Bloatware Benchmark: RGB Software vs. Performance (iCUE, CAM, & More)
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- čas přidán 16. 10. 2019
- RGB LED software like Corsair iCUE, MSI Dragon Center, and NZXT CAM, among others, creates a lot of bloat on new gaming PC builds. This benchmark tests the impact.
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We decided to benchmark a full suite of bloatware, like RGB and peripherals software, both individually and altogether. The testing methodology exactly matches our CPU reviews (so check one of those for notes), but switches the GPU to an ASUS Strix 2080 Ti specifically for another RGB LED component, then also uses the 9600K in an MSI ACE Z390 motherboard for the CPU. We chose the 9600K specifically because we knew it'd be a good performer in gaming overall, but that its weaker core/frequency configuration would likely illustrate the software impact more readily.
Software used includes the following:
- MSI Dragon Center (Motherboard)
- NZXT CAM (X42 cooler, HUE 2)
- Corsair iCUE (PSU, 680X LL RGB fans)
- Gigabyte RGB Fusion (RAM / GSkill)
- TT RGB (Riing fans)
- CM MasterPlus (KB)
- Logitech G Hub (Headset)
- EVGA Unleash (Torq mouse)
- ASUS Aura Sync (GPU)
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Editorial, Testing: Steve Burke
Testing, Research: Jake Henderson
Video: Josh Svoboda, Andrew Coleman
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Related to this is our NZXT CAM test for ANR: czcams.com/video/BHC8_sMgH5Q/video.html
You should also definitely watch our AMD TDP deep-dive explanation: czcams.com/video/tL1F-qliSUk/video.html
Confirming for TDP long play goodness. Worth the bump.
@@agenericaccount3935 Thank you, Johnny! Glad you liked it.
What no polychrome? 😂. This is why they don't have a standard for RGB software yet, "buy all of our stuff or suffer the consequences". 🤷♂️
@@GamersNexus Was a good indepth piece. I know such content can be a pain in the ass to produce, but it is appreciated. The best disinfectant for marketing wank is sunlight.
I'm using a 8350 with R9 280 running iCUE and RAZER software for daily driver...my desktop lags sometimes, lmao. I've got a 2700X box but I've got all my crap on my old box and sometimes I feel like smashing the damn thing.
iCUE for STRAFE RGB Cherry MX Red Silent and RAZER software for a Naga.
"Turned it all to red, didn't make it faster, turned it to blue, didn't make it cooler"
finally someone asking the real questions.
Red is cooler than blue.
Did turning it all to green make the guy behind Steve honk at him to go?
@@jackielinde7568 green lowers the TDP
They tried turning it to purple and the machine turned invisible.
I turned it all to yellow, didn’t overclock my pc
I can’t even imagine how long this video took to record
Luke hahahah i get it
@@screenpatch4146 maybe a day or two. They probably have images and multiple drives setup up for this if they're smart.
Time to uninstall everything and just use christmas lights.
One of my nephews did that. Even put a surge protector INSIDE THE CASE. We're all just waiting for his PC to burn down my brother's house.
Or get an Arduino and let that drive everything
@@AMalas That doesn't sound like a bad idea! But how do you control fans that have lots of ARGB LEDs in them? There's only so many pins, even on the Mega. If you have 9 ARGB fans and each one has 10 LEDs, you will need 90 pins. And then there's the memory and cooler....
@@ArcanePath360 by ARGB, do you mean addressable RGB? Because if so, all you literally need is just one single pin for a lot of LEDs! (Assuming the products have the daisy chain wire going out)
If you mean analog RGB, then youd need only 3 pins and 3 mosfets but then all the red LEDs have to be on at once, so yeah your point is right here
Give me a specific product and ill tell you how many pins you'd need for multiple
@@AMalas I do mean addressable yes. Now I think of it, they are 4 pin I think. I'm rocking the Corsair LL120 ones. I literally have no clue how the lights are addressable with only 4 wires, seems like magic to me, lol, and I wouldn't have a clue how to Arduino them up. There are very cheap options out there on ebay for it to be even worth it IMO, just a fun project to try.
I like how the companies selling "gamer gear" are the ones responsible for worsening people's gaming experience.
Nice job. 👍
"People's gaming experience" is subjective. Some people choose RGB over FPS. that is a fact.
Gamers are the dumbest consumers, its the reason why gamer headsets are trash and gaming chairs ruin your back.
These all tests are about really uncommon situation, which most gamers won't have. When you load your cpu at max and then add additional software to cpu, for sure, you'll get such results.
In reality, most gamers will be at Gpu limit, not cpu, with cpu load about 80, 50 or 30%. Additional 1-10% won't really matter.
