How come I can't play New Vegas on full settings?

[pb7280]

Hello, I got Fallout New Vegas, and I was sure that I would be able to play it on full settings since I can play Fallout 3, and better looking games such as Oblivion on full settings.
Specs:

Windows 7 Professional Edition x64
AMD Phenom II 940 (3.0GHz X4)
ATI Radeon HD 5870 1GB
OCZ FATAL1TY RAM 4GB (1066MHz DDR2)
ASUS M4A78 PRO Motherboard
Western Digital 2TB HDD
Corsair TX750w PSU

I play on a couple different configurations, the best performance is when I play on my monitor (1920x1200) and use my terrible analog computer speakers, but still not too great framerate (under 30 fps). The performance drops a little bit when I output audio to my home stereo through the HDMI port on my graphics card. But the major performance hit is when I output both video and audio to my TV and Stereo through an HDMI cord, but it's what I like most because of sitting on the couch with a controller and hearing the surround sound. I also like leaving my monitor plugged in on duplicate, but that seems to make it worse as well. It seems the most drop is when there is a loud noise, which leads me to believe it's something to do with the graphics card outputting audio while also working on the video. But I'm not sure, and I hope somebody here can understand how I could fix this problem!

I'm about to try to play it on my laptop (Alienware M15x) and compare the performance, specs for it:
Microsoft Windows 7 Premium x64
Intel Core i7 720QM (1.6GHz X4)
NVIDIA GeForce GT 240M 512MB
RAM 4GB DDR3 1066MHz
320GB HDD
1600x900 screen

Thank you a lot for any help

 

[plznote]

Do you have the latest drivers?
Graphics card overclock?
Windows updates?

 

[pb7280]

Do you have the latest drivers?
Graphics card overclock?
Windows updates?

latest drivers as of the last time I played the game, there's probably one more out since then I'll get it when I go home
no overclock, I have before, but caused too many problems
and all of the Windows updates, but not SP1 as that just came out and I haven't been home

 

[rhsnipes]

The problem your having is your system is running out of ram and having to go to the hdd via virtual memory swap to load the info being requested and used. Windows 7 64bit uses 2 Gb Ram... that leaves just 2 Gb Ram for your game and everything else. Recommended Ram for New Vegas is 3 Gb. It's likely you'll need even more though since you are using 2 hdmi ports.

So get another stick of Ram and you'll be alright.

 

[pb7280]

I just played it on my laptop, with the same amount of system RAM and half as much VRAM, and at full settings saw no lag

 

[rhsnipes]

I noticed your mobo specifies something peculiar:

DDR2 1066*/800
(Due to AMD CPU limitation, DDR2 1066 is supported by AM2+/AM3 CPU for one DIMM per channel only)



Make sure you are using 1 stick of 1066 Ram per channel... otherwise your ram will be running at 800 each. Hope this helps

 

[imtai]

Really? That specs look ok to me

 

[rhsnipes]

Check list for ASUS M4A78 PRO Motherboard:

■you need a bios update to use an AM3 chip.
■find sound drivers with windows 7 compatibility
■turn on Crossfire in Catalyst Control Center




advice... get a new board and a ssd whilre at it

 

[rhsnipes]

Okay just realized that's a am2+ chip and I assume know about the hybrid crossfire setup.

I still think it might be your sound driver (saw a lot of complaints from new egg feedback about it)

 

[pb7280]

Okay just realized that's a am2+ chip and I assume know about the hybrid crossfire setup.

I still think it might be your sound driver (saw a lot of complaints from new egg feedback about it)

I know about the DDR2 and 1066MHz channel limitation, I only have one DIMM per channel.
Also I can't use the hybrid crossfire, as apparently it's only compatible with graphics cards of the same series (my on-board graphics is HD 3200, so it would be compatible only with the 3000 series, not a 5870).
And I'm using the latest sound drivers for my on-board audio, and it seems the sound problem is mostly only when I use the 5870 for sound, which as far as I know doesn't go through on-board audio? Now that I think about it, maybe it doesn't render the audio itself...

 

[pb7280]

what Ddr2 limitation? I would like anyone to come forward and tell me DDR3 1066 is faster than Ddr2 1066. Or DDR3 1600 CL9 is faster than Ddr2 800 CL3

I don't know much about DDR3, but in my motherboard manual it says that when you are running at 1066MHz, you can only put in one DIMM per channel. So since I have 4 slots, two channels, I can only use 2 DIMMs, otherwise my RAM will get downclocked to 800 MHz. But I only have 2 DIMMs, so that's not a problem.

Also my drivers aren't Realtek, my on-board audio is VIA. I can't try anything right now because my PSU is being replaced and the PSU I'm using in the meantime won't support my graphics card.

 

[pb7280]

Basically I need to know:
Does playing on two monitors at once, both mirrored at 1920*1080, cause lag?
Does using ATI HDMI audio as opposed to standard on-board cause lag?
If it does, will getting a sound card and running optical help me?

I can't test anything right now, but I'm going to try and run Fallout now with my on-board video, and see if it can perform as well as my laptop.