Advice please

[Moomintroll]

Hello I play World of Warcraft quite a lot and I am gettin quite low fps, solo stuff is ok i usually get 40+ fps but when i enter a large raid instance such as karazhan i end up with around 14fps when not in combat and around 9-11fps when in combat. This is my current system http://uktsupport.co.uk/advent/pc/3112.htm the only changes are that I have a radeon x1600 pro 512mb agp graphics card and there is 1gb of memory instead of 512.
If i bring the overall memory up to 2gb would my fps improve I dont have enough money to totally revamp my system at the mo (even tho its in desperate need of it lol ) I play the game at medium to low settings at 1024x768 resolution so surely shouldnt be gettin 9fps in some areas.

Any help from you guys would be greatly appreciated as its startin to get on my nerves

 

[bc4]

60 gb hard drive can easily become way to small. I'd try backing up all files and running recovery, then only do windows updates, then load the game. Thats the no cost solution.

Hard drives are cheap, try to pick up a second and load the game to that one. I'm not a gamer so I don't know much about this but your system should run better than that since your not trying to run at super high resolutions or anything.

I'm sure others with more gaming experience will be able to give you more help but this is where i'd start.

 

[Moomintroll]

Thanks for the quick reply will give this a try.

Anyone else

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

One way to see if its ram, run task manager, cntrl alt del, and see what you peak ram is. Dont think wow is a major ram draw. Also, make sure your virtual memry is set to either 1.5 gigs or system controlled. Just checked your cpu, its slow, could be the bottleneck here, and not the ram. If heat isnt an issue, and you have access to its running temp, try overclocking your card. Go slow with the ocing tho.

 

[potatomanakaspud]

It sounds like your system should have enough power to run world of warcraft fairly easily my old system was amd 3000 512 ram and 9800pro and it eat through mmorpgs (guildwars) and the requirements should be similar i would recomend the second gig of ram thats always good for speeding up a system.

However how long has it been since you did a fresh system install...

sys can get sluggish if the hard disk is not completly wiped and has a fresh install every couple of years ideally every 6 months...

at the very least run disk defrag and see if there are lots of programs running in the sys tray such as antivirus and other things that could be eating up sys resorces....

im sure you completely uninstalled you nvidia drivers before you installed your ati ones (and that they are most recent) there might be slight conflict...

another thing to check is that the origional ram you had installed is similar to the new ram if they differ greatly they may be opperating much slower than if the ram was from a single set ie matched.

I was nt sure what you set up was or how well you maintain your sys so i tried to cover everything

the only other thing would be that your power supply may not be giving your graphics card sufficient power...

im afraid im not so up to date one wheather 1600 needed an extra power connector but im guessing it did.

Let me know if this helps or covers things you haven't tried

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

All this is good info, you may also want to try and just clean out your system, can of compressed air can do wonders too. Sometimes your rig becomes clogged with dust, causing heat issues, which will slow your system down. Do this and what the others have said, and if its still not working great, come back and we will see what more can be done

 

[double_helix]

What exactly are your system specifications Moom? I was playing World of Warcraft on an AMD64 3000+ Winchester w/ 2x512 (1GB) valueSELECT RAM and a 6600GT 128MB video card w/o issues even in raiding Kara. I believe my settings were 1024x768 on the 6600GT and tweaked WoW display properties to get 20+ FPS on the most taxing raids...

Now that I've got the 7900GS and 180 Opteron, cranked up the detail and playing at 1280x1024 brings a whole new look to WoW.

I'm lovin' it!!!

 

[kpo6969]

It might be a thermal issue? The combination of the card and the P4 cpu seems like alot of heat being generated. Just an observation looking at your system specs. Another 1GB of ram would be a big help too.

 

[cristip60]

The problem is very simple. Are you playing burning crusade?
Burning crusade and normal wow needs dual core. Because there are allot of things to keep track to and that cpu can't cope with that.
Until 2 weeks ago for a hole month i played wow burning crusade on an fx5200 with medium setting and high textures.

