Battlefield 2 + x850xtpe (Need Help)

[pibb]

Originally posted by: stonecold3169

Originally posted by: Corbett
Gaming takes up maybe 5% of what I do on my machine so I went with Intel thanks again for your proving my point. Besides, I was not interested in getting a new motherboard as well.

now now, children...

okay, honest advice here now. First of all, turn down the agp aperture. Basically, what this is (I don't wanna talk down to you, but don't know where you stand with this stuff) is a buffer to fill stuff into if it overloads your videocards memory. Think of it as the equivalent of your pagefile. Now, the higher you set this, the more likely it will actually be used, hurting performance. From everything I've read, on cards with 128mb+ memory, lower is actually better, with 128mb aperture being the highest, and some people saying 64mb is fine. Might wanna give it a shot, would only take a few seconds to check out.

As far as memory goes, check out in your bios what you are running at. Most mobos by default clock 1gb sticks (I'm assuming you are using a pair of 1gb sticks) to very conservative settings. Setting the cas lower would make a world of difference in your case. As for programs to test this, Sisoft SANDRA can tell you this, and also tell you your memory bandwith compared to other rigs with similar specs.

Also, try running the 3dmark series and checking out the online result browser compared to other users, and let us know which tests you are running lower then average in. this may or may not shed some lgiht on what is going on here.

Hope this helps!

*edit* your soundcard is hurting you a lot too. The envy24 chipset is a cpu hog, it's the same chipset used in the chaintek 710, and has great quality but isn't efficent. Might want to consider and audigy 2zs. Also, what are your power supply specs?

Wow is this right? I actually thought AGP Apterture size should be set to how many MB your card is, mine is on 256 right now. Should I turn this down?? btw im running a ati 9550 256mb

 

[pibb]

Originally posted by: Corbett
So when I am in BF2 the game hits a low of 15fps quite often, depending on how heavy the action. Now, i dont think with these specs it should run that slow on my machine. In normal action it will run around 25-30fps but shouldnt it be higher with these specs?

This may be worth reading to you, TweakGuides.net BF2 optimization guide

 

[Polish3d]

Originally posted by: Corbett
Guys one thing I noticed is that my CPU and Mobo are both 800mhz FSB, yet on the log they are clocking in at 200mhz. Is that correct or is something wrong there? Also, apparently when I was messing around with the settings yesterday i ended up underclocking my cpu to 2.9 so I now have it overclocked 10% running at 3.7ghz.

Anyways, shouldnt it register at 800mhz or am I just not understanding something?

Please try what I suggested above re: dynamic and high quality settings in vid card control panel

 

[Varun]

Originally posted by: Corbett
Guys one thing I noticed is that my CPU and Mobo are both 800mhz FSB, yet on the log they are clocking in at 200mhz. Is that correct or is something wrong there? Also, apparently when I was messing around with the settings yesterday i ended up underclocking my cpu to 2.9 so I now have it overclocked 10% running at 3.7ghz.

Anyways, shouldnt it register at 800mhz or am I just not understanding something?

No the FSB is 200MHz but transfers 4 times per clock making an effective 800MHz FSB.

My Prime95 thing got hijacked. Usually people run Prime95 for system stability but you aren't having stability issues. Prime95 will run your CPU at 100% utilization in the torture test, and while running that I want you to run Everest Home Edition

In Everest Home Edition, expand Computer then click Sensor. This will tell you the temperature of you CPU (and other things as well). Just see what it's at and how high it goes. Also, click on Overclock. Overclock will show you your current CPU Clock, Multiplier, FSB etc. As a bonus it will tell you about your RAM which you were wondering about. ie DIMM1: Corsair VS512MB400 512MB PC3200 DDR SDRAM (2.5-3-3-8@200MHz) is what mine says.

Long story short - see if your CPU Clock decreases while running Prime95 due to too high of a temperature. If the CPU throttles down then you need more cooling. If it doesn't you have eliminated that as one problem.

p.s. AGP8X and PCIE will offer almost identical performance. The AGP bus was never saturated when PCIE was introduced. Video cards have onboard RAM and therefore try to use the AGP bus as little as possible.

p.s.s a 3.4GHz P4 is NOT a poor processor for gaming. It's not the BEST but it's not crap either. THIS GUY DOESN'T WANT TO BUILD A NEW COMPUTER JUST TO APPEASE PEOPLE THAT THINK HE SHOULD HAVE BOUGHT AN AMD.

 

[Corbett]

Ok well I did what you suggested and the CPU did not seem to throttle down at all so that must not be the problem.

