i just dont get it..Slow geforce 4 :(? or slow cpu!?

touser3 · Post by **touser3** » Sun Mar 31, 2002 11:58 pm

hi all i have a visiontek geforce 4 Ti4600, i bought this card thinking i would see amazing improvements in frame rates over my old card (geforce 2 ultra) however this has not been the case . in flight simulator 2002 i am getting a whopping 13fps,in tribes 2 it never goes above 65fps and sometimes drops to as low as 25fps,in anarchy online i get a whole 32fps in none crowded areas, BUT i get a score in 3dmark2k1SE with everything at default of almost 11k..i just dont understand this! i have looked through every option, vsync is turned off,anti-aliasing is turned off,i have checked and double checked,i even made sure everyhting was turned off with nvmax..does anyone know what could possibly be wrong? or is this just how fast all these really should be? thanks in advance! P.S. this is with the system in my sig.

P.S. here is a link to my 3dmark2k1SE score http://service.madonion.com/compare?2k1=3135730

*EDIT* i went and did some more testing and this is what i came up with

well here are my findings..its seems to be a cpu problem but i do not know what..i know this because it does not seem to matter what resolution i am running my games at..in tribes 2 i normally play at 1024x768x32 well for the hell of it i took it down o 600x480x32..at this resolution you would think the fps would rocket way up wouldnt you? WRONG! they didnt budge! they stayed at 65fps they where exactly the same! so i figured ok lets try something else..i set the resolution all the way up to 1600x1200x32! with all settings on the highest they go in tribes 2, guess what! still didnt budge! still 65fps, all this could possibly mean is that the video card has more then enough power and can handle everything i throw at it, but something is happeneing between it and the cpu.. because when i set it to 600x480 it should relieve alot off stress off the video card, yet when i did the fps didnt budge because the cpu still had to do the same amount of work..i just wish i knew what the problem was..but at least i know i am not alone in this

my system:
P4 1.7@2ghz,abit th7-raid mobo,visiontek geforce4 Ti4600,
512 samsung rambus,soundblaster audigy,tdk 24x10x40,
Lian-Li PC70,Danger Den mazeP4,cube radiator,eheim 1250 pump.

downhill · Post by **downhill** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 12:21 am

Just a thought and I'll bet you already did this.

I uninstall the old video drivers in safe mode and install the new video drivers in safe mode. Maybe you still have a driver conflict if part of them were not completely uninstalled. Also, have you checked the bios and made sure all the settings your card can use like 4x are enabled?

touser3 · Post by **touser3** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 12:26 am

thanks for the reply downhill, yes i have done all of that

today i even broke down and did a clean format and reinstall of windows and it still made no difference, so i know it is not a driver conflict with the old card, and i have also dug through every nook and cranny of the bios...everything is enabled.

tHE_0ne · Post by **tHE_0ne** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 12:32 am

geforce MX's are BAD

get the Ti

touser3 · Post by **touser3** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 12:33 am

if u had read my post you would have seen that i have a geforce 4 Ti 4600

NOT an mx

Gman33 · Post by **Gman33** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 12:40 am

I seem to get the same results with my Geforce 4 4400 TI. I play MOHAA mostly, but still from 640x480 low settings, to 1024x768 high settings, i still get the same FPS results. Like its telling me "hey i'm gonna give u playable frame rates, and i'll do everything i can to stay there" which is usually in the 50-60fps.

Heres my rig:

Windows XP Pro
1000Mhz Pentium III 100FSB
384MB PC100 SDRAM
30GB Ultra ATA-100 7200rpm
PNY Verto Geforce 4 4400 TI
Creative Soundblaster Live!
56X CD-ROM
Antec 300-Power Supply
Supermicro P6SBA motherboard
15" NEC MultiSync 3FGx

And i've done all that stuff u did with Vsync and all.
My 3DMark2001se score sucks though: 6618

MartialArtist12 · Post by **MartialArtist12** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 12:51 am

Sounds like vsync. For benchmarking purposes, you should turn this off. For gaming purposes, you should leave it on.

touser3 · Post by **touser3** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 12:56 am

vsync on or off..it makes no difference

tHE_0ne · Post by **tHE_0ne** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 3:13 am

i dont like reading lol

onetrueday · Post by **onetrueday** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 4:54 am

Originally posted by tHE_0ne
i dont like reading lol

lol.

