Am I being Unreasonable?

N

npurdin

Weaksauce
Joined
Feb 9, 2006
Messages
124
I'm running an
Asus A8N SLI Premium with Corsair 3GB DDR400 (4G underclocks to 333)
Athlon 64 3700+ ("San Diego' but really a locked Venice IIRC)
eVGA 7600GT CO 256MB (PCIe)
WD SATA 3.0G drive (160GB, 16MB cache if it matters)
Creative Audigy MP3+ sound (tried with and without)
Antec Neo HE 500W PSU

I'm getting horrible stuttering and thrashing (when you hang up on something graphical, often denoted by replaying the same sound byte for 5-30 seconds) in games like BF2, Star Wars Galaxies (come on.. this is a VERY old game... should be fine right?) and most recently, Age of Conan is nigh unplayable on the lowest of settings with all the hangs and stuttering.

I've tried driversweep/update on the graphics drivers, and it helped... a little. Same on the chipset drivers.

Is there something I'm missing that I should look into? Is this performance to be expected from a machine like this? Or am I looking at something else entirely? Thanks for the input.
 
Well, with Age of Conan, you're going to need a mighty-impressive rig... Otherwise, I'd maybe start by checking case temps/cpu temps, and, perhaps a long shot, reformat.

If you're playing such old games as you've said, could it be that it's been a long time since you've done a fresh install?
 
I've found people having issues over time or suddenly if they put large files (not shortcuts or folders) directly on their desktop - like 50mb or more and a pc will start to bog down.
 
[LYL]Homer;1032515177 said:
I've found people having issues over time or suddenly if they put large files (not shortcuts or folders) directly on their desktop - like 50mb or more and a pc will start to bog down.
Click to expand...

Well.. That's something I've never considered. I've kept a total of about 1GB of fiels on my desktop.. mot of them in folders, but still, something to consider.

To put my performance expectations in perspective, my roommate has an old
EMac with
XP2800+ (factory)
2G DDR400
AGP8x eVGA 6800GT
Otherwise, Stock everything

and he runs AoC fairly well.. a few minor hangups, but nothing of the magnitude I'm seeing. I'll tinker around with the desktop theory.. and yeah... it's been a long time since I formatted.. I had my '05 tax return on PDF on my desktop.. so yeah...
 
Have you cleaned out your PC? Sometimes when the PC is overheating, performance suffers.
 
It runs quite cool, and very clean. Freezer64 on the CPU, 80m jet engine (no-name loud as hell) intake on the front, 120mm antec 3-speed in the back, 92m antec on the side (blowing on GFX and RAM)

CPU rarely breaks 68 degrees
 
Question is.. even if my system was performing optimally, which I don't think it is.. would I be out of my league regardless?

I'm beginning to think so.
 
Can't comment on AoC as I have and will not try it (not a MMORPG kind of guy). But BF2 should be able to run decently on that rig. The only time I've had BF2 hang with the sound repeating multiple times is due to punkbuster.

Also, do a virus and spyware scan. What anti-virus are you using?

And what resolutions are you and your roomate playing AoC at?
 
Using NOD32 for antivirus, running AoC at 1024, all low settings

Something I noticed: AoC seems to run ok for the first minute or so, before it starts hanging up. CPU is always at 100%, but the GPU temp seems to be the kicker... it idles at 48C, and when it gets above 78C, that's when things get bad. 7600GT has notoriously poor cooling if I recall correctly.. but could this be the sole cause of my woes?

If so, I suppose I could invest a few bucks in an aftermarket cooler... or should I just go with an 8800 GTX and get it over with? (I don't have tons of money for a new system.. but if I HAVE to... I could continue upgrading after the video card.)

Also, is that temperature something I should even be worried about; are 7600's normally stable at that temp? (RMA then? worth the hassle?)

Is there a way I can prove that the video card is the problem? (short of spraying a can on liquid nitrogen at the fan:mad:)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top