I did manage to play around with some of my settings though. AGP aperature is now at 128mb. Overclocking CPU @ 5%. Changed some settings in the ATI Tray Tool. Now I am hitting 35 for my low fps in heavy action in bf2! I''ve seen it hit around 60fps now when not in heavy action and a few times in the 90s! Must have done something right lol! Thanks for all your help so far guys.

Now, seeing as I have PC2100 I would like to definitely replace that with 4x512PC3200. Any suggestions on what memory to pick up? Preferably through Newegg (unless you find it way cheaper somewhere else).

Also I am going to pick up a Creative Audigy 2 ZS. An OCZ PSU and a new CPU fan. Please check them out below and let me know what you think. Thanks again for all the suggestions. Most of you have been a great help!

(2x) OCZ Performance Series 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR 2-3-3-6

CREATIVE Sound Blaster Audigy2 ZS

OCZ ModStream OCZ52012U ATX 520W Power Supply

Thermaltake CL-P0114 120mm Cooling Fan/Heatsink

Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound

Swiftech MCX-159-R 40mm Ball Cooling Fan for Chipset

 

[shoRunner]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820231012 <-- same timings alittle cheaper

 

[biostud]

wow, the amount of misinformation in this thread is astounding.
AMD is faster than intel for gaming sure, but this doesn't turn intel into crawling snails :roll:

Ignore the "go AMD" since your system should handle BF2 just fine. If you where going to buy a new system it would be a sound suggestion but otherwise it's plain stupid.

Now if your memory is indeed PC2300 that might be a seriously bottleneck. P4 has been known to be very bandwidth hungry, you might find some old reviews to (de)conferm this. Otherwise just do what other has suggested about turning down shadows detail etc. Which is what I would do first, as it costs nothing.

 

[Topweasel]

We aren't talking about staying at 20 FPS we are just talking about the game dipping into 20 FPS. The Person who said 7800GTX and 4400 would work fine, I think thats a stretch but he isn't running a 7800GTX he is running an 850XT and as for running a 4400 "barely overclocked" I am sure running a proccessor that is alread as good as a FX51 (thinking of just one core) if You overclocked it a simple 200MHZ your at the FX53 range with better banwidth. He on the other end is using a much lower then top of the line P4 while good enough for almost any game (including this one) Isn't going to be comparable to your 4400+. Anyways read the Anandtech BF2 performance review at max settings the 850XT gets 50 FPS as and average, this makes me think that it will dip lower very easily (not as adverage but as part of what makes the average so low). While I am not a huge fan of how HARDocp does their tests and try to not read their reviews they are one of the few that give that kind of graph and tell you what the lowest Frame rate was.

So while he has a great Video card, he either needs change his video settings or or replace the vid card (which means toasting the mobo, memory, and CPU). As it stands he is running the best setup he can for AGP (at least vid, he could get a faster P4 or an Athlon64 but lets not get into that). He need to make a decision about resolution and Quality vs. Minimum frame rate (Minimum everyone pays way to much attention to the Average).

 

[dguy6789]

Oh my. This forum has become WAY TOO AMD Biased in the last couple of years.

Ok, now all you people saying to get an AMD, just be nice and STFU. I am tired of all of this misinformation.

Yes, AMD is the better performer in games, but IN NO WAY IN ANY SITUATION would the difference be enough to make one cpu be 15fps and the other over 60. The difference is more along the lines of 5-10fps give or take 10 depending on how high the graphical settings are.

His problem is not his configuration. His system is high end and could run any game you throw at it at maximum settings without aa very well.

ALSO, there is SOME performance differences between AGP and PCIe in older games, but in any modern game, two video cards of AGP and PCIe flavor will perform identically.

Now to the OP:

Download CPU Z here:

http://www.cpuid.org/cpuz.php

It will tell you all you need to know about your cpu/memory/chipset. Your ram speed can impact performance, but it will not make such an impact to be the sole cause of your lack of fps, this I can guarentee.

Download 3Dmark05 here:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/download4376.html

Once downloaded, go into your video card control panel and turn off Vsync and any Anti Aliasing and Anisotropic filtering.

Run the program and tell us what score you get, this will give us an idea as to whether or not the gpu is performing like it should.

 

[Topweasel]

Originally posted by: dguy6789
Oh my. This forum has become WAY TOO AMD Biased in the last couple of years.

Ok, now all you people saying to get an AMD, just be nice and STFU. I am tired of all of this misinformation.

Yes, AMD is the better performer in games, but IN NO WAY IN ANY SITUATION would the difference be enough to make one cpu be 15fps and the other over 60. The difference is more along the lines of 5-10fps give or take 10 depending on how high the graphical settings are.