There might be some people playing 2080ti on 1080p on medium settings, 0.1% of all gamers? But I think they are from one of two categories: 1. cyber-athlet, who already knows all these and doesn't add any unnecessary load 2. Someone who should not ignore their prescriptions and take pills daily!!!
PS: I still love such tests, but I think they are far away from practical use. More just for fun.
I've partially changed my mind, after dragon software took 10-20% of my 3700 cpu! And it didn't work properly (can't even control RGB))) and ruined all coolers' settings. I think it's unacceptable for 300$ mainboard..
And for any inexperienced gamer it would ruin fps for sure, and can destroy hardware...
@@VladimirGolev cpu bound scenarios are becoming more and more common. Also, there have been several instances of software like this causing stuttering even in gpu bound scenarios, even if it doesn't affect average frame rate all that much.
Goes from causing a paradigm shift for TDP... to videos on Frankenboard and bloatware benchmarking. Killin' it, GN
Wouldn't mind both if they're delivered at GN quality
@@decimusanothos5178 They already did both. One of them literally is this one
Would have liked to see Discord and Steam and the other game launchers as well. Maybe a future video?
Which of the Electron implementations is worse. Cause, apart from maybe Steam, most of the game launchers and Discord are just a headless Google Chrome running a web app (Electron).
I can tell from experience, even with 12 cores, discord will sometimes affect performance. I've never noticed steam being an issue, even though it seems like it would cause problems.
@@skyhop Since Discord is Chrome, it will open multiple instances of itself. The more servers you are part of, the more RAM and resources Discord requires.
Maybe razer synapse? Especially since there’s never a clear indication of which one should be implemented, and that the use varies product to product
They should see what it's like with Steam, GoG Galaxy, Origin, uPlay, Battle.net, Bethesda.net, Rockstar Launcher, Xbox (Beta) launcher, EGS and of course everyone's favourite, the Paradox launcher, all open simultaneously.
Gigabytes fusion 2.0 provides the best performance because it almost never works.
Amen
Agree i have gigarbage board, need to replace soon
Bout right for all of their software. I had an Aorus laptop and that software didn't even boot up after the first 5 boot ups.
Which doesn't suprise me why the lip warped and broke off
there fan optionn are decent, dragoncenter suck @all
*Trying to* install it nuked my boot drive, so yeah, serious power savungs, too. 🙄 Board was a gift, but I'll be damned sure never to buy a Gigabyte product.
I and I think a lot of people would love to see an updated version of this including Asus Armory Crate, as it has many background processes that get installed with the app itself.
"You probably haven't seen a system tray this cluttered"
*capture cropped to exclude system tray*
Hah, have you seen MY system tray?
Gore is not allowed on CZcams
And I’m pretty sure my work computer has a more cluttered system tray, still
W10 hides most of it in the little up arrow anyway.
@@samfedorka5629
Vista/7 does too.
Steve if you ever watch the debug mode of the iCue software you can see the computer is directing all the LEDs! The data over the bus is insane. For some reason Corsair couldnt spend the money on a $160 keyboard to install something like a $5 arduino +mux chip in the keyboard to handle the custom animation.
It's rediculous how inefficient it is.
Very interesting! Thanks for the info, and good point.
What bugs me about icue... besides it sucking... is the usb module's required for the fans and light strips not taking the majority of the load. I mean really, why even have those if they could just be daisy chained off the mb? The mess of wires it creates in a case alone is enough for me to never purchase their hardware again...I mean besides icue crashing...
I was expecting such a dumb electronic design. I guess the software itself is poorly designed too because we're talking about entire percents of an i5 horsepower, that's not a RaspberryPi.
That's kind of absurd. Their stuff is some of the most expensive too.
Pointed this out to them already on the forum and the fact that setting the sensor logging to 9999 seconds reduces 'idle' load to near nothing. But what do I know? I know that companies like this and Samsung are utter crap at coding and debugging the basics. The sheeple need to pressure them into open sourcing the code so people who give a damn can fix their blatent mistakes.
They didnt even have TLS on the forum till I messaged them and created a user called jesusnotls or similar
GN, you're my favorite tech CZcams channel. Keep on being awesome. Love from Chapel Hill, NC.
Its been almost a year since this was uploaded, id love to see if any got better (or worse). also a lot of people suggested testing things like discord and steam. Razer synapse could be one to add as well.
Not sure synapse would have as much impact as Cortex.
@@joshua41175 razer synapse fucking sucks. It's the sole reason I don't use razer products anymore. Their drivers are terrible.
Just installed iCUE for the first time today. I thought if I just configure everything and then close it, all would be fine. Well, turns out at least everything worked without it running in the background (or so I thought), but then I looked at the task manager and saw 4 (!!!) Corsair tasks running which had names that had nothing to do with my hardware (something with "gaming headset" for example - I dont even have a Corsair gaming headset!), which used a combined 5% CPU on and off (on a 12-thread CPU).
