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All-round poor performing 8800GTX

M

Monaro

n00b
Joined
Jun 7, 2007
Messages
13
Hi there, lurked for quite some time but now I need some help! Apologies if I shouldn't be making my first post a support thread :L

I have just upgraded from a quite capable EVGA 7800GTX to a Gigabyte 8800GTX, but the performance is quite shocking - below the 7800's benchmarks. About 5000 in 3DMark05, and it never seems to get above 17FPS in any games, even older ones like Far Cry.

Have tried about 3 driver sets - all the same results. I'm wondering if someone can see a clue in my hardware setup, perhaps my 600w PSU isn't enough for the gear I have running off it?

Athlon 4200X2 (XP Dual core optimizer installed)
DFI LANParty UT nF4 Ultra-D
2 x 1GB Kingston HyperX RAM, CL3
1 x Seagate 500GB 16MB SATA
1 x Seagate 320GB 16MB SATA
2 x Raptor 74GB in RAID0 (waste of time really)
X-Fi Fatality
DVD writer
Wifi NIC

No OC on the CPU or RAM, I put them back to stock speeds for the time being.

I have searched many forums and drivers seem to be the main thing, but I've run Driver Cleaner when I swapped cards, and tried different drivers.

That leaves me with 2 other answers: Reinstall Windows or an underpowered power supply. Seems to be a few hardware gurus here so thought someone might spot a fault I haven't.

Any advice really appreciated.
 
Which 600W powersupply do you have?

It seems as if it is a power problem (going off the information you gave) IMO.
 
Well if you have a volt meter you can check your power supply and see what the 12v rails are looking like. If you don't have one, buy one. I've seen cheap $10 models which aren't super accurate, but accurate enough for this type of test. Make sure your 12v rails aren't sagging more than 5% of 12v. If your 12v rail is sagging real bad or fluctuating too much then you might have a power issue. If not then I'd start with re-installing Windows before doing anything else. Driver cleaner is pretty good but it doesn't always work 100%.
 
I would first look at the power supply sice you are running multiple drive.
 
It's an Xfinity PSU. Not a big brand I guess. It wasn't a cheap one though (2 years ago), and did rate in the reviews I read (as far as accurate volts). But I will try a volt meter when I get home on Monday.

Thanks for the advice so far.
 
Guys, these types of comments are getting rediculous. You do not NEED a damn 600Watt PSU to run an 8800GTX. Hard drives are NOT huge suckers of power. If you have 8 of them then fine, that many will suck down the juice but 600Watts is PLENTY for his rig. Kyle runs his machine with a Seasonic 600Watt PSU with a single 8800GTX and 8 hard drives. He has no issues with it either.

What is important is what the quality of the PSU is like. If his house is like mine then he might need a UPS to stabalize his power and provide voltage regulation to keep things running smoothly. I have an older house right now and the power in it isn't the best. UPSes make all the difference in the world for my systems.

Everyone wants to blame the PSU and not the power coming into it. They also seem to be under the impression that an 8800GTX and overclocked processor needs 800Watts to power them. This is simply not true. My system, monitor included only draw 458watts of power idle and it consumes around 580Watts under full load.

The general rule is that you want a power supply that will stay less than 75% loaded at all times. If you are running 90% power output all the time then no 500 or 600watt PSU will last.
 
Thanks for that info Dan. I've been without an UPS for about a year - I didn't know they help regulate the power to the extent it effected it's output too.

So if I have a 600W PSU, I should be looking at a 1000VA 600w UPS?
 
Don't just look at the VA and wattage rating for the UPS, make sure it has active PFC. Otherwise you're just buying a big battery and surge protector, and it won't improve the power going in to your PSU at all.
 
Also what is the revision of your Ultra PSU? X-Infinity or the X-Connect? And how old is it?
 
Monaro said:
Thanks for that info Dan. I've been without an UPS for about a year - I didn't know they help regulate the power to the extent it effected it's output too.

So if I have a 600W PSU, I should be looking at a 1000VA 600w UPS?
Click to expand...

Well the power at the wall can fluctuate quite a bit. If the voltage drops below a certain threshold, the UPS kicks in and provides the rest. Voltage fluctuates quite a bit at my house, so it's a useful thing to have around. All my PC's have them.
 
