What would you recommend to replace my current setup?

[Puffnstuff]

I'm getting pretty upset when trying to play crysis on all high settings with my current setup. The fps's as shown by evga precision swing from around 60 to all the way down to 4 causing the screen to freeze during gameplay. It makes it hard to fight in a battle when the screen will freeze up intermittantly. In crysis I noticed that while walking through a stream my fps dropped down to 4 when 3 jets buzzed overhead and my system stuttered. If I try to turn rapidly during a firefight the same thing will happen.

Both of my cards are identical including the bios version. Both are running 750 core, 1873 shader and 980 memory clocks. My fans are at 65% and my cards run around 58-59c during gameplay. I don't think my q6600@3ghz is a bottleneck however when I run 3dmark06 my scores are lower now than they were a year ago and this build of vista is less than two months old and my wpi is 5.8 with ram being the slowest component.

I've also been reading multiple reviews and one seems to contradict another. Right now the egg has a 4870x2 for around $400 after mir or I could get two 260 core 216's for the same money after mir. What would you do?

 

[conlan]

What resolution and settings are you playing Crysis at?

EDIT...If it's 1900 x 1200 on the 24" in your sig, and it's only Crysis you're worried about...

Look Here that chart gives you a head to head comparison of the cards you mentioned.

 

[Puffnstuff]

Well I play at 1280x1024 and from what I've seen nvidia solutions tend to perform better at that resolution. I'm beginning to lean towards a single gtx 295 card and later this year when I migrate to x58 it should do even better. I might even be tempted to sli that one.

 

[conlan]

We've played Crysis at 1280 x 1024 with an E4400 @ 3.0 and single 8800GT 512 setup without the problems you mentioned.

We haven't checked FPS, but it never freezes up.

Have you updated your drivers recently?

 

[error8]

2X8800 GTS's in SLI should have no issues in running Crysis at 1280X1024. Something is wrong here.

 

[manimal]

Crysis doesnt need to be pimped out on all max settings for great visuals. SLId g92s did great when I ran them on my Q6600 3.6 once I used the ultra settings config at crymod. Do some googling and try out some configs. If you want a new system thats one thing but upgrading hundreds of dollars in hardware for one game is not the best allocation of funds.

 

[rgallant]

Puff ,
I'am in the same boat as you -same cards , I get slow downs and vista reports , [ out of vram -error 500 and hard drive thashing has occured ]so I'am looking for something with more vram , But there is no single card that that seems like a upgrade, yea a GTX 285 @apox. 500 CAN. will give you better min. frames and better game play , but it still has no furture that I see, as it can't max out any of the games I play and for the money I want to max out most \ or some settings.
-unless you get two and a new power supply apox($1100)-not worth the money when newer cards should be coming out. and I still regret the time I spent $ 680.00 for a 7900gtx , only to be replaced by the 2x faster 8800GTX 3 months later. lol
-so I'am waiting to see what the 40nm GT212 is about , if they are 20% faster( min.FPS ) than a GTX 285OC and added features, could be of interest.- with a second one down the road maybe.

-two GTX 260-216 55 nm is possible , but watch out the new ones will be going alcheapo in three weeks -they will be stripped down -less power supplies and layers- and they could be vram limited also at higher res. and DX11.
- if the game doesn't like SLI , you could end up with not much more than you have now. my .02

http://en.expreview.com/

 

[Puffnstuff]

I'm using the latest nvidia drivers with physx enabled. I really don't have problems with any other games I play. I"m still exploring the possibilities of doing another sli with the 280/285 cards and weighing the pro's and cons including price, heat and power consumption. I really wish the manufacturers would quit with the mir game and just lower the prices. If I buy two cards then I can only claim the rebate on one of them.

 

[mhouck]

Originally posted by: Puffnstuff
Well I play at 1280x1024 and from what I've seen nvidia solutions tend to perform better at that resolution. I'm beginning to lean towards a single gtx 295 card and later this year when I migrate to x58 it should do even better. I might even be tempted to sli that one.

Have you tried running one card and seeing what your minimum fps is? Have you tried running SLI at stock settings?

When I had 8800GTS 512, I OC'ed to around those numbers with one GPU and I never had 4fps. (Except maybe in the helicopter level, I only had a E6400 running at stock then.) Edit: Additionally, I was running all settings on high at 1440x 900

 

[Puffnstuff]

I haven't tried running one card but I was running stock when this started. It's the reason that I oc'd the cards to try to overcome it. For 80% of the game it's fine but out in the jungle I noticed the slowdowns. I'm in the mountain now and I don't have the problem. I've played this game twice before and never had this problem and wonder if the newer nvidia drivers could be the problem. It was suggested to me that it was done on purpose so current customers would be inclined to upgrade to a newer card. Like I stated previously my 3dmark06 score is down, way down from where I was a year ago and the each driver upgrade seems to drop performance some. I think I'm just gonna keep what I got and put buying new cards on hold.

 

[Keysplayr]

My friend plays Crysis and Crysis Warhead with a E6420, 2GB and SLI'd 8800GTS 640's at 1680x1050 with most settings on high, and a few set to medium. No AA. I think the lowest fps he ever gets is 18fps, but only for a split second. It might be the slight edge he has in VRAM over your 8800GTS 512's. But at 1280x1024 you should be playing very smoothly in Crysis. You should be getting performance somewhere between a single GTX260 and GTX280 with two 8800GTS 512's. You should never see 4fps unless you have a severely fragmented hard drive and are suffering from mega drive hitching. Have you tried to defrag?

 

[techboie]

Even my single 4850 + 3.5GHz C2D runs Crysis super smooth at 12x10 High Shadows Low. From what I have heard, Warhead is anything but better.

You should be able to play fine at 12x10 V High smoothly. Try a format.

 

[mhouck]

Try a defrag, driversweeper, reverting to older drivers, or a defrag. If your numbers are getting lower, I assume one of these would improve your scores.

 

[nyker96]

simple a single 4870 or GTX260-216 will replace both just fine, runs with less power and do better in crysis.

 

[Puffnstuff]

Well I run perfect disk 10 so all of my hd's are defragmented weekly so file fragmentation is not an issue. I'm still weighing my options. In the past I've always upgraded my cards every two years but crysis changes that.

 

[techboie]

8800GTS 512 SLI>>>4870/GTX260

 

[Puffnstuff]

Well yesterday I reinstalled my new asus striker II formula replacement mb along with a new q9550 cpu plus I added a 8800gt for physx. My framerates are up across the board and the problem I was having with crysis is gone. I was having trouble with my q6600 and had received several errors including a core timing error. Now with the new hardware I can play crysis without any freezing and my rates don't drop as low like they did before. I still plan on replacing my cards but I think that I can hold off little while longer until prices become more moderate.