I let out a huge guffaw, uninstalled that crap and will never buy a Corsair product ever again that requires iCUE to run.
Unbelievable. Anyone who produces crap like that deserves the long term damage it creates, because people will only look at it again in maybe years, in hope they have improved. But as this video and my case prove, they have not improved at all in almost 2 years. It actually got worse!
@@LordMoebius Gotta say, their software has gotten way more stable and uses maybe 0,1% CPU in my system, it´s totally ok and still better than iCue or the logitech software. Few years ago it used to crash and not load profiles in the right way but in the last time its been rocksolid, at least for me
@@froznfire9531 when i originally used it about 3 years ago it kept crashing and disconnecting my mouse when i used it wirelessly. It got so bad that i just never used my mouse wirelessly even tho i paid like $100 extra for the wireless version. No matter what I did it sucked. And their background processes were a huge drain on resources. I dont care about heat maps.
16:58 "bloatware impact on boot time will likely be noticed at each boot" - GN 2019
Also water is wet...
Imagine how it would impact a 'spinning disc' H/D boot time 😱😱😱😱😱
30sec boot on a clean install? Must of been using a Kingston ssd. I can boot in about 15sec with iCue, ledkeeper, discord, and a few more on startup with a 970 evo nvme. Even my benchmark os on a 860 pro 2.5 ssd with just hwinfo and nvidia on boot is faster then there clean boot.
Boot time is also platform and motherboard dependent. For example X570 has 15 seconds of fixed time before it even gets to the POST screen.
@@sogwatchman *pushes anime glasses in* water isn't wet since it is a liquid itself, everything it touches becomes wet though
G Hub gets a partial pass for doing something actually useful with macros, but I would definitely prefer more firmware based solutions so I can set it and forget it.
Good point!
Yeah but I hate my keyboard RGB stops working as soon as it crashes or returns to default if I don't have it running
Or just use a mobo that takes care of everything in your system bam no issue. My Asus board controls my corsair h115i, fans, memory, and two light strips just fine... Why or who in the right mind would use so many it makes no sence.
I have to wonder if Corsair is STARTING to move in this direction. I purchased the Ironclaw Wireless RGB recently, and it seems to push some settings to it via firmware. My custom DPI settings are retained by the mouse, even if iCue isn't running. The RGB settings, however, are not retained. I normally like to keep iCue running to keep tabs on my Corsair Void Pro Wireless's battery level (these things last FOREVER if you disable RGB! I sometimes get 12-16 hours of battery life in light usage).
I have started migrating my system to a 100% Corsair setup, as I really like iCue and its UI for its ease of use. I have a NZXT Kraken X31 AIO, and I plan on replacing it with a Corsair model eventually. If I ever get RGB fans, they too will also be Corsair. Combine that with my Corsair keyboard, and I'll nearly be funny Corsair afterward.
The G Hub software does suck though, when open it actually noticeably degrades performance.
The software you came here looking for is called OpenRGB. It's open source. You set the RGB settings and close it. No goddamn background service crap.
Awesome content once again, thoroughly answered the questions in regards to RGB software I had after seeing icue heavily impact performance.
MSI laptop? Not sure if "recently" even needs to be added there
That's... that's true. "Ever" would have been more appropriate. Good point.
First thing I did when I got my last MSI laptop was to reformat the Windows partition and install it again from scratch.
Their prestige lineup is pretty clean actually. I don't know why they have to stuff useless stuff to the gaming one.
James Amril-Kesh So close. So close. But then you reinstalled Windows instead of a Unix-like. Could’ve had FreeBSD, OpenBSD, GhostBSD, DragonflyBSD, any Linux distro; whatever.
I ordered a GT70 OND back in 2012. I was actually really excited to get it. I7 4c something or other, 16gb ram, raid ssd, gtx 680, bluray burner etc. It was my first high end gaming machine.
That dream became a nightmare when I started it up the first time. Windows 7 boot screen quickly became an MSI dragon background that to my dismay was then a flood of msi themed bloatware windows.
I have yet to buy anything from MSI since. This is coming from an Alienware Area 51M owner.
Now that's how you do content
Been waiting for this kind of test for a long time. Thank you.
"Sir, our software install counts are dropping fast! What happened!?"
"...Gamers Nexus."
Lol that MSI callout was beautiful :D
I have been waiting for this exact benchmark video from any source for a LONG time. Thank you Steve!
