TF2 performance w/i7 + 285GTX

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Nexion<ChesteR>

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Nov 26, 2005
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I think I know the answer already, but I would like to confirm.

I'm running TF2 on max settings with my i7 920 rig and getting 30-40FPS drops on certain maps (Sawmill is one of them). It doesn't matter if I lower graphics settings or not, I've disabled AA and AF with no change. My GPU is only working at around 30% of both memory and core speed. I've disabled multi-core rendering since I was getting random crashes. I'm assuming my FPS dips are due to TF2 only using 1 core, is that correct? Anything I can do to mitigate the issue?

Many thanks.
 
Are you overclocking your CPU? If not, that'll give you a boost in Source games.
 
No I am not, will be looking up a guide on that tonight... Running an EVGA x58 mobo so it shouldn't be too difficult. Mainly want to do it for BC2 performance but there is another reason.
 
Check your temps. My card would start getting slower and slower when it got hot.
 
Card is running very cool (for a 285) at about 55C. I've got pretty good case cooling. I have tried a few servers, it seems to be mostly map dependent. Would a server limit data transfer, thus limiting frames?
 
find out why it crash with multicore on, you want that on.

also set the affinity for TF2 to use all your cores but 0, i find with my Q9400 i set it to use 1,2,3 and i dont get my core 0 hitting %100.
 
I've seen other people on Steam forums say they've had problems with i7 and TF2. Kinda weird that the game wouldn't run good on that CPU but then again every time I play it (OFTEN) it feels like a hack job.
 
I've got another strange performance issue with TF2. I've got an AMD Dual-core running at 2.8, and a 9800gt. I started playing a lot of TF2 a few weeks ago, but I was getting some tremendous hitching. Turning every setting to low didn't fix it.

I vaguely recalled seeing a post in the past recommending that I download the Realtek network drivers from my mobo manufacturer instead of using the stock Windows drivers. I did this, and voila, the hitching is gone and the game runs beautifully. However, if I restart my computer, something reverts and the game runs poorly again. It continues to run poorly until I reinstall the Gigabyte-issued network drivers, which again removes all of the hitching.

This seems to me an extremely bizarre issue. Do any of you happen to have any idea what's going on?
 
tdisen said:
I've got another strange performance issue with TF2. I've got an AMD Dual-core running at 2.8, and a 9800gt. I started playing a lot of TF2 a few weeks ago, but I was getting some tremendous hitching. Turning every setting to low didn't fix it.

I vaguely recalled seeing a post in the past recommending that I download the Realtek network drivers from my mobo manufacturer instead of using the stock Windows drivers. I did this, and voila, the hitching is gone and the game runs beautifully. However, if I restart my computer, something reverts and the game runs poorly again. It continues to run poorly until I reinstall the Gigabyte-issued network drivers, which again removes all of the hitching.

This seems to me an extremely bizarre issue. Do any of you happen to have any idea what's going on?
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Yep, I made that thread on the steam forums.

I think I found a solution. I reformatted and installed Win7 and immediately installed the realtek drivers without any windows update interference. So far I've been able to restart my computer without having to reinstall the driver to restore performance.

I have a Gigabyte P35-DS3R with a realtek 8111B NIC.
 
That might be my exact motherboard. Not sure if I want to go through all that trouble right now, though.
 
tf2 has a buggy engine all you can do is wait for them to fix it but its been broke since 2007 so i wouldnt count on it
 
Source graphics are pretty average now you dont need a good GPU for things like TF2. It's the CPU, the engine is very CPU hungry, yet it doesn't seem to take advantage of multicore CPUs all that well (last I checked)

If you're not overclocking your 920 you might want to consider it, they have massive headroom for overclocking especially if you grab a good cooler for it.
 
Try turning off weather effects. Sawmill uses rain particles and drags my fps down.
 
I have a 930 (basically a 920) and my fps is just about always a constant 60 like you would expect with vsync.
 
Found this on the steam forums. A few people have claimed that it helped.

Ok all, after a ridiculous amount of messing with random &#9829;&#9829;&#9829;&#9829; on my computer to get this game to work properly, I think I narrowed my entire issue down to my network adapter. I tried using a USB Wireless-G adapter that I never use and I was running TF2 better than ever. As such, I went ahead and re-enabled my onboard, gigabit ethernet card and noticed I was still having issues with this network card but not the wireless USB adapter.

Here's what I did to fix this issue:

Start --> Control Panel --> Device Manager --> Network Adapters --> Right-Click your Network Card and hit "properties" --> Hit the "Advanced" tab --> click "Speed & Duplex" from the list --> Change the value to 1.0 Gbps Full Duplex OR 100 Mbps full duplex instead of using Auto-Negotiate.

This has entirely fixed my issue. TF2 now runs with 60 fps on the highest settings in the game. I have a Realtek Gigabit Ethernet Controller. This is an onboard network card. Now, I am not sure if these same settings apply to other network card manufacturer's or not, but I know this helped me for sure.

Hope this helps somebody else.
Click to expand...
 
Bumping this 'cause I just got an i7-950 and the game is actually running very well for me.

This is my load while playing TF2 (I'm running stock w/o turbo and HT):
tf2perf.png


As far as multicore is concerned, I've only enabled it in the game's video options and it balances really well and runs extremely smooth. Did you ever screw with the cvars associated with multicore? If you ever messed with the multicore cvars then I would wipe out the game configuration (disable Steam cloud and delete config files) and start from scratch, then enable multicore rendering in the options and see how that goes.
 
TF2 can be strange with patches. it will run fine and then a patch comes out that drops the fps by 10-15 sometimes.
 
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