Getting Lousy Performance...

[rpgaction]

In many of the games I own that are benchmarked here, my framerate doesn't near those results at their respective settings. My PC contains the same processor and a gig more RAM listed for that benchmark (except that my card is the 256MB version and is also OC'd to 700/850).

Could the extra 256MB on their card be responsible for nearly 30 frames per second, or is there something dreadfully wrong with my PC?

All the info I can give you about this machine...

ASRock 939 Dual-Sata2 motherboard w/ latest bios and drivers
4x512 DDR400 @ stock 200MHz
Athlon 64 3500+ (Venice core) @ stock 2.2GHz
Sapphire Radeon X1800XT 256MB @ 700/850 using Catalyst 6.7
Thermaltake TR2 W0070 430W PSU
Soundblaster Live! Value using latest drivers
Maxtor 40GB primary PATA 7200RPM
Hitachi 80GB slave PATA 7200RPM w/ 1GB partition for paging file
Windows XP Pro SP2 w/ latest updates

The first thing you would probably notice is the four sticks of RAM. My motherboard supports four at a time in dual channel @ 200MHz, the only drawback is the 2T timing. I've tested this thoroughly, with 2GB 2T and 1GB 1T, and my findings are largely conclusive with this article. At settings that actually push the rest of the system, the difference isn't a full two frames per second.

If there's anything else, though, please feel free to speculate. I was driven nearly to madness last night (and resolved to posting this thread) when I couldn't run Dark Messiah (a Source engine game) at full settings...the last straw.

 

[G'ßöö]

is this a freshly formatted PC or? ...pretty good system for an older harddrive

 

[rpgaction]

Freshly formatted.

I salvaged drives (and the sound card) from my old PCs.

 

[G'ßöö]

sounds like you've "tweaked" pretty good ...those are the more intensive/resourse hog games on the market...a newer drive should help somewhat but I'd think the extra 256 mem is probably the issue

 

[Eagle156]

Are you running anything in the background? How many processes do you have when you game (minus the game)?

 

[rpgaction]

As of right now, there are 27 processes running.

 

[MrGlobe]

For about a week, i had a computer setup very similar to yours.

3500+
x1800xt 256
1gb patriot sig with hs

and i too got about 30 fps less than they did in HL2. I am not sure about other games, but that one i know for sure.

weird?

Globe

 

[Marvelous]

install chipset drivers?

 

[Kreator]

only thing i can speculate on would be your drives or memory...

i used to run 4x 1gb sticks myself and dropped to 2x OCZ Plat (higher quality than the 4gb i ran prior but still)

i noticed a nice difference with using this stuff.

i also noticed a good difference when i brought my 2 150gb 10K raptors online.

other than that maybe your running too hot on your card? just speculation!

 

[rpgaction]

only thing i can speculate on would be your drives or memory...

i used to run 4x 1gb sticks myself and dropped to 2x OCZ Plat (higher quality than the 4gb i ran prior but still)

i noticed a nice difference with using this stuff.

i also noticed a good difference when i brought my 2 150gb 10K raptors online.

other than that maybe your running too hot on your card? just speculation!

I'll see if I get any better FPS on average when I leave my card at stock clocks when I get home from school today.

install chipset drivers?

Yeah.

 

[[RS]kookie]

T2 timing for the memory his a big hit. Not all 30 FPS but a chunk of them.

 

[rpgaction]

I've already tested that. 1GB in 1T gives me about 1.5FPS more on average than 2GB in 2T. It seems only to prove a huge factor at settings that don't really push the other hardware.

 

[rpgaction]

other than that maybe your running too hot on your card? just speculation!

Woah! We might be on to something here. I just took some benchmarks with Fraps on Dark Messiah with the card OC'd and at stock at the highest game settings w/ 1280x960/2xaa/16xhqaf.

OC'd got 23FPS...stock got 30.

That can't be good. Do you think it's just the heat or is there some possible conflict with ATITool?

 

[sculelos]

Woah! We might be on to something here. I just took some benchmarks with Fraps on Dark Messiah with the card OC'd and at stock at the highest game settings w/ 1280x960/2xaa/16xhqaf.

OC'd got 23FPS...stock got 30.

That can't be good. Do you think it's just the heat or is there some possible conflict with ATITool?

try underclocking a little bit, if it helps any it's definity your heat.