I'm SO happy you created this content. Been waiting FOREVER to see the numbers. I have half of these installed and running all the time. Thank you tech Jesus..... Thank you
I know this video is 7 months old at this point but I just want to say Thanks to Steve and his team. Your data has seriously helped me make purchases. You're running an amazing service here
this is why i likes Logitech's hardware, especially the gaming hardware. you install G hub or the older Gaming software, set the settings you want and push the settings to the devices onboard memory, and nuke the software. i won't buy hardware that doesn't have built in memory to hold the settings without the software.
and being that my PC is pretty low end (playing games on my HTPC), having unneeded software running in the background sucks what little performance the CPU does have and you can really tell it if you forget to kill a program that runs in the background.
It depends on what you want. You can't have individual game profiles using the on-board memory, you still need the software to run for the "Automatic Game Detection" mode.
@@PrototypeOnyx Also custom lighting patterns too don't save to the device's memory.
Just with ArX control/second screen/monitoring was implemented better.
I love the idea of fine tuning settings and monitoring temps from a cheap tablet/phone.
also you lose some macro features with onboard mode.
@@PrototypeOnyx I got a G110, it has 12 programmable keys and 3 profiles, all on board. So no need for automatic game detect when you can just do it with a button on the keyboard.
1:52 damn it, that upside down NZXT liquid cooler is really bothering me
looks like it would interfere with ram
a small price to pay for salvation
@@Flurry17 i use the same ram and cooler and they dont interfere, just touch.
Well stand on your head .
I'm not sure what you're talking about. Looks the right way up in Australia?
I have mine upside down too because NZXT are pieces of shit and wouldn't allow me to turn the plate
And this is the best kind of unique content. Obvious, informative, useful and more. This is you guys at your best.
This is a much needed review. Thanks for the hard work!
This is insane. I was litterally looking at all my RGB bloatware and thinking, my god that's alot of shitty software just to run lights. Steve you read my mind once again. Thank god for you and your team! ✌️🇨🇦
System 76 is working on a open source RGB hardware controller with software to go with it.
I run on Linux and it has been amazing... but I was missing RGB support until I got my hands on this kit.
You can download the PCB files and build it yourself or buy the full thing.
That's pretty awesome I got to check that out
@@19971997gt also visit beta.LBRY
@@19971997gt found it and all the files to build it. its called thelio IO github.com/system76/thelio-io it incluseds the DXF files to have the PCB printed, or if you cant print it at home there are PCB prototyping companies that charge like 5 USD for a small PCIe board this size.
This is Why I love getting hardware that remembers a setting even if you uninstall the software needed to change it, sometimes you get a diamond in the rough and the Glorious gaming keyboard I bought has built in software to change the lighting any way I want. I hope companies can reduce the performance hit of their software if possible.
Didn't check this when buying my corsair keyboard, ended up getting one that needs the software running 24/7, which really sucks
I have seen this really bizarre keyboard which keeps its colour settings on its own chipset, but somehow it lacks the < | > key. As in there is no key for these symbols to press.
Aquasuite?
@@katier9725 my old blackwidow do that
@@Neiva71 I juat avoid razer because it (and many other brands) are just overpriced hunks of plastic with terrible keycap and switch quality. Software is the cherry on the disaster cake.
I still hardly understand some of this stuff, but I love watching the graphs, data and you talking about them, you revive and reinvigorate technology and being a nerd. Love your work !
Good to know. I'm running both iCUE and CAM with a R5 3600. Thanks for all your hard work, Steve!
"gaming companies hate him, find out why in this short video"
"unexpected but not unwelcome"
thanks for the great content.
Thanks Steve for touching on this very real issue that is quite literally IGNORED by OEMs when we (the consumer/users) try to bring it to their attention for a solution. Personally I can confirm your results and even add to it a bit of how Corsair's iCUE caused a NOTICEABLE IMPACT on my rigs performance. This last weekend I bought a Corsair Harpoon RGB Pro gaming mouse and installed the latest iCUE software ***WHICH IS THE ONLY "RGB or BLOATWARE" I HAVE INSTALLED*** Almost immediately I started to notice its effect on performance. I'm running a Ryzen 5 1600 + Aorus X370 Gaming K5 + G.Skill FlareX DDR4-3200-CL14 (16 GB) + Sapphire Nitro+ RX-590 SE... After running CPU-Z, AIDA64 Benchmarks, Valley, Heaven, Cinebench r20 to compare against my baseline results I took prior to installing iCUE, I was quite shocked to see a significant difference between the before and after scores... In CPU-Z alone there was a 135+ point drop in Multithreaded score (~3225 down to ~3089) and 25+ for Single thread (~412 down to ~385) at stock frequency of 3.40 GHz... All the aforementioned tests followed the same trend in their results that go along with exactly what your video proved... After uninstalling iCUE, low and behold all was back as it was prior to adding iCUE!!! And this is just for controlling the Corsair RGB on my Harpoon Pro mouse and its DPI and Corsairs Service in general... So i'm at a loss now and can't dial in my mouse's DPI or map the mouse buttons either, all i'm left with is the defaults and fixed DPI levels toggled between by the DPI button on the mouse itself...
