Suggestions on upgrades to improve my performance and FPS for Games.

Originally posted by: FreeBirth
Uhm SWG = Sony crap. Sorry but EQ runs like a dog on top end hardware too and its a way older game. SWG has been noted as crap for a long time man.

Sorry that this isn't much help.

Good thing you posted, thanks for the help.

 

[Regs]

I checked the heat and its not a problem, i did some searching and found that alot of people have been having issues with under a gig of ram.

That is the most ridiculous thing I ever heard (aside from part of some dumb stuff I've said) . Maybe if you are running 10 tasks while you are playing a game. What is this world coming to?

/* slams his head on the desk 100 times.

 

[AtomicDude512]

How about Omega ATI Drivers? In Performance mode I get 30fps additional which helps on my Radeon 9000np.

www.omegacorner.com

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: Regs

I checked the heat and its not a problem, i did some searching and found that alot of people have been having issues with under a gig of ram.

That is the most ridiculous thing I ever heard (aside from part of some dumb stuff I've said) . Maybe if you are running 10 tasks while you are playing a game. What is this world coming to?

/* slams his head on the desk 100 times.

not so ridiculous - it's not "What is this wold coming to?".. it's, "Look what these games are doing these days!"

I just updated to a gig myself and for a few apps it's made a huge difference. Planetside is definately one that would benifit. Someone said it will use about 800 megs if you have it and that sounds about right to me.

 

[Regs]

IMO, the game was poorly programmed if It needed 800 megs of ram to run. I would like to hear it from an experienced game programmer: in order for you have a lag-free gaming experience you have to have a gig of ram. Then for sure I'll rush my lazy butt over to newegg.com and order another 512 Megs.

 

[Wingznut]

Originally posted by: Regs
IMO, the game was poorly programmed if It needed 800 megs of ram to run. I would like to hear it from an experienced game programmer: in order for you have a lag-free gaming experience you have to have a gig of ram. Then for sure I'll rush my lazy butt over to newegg.com and order another 512 Megs.

There was once a day when people were saying the exact same thing about 128mb.

And I'm sure there will be a day when people are saying the same thing about 4gb of RAM.

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: Regs
IMO, the game was poorly programmed if It needed 800 megs of ram to run. I would like to hear it from an experienced game programmer: in order for you have a lag-free gaming experience you have to have a gig of ram. Then for sure I'll rush my lazy butt over to newegg.com and order another 512 Megs.

I know what you're saying...it sounds like sloppy programming but in this case it isn't. The size of the worlds in these massive online games is where the problem is. Imagine playing say Quake II back in the day with NO load time between levels - sure you could get clever and move partial levels in and out of memory and maybe end up with something like half-life with the "mini-loads" between levels but to get it down to ZERO load time you're going to have to load up at least the previous, current and next level into memory so the player can move around freely without hitting load spots. That's just counting the graphics! Now throw the other players into the mix. Even if you get the players "object" size down inside the program you still have to be able to have a thousand of them in memory at any given time.

The clever programming comes into play when they manage to get a program that needs 800 megs to run well on a system with only 512...which they've done.

 

[Regs]

Hmm Hmm Hmm The only dilemma I have is this. I have 512 Megs of Pc 2700. Now If I was to buy new ram now it would have to be more future proof like XMS LL 3700 which is an expensive item. Now not only would I need to buy another 512 Megs for the golden 1024 Meg mark, but another 512 Megs to replace the existing pc2700.

I think that will be my next major upgrade. nforce 3 + 1024 DDR2 . CrAzy.

 

[Sideswipe001]

I'm sure that you've already tried it, but did you update the Intel drivers, Application Accelerator, etc? Updated your sound and video drivers to the latest versions as well?

All of that is good at keeping systems fast and stable.

 

[penguino75]

You should just go up to 1 gig RAM. You might think about overclocking, a lot of times it will help.

 

Originally posted by: Regs

I checked the heat and its not a problem, i did some searching and found that alot of people have been having issues with under a gig of ram.

That is the most ridiculous thing I ever heard (aside from part of some dumb stuff I've said) . Maybe if you are running 10 tasks while you are playing a game. What is this world coming to?

/* slams his head on the desk 100 times.

