Report: Microsoft quietly disables vital Windows feature crippling many AMD Ryzen CPUs

Microsoft, in March earlier this year, published a new Xbox Game Bar update that changed the look and feel of the application. The app is essentially Microsoft's in-house overlay for Windows for gaming and helps monitor resource usage, as well as capture gameplay screenshots and videos, and more.

While it may not matter for everyone as there are several third-party utilities like MSI Afterburner (RivaTuner), as well as ones from AMD or Nvidia, the Game Bar is an absolutely vital component for some of the fastest AMD Ryzen CPUs out there.

And according to a new report by PC Games Hardware (PCGH), Microsoft may be quietly disabling the it on Windows 10 systems, at least in the case of Pro and Enterprise editions which could potentially hamstring several CPUs.

If you recall, AMD first introduced its X3D processor in the form of the 5800X3D which comprised a single CCD (core compute die) which meant that the 3D vertical cache (V-cache) was able to feed all the cores on the CPU without any trouble and did not require any special optimization for Windows for task and workloads scheduling across the CPU threads of the 5800X3D.

Later, AMD debuted 3D V-cache to 12 and 16 core Ryzen parts as well with AM5 as the Ryzen 7000X3D (Zen 4-based) chips feature the extra L3 cache. However, since these were dual CCD parts (each CCD houses up to eight Zen cores), only one of the CCDs was equipped with this faster cache while the other was more optimized for higher clocks.

On Windows 10 and 11, the Xbox Game Bar app carries the necessary optimization for handling this task scheduling job such that gaming workloads would be correctly passed on to the CCD with the 3D cache. This is done via the 3D V-Cache Performance Optimizer Driver that is delivered through the AMD chipset driver package. All a user needed to do was assign a particular title or game by checking the "Remember this is a game" option inside Xbox Game Bar settings.

PCGH notes that they were unable to make the Xbox Game Bar feature work properly, even after reinstalling Windows 10, as all attempts apparently proved futile.

After reading the report, I also updated the Xbox Game Bar app on my Windows 10 system to try and replicate the problem. Interestingly, unlike the previous version, the Xbox Game Settings would crash when clicked on it and so selecting the "Remember this is a game option" was no longer possible on my side.

Bizarrely and perhaps coincidentally, the Xbox Game bar support article regarding that option is also gone as it is no longer available. While this issue is unlikely to affect someone like me who runs an octa-core Ryzen 7 5700G APU, Ryzen 7000X3D and 9000X3D owners could be losing out big.

Even if it is just a temporary bug, Microsoft should definitely be more cautious about the app considering AMD Ryzen X3D chips are heavily reliant on them for their performance.

Source: PCGH

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Posted Tuesday 5 August 2025 at 4:03 am AEST (my time).

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