Extremely horrible performance

First off, here is my rig.
AMD 3000+
1gb Corsair RAM
XFX 6600GT

Well, that's the important stuff. The problem I am having is HORRIBLE performance in Quake IV and BF2, both of which I used to be able to play perfectly fine at 1024x768 with Medium settings. However, now I'm only getting about 40 FPS in both games. I can still play HL2 and CS:S just fine with 1024x768 with settings on high and I still get about 80-90 FPS. Anyone know what could be causing problems with ONLY those 2 games?

 

those games are VERY demanding and for your setup, thats about what you should be getting. I wouldnt call 40fps "HORRIBLE" performance

 

Well, I consider it horrible becuase I used to run them at 1024x768 on medium detail on both and get about 70fps.
And I screwed up on the first post. I now am running both games at 800x600 on Low detail and am only getting 40FPS. And I have updated drivers

 

did anything happen/change that could have caused this? did you replace/upgrade any hardware, change any drivers etc. you may want to roll back your drivers to the one that was getting you the best performance. the newest drivers arent always the best

 

The only thing that has changed is a fresh windows install. I don't remember what drivers I used to use, but I just updated to the newest ones today to see if it would help. I'm going to try rolling my drivers back, see if that helps. Or I might switch to some non-stock drivers and see if that helps at all.

 

I've seen many problems come through this board regarding FPS drop...Leading cause believe it or not was a virus, spyware, adware. Seeing how you've just reformatted it's possible. Perhaps a net worm snuck in while updating windows or something of that nature.

Conflicts are another possiblity make sure, IF they are there you have Integrated graphics controller disabled completely and the drivers are gone, also make sure you're PC case is fairly clean.

Good Luck.

 

you could always try the Omega drivers, they work pretty well

 

Well, tried the Omega drivers, tried 77.xx drivers, and tried some 8x.xx drivers and nothing changed. Scanned for viruses and spyware and didn't have either. Tried dropping my settings down to low on both games with a res of 800x600 and it still didn't help, I don't know what the deal is, it's driving me absolutely insane.

I used FRAPs this time instead of the in-game FPS counter and I was having drops as low as 6 FPS and the highest it hit in BF2 was 37.

 

Try you're luck in 3D Mark 06 and see what you get. If you get a bad score then it's a hardware issue, possibly the Video Card going.

With those results I would say, 4000 or higher should be what you're looking for maybe 3500+ and over if it's below that than something is up.

 

I thought 3D mark '06 was extremely hardcore? Would I even get that high with a 3000+ and a 6600GT?

I'm going to run some full hardware diagnostics in a bit, and do some Sandra testing as well as run 3D mark I guess, and probably futuremark.

 

Well I got a 4900 with this setup...I don't see why not, but I have been wrong before.

EDIT: Wait which Processor is that, Sempron or the Athlon?

 

Athlon 64, I'm downloading 3D mark '06 now. I'm going to pull my comp out later and check it to make sure everything is seated properly and probably reseat everything.

 

Well, 3D Mark 06 won't even run. It just loads the benchmark video thing then crashes, haven't tried aquamark yet. Ran diagnostics on it last night and everything hardware-wise checked out.

 

Did you already patch the games?

 

Yeah, both games are patched.

Something is definately wrong, I just ran AquaMark3 and scored a 25k. I used to score ~50k with AquaMark3 on this exact same computer.

 

Reset bios to defaults, making sure you have the correct fsb and such set in bios.

 

Yep, pulled the CMOS battery this morning, didn't help either.

 

how about trying another gfx card in the system?

 

Haven't tried another video card, but I don't have another video card on hand to do so.

 

No go to the bios and reset stuff to default via the menu option just to be sure.

 

Okay, just tried that and got the same thing. I tested my CPU and RAM with Sandra 07 and was getting the results I shold be getting, so it leads me to believe something with my video card as went haywire. I don't see how it could have done that after a windows install, but whatever. I'm going to try and find another video card to test it with, the only one I have on hand is a 9600 SE, so I want to find something a little better.

 

Did you update your motherboard drivers after you installed Windows?

Windows only contains generic drivers which may not perform as well.

 

I sort of had a gut feeling it was the Video Card if it crashes at that point during 3D Mark it has to be.

 

Yeah I got the drivers off the MSI website.

Oh...there's something that is different. Before I reformatted I was using drivers off the disc that came with the motherboard.

I'm gonna try putting those drivers back on, if I can find the disc.

 

You guys think if I didn't install the nvidia cool 'n quiet drivers it would make a problem like that?

EDIT: Nevermind, I downloaded them and tried to install them and it said it's not a 64bit OS
EDIT that EDIT: downloaded the wrong set, lol.

 

what PSU u running I had a similar problem with my new setup and it turned out to be the PSU. I bought a good brand PSU with ample amps on the 12volt rail and everything works fine now.

 

I'm running a thermaltake silent purepower 480w. I installed new Mobo drivers and installed the AMD Cool 'n Quiet driver thing and it helped. I'm still not at the performance I used to get, but it's playable at 800x600 medium detail.

 

if you can double check the amount of amps you are getting on the 12volt rail. I had enough raw power but the amps was to low. Maybe a long shot but worth looking into. I had the theramltake PSU and upgraded to the Silverstone st56zf and it ahs been great since.

 

I dont remember how many amps the PSU has, but it's ample. When I bought it I made sure it had enough wattage and amp output to run everything without running into any problems.

 

I think it's pretty much resolved. I just moved and my brother found my old driver CD and he is going to come down in a week or so and bring it with him. The new drivers definately helped, my AquaMark score went up to 51,000 and both Video and CPU scores went up by 3000 points.

Thanks for all the help, I really appreciate it. Most of the time I know how to fix it, but this time I didn't.

Thanks again

 

Glad to hear it helped.

The latest drivers from the manufacturers website are generally better than the ones supplied on CD's, as they are usually dated.