Im not sure what you meant by that but swg is a memory hog.......I not talking about everyday things....

 

[GullyFoyle]

Originally posted by: Jeff7181I'm not saying it's bottom of the barrel... I'm saying for a GAMING RIG a 2.4 Ghz P4 is at the lower end of the spectrum. I don't care if it's a B C D E or Z...

I'm sure there are lot of people out there with low-end Athlons (such as my XP1800+, w/GF4-MX440 video card) that consider their computer a "gaming rig".

From my perspective (and the teeming masses like me), I'd say Phocas' P4 2.8Ghz w/9700Pro is somewhere above the midrange.

Sorry to get off topic.

 

Your not off topic, thanks for the input.
I will be ordering a p4c that overclocks (hopefully)well in the next couple days, along with a better mobo. Along with the ram i should be good to go.

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: DanDeighan

Originally posted by: Jeff7181I'm not saying it's bottom of the barrel... I'm saying for a GAMING RIG a 2.4 Ghz P4 is at the lower end of the spectrum. I don't care if it's a B C D E or Z...

I'm sure there are lot of people out there with low-end Athlons (such as my XP1800+, w/GF4-MX440 video card) that consider their computer a "gaming rig".

From my perspective (and the teeming masses like me), I'd say Phocas' P4 2.8Ghz w/9700Pro is somewhere above the midrange.

Sorry to get off topic.

Lol... those people need to see a real gaming rig then... I consider my rig in the middle mainly because of my video card and monitor. I basically have an XP3200 with a GB of PC3200 RAM and a WDJB hard drive... but the Ti4200 @ Ti4600 speeds is the weak link in my "gaming rig" ... and I have a cheap $80 17inch monitor.

And like I said before... nowhere in his post did he say his P4 was running at 2.8... he said 2.4... and a 2.4 Ghz P4 is the lowest clocked P4 I'd consider in a gaming rig... especially being that it's a 2.4 b, without the 800 Mhz FSB, which helps P4's quite a bit.

But anyway... getting back to the origional topic... I just had a thought...

My inet connection is really good, i play CS all the time and i would know if it were going haywire, my ping in there is good as well but the FPS sucks...

CS isn't exactly stressful on internet connections anymore, especially cable or DSL. A better guage to use would be something like BF1942, which is a known bandwidth hog, which is why good servers are very close to the backbone. What type of connection do you have? ISP, up/down bandwidth, ping to your ISP, ping cross country?

 

[zShowtimez]

I don't belive the P4C's are supported by the SINXP, so You would need a new mobo. Seriously you should get the ram first, and I think youd be ok.

 

[magomago]

Originally posted by: Jeff7181

Originally posted by: Phocas

Originally posted by: Jeff7181

Originally posted by: Phocas
2.4 @ 2.8 (even not overclocked) is lower end? ok

Nowhere in your post does it say your 2.4 is running at 2.8... and yes, a 2.4 Ghz P4 would be at the lower end of a gaming rig.

Thats why i said even not overclocked, there is not a really huge difference between the two speeds in the games that i play. The majority of the people here dont have 3.2 chips, i dont get where you are getting your stats from... Im not saying its in the top percentile but its certainly not bottom of the barrel.

I'm not saying it's bottom of the barrel... I'm saying for a GAMING RIG a 2.4 Ghz P4 is at the lower end of the spectrum. I don't care if it's a B C D E or Z...

I think you are setting your levels WAY to high. Even a 2.4 I'd consider more towards the mid-upper range in a worst case scenario. My rig is inferior (mainly due to the Videocard) yet I still consider it a gaming rig.
If we all followed your idea of a gaming rig we'd all be tossing away what we have and keep moving up every six months. The way I see if is it you have a 2.6Ghz/2600+ or over you are gaming on the high end providing you have memory and videocard muscle to back it up (he had 512 megs of ram AND a 9700PRO - and now he just got a new mobo/processor on top of it) because I don't see too many people with rigs like that complaining that they can't game at their speeds.

But looking at his rig I'd assume that adding an extra 512 megs of ram would make a huge difference.

To me 1gig of ram, a 2.4@2.8Ghz (Even if it is 533mhz fsb), and a 9700pro IS high end.