Thanks for this, it's very informative. Makes me wish someone makes an all for one led control software though I know it's probably impossible.
Why was the NXZT logo upside down? Was it just to infuriate the detail obsessive among us? Thanks for the deep dive, though. The RGB decentralization is awful for UI/UX.
@@YT_handles_r_stupid always online bullshit
John Titor - Has always been easy to disable and even easier now.
Great video ! Do you know if RGB bloatware effects scales with things connected to it ?
For example, iCUE uses 4% with a certain set up, does adding RGB strip, RGB fan and/or corair Keyboard, mouse (you get my point) change significantly the bloatware impact ?
If so by how much ? Could it be a follow up video about that ?
Dude great work. Love your channel. You really pour your life into this and it shows and I appreciate it. But I gotta say man the audio is clipping throughout
Insanely in depth. Thank you for that.
I wish you would have tested Razer Synapse as well but iCUE definitely helped me.
yep
Yep here too!
Should add corsair link as well.
Forgot to add msi afterburner and aida 64
Second the razer software.
@@abdulhkeem.alhadhrami We didn't "forget," we just didn't add them. It wasn't in the scope of the project. Also, AIDA isn't bloatware. It's monitoring and logging software.
iCue is a huge performance hog on my system. I can't remember exactly when it started, maybe around a few months ago, but I suddenly started getting very annoying stuttering in all my games and even in the windows desktop. The only fix I found for this was to just disable iCue startup. There is a service running in the background doing its thing like controlling the RGB and fan speeds etc. But it has no effect on performance at all. Only when the application of iCue is started will it cause this issue. I even did 3dmark benchmarks on my system with all the stuttering and compared it to benchmarks from before the stuttering. My CPU score dropped with like a quarter of its normal score because of the stuttering.
@Super Jeff That is disappointing. Ever since I posted my comment I have kept my iCue application disabled and only the service running. I only open the iCue application to update it and then I immediately close it.
It really sucks to have to do something like that just for supporting the company that created it.
Well, rejoice, one year later at least half of the 4 services it installed on my machine caused 5% CPU usage.
icue also crashed a lot for me. IDK why this software to control the RGB is so buggy? MSI and ASUS's RGB software wasn't any better.
Do i have to completely uninstall it? Or disable works?
@@alaminmdtanvir3361 No. you do not have to uninstall it. Just remove it from start up, then restart your computer. iCue will no longer start up with Windows but everything will still be working fine and the stuttering will stop.
Great video! Didn't expect these "small" apps to have such large impact on modern systems. I really hope you do a similar video for the impact of overlays on performance. There are multiple enabled by default currently -- Xbox, Discord, Radeon Overlay, Steam, etc.
Nice topic, and very well covered, GN. I use a motospeed inflictor ck104 chinese special keyboard, with outemu switches. Has hardware controlled RGB that doesn't go through the PC at all, and colours/effects are set in its own memory so can be plugged into a different system and works the same. One of the few devices it is actually objectively useful to have lighting on at times, for when I draw a blank and need to look down to find a rarely used key. Only other RGB is the fans in my tower, Thermaltake's first Riing series that is not USB controlled but rather standalone controller plugged into 4-pin PWM, not addressable and clunky but only use it to set a certain colour and run with it until I want to change colour weeks/months later. The way these newer "premium" RGB products work from 'better' name brands and especially at their price points is one major caveat that makes altering my lighting setup absolutely not worth it.
I’d be curious to see a benchmark with 6 vs 8 core CPU performance with RGB software/background processes. Would the 8 core have any difference in performance?
Did you test the different lighting effects as well?
I found that with Asus Aura a rainbow colour affect more than doubles my idle CPU usage over using a static colour.
I'd really love to see this revisited a year later, and including things like Razer Synapse 3.
Also, I'd love to see some testing on perf and compatibility with hardware-based aRGB controllers and whether that affects the results.
It's nice how you can use most GPU OC software on other brands, I've used MSI's afterburner for every GPU I have had, and I have yet to have an MSI GPU. It would be nice if we could have some form of cross-compatibility for lighting software.
I would be interested to see how impact is when you have CPUs with more cores and/or threads. I would like to see this compared to a 3600 to see if there is a significant improvement if any with having the extra threads with the same core count.
Thank you for this, a lot of times I've been hitting my head on the wall trying to explain to people how bloatware (not to mention useless software they don't even use) will severely bog down a system.