His problem is not his configuration. His system is high end and could run any game you throw at it at maximum settings without aa very well.

ALSO, there is SOME performance differences between AGP and PCIe in older games, but in any modern game, two video cards of AGP and PCIe flavor will perform identically.

Now to the OP:

Download CPU Z here:

http://www.cpuid.org/cpuz.php

It will tell you all you need to know about your cpu/memory/chipset. Your ram speed can impact performance, but it will not make such an impact to be the sole cause of your lack of fps, this I can guarentee.

Download 3Dmark05 here:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/download4376.html

Once downloaded, go into your video card control panel and turn off Vsync and any Anti Aliasing and Anisotropic filtering.

Run the program and tell us what score you get, this will give us an idea as to whether or not the gpu is performing like it should.

No it can't read Anandtechs GPU review for BF2, it shows the 850XT as AVERAGING 50 FPS at 1600X1200 maxed out. When you have an Average it tends to mean that it goes below and above that on several times Hardocp even has a review showing on 3 seperate accasions the 7800GTX droping below 30 FPS and hitting 11 FPS once. He has a great setup that would run almost any game at its highest settings but this is one game where it can dip that low on just about anybodies setup and especially the 850XT. He is not running a top of the line machine (from any manufacturer) and needs to do what we all do and find a compramise between acceptible frame rates and quality.

 

[dguy6789]

An average of 50fps is playable in most scenarios. But he is saying it goes down to 15fps very often, which I would doubt is normal. It is understandable that the frame rate will go down dramatically from time to time, but it should not go down THAT low that often.

 

[Topweasel]

Originally posted by: dguy6789
An average of 50fps is playable in most scenarios. But he is saying it goes down to 15fps very often, which I would doubt is normal. It is understandable that the frame rate will go down dramatically from time to time, but it should not go down THAT low that often.

Easy answer, he isn't Anand. Could be things as simple as Nav running in the back ground. The reviews anand does doesn't include anything running in the background (cept the CPU reviews). He might want to try turning off HT to see if that helps (who knows how many cycles are being taken by crap) but then simple things as a IM can make the machine sputter for a second. I am just saying that if a 7800gtx is almost twice as fast on that setting as a 850XT and it dips that low then i am not surprised that his machine would do alot more often.

There isn't much he could do about his machine besides trying a clean OS. He has at or near the highest CPU (for his board) and the Best AGP vid card available and more then enough memory. Anything else would require almost a complete rebuild of his machine.

 

[dguy6789]

I still think he should run 3Dmark to make sure his video card is performing like it should. The more variables we eliminate, the closer we are to solving the problem. It could be software, it could be the video card, eliminating variables makes finding a solution much easier.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: mOeeOm
The processor and the ram(unless it is good, post what kind it is). You should get an AMD64 or X2 processor and some quality 2GB ram. That should help.

an x2 would have no benefit as the game is not smp/smt aware, educate yourself.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: Varun
What kind of Heat Sink and fan do you have on your CPU? If the CPU gets really hot it will throttle itself which could be your issue. Run a game that takes a lot of juice, CPU gets hot, CPU throttles, game gets really slow.

Check it out and maybe get that nice Zalman with the 120mm fan and copper fins. You can use Everest Home Edition to check your CPU temps.

the xp90 is better than the zalman...based on benchmarks, not faboyism, and the xp90 is not too big to interfere with the install

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: mOeeOm
Hmmm...if you won't agree that AMD is better for gaming...then I don't know how we can help you.

amd may be better for gaming, but not to this extreme.

 

[Topweasel]

Originally posted by: bob4432

Originally posted by: mOeeOm
The processor and the ram(unless it is good, post what kind it is). You should get an AMD64 or X2 processor and some quality 2GB ram. That should help.

an x2 would have no benefit as the game is not smp/smt aware, educate yourself.

Sure there is a benifit to games. Having a core dedicated to a game has to be better then wasting cycles on stupid crap running in the background. People need to stop thinking one demensionally. But none of this is usefull for him anyways since I think the biggest culprit is his vid card, but even then onely so much can be done about that. He should probably wait till the 520 comes out Maybe the 7800GTX will come out on AGP and if not the 520 will and if both then he can get which ever one is faster but even then he could still end up falling below 30 FPS just less often.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: dk1m
hm im no pro with hardware but my suggestion would be to jus turn down ur resolution cuz i think the agp 8x mite have slightly lower performance over 16x pci e

unless u have a really huge monitor i think 1024x768 or 1280x1024 will be ok, maybe with 2x aa (if it doesnt hurt ur performance 2 much id go with that

i also noticed some people here are very arrogant and unpolite (jus based on a some threads i read), while others are very helpful and supply good info, but because i personally don like dealing with people like that i prefer to get help elsewhere (extreme overclocking forums, ard Forum have some nice people )

obviously not a pro as we don't even use the bandwidth the agp 8x gives us so that is not a bottlenck, even with the 7800gtx...