 

[double_helix]

The problem is very simple. Are you playing burning crusade?
Burning crusade and normal wow needs dual core. Because there are allot of things to keep track to and that cpu can't cope with that.
Until 2 weeks ago for a hole month i played wow burning crusade on an fx5200 with medium setting and high textures.

What?!? WoW+BC does NOT need a dual core. Sorry. It's nice and everything lovely, but needed?? Not at all. And you're playing WoW+BC w/ an FX5200 w/ medium settings and high textures? What resolution? I was getting 30-40fps w/ my 6600GT and AMD64 3000+ (which slams that FX5200) and running 1024x768 w/ 24-bit color and 16-bit depth I think. Of course I had the variable settings tweaked and did not have high textures running (on account of raiding with 40 people makes quite a bit of work on the video card)

You'll find the requirements for WoW+BC are actually quite minimal.

(This requirement is off the BC expansion pack)
OS: Windows 2000 (Service Pack 4); Windows XP (Service Pack 2)
Processor: Intel Pentium 3 or AMD Athlon 800MHz minimum.
Memory:
512 MB RAM,
1GB RAM is recommended
Video:
Minimum: 32MB 3D graphics processor with Hardware Transform and Lighting, such as an NVIDIA GeForce 2 class card or above.
Recommended: 64MB VRAM 3D graphics processor with Vertex and Pixel Shader capability, such as an NVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 class card or above. External links section below has a link to show other video chipsets Blizzard has marked as supported.
Sound: DirectX-compatible sound card

So, in summary, to say that WoW+BC needs a dual core? Nope, sorry.

 

[goldenboy]

i dont play wow but it definatly sounds like a ram issue.i would try borrowing some from a friend,even an extra 512 stick might do the trick

 

[cristip60]

Well when you are in the big cities and if there are allot of players there you definetly need dual core believe me. Just to sopt the serious stutering.

 

[double_helix]

Stormwind and such? Org, Shat? UC? Nah, was in Shat and The Dark Portal when it opened (That was hell man, there was 50-60 people storming to get through with alliance and horde ganking and with my 6600GT I was scraping 5-10fps)

You don't NEED a dual core processor, more than anything its RAM and the video card. A good solid single core processor will still crank out WoW+CB. Sorry.

OP - tweak your game settings. Video Options > Set Resolution 1024x768 Refresh 60Hz Mutlisampling 16-bit color 24-bit depth (could set lower). In World Appearance check your terrain distance (I set mine in the 60-70% range on my 6600GT), Terrain Texture to Low, Weather Intensity Low, Check Level of Detail, and set Anisotropic Filtering to Low. Could also uncheck Trilinear Filtering. If wanted, could also uncheck Full-Screen Glow Effect and Death Effect. These settings, again, are a personal preference but I used the listed settings when playing on my 6600GT and would usually get 30-40FPS with my AMD64 3000+ (Single Core) even in the most daunting instance/zone/city.

 

[cristip60]

Well how come you don't need dual core but you actually state that with those minimum video settings that you use you are still getting low performance when you are in a place full of players, you don't make any sense.

 

[krazyups]

How's your internet connection? If it is laggy, then that could be a contributor to your problem, along with the numerous items listed above.

 

[double_helix]

Well how come you don't need dual core but you actually state that with those minimum video settings that you use you are still getting low performance when you are in a place full of players, you don't make any sense.

Reread please, it makes plenty of sense... I actually was using the 7900GS w/ my AMD64 3000+ but only picked up 10 FPS, wasn't till I changed to the dual-core then I could make full use of the 7900GS easily.

old setup:
AMD64 3000+ Winchester
1GB DDR valueSELECT RAM
6600GT

Getting about 30-40 FPS with correct WoW Tweaks running at 1024x768

new setup:
AMD Opteron 180
1GB DDR valueSELECT RAM
7900GS

Getting about 70-80 FPS with full settings running at 1280x1024

And as the poster above noted, it's possible that its the internet connection being the limiting factor. I'm using a premium cable modem service and usually download 800-1200KB/sec