Cyrris
12-29-03, 02:33 AM
OK, recently I was lucky enough to get a GeCube Radeon 9600XT "Extreme". It's has 2.5ns memory modules, so it shipped with a default cpu/mem speed of 500/700 instead of the usual 500/600. The supply here was really thin - I preordered mine so i got one from the very small shipment that came in mid-december, while everyone else in the country is rather upset, as the next shipment is delayed until mid january. Odd though... they shipped the thing with Cat 3.6...
But, as luck might *not* have it, it just isn't running that well for me, and I'm not sure if there's one single thing i can do to get better performance, or if it's a range of factors. So, I'll just give you the low down on my PC, hopefully you guys can help me out.
The Video card: Radeon 9600XT, currently running at 550/700, using Rage3D. My motherobard only allows it to run at 4x AGP instead of the preferred 8x, but i wouldn't think that this would be much of an issue. I've run catalysts 3.6, 3.9, and (currently) 3.10.
The Chip: AthlonXP 1800+, not overclocked, just running at the stock 1.53GHz. I wouldn't think that my new video card is really too good for my processor...
The Chipset: My Gigabyte motherboard is an old one, and it was cheap too. It's only got a VIA KT-133a chipset on it, so my 512MB of RAM isn't DDR.
Also (perhaps) noteworthy, is that I haven't formatted for quite some time. I recently got my Radeon to replaced my old GeForce2 Ti, but instead of formatting, i just used an nVidia nasty-file-remover. I defrag all the time, running Windows XP Pro, and there's plenty of room left on mt hard drive. May games are on a different partition from my windows installation.
The Problem: The two games I play most, UT2003 and CnC Generals, more or less run worse than I think they should. On the GeForce, I'd run both with low detail, and both ran ok-ish. Now I run them both on reasonably high detail (not fully high), with 8x aniso, and no anti-aliasing, and the framerates are just as poor as on the GeForce. Putting the details back down again still doesn't make it silky smooth, either. This is despite me seeing better frames posted on review sites, even with inferior 9600 pro's. Now sure, they're all using top-line Athlon64s or P4s, and I think that this is probably why Generals runs so much worse for me than for them - but UT2003? A simple botmatch with 10 or so bots simply won't go over 50 fps, and is constantly diving into the 30s and even 20s. I would think that an 1800+ would definately be enough for UT2k3, as the game itself is already over a year old. I do recall a friend of mine, on an 1800+ (but with ddr ram) and a Ti4600, telling me the game was always silky smooth for him, with details right up. That's why it's all so confuzzling. I know my Radeon is better than his GeForce 4.
My motherboard can only handle up to an AthlonXP 2400+ or maybe a 2600+. Would going with one of them fix my problem entirely, or have I overrated the 9600XT's abilities? Would a format help at all? Is running with old PC-133 RAM or 4x AGP something that would really make much difference?
But, as luck might *not* have it, it just isn't running that well for me, and I'm not sure if there's one single thing i can do to get better performance, or if it's a range of factors. So, I'll just give you the low down on my PC, hopefully you guys can help me out.
The Video card: Radeon 9600XT, currently running at 550/700, using Rage3D. My motherobard only allows it to run at 4x AGP instead of the preferred 8x, but i wouldn't think that this would be much of an issue. I've run catalysts 3.6, 3.9, and (currently) 3.10.
The Chip: AthlonXP 1800+, not overclocked, just running at the stock 1.53GHz. I wouldn't think that my new video card is really too good for my processor...
The Chipset: My Gigabyte motherboard is an old one, and it was cheap too. It's only got a VIA KT-133a chipset on it, so my 512MB of RAM isn't DDR.
Also (perhaps) noteworthy, is that I haven't formatted for quite some time. I recently got my Radeon to replaced my old GeForce2 Ti, but instead of formatting, i just used an nVidia nasty-file-remover. I defrag all the time, running Windows XP Pro, and there's plenty of room left on mt hard drive. May games are on a different partition from my windows installation.
The Problem: The two games I play most, UT2003 and CnC Generals, more or less run worse than I think they should. On the GeForce, I'd run both with low detail, and both ran ok-ish. Now I run them both on reasonably high detail (not fully high), with 8x aniso, and no anti-aliasing, and the framerates are just as poor as on the GeForce. Putting the details back down again still doesn't make it silky smooth, either. This is despite me seeing better frames posted on review sites, even with inferior 9600 pro's. Now sure, they're all using top-line Athlon64s or P4s, and I think that this is probably why Generals runs so much worse for me than for them - but UT2003? A simple botmatch with 10 or so bots simply won't go over 50 fps, and is constantly diving into the 30s and even 20s. I would think that an 1800+ would definately be enough for UT2k3, as the game itself is already over a year old. I do recall a friend of mine, on an 1800+ (but with ddr ram) and a Ti4600, telling me the game was always silky smooth for him, with details right up. That's why it's all so confuzzling. I know my Radeon is better than his GeForce 4.
My motherboard can only handle up to an AthlonXP 2400+ or maybe a 2600+. Would going with one of them fix my problem entirely, or have I overrated the 9600XT's abilities? Would a format help at all? Is running with old PC-133 RAM or 4x AGP something that would really make much difference?