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: wasserkool

Originally posted by: Bona Fide
Just a thought...when you come here asking for help, don't be an asshole to everyone who tells you the problem. Okay?

Intel sucks for gaming. Get over it.

Factor in an AGP graphics card, and extremely high resolutions, and you will get 15fps.

quoted for truth!

quoted for ignorance

 

[biostud]

Originally posted by: Topweasel

Originally posted by: bob4432

Originally posted by: mOeeOm
The processor and the ram(unless it is good, post what kind it is). You should get an AMD64 or X2 processor and some quality 2GB ram. That should help.

an x2 would have no benefit as the game is not smp/smt aware, educate yourself.

Sure there is a benifit to games. Having a core dedicated to a game has to be better then wasting cycles on stupid crap running in the background. People need to stop thinking one demensionally. But none of this is usefull for him anyways since I think the biggest culprit is his vid card, but even then onely so much can be done about that. He should probably wait till the 520 comes out Maybe the 7800GTX will come out on AGP and if not the 520 will and if both then he can get which ever one is faster but even then he could still end up falling below 30 FPS just less often.

yeah, all benchmarks says so.... :roll:

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: Crescent13
Your CPU SuXxOrZ!! that's the problem, it's the biggest bottleneck.

GO AMD!!!!!!!

EDIT: oh yeah and AGP doesn't help at all.

idiot. pic-e wouldn't help either as i said before the agp bandwidth isn't fully utilized. kind of like sata vs pata, the interface is not the bottleneck, ass

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: Corbett
Thanks. I didnt realize the Intel has THAT MUCH of a bottleneck.

Anyways, about the throttling. I am going to run that prime95 torture test and select the second option. How long with that take? Are you sure it is not throttling? I swear it may just be my imagination but it does seem to slow down the longer I play, even though I have the GPU fan set to 100%.

run prime95 and cpuz at the same time, cpuz will read the speed of the cpu to see if it is throttling. prime95 is one of those programs that can run as long as you want it to, but it should run in the torture test in the 2nd option for as long as you want, a couple hours will definately get the heat up. i am assuming that cpu is the prescott core, which are known to run hot so this maybe the route, along with a psu problem.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: Bona Fide

Originally posted by: Valkerie

Originally posted by: Corbett

Originally posted by: Bona Fide
Just a thought...when you come here asking for help, don't be an asshole to everyone who tells you the problem. Okay?

Intel sucks for gaming. Get over it.

Factor in an AGP graphics card, and extremely high resolutions, and you will get 15fps.

Funny, there are plenty of others with similar setups running 50fps. But thanks for showing how biased you are towards AMD.

Now here's some advice for you. Take your AMD and stick it where the sun dont shine.

Both AMD and Intel are very good processor manufacturers. It's preference according to the users. You can be biased all you want, but when it comes down to the bang for the buck, you can't convince someone to get an AMD processor if they have an LGA mobo and want to replace a CPU. It's common sense, and not everyone shops the same.

He was not asking for an upgrade. He wanted to know why his framerates were so bad.

- 1600x1200 resolution, all settings high
- AGP graphics card
- Intel processor

Not a good combination, I'd say. But w/e.

agp is the not the probem, read and learn a$$

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: Topweasel

Originally posted by: bob4432

Originally posted by: mOeeOm
The processor and the ram(unless it is good, post what kind it is). You should get an AMD64 or X2 processor and some quality 2GB ram. That should help.

an x2 would have no benefit as the game is not smp/smt aware, educate yourself.

Sure there is a benifit to games. Having a core dedicated to a game has to be better then wasting cycles on stupid crap running in the background. People need to stop thinking one demensionally. But none of this is usefull for him anyways since I think the biggest culprit is his vid card, but even then onely so much can be done about that. He should probably wait till the 520 comes out Maybe the 7800GTX will come out on AGP and if not the 520 will and if both then he can get which ever one is faster but even then he could still end up falling below 30 FPS just less often.

not really. a 3.4HT vs a x2 4400 is just 2x2.2 a64s. having run dual processor machines, the second processor is only used for the small stuff like av, firewall and whatever else is running in the background which shouldn't account for much.

 

[bob4432]

get this hs - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835109119
and a nice 92mm fan, excellent performance, better than quite a few h2o setups