I know a woman that has a freaking Titan V and she complains it's PoS slow card! I kindly tried explaining to her it was a PEBCAK kinda problem.
most of the RGB tools from the various peripheral manufacturers have gone through a couple major version since this was published. Can you do an updated version? I'm specifically interested in the comparison between corsair iCUE, razor Synapse, SteelSeries engine, and whatever logitch's is etc. I'm trying to choose a new mouse and want to know which will suck least.
Impressive results, totally not something I expected to see. ...Feels like 2001 all over again, running Windows XP and disabling everything in the Task Manager.
Ooooh that takes me back lol
should have used the Walmart overpriced PC.
price was not a real issue.
the prize is price
@@nimrodquimbus912 you get extra glue
You restored my faith in humanity.
@Critical Tech well then, don't blame me when your faith gets crushed.
I wish you tested the impact of those softwares when you've totally disabled the LED management...
Are they still consuming some CPU time or just idling?
I'm having a Corsair AIO and I just use the iCue for the fan curve/pump speed management and I disabled the lightning.
I think the curve is pushed into the AIO controller's memory and that it's still applied at boot outside of the OS so I just disabled the iCue at Windows start but I might be wrong there...
Excellent job Steve! I have experience with ASUS Aura Sync, and that program used like 4-5% CPU time in the background...! I just uninstalled it after I found that out. It impacted my gaming performance with a 9900K/2080Ti combo in Battlefield 5.
Damn Steve, I LOOOOVE Linode. What if we bloat their servers?
RGB control in the cloud? I think you're on to a winner. Think of the subscription fees!
I wonder if setting up iCue settings and then leaving the software OFF during use will behave like a post-uninstall in performance or the same as just having it on. iCue can set hardware settings that are used when the software is turned off.
I am wondering the same
@Tab You might have a hardware lighting button in iCue that you can set for your keyboards RGB aswell. I could for my K70. Same with led strips.
@Tab I dont have my K70 anymore but it was in the same spot for everything.
If you open iCue, go to where you change the RGB settings (per item), you have your created effects on the left and a bit further down is "lightings library" and below that there should be "hardware lighting". Click that and you should be able to set a single color that it runs when the software is off.
Does this take in to account the benefits of iCUE such as fan curves? For example what if you use iCUE to set aggressive fan curves to cool a CPU and allow for better boost clocks? What would the fan curves be without this software installed and would it be worse off as a result?
Maybe this is a stupid question but I’m not sure it was clarified in the video. Did you run these tests with the programs running in the background/taskbar or were they completely shut down after RGB settings were chosen?
I’m convinced iCUE is a mining platform. I have corsair RAM in my pc and need the software open for the lighting control. The software has a process called LLA service that constantly uses your internet bandwidth for god knows what reason.
Do you always need to have it open in the background to have rgb on
Lord AT It did when I posted this. They’ve since fixed it, at least for the ram I have. Don’t need it on all the time to control the lighting anymore.
@@BackwardsCombatable thanks currently debating whether to get Corsair h115i AIO and fan or not I heard good and bad abt icue I heard it got way better tho
Would love a hint about where to find a tutorial on building a super slim windows install for low resource overhead. Against all bloatware enemies, foreign and domestic.
Google debloat windows 10, some good repos on GitHub for doing such things
@@tarfeef_4268 10-4 😋
It's easy, install Windows 10 ltsc and enjoy glorious power user windows that will pretty much only do what you tell it and only install updates when you make it do so
@Omega He said Windows install. Linux still isn't that glorious when it comes to gaming.
Windows 10 LTSC.
Nothing else is comparable, can't really even make it any smaller
Out of curiosity, I have multiple RGB software as many but I was wondering since I have them set to not start with boot does that prevent the performance hit on boot times. Also once booted I open them so the RGB effects I want and have pre set start then I fully X out of the program before playing any games. Does fully closing the program when playing prevent the performance hit as well or does it at least lessen it or does it remain the same?
Which version of Civ VI do you use for testing (looked for article link under video but couldn't see it)? The latest DLC brought vastly improved calculation times for AI.
Has any progress been made on reverse engineering the control schemes for these products? I'd like to see a FOSS implementation of a unified control software for multiple vendors, someday.
found this just yesterday gitlab.com/CalcProgrammer1/OpenRGB
@@storm5133 Thank you! I hope this ends up being a killer solution!
@@storm5133 doesnt support shittybyte tho
is it fair to assume this is also the case with having several game launchers like steam, gog, uplay, origin, epic, etc?
perhaps other programs like discord, MSI afterburner, playing audio in the background?
Discord, being a pretty thicc electron app (Chrome wrapping) could have a pretty decent impact.
I always wanted to know how much this affects performance Thank you GN!
Love that you needed to pick up a written list of all the stuff you installed
"Turned them all to red, but it didn't make it faster." I refuse to believe this propaganda :-P
Please make an updated version
Very interesting test. I was always wondering this myself.
