Every game slowing down after several minutes, PLEASE HELP!

[GavinUK]

Hello,

Whether i put the graphics on fairly high, or absolute lowest settings .. games always start with perfect framerates but always drop down after several minutes making games unplayable (especially online). Happening with BF2 and BF2142 and pretty much every other game.

Have also ran 3DMark06 (and 05,03) which rates my score almost lowest of PCs with my setup. CPU tests run extremely slow at around 0.25FPS.

PC Setup:
Athlon 64 3500+ (running at 2.42GHz)
3GB Ram DDR-3200
XFX Geforce 7900GT Extreme
ABIT KN8SLI NF4 S939
Creative X-Fi Fatality Pro Sound
Windows XP Pro SP2
Drivers (NForce and Forceware 93.71) up to date.

Obviously somethings going wrong somewhere, and im at a loss. If anybody has any ideas i would be extremely grateful!

If you need any extra info just ask Cheers!

 

[kaotao]

Have you checked to see if there are any unwanted programs running in the backround, perhaps something malisious trying to access the internet?

 

[GavinUK]

Have you checked to see if there are any unwanted programs running in the backround, perhaps something malisious trying to access the internet?

Hi thanks for the reply,
Yes everythings clear, ive even formatted a couple of times .. same just happens. GPU temp seems to be at 49 degrees and doesnt go higher aswell. No unneeded tasks running at all.

 

[kaotao]

Have you added any new hardware, or done anything different to your PC lately, like upgrading you GPU, PSU, etc...?

 

[kmjohnso]

Might be your cpu is heating up. I had a thermistor in my cooler go and i didn't notice till the temps outside got warm. I had similar symptons and setup.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Id try a few things. Could be a memory leak, does your hard drive run alot? Also you didnt state your psu. Could be either underpowered or getting hot.

 

[fender22]

Hmm, I had a similar problem with an older setup.. I notice that you have a mild OC on your processor.. Under load, it could be to high and it could begin to throttle back your processing power to control the voltages.. The same thing could be happening to your graphics card, but I would probably say its the CPU, check your temps out... And it is normal for most CPUs to run the CPU test of 3dmark05 and 06 at extreme low FPS, heck, my 4600+ runs around the same.. maybe around .5 FPS...

 

[GavinUK]

Yeah upgraded a few months back, everything runs alot better its just that it eventually slows down. Hard drive is a WD 400gb SATA2, PSU is a 450W thing .. only cheap wonder if it could be that?

The small overclock on the CPU was from earlier today, and the problem happening long before that.

Thinking maybe a PSU upgrade could fix the problem?

Will also check out the temperature of CPU after it happens aswell!

 

[Dr_asik]

Looks like the processor doesn't like running at those speeds and under stress it automatically slow down to a much lower frequency. Try a more conservative overclock and the problem should disappear.

EDIT: could also be the video card, same phenomenon. It's an XFX so it's probably factory overclocked.

 

[fender22]

temps throttling back the clock speeds of either ur CPU or GPU, prolly CPU...

 

[slashzapper]

It is your Cheap POWER SUPPLY UNIT :roll: Why people go cheap on power and then complain , ill never get it :roll:

 

[GavinUK]

Well hope i can find out which it is... temps seem to be fine on both and i was aware of the XFX factory overclock (and rumour of poor cooling on card) so fixed a new cooler and heatsinks on it when i bought card).

I'll decrease clock on everything a bit and see if that helps, and if not go for a new PSU.

Considering a Dual core upgrade at some point so any recommendations on a worthy PSU?

Cheers for the help btw glad im getting somewhere now

 

[GavinUK]

Ive just had a thought ... i know very little of overclocking (which i will look into more soon) .. but if the XFX card is factory overclocked, could the mobo voltage be causing any problems? Perhaps upping the PCI-E voltage to compensate?

if im barking up the wrong tree let me know

 

[LAN_deRf_HA]

have you tried taking out your "odd-man-out" memory stick?

 

[GavinUK]

Yes mate, didnt make a difference, so i just stuck it back in there. Not likely voltage settings then? (at work at moment, so just racking my brains about it ... will give it a go when at home if you think its possible).