Video Performance Decrease w/A7N8X & 9700...

[FesterSilently]

Hey Folks,
I'm very anxious/upset/nervous...but mainly disappointed with *myself* for not knowing what the friggin' problem is! I have just upgraded (successively) from an Abit AT7 w/1600+ @ 1.55 Ghz...to an Abit IT7 w/a 1.6 @ 2.4 Ghz...finally to my A7N8X w/2400+ @ 2.25 Ghz, so I've a good idea of where my 3dMark oughtta be, but I'm pulling down at or just under 10k. WTF?! I pulled down 12.8k on my AT7 configuration and 13.9k on the IT7. I KNOW I should be sneaking close to 15k (if not higher) with this setup!
Okay...screaming/rant finished.
It's just that I've been awake all night and trying to figure this thing out for about twleve hours now. During which time I've done five clean installs of WinXP. And switched back and forth from the Asus driver download to the Nvidia one. And trolled the forums for something similar to this thread.
Whew.
So what is it? If someone knows the answer or knows of its location in another thread, please spank me soundly and point me to it.
(BTW - yes, outside of the mobo BIOS that came out today [that I'm about to flash], *EVERYTHING* in this rig has up to date firmware/software/drivers)
Here's my setup:
- A7N8X w/1002 beta 3 Uber BIOS
- AMD 2400+ OC'd to 2.25 Ghz
- 2 x 256Mb Samsung PC 3200 (in sync w/CPU)
- ATI Radeon 9700 (rev 1.3, 8004 BIOS)(Catalyst 62.55)
- Audigy 2
- High Point Rocket RAID 100
- 2 x WD 8000JB in RAID 0
- Swiftech 462 T+ w/Vantec Tornado
- Microsoft USB keyboard and mouse
- TTGI 520w PSU
- WinXP SP1/DX9

Stewing Quietly,
Fester

P.S.
And, yes, I know 3dMark is not a game, nor is it the be-all and end-all of system diagnostic benchmarks, but it is a great baseline from which to start, and when I see a drop like that, I know things much deeper than 3dMark will be affected.

 

[human2k]

10k, that is low for a rig of that magnitude. My rig (see sig) does over 12K on avg.

 

[FesterSilently]

Thanks.

 

[rbV5]

Maybe you might run Sandra, it may help pinpoint obvious problems in specific subsystems.

 

[chizow]

Hmm sounds to be a driver or a BIOS setting issue. I've got a very similar rig running and I pulled 15000+ w/out tweaking any settings or OCing my 9700pro.

I'm running a different BIOS as well, so any "uber" BIOS tweaks could have an effect on the AGP bus. What is your AGP bus set to? Try locking it at 66mhz. I'm using 1002.001 btw.

What version Cats are you running? If its Cat 3.0 with DX 9, you need to get the latest 3dmark2k1 SE Build 330.

Try the new Nforce2 UDP ver. 2.03, released yesterday. It brings the DLX into the UDP fold, no need to use the 1.16's anymore. The GART driver hasn't changed between the 1.16 or 2.0's to the 2.03 ver, so its probably not the answer, just a precaution.

What are your BIOS settings? Did you make sure the main VGA adapter is set to AGP? Also, check your primary and secondary settings in the ATI control panel. Disable fastwrites, leave 8X on, if that doesn't help try disabling 8X AGP. Set your AGP aperture to 64MB. Turn off any features you're not using (serial, parallel, gameport etc.) as well as any performance/heat monitors.

What are your memory timings? Slow timings might explain part of the problem, but not ~5,000 marks worth.

Is your Pro OC'd? If not, I'm guessing you've made sure its a Pro at 325/310.

Not sure what else might be causing it, as 3dmark really only stresses Northbridge subsystems (cpu, graphics, memory).

Chiz

 

[FesterSilently]

 

[FesterSilently]

Wow. Guess I was *really* silent on that last post. Anyway...

Yes, I've got:
DX9; Catalysts 62.55's and 62.75's (betas); Primary Display is set to AGP; my memory timings are as agressive as these half-a$$ed sticks will go (3-3-6-2.5 CAS); ALL unnecessary items have been desabled in BIOS (SATA, 3Com LAN, Parallel Port, Serial Ports, AC97 audio, fastwrites off, 8xAGP on (and off, once), etc.). AND my 9700 is OC'ed from stock 325/310 to 360/330! Something curious is definitely afoot.
Is there any difference between the ASUS driver set and the (now WHQL) Nvidia driver set?
Rrrrrrrr...

 

[KillaBong]

Try direct x 8.1?

 

[mechBgon]

Try pulling out your Audigy2 as a troubleshooting step and let's see what happens then. Also, have you consulted the (confusing-as-always) shared-IRQ chart on page 17 of your manual, and why did you disable Fast Writes?

This is why I suggested trying it without the Audigy in there: Asus' knowledge base Probably not the issue, but who knows.

I put Creative Lab Audigy2 sound card with A7N8X. I cannot load the gameport driver. Why?

Answer This is due to Creative Audigy2 sound card must use a designated I/O decided by the sound card itself, unlike the I/O for other PCI devices are assigned by BIOS. Thus, this will cause I/O confilct. If users want to put Audigy2 on A7N8X and use gameport's function, please disable the gameport on Audigy2 and use the onboard gameport.

 

[Zab]

Have you tried this setup without using your raid card, and just hooking up 1 drive to the motherboard?

 

[Ketchup]

Run the CPU Arithmetic and Memory Bandwidth benchmarks of Sisoftware Sandra and tell us if your scores are where they should be.

 

[FesterSilently]

Got my problems fixed, by voodoo magic, no less! By that, I mean that after maaany reseating of components, software switches, clean installs...you know, a lot of nothing, I began to get (what I assume to be) nominal performance. So I flashed to the latest (jan 31) Uber BIOS (which, by the way was another voodoo pain in the a$$ - I could NOT , despite six attempts, with four different floppies, get the BIOS to flash in DOS. It kept hanging just after it asked me if I wanted to "continue with the program" and flash the BIOS now. I finally did something I swore I'd never do - I used a Windows-based BIOS flashing program [*GASP*!!]...and it worked! Whatever...) and did another (hopefully the last [for now] ) clean Windows install, and, here I am - starting to experiment with overclocking like the best of 'em!
Yay!
But...now I've got some questions for all you Overclocking Overlords out there - come one, come all to my "Overclocking Overlords" thread!

Frightfully Festive Fester

P.S.

I want to thank all of you PROFUSELY!! I am flattered to have received so many reponses and so much help - I only hope that I am able to return the favor to someone else when the opportunity arises! You guys are great!