@GamersNexus: Can you do a test on the other kinds of software that come with the motherboard's like the Gigabyte suite, MSI suite, etc. They always want you to install like a slew of programs with the motherboard. Those do you usually include the RGB apps as well.
Then you have the other situation with the gaming now with all the launchers that we need. I have like 8 launchers now for my games. I usually turn the ones off that I don't need but it is convenient to have them already running when the computer starts up so that I don't have to worry about logging in.
Just asking. I know you probably don't have much time to do everything. 😃
If i was a teacher id use your briefings and videos to show students what informational charts and graphs should be and how to do a proper experiment because you guys are so fucking concise in displsying info and you seemingly cover almost every possible variable to provide good consistent data in all your projects. Good job im a fan
I uninstalled iCUE and run RGB from an Arduino using the FastLED library. 1000x better than iCUE's lighting presets and takes no performance from the PC since the Arduino does it all, plus I can push the refresh rate on the LEDs above 200hz without issues. The Arduino is great for this task.
I'd love to know more about how you did this. Any pointers beyond the library? Is your code available?
@@edolnx it's easy enough just using the FastLED examples. The Corsair fans can be treated as a ws2812b addressable RGB strip if connected to the corsair RGB hub(the one with 6 ports) so there isn't really anything special that needs to be done. Just figure out the pinout on the hub and connect it to the Arduino. Make sure the data pin and 'number of LEDs' parameters are set correctly in the program.
For someone who has played with Arduino and addressable RGB strips this probably makes sense. If not then there are many examples to learn from online. When you have that working the possibilities are endless pretty much.
@@NickyNiclas sweeT!
Can you recommend a tutorial or where to start in general for someone new to arduino? I'm using Jacknet to control the various components but it still runs through the pc, albeit with much less resource use than all the software it replaces, but I'd still like to try what you're describing!
As someone who has every Corsair perpherals/ RGB, I feel cheated.
Atleast ur with 1 brand, icue is still p dope with how it has so much functionality baked in
@@buckbuckleyson2259 And all I need from it is setting DPI, setting the custom buttons and disabling RGB.
@@Krigalishnikov "disabling RGB" you monster XD
It's MUCH better than having to download a million software since iCUE gives you everything (ram, AIO, fans, rgb, keyboard, mouse) where if you went to others you'd have to atleast down 2 softwares. I'm planning to do a build with iCUE in mind so that I don't have to download any motherboard RGB software.
ICUE at least keeps the addons specific to your devices. MSI makes you download all of their garbage just to make lights change colors...
Great work on this
Hold on, do you need the RGB software to be running all the time? Can't you just set the colors/config you like and close it, never opening it again until you want to change something? (and disable launch on start-up)
You guys should really review Open RGB; a free software that aims to standardise lighting in systems having components and peripherals from different manufacturers. its still under development but pretty helpful and lightweight
I have mine setup so it changes my ram and cpu cooler lights when I start the computer, then it closes itself so it's not actually running anymore.
@@MultiNastyNate how?
@Joe Beef Hash what do you prefer: bad fps or data collecting?
I wish you guys would do this again.
Did you test these games in windowed mode? Becuase CAM 3 used to create HUUGE lag spikes in Stardew Valley until I set it from borderless full screen to exclusicve full screen.
Apropos, did you test CAM 3 or the newer 4?
I would find it interesting to see now if the performance comes back up if you close these tools via system tray...
This is real journalism right here. Very well done as usual Gamers Nexus.
iCUE definitely does need some big improvements!
got a new i9 9900k - and my first cpu core was on 80% while idleing for no reason.. games lagged, etc. until i realised, that my iCUE was causing the cpu load. So if any of you got problems, turn off that shit.
Had issues with a recent iCUE version too, then I went back to an earlier version until a fix was out, and the problem was solved. Current iCUE version seems to run great
@@Galistia my biggest problem is the intergration with RGB fusion software that will change my damn ram orange all the time lol
Yeah and the maker is a fucking douchebag, he blames us for his tedious, and shitty product!
@@zabuza_zen7217 worse one I’ve seen is g-skills driver. Doesn’t work on different motherboard manufacturers and when it does work it uses 5% of the ram. Even iCue works better.
I wanna see an improvement in the memory of RGB settings, I find it really interesting my Stock AMD Cooler boots up with its RGB settings i set before windows even starts, but my ASUS Board, Ram and Fans dont start their RGB til windows has at least started. and my GPU is Gigabyte and similar to my Cooler is set and forget i even uninstalled the software and it stays what i set it to.
@Salaminized exactly my point, why only "some" If Cooler Masters program for AMD Coolers can do it, why cant ASUS, who literally make the board and the software? Why cant Fan kits that usually make you buy some kind of wire node have the same thing? Cutting corners to save pennies.
