9800 Pro Slow?

[NavJitsU4]

I recently upgraded from:

Athlon 1700+
Soyo K7ADA MOBO
384 PC 2700 RAM
GeForce 2 Pro
Segate 40GB ATA 100 x2 5400 rpm
Sound Blaster Audigy

To:

Athlon 2800+ (Barton)
Asus A7N8X Deluxe
Geil PC3200 RAM
Radeon 9800 Pro
Segate 40GB ATA 100 x2 5400 rpm
Soundblaster Audigy

So, as anyone would expect, I was expecting a pretty big step forward in the gaming department but so far that does not seem to be the case; let me explain; when running relatively new games i.e. NFSU, UT2K3, etc.. I do not get the steller performance that I expected; NFSU running @ 1024x768 32bit with 2x aa/af I get on average about 30 fps and it dips down into the teens at certain points... UT2K3 @ 1024x768 32bit 2x aa/af I get huge frame rates in smaller maps around 120 - 60 fps. In bigger maps such as avaris i get big frame rates in closed in areas and in open areas with lots of action it drops down to the high 30's.

Few reasons that IMO are the problems:

1. I purchased the 9800 Pro Off ebay, and in the auction it was listed as " Gunuine Built by ATI 9800 Pro w/ Samsung Memory " and in the fine print it said that the card was brand new and it was pulled from a DELL system, I did not think that would be a problem so I won the auction and got it for 194 USD s/h included. The card's stock clock according to Rage 3d is 378 Core and 337 Mem, I can overclock it to 400 Core and 369 Mem, I haven't pushed it further as of yet, the memory on the card reads: SAMSUNG 328 K4D26328E-GC2A. I don't know if this card is really a 9800 pro; i hear some people say that the memory should read in the 700 but I think they say that because the double the numbers because it's ddr, in that case mine is right where it should be. I was wondering if this card is really not a 9800 pro but something else that has been softmodded to read like one? so, here is a picture of the card maybe some of you can spot a fake: CARD

2. I haven't upgraded my hard-drives yet, but the soon will be replaced with a Segate 120GB SATA unit. I'm wondering if my current drives are creating the bottle neck?


I will post 3dmark and Aquamark scores in a few.

Any help/suggestions is well appreciated

 

[JonnyBlaze]

those are the same default clocks of my 9800pro.

one thing to try for ut2k4. in the ut2004.ini file, under the [D3DDrv.D3DRenderDevice] heading, change UseTripleBuffering to true.

that might help some

JB

 

[Connoisseur]

well off the bat I can tell you that the 5400rpm hd's are holding you back as far as load times. There's def. a noticeable dif between game load times with a 5400 and 7200. Also, how much ram do you have? If you only have 256mb then you should DEF upgrade to 512. I can't comment on the vid card cause the picture is pretty blurry. Finally, what's your PSU? if it can't handle the power draw from your components, then the system WILL slow down (happened to mine). hope this helps

 

[tazdevl]

Those games are also CPU limited to a certain extent. If you wanted a big jump, should have gone with an Athlon 64 or P4 and OC'd over 3GHZ.

I'd also tighten up your RAM timings, if you can, might help.

Do you have the latest Catalyst drivers? Could be the card... but I'm skeptical.

Did you do a fresh OS install or did you use something like DriverCleaner to wipe the last remnants of the Detonators from your system.

 

[nRollo]

That is the cheesiest looking 9800Pro I have ever seen.

What are the RAM chips on it?

Apparently Sapphire made that thing, or at least that's the only one I ever saw that looked like that:

http://www.digit-life.com/articles2/radeon/sapphire-7.html?41592

 

[NavJitsU4]

Connoisseur
Also, how much ram do you have? If you only have 256mb then you should DEF upgrade to 512. I can't comment on the vid card cause the picture is pretty blurry. Finally, what's your PSU? if it can't handle the power draw from your components, then the system WILL slow down (happened to mine). hope this helps

I have one stick of Geil 512 MB PC 3200. My PSU is 300 watts, the devices connected to it directly include: 2 hdds, 2 optical drives, 2 case fans, fdd, mobo, cpu fan and 9800 pro; i did not even consider this as a potential problem, I have an extra 300 watt psu i'm gonna use that to power the 9800 pro and check if that fixes my problem.

tazdevl
Those games are also CPU limited to a certain extent. If you wanted a big jump, should have gone with an Athlon 64 or P4 and OC'd over 3GHZ. Do you have the latest Catalyst drivers? Could be the card... but I'm skeptical. Did you do a fresh OS install or did you use something like DriverCleaner to wipe the last remnants of the Detonators from your system.

I have the latest drivers installed. I did a fresh install but my geforce 2 was in the system at that moment because I had not recived my 9800 pro yet, I did uninstall the nvidia disp drivers and I recently ran driver cleaner. I just don't understand why my system should be putting out those low frame rates; I mean I have well above the "Recommended" requirements on the box.


Here are my 3dmark 03 scores, with the default settings; i could not change those settings anyway: 4167 3d marks
does that sound right?

 

[NavJitsU4]

Rollo
What are the RAM chips on it?

The numbers printed on the RAM are SAMSUNG 328 K4D26328E-GC2A. Sorry about the pictures; i don't have a good camera, I took those using my cheap webcam, but you should pretty much get the idea.

 

[nRollo]

I think that is 2.8ns/700MHz RAM, but the only reference I could find to it is in this article:

http://www.pcpop.com/Market/2004/3/16921.shtml

There are some models numbers close to it on the XBit reviews of various 9800Pros, so it's probably legit.

 

[Dman877]

Those are the same chips that are on my 9800 retail card. Try the 4.3 cats, they are supposed to be a bit faster I think.

 

[shock311]

my 9800 pro looks exacty the same, bought it off someone from this board, said it was a dell pull. I get over 16k in 3dmark01 and over 6k in 03, far cry also runs at an average of 42fps. So I would assume its a genuine dell 9800 pro