Why does my agp system suck so much?

nimchip

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Apr 22, 2006
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I had the following system:

3.2 ghz northwood p4
2x 512 mb pc3200 dual channel ram sticks
ati radeon 9800 pro
asus p4s800d-e Deluxe

I'm just wondering, I have a friend that has the same specs with the exception of a 3.0ghz p4. We both play WoW among other games. The problem is that his WoW moves incredibly well, while mine ran like crap. I'm running minimum settings while he isn't. It doesn't make sense. CoD2 ran like crap too... while other games ran pretty well.

I recently upgraded to a eVGA GEFORCE 7800GS and it STILL runs like crap. Actually it runs as bad as when i had my radeon. I took careful steps to remove the ATI drivers using Driver Cleaner cause i learned from experience that brand swaps usually give you worse performance output if you only do a standard uninstall... I'm still running on minimum settings on both CoD2 and WoW.

My friends suggested i reformat. I haven't reformatted in forever. Could this cause slowdown? Another thing: could it be the ram that is faulty? Is there anything else that could be giving slowdowns? Please let me know, I'm incredibly frustrated and I simply do not have the cash for a new PCI-E right now...
 

Corasik

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Have you got the SIS AGP driver properly installed, the graphics card may be using PCI (64mhz,32bit, and no x8) emulation mode otherwise.
 

DestroyerOfSenses

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Yes, a reformat can do wonders, also check to make sure you have the latest drivers.
Btw whats your power supply? If you're running the 78000 off a lil psu that can definently hinder performance ( I had the psu problem with my 7800gs from BFG, but now it runs like champ, now it runs WoW perfectly for my 49 undead warrior).

Also, check to see what programs you have running in the background aswell, if you have stuff like norton or mcaffe running, disable them during gameplay. Easiest way to see whats running in the background is to pull up taskmanager (ctrl+alt+delete) and go to the proccesses tab, On my system right now even with antivirus/anti spyware and serveral windows open, I only have 25 processes. (it tells you how many processes you have in the lower left hand corner) Anything over 35 is excessive, and you should check the programs that start when the computer starts (go to the start menu, click run, type msconfig, goto the 'startup' tab and disable some of the programs.) Also any extra 'themes' or special 'screensavers' you might have can eatup memory aswell.

Hope this helps :)
 

Plekto

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My guess would be the bios is set up wrong. Say, for instance, if the AGP aperature is at 16MB or something simmilar, it'll choke itself to death.
 

Fox_granit

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have you recently cleaned the regestry? Find CCleaner on Cnet download and run it. it will clean the registry and clean up the system.

Good luck
 

nimchip

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I actually changed the PSU before installing the new card, cause my old psu didn't have the amperage on the 12v rail. I'm running on an Antec now with 17A on 2x 12v rails... pretty sure that's enough

I haven't ran registry cleaner but i'll give it a try before reformatting.
I'll check the BIOS and the AGP drivers (though im sure i have the agp drivers installed) too

Thanks for the suggestions and I'll let you guys know.
 

melarcky

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yes REFORMAT and also driver check, i had the same problem with my system and it was so bad i couldnt use messenger programs! haha after the windows reinstall and reformat it works like new :)