 

[m1ke101]

uh...I really don't think 2.4ghz should be considered "low end". I think low end would be a ghz or slightly above.

 

Originally posted by: Jeff7181

Originally posted by: DanDeighan

Originally posted by: Jeff7181I'm not saying it's bottom of the barrel... I'm saying for a GAMING RIG a 2.4 Ghz P4 is at the lower end of the spectrum. I don't care if it's a B C D E or Z...

I'm sure there are lot of people out there with low-end Athlons (such as my XP1800+, w/GF4-MX440 video card) that consider their computer a "gaming rig".

From my perspective (and the teeming masses like me), I'd say Phocas' P4 2.8Ghz w/9700Pro is somewhere above the midrange.

Sorry to get off topic.

Lol... those people need to see a real gaming rig then... I consider my rig in the middle mainly because of my video card and monitor. I basically have an XP3200 with a GB of PC3200 RAM and a WDJB hard drive... but the Ti4200 @ Ti4600 speeds is the weak link in my "gaming rig" ... and I have a cheap $80 17inch monitor.

And like I said before... nowhere in his post did he say his P4 was running at 2.8... he said 2.4... and a 2.4 Ghz P4 is the lowest clocked P4 I'd consider in a gaming rig... especially being that it's a 2.4 b, without the 800 Mhz FSB, which helps P4's quite a bit.

But anyway... getting back to the origional topic... I just had a thought...

My inet connection is really good, i play CS all the time and i would know if it were going haywire, my ping in there is good as well but the FPS sucks...

CS isn't exactly stressful on internet connections anymore, especially cable or DSL. A better guage to use would be something like BF1942, which is a known bandwidth hog, which is why good servers are very close to the backbone. What type of connection do you have? ISP, up/down bandwidth, ping to your ISP, ping cross country?

Ok ok, the reason i put 2.4 on the list and not 2.4 @ 2.8 is because its a 2.4 chip. I am looking to upgrade and was looking for suggestions. I could try to show off and get it to 2.9 with settings perfect but that wasnt the point of the post. I dont want get into a pissing contest but according to anandtechs benchmarks HERE my regular 2.4 is only 4 fps behind your overclocked chip in Q3(assuming you have a barton). My chip overclocked is 28 fps faster than yours is overclocked, I have been to MANY lans competing and I know what kind of machines most people have at these events. My machine is definately mid to upper range as far as the gaming machine goes ( i have a 21 inch sony monitor also). Our video cards would have much more weight on this scale than our cpus, and I think we all know how much better a 9700 pro is compared to a geforce 4200........

 

Ohh ya, its not my inet connection lagging me.

 

[Jeff7181]

Ok ok, the reason i put 2.4 on the list and not 2.4 @ 2.8 is because its a 2.4 chip. I am looking to upgrade and was looking for suggestions. I could try to show off and get it to 2.9 with settings perfect but that wasnt the point of the post. I dont want get into a pissing contest but according to anandtechs benchmarks HERE my regular 2.4 is only 4 fps behind your overclocked chip in Q3(assuming you have a barton). My chip overclocked is 28 fps faster than yours is overclocked, I have been to MANY lans competing and I know what kind of machines most people have at these events. My machine is definately mid to upper range as far as the gaming machine goes ( i have a 21 inch sony monitor also). Our video cards would have much more weight on this scale than our cpus, and I think we all know how much better a 9700 pro is compared to a geforce 4200........

So does that mean your computer can piss farther than my computer on a Quake 3 level? Lol... you say you don't wanna get into an argument, then you compare your computer to mine... make up your mind.

 

[Jeff7181]

I think you are setting your levels WAY to high.

You could be right... but when I think gaming rig... I don't think of something that's just "good enough" to run games... and seeing as how games like Star Wars Galaxies are pushing this 2.4 Ghz "middle to high end" system to it's limits... I think it's safe to say it's at the lower end of the spectrum. Maybe not for yesterday's games, but definately for tomorrow's.

I mean seriously... some people are saying a 1 Ghz processor is the low end of a gaming rig? Please... if you have a 1 Ghz processor and tell people this is your gaming rig, you either are poor and can't afford to upgrade, or you don't play many computer games.