That was a REALLY dumb answer.

I know you tried turning the vsync off, but I'd try that again. Or, dont they have something for nvidia cards like the rage3d? An optimizer of sorts? You might be missing a setting.

wip3out · Post by **wip3out** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 5:26 am

This doesn't make sense at all i've read all the reveiws I can find on the Geforce 4 Ti cards because I'm buying one very soon. In all the benechmarks it shows amazing framerates i.e. 250FPS in Quake 3 at 1024x768 @32 high detail.

So my only conclusion to your problem is that your monitors refresh rate maximum is 65hz and so the most framerate you can get is 65FPS. Although this should only occur when V-Sync is turned on, so if you have tried with V-Sync off The only suggestion I can make is that turning off the V-sync with the Geforce 4 Ti series doesn't work.

Have you tried any OpenGL games touser??

Muscular Beaver · Post by **Muscular Beaver** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 8:13 am

maybe its only NT-OS related? also its not just one or 2 manufacturerers. I have an leadtek Ti4600 and as you can read, I have the same problems as you guys. Im pretty mad about it. thought I would give nvidia a try for the first time and got a kick in the ass from them.... im very disappointed. also in tribes2 my FPS will fall if I turn the resolution up. I get about 50 to 100 fps with max details and 2x FSAA at 800x600. with 1024x768 I get about 40 to 80 and at 1280x1024 it gets more stable at about 30 to 50 fps. this is all when I hang around at one of the bases in katabatic. I think it will get even slower when there is heavy offense and mortar fire etc. when I turn off FSAA it maybe gets 5 fps faster at most.

I also dont think its hardware related, since we all got pretty different hardware. I for my part have a VIA chipset KR7A mainboard with 768MB PC2400 Corsair RAM and a thunderbird 1.4 at 1.6ghz running w2k.

wip3out · Post by **wip3out** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 9:43 am

REFRESH RATE FIX!!!!

Have you got it touser and beaver??????

Muscular Beaver · Post by **Muscular Beaver** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 10:44 am

huh? I dont have vsync on. that smart am I

anyway I have a refreshfix, yes.

Gman33 · Post by **Gman33** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 12:50 pm

Ya i've tried that refresh fix program, and its actually pretty good. Problem with me is that my monitor actually sucks. Only letting me go 72hz at 800x600, and 60hz at 1024x768, so u see with vsync on, my maximum fps is about 75fps.

Now i have turned off vsync and fps have exceeded 200fps in some areas of MOHAA, but then again i see some sort of clipping, so actually it looks better playing 60fps with vsync then 200fps with vsync off, but it depends also on your hardware, the results differ for everyone.

My solution is a new 19" monitor that can go 100hz at 800x600 and at least 85hz at 1024x768. Right now i'm stuck with a 15" NEC MultiSync 3FGx.

touser3 · Post by **touser3** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 1:06 pm

yes i have the refresh rate fix, yes i have made sure vsync was turned off, yes i have used every tweak program i could get my hands on, nvmax and geforce tweak utility and riva tuner to name a few! and no my monitor doesnt suck i have a 19" sony trinitron E400.. and wip3out yes the reviews for these cards are awsome! my benchmarks are completely awsome! i get almost 11k in 3dmark2k1SE as mentioned in my first post! but in real life games like the ones in my first post, tribes 2,MOHAA,anarchy online,ghost recon it performs like crap! i mean 30fps in all those games with my system! i was getting higher with my geforce 2 ultra..no..there is something else wrong here and it is not the refrsh rates and it is not vsync!

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 7:35 pm

I think you should try putting the video card into a different computer to see if the card is messed up... but i think i know exactly whats wrong with it.

touser3 · Post by **touser3** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 8:32 pm

Mr White, unfortunately i dont have another pc to test it in i am almost 100% sure it isnt the card istelf

. BUT you said you think you know exactly whats wrong with it!!!?? what do you think?? please tell!!

touser3 · Post by **touser3** » Tue Apr 02, 2002 3:09 pm

bump!