Hard drives tend to take between 5 watts to 25 watts (on older ones). Newer HDDs are in the zone of 10 watts or so. Raptors take between 8~10 watts on average, and when idle consume even less power. So, as said above, the HDD's will not be sucking too much energy, especially with 5 or less.


Also, check to make sure the PCI-E slot is running in 16x mode. I've seen some people have a 16x slot run at 1x (which can and will lower performance). Both of my PCI-E ports only run at 8x, even though they are designed for 16x (especially with only one video card installed), but I don't see a performance difference with my card. You might with yours though as it requires more bandwidth than mine (mine is based on the 6600 core).


Good luck to you.
 
When I got my motherboard (the P5B, i know it isn't the same as yours) in the BIOS, the PEG (PCI express) was forced at 1x, which reduced the functionality of my video card. Turn that off.

Also, is your motherboard SLI capable? If yes, put the video card in the topmost PCI-E slot.
 
Look at the setup that I'm running with a 600w PSU. I would make sure that you have totally uninstalled your previous drivers.. Use driver cleaner Pro or whatever.

Next, make sure the drivers that you are installing are the 154.xx. I went from a 7800GT in SLI to a 640MB GTS and the difference is night and day.
 
Dan, the website should really do a wattage consumption test like this fellow did because a lot of "hardcore" gamers think they need 1000W PSUs to run SLI or 700W PSUs to run one video card due to marketing FUD.

That nonsense just needs to be debunked. As noted in the linked thread, a normal 8800GTX computer under full load is drawing a mere ~230W from the PSU.
 
Matrices said:
Dan, the website should really do a wattage consumption test like this fellow did because a lot of "hardcore" gamers think they need 1000W PSUs to run SLI or 700W PSUs to run one video card due to marketing FUD.

That nonsense just needs to be debunked. As noted in the linked thread, a normal 8800GTX computer under full load is drawing a mere ~230W from the PSU.
Click to expand...

i agree with you, i have to post this, my 12V (single rail, ol' psu) only have 18A, MSI said their 7900GT needs at least 21A (or 23A, i don't remember exactly which one, printed on the box), but i have no problem running it on my system at all, it was all fine that i decided to overclock and eventually vmod it.
 
Thanks for the info guys - I have an UPS on the way.

I had a friend check my PC out while I'm away and he found the fan on the video card was not turning - he reconnected the fan plug and it's going. I reckon I must have knocked it trying to squeeze the big mofo in to the case (or fit things around it more like).

I had him fire up BF2 and it was getting about 60 FPS, and Oblivion about 30-40 (1280x1024)

3DMark is getting about 12000

Are these acceptable rates?

What's the likelyhood of the card being damaged - it never artifacted or froze? It's only had several hours of gaming, with the longest stint being 2 hours at once - it's had a few day's worth of up time though, desktop stuff, a couple of movies.
 
nosferatu: As long as you don't have many other components running in your comp, 17 amps on the 12v rail will be fine. The rating is stated from a computer that is fully loaded (ie multiple HDDs, optical drives, full memory, 5 PCI cards, etc). Most people do not have all of these many components in their machines and can thus run hardware, such as yourself, on a lesser PSU.

My PSU is a 500 watt, but the 12v rail is only 20 amps. I'm not concerned though as my video card only consumes 31 watts at peak (woo, what a beast).

But yeah, any more it would be better to get a PSU with dual 12v rails that equal at least 28 amps (or a single rail equalling the same), but this is just to be safe, it doesn't mean you HAVE to have it, as proven by you and many others.

What's funny about my PSU is the 5v rail has 55 amps on it! LOL What the hell am I going to do with 55 amps on a 5v rail?!?! The manufacturers should have dumped more of the power into the 12v rail instead. LAWL

Now, if one was to run 2 8800 Ultra's in OC, then I might recommend haveing a PSU with a 12v rail of at least 38~45 amps or more, but this is just to be safe.

My other comp is running 2 7900GT OC's from BFGTech, and it has 2 12v rails with a combined power of 38 amps. It is a bit overkill for these video cards, but not necessarily if 2 8800's were used.
 
Monaro said:
Thanks for the info guys - I have an UPS on the way.

I had a friend check my PC out while I'm away and he found the fan on the video card was not turning - he reconnected the fan plug and it's going. I reckon I must have knocked it trying to squeeze the big mofo in to the case (or fit things around it more like).

