poor performance with Radeon 9800pro

[simon_j]

Hello. I am having some performance issues with my Radeon Pro 9800 128mb. I could not see any significant boost in performance over my previous card, GF FX 5200. I am getting 4,000 on the GPU portion of Aquamark, and barely 3,000 on the FFXI benchmark (I've been told it should be getting 4500+ easy.) My system is a P4 2.4 w/o ht, with one 512mb ddr. I did read on an earlier post that having dual channel ddr is preferable, but is my current ram setup the sole reason for such low performance? Or is the card possibly defective? (It's been crashing a lot, too...) Thanks.

[Soulburner]

Check your AGP rate...

[simon_j]

I've tried both agp 4 and 8 with fastwrite on and off, but there's no change in performance.

[dawizza]

check the antialiasing and anti thingy filters, if set too high the performance will drop to gain better graphics
also make sure vertical sync is off

hope this helps :)

[simon_j]

I have everything set to minimum, vert sync off, everything at performance setting, and I've also tried turning fastwrite on/off with smartgart...still, I'm getting very poor performance. =(

My MB is VIA P4X400, and all drivers are up to date (result of trying to get Call of Duty to work :rolleyes: )

[SearanoX]

It would be a big help if you were to post your other system specifications. Your CPU, motherboard, RAM, or a number of other things could be holding it back from it's true potential.

[Soulburner]

I've tried both agp 4 and 8 with fastwrite on and off, but there's no change in performance.

But are you sure its actually ON?

Open up something like 3DM03, it will tell you your current AGP rate. I'll bet that its 0x because you didnt install your chipset driver.

[simon_j]

Yes, AGP is on. The AGP driver is part of the VIA 4 in 1 drivers. (Not quite that clueless. ^_^;;)

BTW my #DMark 3 score is just over 5400.

[AsianBatman]

Radeon Pro 9800 128mb. My system is a P4 2.4 w/o ht, with one 512mb ddr. ?
My MB is VIA P4X400, and all drivers are up to date (It's been crashing a lot, too...) Thanks.

There you go seranox..

[Arsenal11]

Well, that 3dmark03 score isn't too bad...
Have you tried uninstalling drivers, and reinstalling them?? These new 4.1's ran really bad at first for me, and I had to reinstall, and now everything runs beautifully!

[SearanoX]

There you go seranox..

Gah, don't know how I missed that. Thanks for pointing it out for me, my Dark Night friend.

Yeah, the computer shouldn't be limiting you...and that score is about standard for your setup. I get around 5700-5800 with mine (faster CPU but limited by the motherboard). Sounds perfectly fine to me.

[simon_j]

Yeah, the 3d mark score is pretty average, that's why I didn't post it at first...but comparing my aquamark scores to other similar set-ups, the GPU score is about 1000 to 1500 below average. And the ffxi score is atrocious...a p4 2.4 with a radeon 8500 is supposed to get 4000 easy, but my score is 3300 at best.

As far as real world performance goes, UT2k3 averages 50~70 on normal settings @ 1024 x 768, and 40~60 in America's Army. But that's about the same performance I got with the GF FX 5200 (the crummy version, too!) The idea that a card costing three times as much as my last one but doesn't perform any better is just killing me.

Demos like Halo or Deus Ex will run, but not anywhere near a steady playable fps, even with all details lowered. I suppose Doom 3 and Half Life 2 are out of the question. =(

It's also my first time building from a kit, so I keep having nagging suspicions that I did something wrong...I don't think I'll ever try it again. Suddenly the prices on those Alienware PCs almost seem justifiable :laugh:

Thanks for all the suggestions, guys. I think I may as well get an RMA from ATI, since the card has been crashing a lot on me, too, especially with the newest drivers.

[Soulburner]

What driver are you using?

I would try a different one, or a newer one.

[simon_j]

I am using version 6.14.10.6343, the version that came with the CD. All newer versions cause a LOT of random crashes. (But this version also crashes occasionally, too.) It seems to be the same ati2mtag problem discussed in an earlier thread.

The new drivers also cause a lot of graphical glitches like this one-->

http://www.yoropa.lunarpages.com/temp/glitch.jpg

(Don't click link, must copy/paste into browser.)

None of these problems occured in the first few weeks I had this card, so it *might* be hardware-related.

[Soulburner]

Did you recently upgrade from another card, like Nvidia?