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new video card = slow as all hell
happyshark
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I just got a evga 7600gt and a 22" widescreen lcd in the mail. I used to have onboard video. Now, I have not been involved in any kind of pc gaming at all for the past 6 years or so, so it is frustrating that when I do upgrade to something that i was reccomended it doesnt work. I upgraded to the newest nvidia driver, put my resolution to the right one (1680x1050).
I bought S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and I got into the Quake wars beta so I installed both. They run like shit, slow as hell. No artifacts though, just shitty framerates even when I really lower the settings.
Is there some test I can do to see if my card is running right? Maybe my motherboard is still using the onboard video somehow? I didnt disable it in the BIOS or anything although i did look and couldnt find an option for that.
I have a 2.8 Pentium D as a cpu and 1 Gig of RAM. Maybe my screen is too big and I should have ordered a better card? If anyone could help I would really appreciate it.
I bought S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and I got into the Quake wars beta so I installed both. They run like shit, slow as hell. No artifacts though, just shitty framerates even when I really lower the settings.
Is there some test I can do to see if my card is running right? Maybe my motherboard is still using the onboard video somehow? I didnt disable it in the BIOS or anything although i did look and couldnt find an option for that.
I have a 2.8 Pentium D as a cpu and 1 Gig of RAM. Maybe my screen is too big and I should have ordered a better card? If anyone could help I would really appreciate it.
happyshark on
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That or just look in your Display properties.
and you're attempting to play probably the most demanding game currently on the market, and the beta (buggy, unoptimized) of a to-be-released and also heavily demanding game
I guess I'm saying I'm not sure where your expectations were, but don't expect to be kicking these games' ass or something
download and run 3Dmark and compare to other people's scores with the same or similiar hardware. that'll tell you whether you're far off the mark or not.
So yeah, run S.T.A.L.K.E.R. on static lighting and you should be able to amp up all the other settings to pretty high quality and have reasonable frames per second.
I ended up playing about a week or so and it just wasn't working as well as it should've been. I started a topic in this same forum and someone recommended Driver Cleaner. It wiped my system of ATi files that I had missed when manually removing them myself in regedit. It works quickly, too.
http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=23420&
There's my old topic. The suggestions really do work. And oddly enough (maybe it's just me), simply playing games over a period of time seemed to improve performance once I had all of the ATi files and drivers uninstalled and the nVidia ones running.
If you need more help or anything isn't covered there, ask me.. I feel I have enough experience to help out at this point.
I can run previous generation games and cranked or nearly-cranked settings (Doom3, Quake4, Oblivion, HL2) and maintain 30+ fps rates for most of the game, but the latest gen games are even taxing to my system.
I'd say it's only a matter of a year or two before games start utilitizing multiple CPU cores and Gigs of video RAM.
tl;dr: Our computers are starting to show their age. Mine is nearly the same as yours, and beyond swapping out to a slightly more powerful processor and bumping the RAM up to 2GB, we're really just at the limits of our hardware.
Start saving for your new computer. I hear they're expecting octocore chips for January-February next year.
All in all, you need to lower your expectations a little. Those two games are probably only going to run optimally with an Nvidia 8 series card.
You know unless you got a real good deal on your monitor I might even consider downgrading the monitor to like a 19 inch and then taking that money to upgrade your video card. Just a thought.
There's NO WAY I'm sending this monitor back for a 19"....I got it for 225 with a $50 rebate I'm about to send it. It's a freakin work of art. So beautiful on my desk.
Do not ignore the previous advice on resolution and AA/AF settings. I know for a fact that more RAM will not allow you to play at 1680x1050 with your current graphics card.
To be sure your card & system is running properly, do what Deusfaux said, and download & Run 3DMark. As long as your score is on par with other people with similar setups, you should be fine. Post your score here, and people here can probably tell you if your score is proper.
I will download the one off download.com....3dmark 05
In the results where it compared me to 15 similar systems I got the absolute lowest score. T
Should I take the card out and put it back in ? I'll try it and see if it fixes anything.
Below is the result details of your submitted project.
Main Test Results
3DMark Score 3655 3DMarks
CPU Score 1602 CPUMarks
Detailed Test Results
Game Tests
GT1 - Return To Proxycon 14.2 fps
GT2 - Firefly Forest 9.2 fps
GT3 - Canyon Flight 23.8 fps
CPU Tests
CPU Test 1 0.8 fps
CPU Test 2 1.4 fps
If the card wasn't seated right, it wouldn't work at all, so don't bother taking it out. From here I would check your BIOS for the proper settings, i.e. graphics aperture. You should be able to fish up a good BIOS guide just using Google.
Also make sure you aren't running any shit in the background when you test, be it Norton Antivirus or some malware you got accidentally.
I'm with Iroh, check your graphics aperture and AGP bus settings in the BIOS.
You may also need to update your motherboard's chipset drivers.
Speaking of which, full system specs would be an awesome help to us for solving this one.
That resolution will be impossible for your card to handle with any modern game. I am sorry, this is the truth. No amount of tweaking will help you out aside from lowering the resolution to something reasonable for a mid range card that's almost 2 generations old.
pentium d 820 2.8
asus p5rd1-vm
1gig Corsair valueselect
80gb hard drive
windows xp service pack 2
EDIT: Do I need to update my bios using a floppy drive? I dont have one but I guess I could get one.
EDIT 2: I called Asus support and he said BIOS shouldnt be an issue, instead it is a driver conflict.
Reinstalling latest version of directx 9c (not 10) might help, although probably not - as the games would generally not work at all if there was a problem with this.
Vsync can cause low framerate problems too, although what you describe would mean that your monitor is refreshing at about 10-20hz, which is pretty unlikely. You should be able to force it off in the Nvidia control panel if you want to check that. I highly doubt this is the issue though.
Other than drivers, its either an overall OS problem (malware) or hardware. If you have a spare HD, install windows on it, install one of the games and only the things you need to get it running (ie directx, good drivers). If it still performs poorly, its likely the card or mobo.
Make sure your gpu and cpu aren't overheating when under load. This can happen even to new cards - I've personally had a problem with crusty thermal paste on a 6600gt resulting in temps over 110C - it should remain below 60 - 70 tops - under load... can't remember exactly, mine is always at 40-45c with liquid cooling now :P. If for any reason the cpu or gpu are overheating they will clock themselves down, cause lock-ups, cause reboots, or cause "artifacts" (gpu overheat) on screen. From my experience, its more likely for the cpu to clock the system down when overheating, and the gpu to cause lockups and reboots.
Warning - If your card is new and overheating, don't fix the problem yourself - return it for warranty replacement or repair. Taking off the heatsink from your card will likely void any warranty. Plus, the GPU could already be damaged, so why not get it replaced.
Stupid question, but you did plug the PCI-E cable into the card, yes?
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?? I just plugged the card into the pci slot...no cable? What cable? there was some stuff that came with the package but i didnt use any of them
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The problem is, I can't see the side of the card that would have the plug-in.
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Have you checked the temperature inside your case? If things are getting too hot your card could be throttling back.
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I'm going to wait until I get improved powersupply on monday before I order anything else off of newegg.
Typically I get problems if I don't 1) uninstall the old drivers and reboot, 2) install the new ones, and 3) reboot.