Bad Performance

[SeeK]

Hey. I'm thinking there might be something wrong with my dear X1900XT. In Oblivion I get about 17 FPS in Imperial City. That's with everything on high with HDR. No AA, since it doesn't work with HDR. Now, I think that's quite low, even at those settings. This card costed $750, so I'd expect better performance than this.

I have not tweaked the game to look better. Quite the contrary. I have done changes in the .ini to make the game flow better without looking worse. It had a quetionable effect.

A friend of mine says he's got pretty much my system, except he's got a 7800GTX, which, as far as I know, is not as powerful as an X1900. He says the game flows great everywhere in the game.

This sucks. 17 FPS is too low. Of couse I get much better in caves and other indoor areas, but as soon as I go outside my FPS drops like crazy. If I'm lucky, I might have about 30. But if I turn around 180 degrees, the FPS will go down to about 5 until it recovers. This is VERY annoying.

Should I RMA my card?

 

[zekrahminator]

steps to take to fix lag- 1)Run spyware/virus check 2)Add fast RAM, lots of it 3)OC processor (aftermarket coolers might be necessary) 4) OC video card (aftermarket coolers might be necessary) 5)Get a WD Raptor or two . Happy Gaming!

 

[KennyT772]

um remember fps doesnt just take the gpu. whats ur cpu? how much ram do u have? what skt are u running?

 

[SeeK]

Oh, there. I changed so you can see my specs now. As you can see, I've overclocked everything. And the memory is fast. And I have no spyware/adware/viruses. No Raptor though, but that usually doesn't have a very big impact on FPS.

 

[Solaris17]

hmmm why arent you running dual channel on the ram? is that a 754 board?

 

[KennyT772]

why are you running 333mhz vs 400?

 

[yogurt_21]

lol people the system specs drop downs are there for a reason.
he's probably running 333 because he has 4x512 instead of 2x1GB
no it's not a 754 board is the a8n32! hello 939, dual 16x sli lanes.

but 17 frames? my freind is running oblivion on an x1800xt with the same detail settings and he has 60+ frames and only a few stutters due t his slow cpu (3500 venice at stock)

something's up.
what cats are your running? have you tried older cats? omega drivers perhaps?

next what os/sp, what bios version on your mobo, what chipset drivers version?


have you tried running the game with the cpu at stock? (sometimes games don't run wel on oced hardware).

 

[SeeK]

I'm using 2x1GB sticks. And I never bothered checking into Dual Channel that much. And the reason I'm running them in 333 is because I can't run them in full 400 with the timings I want.

As for the Cat, I'm running 6.3. OS: XP Home SP2. Latest BIOS version (1103) and the latest chippies from nVidia, 6.85. And yeah, I've tried resetting everything to nominal settings, but that just made it worse.

So, is my GPU fried? 'Cause something seems amiss here. Like I said, you'd expect more from a GPU that expensive.

 

[peta01]

Try to benchmark it using 3D Mark 05.
Try to "clear" your memory before running the game (close all unneccessary residental app.)

 

[SeeK]

I get about 12000 in 05 and I have no particularly heavy apps running in the background while playing.

 

[trog100]

I get about 12000 in 05.. he he he.. nothing wrong with your card then.. so that just leaves oblivion.. ??? and a "mystery"..

do u have any other high-end games..??

trog

 

[zekrahminator]

12000 3Dmark05 on X800GTO2 MODDED??? holy crap!

 

[SeeK]

Yup, I've got FEAR as well... but that is so damn badly optimized. I get low FPS in that too.

Something seems wrong. Even if I get a normal 05-score, Oblivion should flow better than this. Hell, this is like the third or fourth most powerful card on the market! Any game should flow on top settings with this... at least that's what you'd want to believe.

 

[OOTay]

hmm well might as well give the ram a try and put it in 400mhz instead 333mhz. If that doesnt work well it might just be Oblivion becuase i get low fps on it too. Its just a very system intensive game.

 

[peta01]

hmm well might as well give the ram a try and put it in 400mhz instead 333mhz. If that doesnt work well it might just be Oblivion becuase i get low fps on it too. Its just a very system intensive game.

He has 400Mhz memory, but it is underclocked to be able to set faster mem timings->higher performance.

 

[peta01]

Try to make screenshots of your cards settings. There must be something wrong.

 

[SeeK]

Making and uploading screenshots is a pain in the ass. Instead I'll try to write what settings I have:

Desktop Area: 1280x1024
Color Quality: 32-bit
Refresh Rate: 75Hz
Anti-Aliasing: Let the application decide (no Temporal AA activated)
Anisotropic Filtering: Let the application decide (no HQ AF activated)
Catalyst AI: Advanced
Mipmap Detail Level: Quality (I've tried the lowest setting, no noticeable change)
Wait for Vertical Refresh: Always Off
Smartshader Effects: None
Adaptive Anti-Aliasing: Off
Direct3D Settings: Support DXT texture formats is enabled

That's all the settings that could have any effect.

 

[HookeyStreet]

I get about 12000 in 05.. he he he.. nothing wrong with your card then.. so that just leaves oblivion.. ??? and a "mystery"..

do u have any other high-end games..??

trog

Surely thats a mistake??? 12000 3DMARKS!!!!!

EDIT: Sorry read the post wrong what a n00b

 

[Azn Tr14dZ]

But, he says that he gets low fps in F.E.A.R. too. You are running the latest catalyst, right? Maybe you should uninstall and re-install Oblivion.

 

[SeeK]

Done that. I've re-installed Oblivion about four times. The Cat's been re-installed so many times I don't remember.

Another friend of mine's got a 7900GT. Besides that, he's got pretty much the same system I've got. Same CPU, equally fast RAM... but he gets twice the FPS I get on the same settings in Oblivion. I've seen screenshots, it's true. He gets about 70 FPS in forests.

 

[Steevo]

Possibly turn your AI level down to basic. It is just a CPU based culling for the z buffer and can cause some problems in certain games. Especially CPU limited and or OpenGL based games.

Next what clocks are you running, are you using CCC to OC the card, or possibly another solution?

 

[trog100]

so we still have a mystery.. super good 2005 score.. poor game performance.. if it scores well in 2005 it should score well in games.. games need more memory but thats the only difference..

in fact according to its 2005 score it should play every game thats out there with no problem at all..

trog

 

[trog100]

only just realised what oblivion is.. he he he.. the last one crippled my ati 9700 pro.. especially when that winged female thing appeared.. it turned out to be a bug with soft shadows and ati cards.. shame was i never found out about the "bug" till i had finished playing the bloody game..

try turning the odd effect off.. soft shadows first.. he he.. i would imagine this release would have fixed such things but u never know.. its bound to be buggy..

trog

 

[SeeK]

I've tried disabling Catalyst AI. And yes, I am using CCC to clock. It seems ATI Tool isn't compatible with my card when overclocking. And I'm not sure I want to use anything else. I realize CCC loosens timings to get a higher frequency, but I really don't care.

 

[SeeK]

It seems Oblivion just hates my GPU at the moment. The game just doesn't really support it very well. I'll just have to wait for a patch or something.