I had him fire up BF2 and it was getting about 60 FPS, and Oblivion about 30-40 (1280x1024)

3DMark is getting about 12000

Are these acceptable rates?

What's the likelyhood of the card being damaged - it never artifacted or froze? It's only had several hours of gaming, with the longest stint being 2 hours at once - it's had a few day's worth of up time though, desktop stuff, a couple of movies.
Click to expand...

It could easily be damaged... but I'd expect some kind of artifacting if that were the case.

With the fan on auto the 8800GTX can idle as high as 70C in a not-so-cool room. With no fan... well, honestly, I'm amazed it didn't shut itself down. You should be getting far higher framerates. Reinstall Windows (yes, I know, a royal pain) and install the latest beta drivers from nzone.com. Check Oblivion again. If you're still getting poor framerates, see about getting the card RMA'd.
 
if the fan died, it means that the gpu runs really HOT, do you check the temp of your gpu when you game?

the hot temp will likely affect your gfx card life span, but i'm not sure how much.
since it never froze or artifacted and only few day's worth of up time, my guess is your card not being damaged at all.
 
Matrices said:
Dan, the website should really do a wattage consumption test like this fellow did because a lot of "hardcore" gamers think they need 1000W PSUs to run SLI or 700W PSUs to run one video card due to marketing FUD.

That nonsense just needs to be debunked. As noted in the linked thread, a normal 8800GTX computer under full load is drawing a mere ~230W from the PSU.
Click to expand...

My UPS actually shows the information. It includes my monitor which according to Dell's specification pulls 150W. If that's true then 458-150=308w at idle out of my PC. Considering all the drives and gear I'd say that's about right. Under full load, it's pulling around 580w or so. Minus 150, and we are talking about a max draw of 430. Again, that's not too bad I don't think.

I didn't buy this 1200watt beast because I needed 1200 watts of power, well not today anyway, but it supports PCIe 2.0, and then 8 pin power connectors on the newer graphics cards, and because all the reviews indicate that it's just about the best PSU you can buy now. I bought it for that reason. The price wasn't an object, and though I would have settled for less wattage, I believe in having more than I need rather than not enough. The last couple of PSUs I've bought have had to be replaced quickly due to them not being powerful enough to leave room for growth and expansion.

I'm in total agreement on the fact that you don't need 800+ watts for a single 8800GTX setup. Hell Kyle's machine has a ton of hardware in it, and he runs a Seasonic 600watt without issues. Granted if he were to go SLI he might need an upgrade, but it would be close.
 
Yes, but did you then factor in the PSU efficiency? Total wall draw is one thing, but each PSU has its own peak efficiency rating which I believe is 80-85 percent. So your PSU is actually doing ~0.85x430 at full load.

Apparently the important numbers are not so much wattages but amps per 12V rail. The folks at Ars (reasonably) speculated that NVIDIA recommends the overblown wattage numbers to cover their ass because a lot of companies make shitty power supplies advertised with big wattage numbers belied by an absence of active power circuitry and dedicated rails and enough amps on the 12Vs.
 
Matrices said:
Yes, but did you then factor in the PSU efficiency? Total wall draw is one thing, but each PSU has its own peak efficiency rating which I believe is 80-85 percent. So your PSU is actually doing ~0.85x430 at full load.

Apparently the important numbers are not so much wattages but amps per 12V rail. The folks at Ars (reasonably) speculated that NVIDIA recommends the overblown wattage numbers to cover their ass because a lot of companies make shitty power supplies advertised with big wattage numbers belied by an absence of active power circuitry and dedicated rails and enough amps on the 12Vs.
Click to expand...

I bought this power supply because it's one of the best on the market. I looked at the reviews, and the numbers they found. I read both JonnyGURU's review and the [H] review which both did various load tests and measured ripple and efficiency. In any case, I was making a point about power supplies and how it could be a factor in the original posters problems. We have strayed a bit off topic in regard to this.
 
If the fan wasnt going, then your card was overheating, and thus throttling the core speed down to save the chip from frying. This is probably the case, which is why you had such bad performance. But even still...8800gtx should own anything at 60fps + @ 1280x1024...maybe some damage was done?
 
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