Muscular Beaver · Post by **Muscular Beaver** » Tue Apr 02, 2002 3:39 pm

Im going to see if I can RMA it back and get another one. I doubt it since they will say I installed it wrong but ill give it a try. Ill let you guys know what will happen.

touser3 · Post by **touser3** » Tue Apr 02, 2002 8:00 pm

ok guys i believe I HAVE A FIX!! i have been talking to a very knowledgable (thats a chance in a million lol) tech support guy from visiontek through email and i think we have this problem fixed! i am going to post all of my emai;s to and from him in thos epost..try and follow his instructions and remember the card MUST be on either IRQ 10 or 11 ALONE!

the first message was exactly how i started this thread as..

reply : I had the same issue once and it turn out to be that I was sharing the IRQ number for my video card with other devices. Make sure that is not the case. Let me know what you come up with. Jason

me: Thank you for the reply Jason i appreciate it, i was really expecting a "its not out problem; sorry" answer but i didn't get that, and for that i am impressed. i had checked the IRQ's and i am running windows XP Pro and according to the microsoft database XP likes to put more then one device on the same IRQ, it used to be that i had about 9 of my devices where all on irq 19! but according to microsoft that was not a problem..but after the format they are now spased out pretty well withought more then 2 on the same irq, i have attatched a jpeg with a screenshot of my irq's for you. i hope we can find a solution to this problem.

reply: How many processors does your PC have?

me: as in how many cpu's am i running in this computer? only 1...the P4 1.7@2ghz

reply: You have the video card on a virtual IRQ#. Our card need to be on IRQ10 or 11 by itself. Check to see which driver you are running in your Computer category in device manager. It most likely ACPI Uniprocessor which is the culprit. Attached is a screen shot of where the driver is. First try changing the driver to "Advanced Configuration Power Interface". See if that corrects the problem. If not you will have to change the driver to "Standard PC"(like I had to)lol. That will let your bios do the assigning of IRQ#s. Let me know how it works out. Jason

me: thank you for that reply jason! i changed it to Advanced Configuration Power Interface. and that didnt seem to work but then i changed it to Standard PC and it moved all my irq's around..but the graphics card is still sharing irq 12 with my firewire controller..however i decided for the hell of it to boot up tribes 2 and for the first time with this card it broke the 65fps barrier and actually hit 100fps! it still went as low as 45fps in crowded areas but the perfomance did increase! however the performance increase in flight simulator 2002 was only about 1-2fps..is there any other way to get that card on its own irq? thanks again!

reply: You may be able to change those setting in your Bios. Look for a section on PCI/PNP configuration. See if you have Pin assignments. Those pins are slots on the board in which you can specify IRQ#s. Otherwise, put the firewire card in a different slot. See if that changes it. Looks like we're moving forward though!! Jason

me: yup, went into the bios and i have PnP/PCI and i changed the video card onto irq 11 because you said it had to be on 10 or 11 and it was on 12..welp anywho now it is on 11 with 2 other things i have attatched a screenshot of it,m anywho i am going to type out a layout of the bios screen for PnP/PCI for you it looked like this:

Force Update ESCD- Disabled
Resources Controlled by- Auto(ESCD)
PCI/VGA Palette Snoop- Disabled
Allocate IRC to VGA- Enabled
Allocate IRQ to USB- Enabled
PCI Latency Timer- 32 PCI Clocks
PIRQ_0 Use IRQ No.- and i set this one to 11 as this is the one for my video card
PIRQ_1 Use IRQ No.- Auto
PIRQ_2 Use IRQ No.- Auto
PIRQ_3 Use IRQ No.- Auto

reply: Try manually setting the other pin assignments to different IRQ#s. Try moving card around in their slots keeping the first and last slots open. I'm taking off for the day so I will be able to continue in the AM. I think you're almost there so keep at. Jason

so anywho what i did after that was change the rest of the PIRQ_1,2, and 3 from Auto to just a random irq but not 10 or 11 rebooted the vid card was on irq 10 all by itself booted up tribes and for the first time since i installed the card it broke past 65fps with all settings on as high as they go and hit 107fps! and never dropped below 49fps even in a huge crowd of people but it average about 75fps, flight simulator got a boost as well and Ghost Recon with everyhting on high never dropped below the mid 50's and averaged in the high 70's, i have not tested MOHAA yet but i am sure it got the boost as well..tell me if this helps you at all, i sure hope it does!!

Muscular Beaver · Post by **Muscular Beaver** » Tue Apr 02, 2002 9:38 pm

wont help me since my card has an own irq (11).

SG Broadband Community

i just dont get it..Slow geforce 4 :(? or slow cpu!?

i just dont get it..Slow geforce 4 :(? or slow cpu!?

hmmm