Call of Duty 4 Problem

Hey guys,

I would really appreciate any help with this problem I have.

Specs
Gateway
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4200+ 2.2Ghz
3.00 GB Ram
ATI Radeon X1600pro

OS
Microsoft Windows XP
Media Center Edition Version 2002
Service Pack 2

Ok,
I started out with Vista on this computer because I bought it to upgrade over XP. I had been running Vista for awhile and bought COD4. It played fine got around 50avg FPS each map, and was working great. I decided to reformat(for clutter reasons etc)my computer by using the recovery disc that came with my Gateway Comp. That went smoothly, had a fresh computer and I NOW have XP because I did not want to reinstall Vista. I am not a fan of it. I installed ALL drivers possible for my hardware. Up to date ATI x1600 drivers, my soundcard drivers, and my Wireless Connection(Belkin Pre-N) Drivers. I am connected through a Desktop pre-N card which connects to a Router in the same house. After all the necessary installations and upgrades, I install Call of Duty 4 again. Download the patch for that game like usual, and go to click Join a Server, just like a usually do.
I click Refresh List, and something unusual happens and basically it lags when I refresh the list, my cursor is extremely hard to control once I click refresh list, and ALL pings are 100+ which is never the case before I reformatted. I enter a server and my ping goes to about 80-90s constant and my FPS goes to low 20s. First I tried to establish whether or not this was a network connection problem, I hooked up straight to the cable box with an ethernet cable. Same Result, slow refresh server list, and ping and fps Terrible. I hook up straight to the Router that hooks up to the cable box. SAME Result. So it cannot be my Pre-N network. I go on my brother's Comp which is substantially better than mine, and he has absolutley no problem, Server list refreshes fine, and ping is good.
What is the problem here? I cannot think of ANYTHING to help me.

The only thing I can think that has caused this, is me not running Vista like I did. Before I reformatted I was running CoD4 on Vista and I had no problem with server list/ in game. and now I can't bear playing the game or trying to join a server.

Please please please, I would love it if someone could help me here, thank you very much.

 

Just trying to eliminate the factors, you have an up to date ver of directx right? a firewall could be causing an interruption and making it lag, if you have xfire, shut it down, it sometimes makes the game laggy and crashed the game, and close out any other programs you have running. see if that helps

To see what ver of directx ya got, go to start>run>type in dxdiag

=D
hope this helps man, it was frustrating for me to try to get cod4 to work =P

 

hey man i have the similar problem my fps just drops from 80-90 to about 20-10 im exited out of everything i dled zone alarm so i can have the gaming mode, i cleaned up the spyware, updated my graphics card, idk what else to do.

 

It could be from Zone alarm, i have the same problem, i get all laggy and stuff sometimes when im playing cod4 and zonealarms on, try unplugging the internet and disabling or turning off the firewall, i say unplug the internet so your not totally vulnerable =)

 

I dont think its zone alarm because it was happening with me with having mcafee.

 

Then it could be the firewall right there zonealarm is a very good firewall, but it can be overprotective when you want to do things like play games and things like that

 

I just disabled it and all. Went in a server still had the problem fps was at about 100 120 or something dropped to 50 then 40 and so on, it seems as if the certain things I'm looking at in the game makes it go down. Any thing I could update on my pc to run the game better maybe?