 100%, besides going by fps.

There have been also peeps who complain cpu usage is not 100%, while they lack the understanding, that they're gpu is bottlenecking and/or their cpu is just more than good enough.

Also, why the F nobody ever lists their specs. Also if it's a laptop, pc, or some weird knock off pc with laptop specs.
Also matters how your gpu is running in terms of the bus interface, what pcie lane amount is and what gen is being used, gpu-z can show what your gpu can support, and what you're actually running, gen/lane differences between each other being always 2x bandwidth amount.

[DreadEye2020]

Yor specs doesn't matter. Just force the game to rebuild the shaders the way user Ger420est suggested.
But instead of deleting your Save_Settings.sav file, move it out of the folder onto your desktop. After the shaders rebuilt in game, cancel the setup, agree to TOS of game, then quit the game. Drop your old sav file from desktop back into the folder overwriting the newly generated sav file.

[Major Tom]

Roll back your Nvidia drivers to 566.36. They completely botched the latest releases, so stay on these until they come out with something acceptable.

https://www.nvidia.com/content/DriverDownloads/confirmation.php?url=/Windows/566.36/566.36-desktop-win10-win11-64bit-international-dch-whql.exe&lang=us&type=GeForce

[juliusgeeza]

I7 10 core 13620H
8GB 4070
64GB RAM
2560x1440 screen res
165hz refresh rate

I already tried recompiling shaders several times. I even did it by deleting Nvidia shader caches.
Downgraded to Nvidia driver from before I noticed this being a problem, it looked promising however after compiling shaders the CPU is still running at 98degC IN THE MENU.

Next I’m going to try Nvidia driver 566.36, though that seems way too early considering all these problems started after the driver update on May 12th.

I’m considering that the real problem could be that I’ve cooked my thermal paste? I’ve had the laptop for less than a year.

[juliusgeeza]

I will also look into powerplan / undervolting. Not something I would have thought I’d need to do, but I agree I don’t need the CPU pushing to it’s limits.