New 9800Pro arrived yesterday, some questions

  • Thread starter Thread starter GTX_SlotCar
  • Start date Start date
Tim W. said:
Why?



Enjoy,

TLW
Click to expand...

Loading game data,...loading textures...loading world... loading ....

That is why, really a game nowadays can easily fill up 700 MB to
1000Mb of memory with all the high quality textures it must unpack
into it's memory. Knowing windows needs atleast 125Mb just think about
what happens with your 256Mb case.

Your low memory amount holds up the videocard by having the use the
harddisk for the textures ( and that is of course very slow )
 
Loading game data,...loading textures...loading world... loading ....

That is why, really a game nowadays can easily fill up 700 MB to
1000Mb of memory with all the high quality textures it must unpack
into it's memory. Knowing windows needs atleast 125Mb just think about
what happens with your 256Mb case.

Your low memory amount holds up the videocard by having the use the
harddisk for the textures ( and that is of course very slow )
Click to expand...



Hi,
it's very rare to use over 512MB of RAM. Take a look at task manager (Right
Click task bar, *Task Manager*). Click on the *Performance Tab* look at the
bottom where is says *Commit Charge* and look for *Peak*. . . see this
picture I made:
www.waynes.spamtrap.btinternet.co.uk/max_mem.JPG

Use this from time to time after playing some intense 3D games, and let me
know if it goes above 512MB
 
Wayne said:
Hi,
it's very rare to use over 512MB of RAM. Take a look at task manager (Right
Click task bar, *Task Manager*). Click on the *Performance Tab* look at the
bottom where is says *Commit Charge* and look for *Peak*. . . see this
picture I made:
www.waynes.spamtrap.btinternet.co.uk/max_mem.JPG

Use this from time to time after playing some intense 3D games, and let me
know if it goes above 512MB
Click to expand...

Morrowind has taken my peak memory to over 760 MB before it crashed. I
could tell it was about to crash as it kept getting slower and slower.
Unfortunately on my computer upgrading from 512 MB to 1 GB is not cost
effective as I use RDRAM :(
 
I also heard many tales about winxp crashing and many compatibity probels in
games with system over 512Mb rams. Don't know if that's only windows,
motherboards, games or what combination, but it DOES exist to some degree. I
don't want any more unstable system than what i have already, little ram
(512mb) or not.
 
Morrowind has taken my peak memory to over 760 MB before it crashed. I
could tell it was about to crash as it kept getting slower and slower.
Unfortunately on my computer upgrading from 512 MB to 1 GB is not cost
effective as I use RDRAM :(
Click to expand...


Hi,
eeek!. . . . .760MB. . .that's crazy. I never played that game myself so I
can't comment (I heard its good though!).

Maybe something else is wrong?
 
Wayne said:
Hi,
eeek!. . . . .760MB. . .that's crazy. I never played that game myself so I
can't comment (I heard its good though!).

Maybe something else is wrong?
Click to expand...


Usually it is fairly well behaved and uses around 250 MB. But under
certain reproducible conditions it doesn't seem to clear it's memory of
places visited quick enough and the memory usage goes through the
ceiling until it crashes. Others have said that they don't have the
crashing problem with 1 GB but I am going to have to upgrade my whole
system before I get that kind of memory.
 
I got my Sapphire 9800Pro from newegg yesterday for $229. Before I received
it, the price had already dropped $5 on their web site :-)

Performance wasn't quite what I expected. 3DMark2001 scores were around
15500. With my OC'd Ti4400, I got 14000 with the same quality settings. I
expected around 16200 or so with the Pro. To be fair, I got 15888 with it
OC'd at 400/370. I'm also aware that there would be a bigger difference in
scores if I used 3DMark2003.
Click to expand...

There isn't much to 3DMark2001 anymore. but with an AMD64 bit CPU,
people have surged past 20,000. there is a 5 fold in ability with
the new card with 3DMark03.
Most of the games I play are older, so there wasn't much difference there,
either. Call of Duty did play very well with only a couple hiccups. 3D image
quality was excellent. I did miss that ATI desktop, too.
Click to expand...

make sure you're clean of all Nvidia drivers.... makes a difference.
The memory chips do get scorching hot. I'll either cut up an old heatsink
for them or buy something. Any ideas of good HS for them? If I OC the card,
I'll need them. I'm also considering the Arctic Cooling VGA Silencer.
Click to expand...

Or stop overclocking the card... and leave it alone. Improper
installation of heatsinks to memory may cause more problems.
The card came with Cat 3.8 drivers. I also tried the 3.7 and 4.1. Is there a
driver that's faster (non-omega)?
Click to expand...

Stick with what works... I'm using 3.9 until I see a reason to bother
changing.
Win 2000 Pro
Abit AI7
Geil 256MB PC3500 DDR433 at 2-2-2-5 and 190 mHz
P4 1.8a at 2.57gHz
fsb/mem ratio at 3:4
Click to expand...

CPU is a bit on the old end... but you've good some serious
overclocking there. ;)

Sometimes, OC messes with system timing (still) and can effect varous
item performces besides the CPU.

I OC my AMD CPU by 200Mhz - in some benchmarks, I gained noticable
improvements. But in others, I lost performance or none at all... and
gained heat. So back off down to a slight OC and leave it at that.

hey, I'm getting over 100fps in any game I have... soooo ;)
 
Yes. Oddly, it has it as 9800 Pro and again as 9800 Pro secondary. I suppose
it's some driver or hardware thing with these cards that loads it twice?
Click to expand...

Dual Output
 
left a note on my windscreen which said:
I also heard many tales about winxp crashing and many compatibity probels in
games with system over 512Mb rams. Don't know if that's only windows,
motherboards, games or what combination, but it DOES exist to some degree. I
don't want any more unstable system than what i have already, little ram
(512mb) or not.
Click to expand...