@@River_Miles its another LGBT money making conspiracy.
yea aura sucks for my asus... if its set to a animation rbg show it eats like 10% cpu load. and sometimes the load is higher
@@ZodaSoda the corsair nodes that control the fans, strips, etc can set to set and forget once you set it up right in hardware lighting. Then just set icue to not start on boot. Having fans store there led colors by them self would require each fan to have its own memory on it. If done this way the price of fans would be even more expensive then what they are now. It also depends on the type of leds used. There is a difference between 12v rgb & 5v argb and how they work.
@@ZodaSoda uhhh.... auto correct much?
Question, what if you are running a game with like lighting integration for special effects tied to various titles (like icue and Far Cry 5) affect performance?
I don't get why corsair or nzxt or someone does not have a very simple programmable microcontroller in the commander or hub where you just pull the software up once. Program what you want and close it
For the frame time graphs in future videos, do you think you could stage each run so the wipe across the screen a second apart? This way you could see the "underlying" runs rather than have them overlay each other and hide data.
16:08 "Dragon Center, just like it offers its users... appears to do almost nothing." Brutal, Steve... brutal.
not wrong though .
After watching this video I would really like a guide to the most clean Windows 10 install for games only and/or best performance. I evade most bloatware as I can but you have the means to show what can be the best for game or other performance types of PC.
interesting
What was the lighting profile on the keyboard?
Icue uses 8-9% of my CPU if I got a complexe lighting scheme running, that I went for a static lighting directly saved on the keyboard.
So weird I had just suggested you guys should do this! Awesome!
At least I think it was you guys, it might have been LTT. But pretty sure it was Steve.
RIP my old 4690k while running LGS, iCue, and MSI Dragon Center.
I absolutely hate Logitech's "Logi" whatever software. I spent hours making my own effect (Mad Effect related, btw). The export/import feature from LGS should be on all RGB software.
Now, with my new system, LGS (kbd, mouse), MSI Dragon (because Music Light isn't available as a standalone for the MSI 2080 Super), Corsair iCue (mm, Dom Plat RAM), Asus software (mobo), NZXT (case, CPU)..
This proprietary addressable software is ridiculous. Open source this crap for a synchronous RGB experience.
I just made an all corsair build
I am traumatized by a logitech bloatware experience that I had years ago and will never allow a product from Logitech near my PC. This stuff matters to daily PC users more than manufacturers want to believe.
What about Razer's software? Does that affect any meaningful performance?
Yes
I’m impressed that you were running Aura Sync. I can’t get more than my motherboard to change colors. So much for compatible devices. Great video as always
Aura Sync is a pain to get working right when it goes wrong. Search for a way to clean uninstall it completely from windows, then install the latest version compatible with your motherboard should help. Make absolutely sure you've completely unloaded and removed it everywhere, including the registry or you will have problems.
That’s what I had to do on my first build. I made sure it was the first thing to download on this one and it doesn’t work properly. Lol
I love this topic. Both hilariously funny and addressing a serious problem if we would ever depend on such bloatware.
Well Damn. I have aura sync and saw it on the thumbnail but didnt find out the damage.
What about having the items installed but not set to run at start up and having them all turned off after using them for their respective needs?
I don't even let discord run at start up.
Also wondering this
that is not an option
@@NarciisJr can be, depends on the software. Icue you’re correct has gone the way of stopping this. They do it the worse too with a bait and switch. A Corsair keyboard will work the instant
You plug it in, lights and all. But once you update the firmware on the keyboard, which is required to make any changes at all, they update it to force the lights off when icue is closed.
Also though, this is a recent chance less than a year old from Corsair. And my comment is over a year old that you decided to respond to. Thanks for the memories!
@@tsfitz443 My K70 has onboard memory. I can plug mine into usb power plug and i have 3 saved RGB profiles. I can take my keyboard to my friends house and have my Settings as soon as it powers on. :)
I have a couple of these programs (NZXT CAM, Corsair iCUE, logitech ghub) but if I were to uninstall them then some of my devices wouldn't work properly. I wish I could control certain things on my MSI motherboard but I've heard terrible things about dragon center. Is there any program that combines everything?
Could i just install this bloat and kick it out of autostart and only open it to change something and close it again?
Or does it still run in the Backround?
iCue has an option that allows you to set a rgb profile that runs after you close the background application. I would have liked to have seen this benchmarked as well, to see if it mitigated or even restored performance, outright. Bit of an oversight, if you ask me.
I've been using CAM for 2.5 years. It's been buggy time to time but now I'm mad!
Very insteresting and a timely video.
Hopefully this content will be updated again soon. I'd like to see Armoury Crate examined in detail please.