7800GT SLI setup and Black and White 2

[TheRyuu]

I have a 7800GT SLI setup and I play the game Black and White 2. Now, thats a very demanding game and sometimes it comes to a dam crawl sometimes. So what settings can I use and how can I improve performance.

P.S. This thread can be considered software or video, but since it mainly focuses on video settings, I thought it might belong better here. Mods can move it if they like...

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Originally posted by: wizboy11
Mods can move it if they like...

There's mods in video?

B&W2 is very hard on video cards... even SLI setups. What resolution are you trying to run? You might need to drop down to 1280x960 to have AA and keep playable rates throughout. According to AT's review, the 512GTX SLI only got an average of 44 at 1600x1200 and they're quite a bit stronger than the GTs.

 

[TheRyuu]

1280x1024 is what I play it at. It's REALLY slow sometimes (like if I try and look at the whole island, or look at ground level from one side of the island to the other), and thats with NO AA.

 

[TheRyuu]

^ Bedtime bump

 

[BlacKJesuS]

I dont know wut your problem is:

3000+ @ 3500+
2gigs of pc3200
x850XT oc'd to PE speeds
200 gig HD


I got 40fps at 1280 w/ max details

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Originally posted by: wizboy11
1280x1024 is what I play it at. It's REALLY slow sometimes (like if I try and look at the whole island, or look at ground level from one side of the island to the other), and thats with NO AA.

Have you verified that SLI is working? I know, sounds silly, but I gotta ask. Can you verify 100% in another app (try 3dmark for example) that SLI is working correctly? Write down your score, then disable SLI and repeat the test. Let's make sure.

Then, we'll wanna nail down your SLI settings specifically for B&W2. I think the nV standard profile is AFR for that game. See if that's what you have it set to. If it is, let's try AFR2, and even SFR.

I also don't mean to pick on obvious things, so please don't be offended-- in your nV control panel, is AA set to App Controlled, etc? It's easy to accidentally screw with stuff in the control panel and forget.

 

[TheRyuu]

Originally posted by: deadseasquirrel

Originally posted by: wizboy11
1280x1024 is what I play it at. It's REALLY slow sometimes (like if I try and look at the whole island, or look at ground level from one side of the island to the other), and thats with NO AA.

Have you verified that SLI is working? I know, sounds silly, but I gotta ask. Can you verify 100% in another app (try 3dmark for example) that SLI is working correctly? Write down your score, then disable SLI and repeat the test. Let's make sure.

Then, we'll wanna nail down your SLI settings specifically for B&W2. I think the nV standard profile is AFR for that game. See if that's what you have it set to. If it is, let's try AFR2, and even SFR.

I also don't mean to pick on obvious things, so please don't be offended-- in your nV control panel, is AA set to App Controlled, etc? It's easy to accidentally screw with stuff in the control panel and forget.

Changed it to SFR and I actually think that helped a bit. I thought that the profile for the game automatically overrides the SLI setting in default settings, but maby I'm wrong? I'll try AFR next. I wish that nHancer worked, but it doesn't seem to be. With that I could view the default SLI profiles that the games use.
Without it though it's not that hard to do. I can use Coolbits 2 in the nv control panel and that lets me decide.

And yes, AA and AF are both Application Control.

 

[Powermoloch]

Black & white 2 runs really well @ 12x10 all highest settings with my x850xt agp...

 

[TheRyuu]

Originally posted by: Powermoloch
Black & white 2 runs really well @ 12x10 all highest settings with my x850xt agp...

Do you have Bloom on high? And other SM 3.0 features on?

 

[Powermoloch]

Originally posted by: wizboy11

Originally posted by: Powermoloch
Black & white 2 runs really well @ 12x10 all highest settings with my x850xt agp...

Do you have Bloom on high? And other SM 3.0 features on?

uggghh x8xx series does not support SM 3.0

the game looks beautiful honestly.

How does the other games perform w/ ur current setup besides B&W 2?

 

[TheRyuu]

Originally posted by: Powermoloch

Originally posted by: wizboy11

Originally posted by: Powermoloch
Black & white 2 runs really well @ 12x10 all highest settings with my x850xt agp...

Do you have Bloom on high? And other SM 3.0 features on?

uggghh x8xx series does not support SM 3.0

the game looks beautiful honestly.

How does the other games perform w/ ur current setup besides B&W 2?

I know the x8xx series does not support the SM 3.0 stuff, I'm pointing that out because the game might be less stressful on your GPU then my GPU's. I'm pretty sure the problem was the SLI profile thing. Don't have time to test it now but I'll give it a shot later.

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Originally posted by: wizboy11
Changed it to SFR and I actually think that helped a bit. I thought that the profile for the game automatically overrides the SLI setting in default settings, but maby I'm wrong?

No, you are correct... the settings should end up being what you have set up for the profile of THAT game, and not the "default profile". The "default" would only be used on games that have no profile at all.

It's odd that it is not working right for you. I'm not a big fan of using Coolbits for profile editing. MUCH prefer nHancer or just editing the nvapps.xml file manually. I'm not sure why nHancer isn't working right for you though. Maybe try reinstalling it (do you have the latest version?).

 

[TheRyuu]

Originally posted by: deadseasquirrel

Originally posted by: wizboy11
Changed it to SFR and I actually think that helped a bit. I thought that the profile for the game automatically overrides the SLI setting in default settings, but maby I'm wrong?

No, you are correct... the settings should end up being what you have set up for the profile of THAT game, and not the "default profile". The "default" would only be used on games that have no profile at all.

It's odd that it is not working right for you. I'm not a big fan of using Coolbits for profile editing. MUCH prefer nHancer or just editing the nvapps.xml file manually. I'm not sure why nHancer isn't working right for you though. Maybe try reinstalling it (do you have the latest version?).

The problem with nHancer is everytime I try to start it I get a XML error that says "are you sure you rebooted after a driver reinstall?" or something to that affect and even after I reboot, it still does it. And it also doesn't matter what driver version I use either.

 

[deadseasquirrel]

There is one issue with nHancer (at least the version I'm using) where you need to go into the XML file and edit "Simpsons: Hit & Run" so that you replace the "&" with "and". His proggie didn't like the "&" for some reason. Doesn't sound like your problem though.