I think that's probably due to faulty memory or something. XP is fully
compatible for 1GB of RAM. I doubt the vast majority of people would
encounter any problems upgrading from 512MB to 1GB. I would wager in
the majority of cases this would in fact improve system stability.
 
Stoneskin said:
left a note on my windscreen which said:




I think that's probably due to faulty memory or something. XP is fully
compatible for 1GB of RAM. I doubt the vast majority of people would
encounter any problems upgrading from 512MB to 1GB. I would wager in
the majority of cases this would in fact improve system stability.
Click to expand...

I upgraded my XP Pro system from 512MB to 1GB, no problems. Now, taking
a Win98 system to over 512MB is a different matter :-)
 
but in games like Call of Duty (and the racing sims I have), my hard drive
isn't accessed except when loading new maps.
Click to expand...

Oops, I was wrong and I'll admit it. In CoD my hard drive is accessed during
the game, and the game chops for a second when it happens. I was just too
busy ducking bullets to notice. I'll bring a 256mb stick of OCz memory home
from work and see what happens. It won't run as dual channel with my Geil
memory, but at least I'll see what 512mb will do for me. I haven't had this
happen with other games.

If 512 helps, it brings on another delima. With my current P4 1.8a running
at 2.57gHz, the Geil PC3500 memory I have runs very tight timing at 2-2-2-5.
My FSB/Mem ratio is set at 3:4.
In 3 or 4 months I plan to upgrade to a P4 2.4c and hope to get up to 3.3gHz
out of it with a ratio of 1:1. I've chosen OCz PC4200 memory for this
because it'll run up to 280mHz for the FSB. Like all high speed memory, it
sacrifices the tight memory timings to accomplish this. This is great for a
2.4c @ 3.3gHz, but not so hot for my current cpu. At the same time, it
doens't make sense getting another stick like I'm using now, knowing the
PC4200 will be better for my future plans.

Gary
 
hey, I'm getting over 100fps in any game I have... soooo ;)

Just for the kicks, try StreetLegal2 or StreetLegal1, I bet you can't get
over 30-40 fps! And that's if you're really luckt ;)


(PS: This has nothing to do with your system being bad, it's the game, it is
real real slopp programmed :)
 
I haven't downloaded 3DMark2003 yet. Since all my other tests were with
2001SE, I've stayed with it to compare my new 9800Pro. Since the only 'new'
game I have is Call of Duty, it seems appropriate.
As I stated, I'm aware that comparing the cards with 3DMark2003 would show a
greater difference.

I plan to upgrade my cpu and memory to a P4 2.4c or 2.6c and OCz PC4200
memory, but checking the 3DMark2001SE scores, I found I could get more
performance by upgrading my video card first (from the Ti4400 OC'd to
324/662 to the 9800 Pro).

I don't have a heat problem with the P4 1.8a OC'd to 2.57. It's running at
1.65 volts and the heat on these cpu's doesn't go up until you start hitting
above 1.7 volts. The way Intel makes and markets chips, the total line of
1.6A's to 2.4A's are all the same. After manufacture, the clocks are locked
to determine the speed of the chip. I can OC up to about 2718 mHz, but with
trade-offs in my system. At anything over 2.57, I have to loosen my memory
timing and actual performance drops. Then, when it gets over 2600, I have to
change my fsb/mem ratio from 3:4 to 4:5 or 1:1, so it slows performance even
more. I can't get enough out of it to make up for the performance difference
in slower memory timing or lower FSB bandwidth. 2.57 gHz seems optimal on my
system, with the FSB at 142.7 and the ratio at 3:4, the memory at 190 mHz
and the timing very tight at 2-2-2-5. It'll run Prime95 along with
3DMark2001SE looped without crashing. It's stable.

The Cat. 3.8 drivers came with the card, but the 4.1 drivers have a fix for
Call of Duty crashes. I don't see any difference in performance, yet.

I haven't scoured the registry yet to see if I can find any remnants of the
nVidia drivers. It's too bad the tool for this won't work in Win2000. I'm
sure there are some there, but I think they're just taking up space, not
interfering with the ATI drivers.

Gary
 
Oops, I was wrong and I'll admit it. In CoD my hard drive is accessed during
the game
Click to expand...



WHAT! your hard-disk gets accessed during a game? LOL that's outrageous!!!!
 
Oops, I was wrong and I'll admit it. In CoD my hard drive is accessed during
the game, and the game chops for a second when it happens. I was just too
busy ducking bullets to notice. I'll bring a 256mb stick of OCz memory home
from work and see what happens. It won't run as dual channel with my Geil
memory, but at least I'll see what 512mb will do for me. I haven't had this
happen with other games.
Click to expand...

Mount the Cd as a virtual drive and perhaps the game will really speed
up.
 
Mount the Cd as a virtual drive and perhaps the game will really speed
up.
Click to expand...

Loading more software into the PC is hardly going to help a machine
already short of main memory.
 
Do yourself a major favor by getting more ram. 256 is woefully low.
Gamers should have 1 gig now.
Click to expand...

I've swapped 266 RAM for 333. For cost reasons, I've gone from 1 GB to
512 MB (temporarily). UT 2003 is starting to choke on that much RAM
and the HD is taking the beating. Come out of UT 2003 and it takes a
while to tidy up the caching.
--

Julian Richards
julian-richards "at" ntlworld.com

XP Home
L7S7A2 motherboard
Powercolor 9800 SE 8 pipelines with Omega drivers
1 GB RAM
10 GB + 80 GB HDs
CD+DVD/CDRW drives
 
Back
Top