Completely Frustrated

[darkrisen2003]

after nearly a year and a half i still cannot figure out what is going on. in games i get the strangest lagg thats just not explainable. its not internet lagg this is hardware lagg. in games like everquest in pretty much any zone even if there are no people in the zone when i move itll drop to like 1 or 2 fps then just back into normal. now even after getting the new motherboard, case, powerspply, ram, video card. its still doing this. just ram 3dmark05 and got a 939 and this is really freaking me out. ive just build this system and im on a clean install of winxp pro. updated drivers, directx9.0c etc. i just cant figure this out and im just about ready to cry trying to figure out what could be causeing this. ill have the cash to replace a part or 2 on the 9th and i cant figure out what would be my best move considering the only stuff i havent replaced are the processor / hard drive. ill have roughly 300 to blow on whatever is deemed the best move.


System
Raidmax 668 black case
Raidmax 420w
Asus p4c800-e deluxe
p4 2.4 (533) northwood
512 ddr333 kingston value ram
PNY 5900 se 128mb
80 GB WD hard drive
onboard sound
Cable internet (3mb down / 256 kb up)

also noticeing that 100mb of PF is in use on startup and this is wierding me out a bit as im used to only haveing 77 to 80. have been told that it is very possible that it is due to the electricity in the house could not be grounded well and if thats possible what can i do to fix this. im just really frustrated and have been trying to fix this for over a year and im completely out of ideas please help.

 

[LifeStealer]

Have you tried to monitor CPU usage during these times? Have you managed to reinstall xp yet?

 

[Whizzy]

To what value is your AGP Aperture size in BIOS set ? Maybe check some other video card related things in the BIOS also..

 

[TwoBills]

I'd start w/a UPS and a different psu.

Cusa has a Belkin 500va ups on sale, this week, for $20AR. Plug that into the wall and it'll let you know if you have a grounding problem.

Get rid of that Raidmax psu and get a 300w Fortron for around $25 NE. Or if your looking to future proof a little: Enermax 350. $59 NE.

 

[stevty2889]

I wouldn't trust the raidmax PSU, generic PSU's lead to all kinds of trouble. Since 3dmark 05 just came out, I can't really say weather that score is right for your system or not, but a 5900se is not exactly a top of the line card. You may also want to try using some of the older Nvidia drivers. As for what to upgrade with you $300, I would go to 1 gig of ram, and get a newer video card, like the 6600GT or a 6800, I would also recomend getting a good power supply, like an Antec or Enermax.

 

[Shagga]

I would perhaps try another stick of Ram, removing your existing 512MB stick in the first instance. As Stevty said, consider 1GB of Ram anyway.

 

[darkrisen2003]

ok in light of a few suggestions ive gona back into bios and uped my arpeture size to 128mb instead of 64mb. made sure that all my other bios settings are correct and ram another 3dmark05 test and got 947. this is really bugging me because my friend has another setup that in my opinion is smaller then mine in terms of hardware and in all other previous benchmarking programs always scored lower then me but in the new 3dmark he is smokeing me and it makes me believe that something is terebly wrong here. if this could really be a ground problem would one of those special power strips from circuit city be enough to fix the problem or would i need to get a batery backup system instead to fix the issue. im already planning on getting a antec true 550 psu and new ram processesor when money permits but for this check i was planning on getting the psu, a sleeveing kit, and some new case fans and lights etc to jaz my rig but i wanna get this issue fixed.

would something like this help
http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm...m/ccd/productDetail.do
or should i go ahead and get something like this
http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm...m/ccd/productDetail.do


i just dont know what the hell could be causeing this. the video card isnt the best out there and i know this but it should be getting better scores then this. ill keep looking into this but i just am running out of ideas.

 

[TwoBills]

Originally posted by: TwoBills
I'd start w/a UPS and a different psu.

Cusa has a Belkin 500va ups on sale, this week, for $20AR. Plug that into the wall and it'll let you know if you have a grounding problem.

Get rid of that Raidmax psu and get a 300w Fortron for around $25 NE. Or if your looking to future proof a little: Enermax 350. $59 NE.

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I don't know what kind of "special power strips from CC" your talking about. Your link doesn't work. Doesn't matter anyway. If you have a grounding problem with your house wiring then you just have to confirm/fix it. There's no magic bullet. The ups (battery back up system) I mentioned above will let you know, as soon as you plug it in, if you have a problem with grounds. Spend the $20.

When I plugged in my 2nd ups it just wouldn't work right. Then I remembered that my 1st one wouldn't work right in the bottom plug of the duplex outlet I was using. It was one of those 2 pronger jobs and I had to rig up an adapter and a ground to get it to work. In order to get the second ups to work I had to pull the old 2 prong outlet and properly wire a three prong duplex in there (the ground wires were just "floating" around inside the metal box. After I rewired the outlet both ups systems worked perfect.

Gonna check the specs on that 550 now...............Jeez, that's what I thought. (3) different tru 550s, all over $100 and (2) of them only have 24amp/12v (32-40-24). The other one does have 36a/12v but it's out of stock. Check out the Enermax I mentioned above (32-32-26) or if you really like the feeling of having high wattage numbers then take a look at the specs of an Enermax 460 whisper 2.