*EDIT* Also... look at the charts... a P4 @ 2.4 Ghz is consistantly in the bottom half of anandtech's charts... and often in the bottom 1/3... don't get me wrong... I'm not telling this guy his computer sucks... but I'm just saying... he's playing a game that's known to use up to 800 MB of RAM, maybe even more... it's a brand new game that's not only demanding on the video card, but also the CPU since it's multi-player... and while a 2.4 Ghz P4 is no slouch in Quake 3 or UT2k3... new games do require more processing power. If he's got it overclocked to 2.8 or 2.9 Ghz, that's great, it's probably not a CPU issue then... but go back and read his origional post... it says 2.4.

 

Originally posted by: Jeff7181

I think you are setting your levels WAY to high.

You could be right... but when I think gaming rig... I don't think of something that's just "good enough" to run games... and seeing as how games like Star Wars Galaxies are pushing this 2.4 Ghz "middle to high end" system to it's limits... I think it's safe to say it's at the lower end of the spectrum. Maybe not for yesterday's games, but definately for tomorrow's.

I mean seriously... some people are saying a 1 Ghz processor is the low end of a gaming rig? Please... if you have a 1 Ghz processor and tell people this is your gaming rig, you either are poor and can't afford to upgrade, or you don't play many computer games.

Thanks for your response, it was very insightful.
Quake 3 was an example for your cpu not your graphics card. We all know that your card won't beat a 9700 pro in games (where the cpu is your cpu and mine is 2.4 OR 2.8). The point of this is that you said :

Actually that processor is at the lower end for a gaming rig.

and that just isn't correct... Please dont turn this into a amd vs intel because it isnt, I really would have gone either way. I talked to an editor here at anandtech and have decided to get on the p4 2.4c (that most people have been overclocking the hell out of) and a ABIT's 865PE or 875P series of motherboards.

 

[Jeff7181]

Lemme put it this way... if you were building a gaming rig, would you buy anything slower than a 2.4 Ghz P4?
And for the record... you were the first to compare an Intel rig to an AMD rig.

 

[sharkeeper]

It's software for sure...

I think Tiger Woods 2003 runs like shoit on the following:

SuperMicro X5DAE
(2) Xeon 3.06GHz CPU
8GB REG ECC RAM
(6) Fujitsu 3MAS3367 36GB 15K HDD RAID0 on Mylex AcceleRAID600 (Ultra 320, PCI-X)
nVidia GeForceFX 5900U 256MB overclocked to 500/950.
SB Audigy2ex

Everything else flat out flies!

Yet TW2003 with all eye candy ON at 1280x1024 lags (IMO) too much.

Friggin' games! I have to settle for 4xAA at that resolution.

-DAK-

 

Originally posted by: shuttleteam
It's software for sure...

I think Tiger Woods 2003 runs like shoit on the following:

SuperMicro X5DAE
(2) Xeon 3.06GHz CPU
8GB REG ECC RAM
(6) Fujitsu 3MAS3367 36GB 15K HDD RAID0 on Mylex AcceleRAID600 (Ultra 320, PCI-X)
nVidia GeForceFX 5900U 256MB overclocked to 500/950.
SB Audigy2ex

Everything else flat out flies!

Yet TW2003 with all eye candy ON at 1280x1024 lags (IMO) too much.

Friggin' games! I have to settle for 4xAA at that resolution.

-DAK-

w00t! That is one hell of a machine!

Lemme put it this way... if you were building a gaming rig, would you buy anything slower than a 2.4 Ghz P4?

That is why i am posting (read topic ), and i think its ironic that i am going for the 2.4c since its one hell of an overclocker!
As far as the amd vs intel:

is it just me, or has there been more and more Intel users complaining about crappy FPS measurements in games lately?

I think its just you and that most people (amd or intel) want the top performance they can get.

I was really close to getting a good overclocking Barton, but then i saw a few things that changed my mind:
I hear that SWG is multi-threaded, i looked at the benchmarks for both chips and the games that i play, lastely i saw the overclocking results for the 2.4c.
I will for sure post after i get all the parts put in and running and list the results and if it helped a little or alot. I really appreciate the thoughts that were posted and the people that also private messaged me.