ATi Radeon 9600XT Asus/Saphire performance problems.

Hey guys,

I have a problem with my Radeon cards. Previously I was using an Asus ATi Radeon 9600XT 128MB. I recently switched to a Saphire ATi Radeon 9600XT 256MB. I noticed that in games such as DOOM 3, Bloodlines, Panzers, Warhammer, The Sims 2, etc. the 256MB card seems to perform worse than my old Asus 128MB card. However, when I up the graphics settings or resolutions, the 256MB card would not get slower like the 128MB would. However, while comparing the cards at medium graphics settings, the 128MB card would perform better.

It seems almost like at medium graphics settings the 128MB card has faster memory. However, when dealing with more textures or higher resolutions, the slower, but more memory card seems to be faster. Are Saphire cards generally slower, memory or frequency?

At any rate, I read PC Gamer a lot, and my system specs are on par or above their mid-ranged system. I still think games run much too slow on my computer. Panzers runs at an almost unacceptable level even with everything set to low. I play all my games at 1024x768 - 32. Will disabling fast-writes or any other option improve performance? I don't want to shell out $400-$600 for a new video card. That's the reason why I upgraded to a 256MB version of my old card. I was hoping it would last me a little while longer before it became obsolete. Should I upgrade my CPU?

I have all the up to date drivers for my mobo and graphics card. Anyone else own a Radeon 9600XT who isn't satisfied?

Here are my specs...

Thermaltake 420watt PS
AMD Athlon 2800+ XP
Kingston 1024MB DDR 400 PC-2700
Asus A7N8X-X nForce 2 mobo
Saphire Radeon 9600XT 256MB AGP 8X
nForce 2 Sound, etc.

Any help would be much apprecaited, thanks.

Bryan

 

well 256MB does just that; removes some stress out of the CPU to produce higher res grpahics without so much lag. Did you uninstall your previous drivers ? If not use driver cleaner 3.3 to remove the old drivers