Installing ATI CCC reduces performance on 4870 X2

[Dkcode]

I installed a brand new Powercolor 4870 X2 yesterday to replace a 8800GTX and compliment a 30" monitor.

I ran driver cleaner pro in safe mode and also ran CCleaner to clean out temp files and did a registry clean to remove nvidia related entries.

After the new card was installed, everything went ok. However the gaming performance was very disappointing, only a little bit quicker than my 8800GTX and in UT3's case, no difference at all.

After much faffing i plugged in a spare hard drive and installed a fresh copy of Windows XP SP3, i downloaded the latest drivers for my motherboard & LAN and ran Windows update installing only critical updates. I kept this install as clean as possible, no AV software was installed, only drivers for critical components. I then installed the video drivers from the CD and then i installed UT3. Performance was still the same.

I uninstalled all ATI related software, ran driver cleaner ect and installed only the display driver. UT3 ran very well after this, roughly 2.5x the speed.

I plugged in my other drive and did the same, all my games showed a great improvement but the lack of AA, AF control outside of the game bothered me so i downloaded ATI Tray Tools 1.5 beta. With this installed i encounted the same problem as above. Uninstalling did not work so i had to remove the drivers and start over.

This is a strange problem and exists both on my old install and fresh install of XP with minimal software. My specs are as follows:

Intel DP35DP P35 motherboard
E6850 @ 3GHz
2GB DDR800 5-5-5-12
Creative XF Xtreme Gamer (Did not install a driver for the fresh XP install)
Corsair HX620
XP x86 with all updates excluding IE7, Malicious software removal tool, Media Player 11 ect

I have a copy of Vista home premium x86 which i will be installing on a spare HDD tonight.

When this card is working how it should, its very fast. Some games fare well than others, COD4 has microstutter here and there, Mass Effect is better, but still slows down in central Presidium. Certainly performance no where near the level some of the review sites have been posting, take it all with a pinch of salt i suppose.

 

[nitromullet]

I had a few thoughts about your issue that you might want to check...

I wonder if for some reason CCC/ATT might have disabled Cat AI (disabling CF), which is most likely on by default.
Maybe the IQ settings are set lower by default which is why you are seeing gains without CCC/ATT.

 

[chizow]

Interesting results, its possible CCC has some associated overhead or is applying filters/settings/profiles and causing the difference in performance. Also, don't you need CCC enabled in order to use CF, even with the X2? I'd try and compare some SS to make sure there isn't anything going on with IQ settings with and without CCC enabled.

Also, for Mass Effect and UT3, make sure you turn off frame rate smoothing as that will limit your FPS. Another thing to keep in mind is that UT3 and ME are both UE3 titles, which are extremely CPU intensive. Its quite possible you won't see much difference in FPS without cranking up the resolution and AA.

 

[Dkcode]

The problem still persists if i use ATI Tray Tools.

Without any kind of control panel, to me it seems the card defaults to 16x AF with high quality mipmaps.

I have done some more testing on Mass Effect and the frame rates are through the roof. The limited test i ran yesterday was at the far end of the presidium, looking upon the water, frame rates looked to be in the 40's at the lowest. Everywhere else is easily 60fps+

I'll be keeping an eye on driver updates.

 

[Tempered81]

try 8.7 or 8.54 betas. Most reviews were done with 8.6/8.7 anyway. good luck.

 

[minmaster]

yes, i'd test it again with CCC and disabling catalyst AI. what else from CCC slow down games that much?

 

[BFG10K]

Don't disable Cat AI; instead make sure vsync is off.

 

[Dkcode]

Just installed Vista x86 on a spare hard drive. Installed the CAT 8.54's this time with the same results. Lacklustre performance in UT3 without any AA when CCC is installed.

I will try the old ATI Control Panel and test results.

Originally posted by: BFG10K
Don't disable Cat AI; instead make sure vsync is off.

I have cycled all the modes of Cat AI to no avail, even turning off makes no difference. Also Vsync was left off by default.

 

[Dkcode]

I have fixed the issue.

Using the latest 8.8 official display driver only.
Installing the CCC 8.7 standalone.

Everything works great now.

The 8.8 suite seemed to be forcing 4x AA, but showing no AA in game yet taking away the performance for it. Also forcing AA in the control panel (UE3.0 specific) did not enable any AA at all.