Geforce FX 5200 Problems Is this as fast as it will go ?

[rt_jim]

Via Chipshet
1.3Ghz CPU
512MB RAM
128MB Geforce FX 5200 (PCI)
52X CDRW Drive
DirectX 9.0c

Experiencing bottlenecks each time i play DirectX games

Can anyone help me out.
I would have thought having a 512 MB RAM + 128MB graphics card would
make my system run blindingly fast.

All i can say is low 3d mark scores 300+
Low Morrowind FPS 17 ( This is with all graphic card details at minimum) Screen at (640X480)
I know morrowind is very slow, but this occurs in
Battlefront
Star Trek Elite Force2
ST Brigde Commander
(Older games and still problems)
Tried tweaking BIOS but still jittery performance.

Any help would be brilliant.

Jim

 

[cmy6800]

I dont mean to crap in your cereal man, but... Your 512 of ram and a 128 5200 PCI is not going to be blindingly fast. Now, on to help... You said you scored around 300 in 3dmark... which version? 2003? 2005? Keep in mind, with games loading levels/content on the fly, your HD makes a pretty big difference. If you don't/can't upgrade, consider some ways to optimize your system. Make sure only the bare minimum programs are running. This includes the programs in the background. You can control what loads up on startup by going to start-run-msconfig. Select the startup tab and uncheck everything that you don't need. Defrag your hard drive. Defragging will cut down on access times. However, here are some things that are holding you back:

1) You are sportin a 1.3Ghz CPU
2) Your video card is PCI
3) Your video card is somewhat antiquated
4) Didn't comment on your HD, but if it is of the 5400RPM variety... it is holding you back as well.

Really look into minimizing the running programs though to free up system resources and maybe look into overclocking your card using coolbits if it doesn't give you the performace you are looking for. Also, having everything up to date can make a huge difference. Make sure you have the most up to date drivers. I like www.guru3d.com to get my drivers. Hope this helps you.

 

[rt_jim]

Reply

PC mark 2003

But aside from this, i am getting a reasonable performance.
I am only trying to discover where the bottlebeck is due to the jittering.

Would it benefit to reduce either the memory on the Graphics card or system Ram to fine tune the BUS performance.

I have already done the basics in stablising the system (defrag/BIOS etc..) with no luck.

My system spec's are well above the games i have listed and others release around this time. AVP2 etc..
And still with low detail and pixelated nightmare screen size i am still getting juddering in movie intermissions (C&C renegade) and jerkiness in some of the most simple of games.
Now when i run Quake2 it flies (opengl) except only the intermission movies.
I have seen some comments regarding the performance of Geforce FX with relation to DirectX8 and someone saying the hardware doesn't really support Directx9.
But after reinstalling XP and applying Directx8 the performance is still the same.
DCdiag doesn't report any conflicts.
I have changed the setup to be none ACPI to enable IRQ handling so that my graphics card isn't sharing the same IRQ as other devices. to no avail.

Your comments are valid but my system should still be effective (without glitches) for most of the games i have listed here, with some requiring a minimum of 700MHZ Processor to play.

 

[cmy6800]

Okay, I see. Is the slowness a new problem or a persistant problem that has always been? Just another thought real quick... If your jitteryness is like, good framerate, then a pause, good framerate, pause, etc. It is probably not your video card (as far as hardware goes). Even so, with your specs and playing games like quake 2, it should not be slow at all. I agree with you. Okay, well, that's all I can muster up at the moment.

 

[rt_jim]

This problem has been here since starting out with the new 128MB Graphics card.
I have heard other comments regarding a VIA Chipset + Nvidia Geforce FX incompatibility issues but don't know anything concrete.
Tried the over-clocking method with nothing to show except needing a reboot when i pushed it too far.

Yes it does start and stop during movie clips and game play.
1 thing i did notice is the sound crackles when trying to sync to the sticking movie frames. I just assumed this was the animation dll or whatever catching up with itself.

I use the onboard sound driver AC97 and have disabled the onboard graphics AGP(so it says) Of the 2 available ram slots I have 1 512MB Ram stick (100 speed i think)
I have tried moving the graphics card to a different PCI slot with the same events.
Instead of 1 X AGP , 6 PCI on the motherboard
i have 1 X AMR, 4+ PCI and 1 X ISA (Yeuck)

There is a good PC trying to get out. Just not configured correctly.

 

[cmy6800]

Hmm... Do you have the most up to date board drivers from VIA? I kinda doubt that will fix the problem, but it won't hurt anything and if it is a compatibility problem, maybe a new driver could fix it. My first thought on how it starts and stops in movie play and game play is the HD. It is possible that it is lagging when it is loading content on the fly. I had that problem with my own computer. When I built mine, I used an IDE Samsung 160GB 7200RPM drive with 2MB cache. This was a temporary solution until I got my SATA drives. The 160 samsung was a freebie from work (for those wondering, no, I didn't steal it) so I used it just to get my PC up and going. I replaced it with dual SATA Samsung 120GB 7200RPM 8MB cache drives in RAID 0 and it was night and day. I'll use DOOM 3 as an example since it is one of the most intensive games out. Before, I had to use medium quality and would still have some pauses from time to time. Ultra High was just out of the question since that was jittery as hell. After the HD upgrade, I'm running Ultra High 1280x1024 with all options checked and 4xAA. No jitteryness anymore. Will a HD upgrade solve your problem? I don't know. You might look at your pc's HD access led when it jitters and see if it is pegged out or not. Anyway, if you figure it out, let me know. This is really starting to grab my interest.

 

[rt_jim]

I have found out that the main cause was due to the PCI Latency problem.
Most people would have the same problems with this.
When you buy a new Graphics Card the manufacturer sets the PCI Latency value to a high number.(248 approx.)
After reducing this to the 64 (all other devices are either 0 or 32) i saw substatinally better performance on all accounts. I may even try 32 to see if i see anything else.
It was a shame to think that i would have bought another hardware when manufacturers don't make this part clear. And the ability to give a device a less dramatic PCI Latency value. Therefore my CPU was there spending more time attending to my graphics card than the rest of my system (including HDD access etc.)

Thanks for your help and interest in this Situation cmy6800
And i hope anyone can learn from this little tweak that can effect so many of us.

Jim