New video card, Same problem. HELP !

[Jrams116]

So you guys might remember me when I posted the problem with my Radeon HD 4890. I had upgraded from a GTS 250 1GB and upgraded to the 4890 expecting a little more FPS, well that wasn't the case. On ALL 3dmark06 and 3dmark vantage benchmarks it performed EXACTLY the same as the GTS 250 1GB that I had, So I got sick of the card and sold it and stuck to Nvidia by downgrading just slightly to a GTX 260 Core 216. I used driver sweeper to sweep all my old drivers and popped this thing in. AGAIN, same performance, No improvement from the GTS 250 1GB or HD 4890. Now here's the thing, The Radeon HD 4890 and the GTX 260 Core 216 have the same power supply requirements and so did the GTS 250 1GB. They all require 500W power supplys and thats exactly how much my PSU is, I have an OCZ StealthXtreme 500w with 36amps on 12v rail which is EXACTLY what the gtx 260 core 216 requires. So I was wondering maybe even my GTS 250 was supposed to perform better ? So my question is CAN IT BE THE PSU ? The cards say that 500w is the minimum but I seem to be getting the same performance on these 3 different cards. I need help finding out EXACTLY what the problem is all my drivers are up to date and if it helps here are my specs.

AMD Phenom II X4 940 @ 3.5GHz
EVGA GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 896MB
Windows 7 Ultimate (32-Bit)
Kingston 4GB DDR2 800 RAM

Can it really be my PSU ? It's like the only thing that seems to make sense, and if it is whats the CHEAPEST/BEST powerful PSU I can get, im tight on money and only have about 60 bucks to waste right at the moment.

 

[rolli59]

Could be the psu. Here is one with in your budget after MIR http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341019

 

[Mousemonkey]

Try a different CPU then, like a 955.

 

[rolli59]

what kind of resolution are you playing at?

 

[Jrams116]

Im playing at 1440x900, but can play at 1920x1080, But wherever I play on whatever settings I got the SAME performance with each card. And I know for a fact that uprading to a 955 will not do anything at all the performance increase isnt significant at all, 955 only allows ddr3 use and has 200mhz more. The 940 is NOT bottlenecking the system I know that for sure, I guess ill just have to try a new psu because it's the only thing that makes sense right now. anyone else want to help ? someone who knows much more then a clueless noob like myself ?

 

[rolli59]

Im playing at 1440x900, but can play at 1920x1080, But whereever I play on whatever settings I play I got the SAME performance with each card. And I know for a fact that uprading to a 955 will do anything at all. The 940 is NOT bottlenecking the system I know that for sure, I guess ill just have to try a new psu.

Go for it

 

[Jrams116]

Anyone else have any ideas before I spend money on something I really don't want to buy ? How about a clean fresh install og Windows 7 Ultimate ? I have used 3 different cards with the same windows, GTS 250, HD 4890 and now GTX 260 Core 216. Maybe driver sweeper didn't clean out some invisible files or something in the registry is still in there from one of the old cards ? What do you think ?

 

[Jrams116]

**** UPDATE *****

instead of making another topic I just bumped this old one up, well you guys knew my problem (its above on my first post) a few days ago I decided to just go out and get a very good power supply and I got the 750w corsair from newegg, from what I hear its one of the best out there and it has a single monster 12v rail at 60amps, well guess what IM STILL HAVING THE SAME PROBLEM, this is pissing me off and now im starting to think that its just my motherboard, I wasted $120 bucks on a psu for nothing, My CPU is fine as I tested it with cinebench and the scores were normal so its not my cpu. The only thing i can think of right now is my memory, I have Kingston 4GB of 667MHz ram and that is pretty old but I doubt RAM has anything to do with this or am I wrong ? what else can be the problem ? Am I going to have to get a new damn Mobo ? thanks in advance.

 

[coozie7]

Faster memory might help but do n't bother with a motherboard change. Apart from extra features like better overclocking and more drive/USB/sound connections there is usually very little between them performnce wise, certainly not enough to justify the expense and hassle involved.
I've not seen your earlier posts, so forgive me if I repeat what has already been said or done.
Before you start, download a system info program like Everest and see if anything looks astray-Is the PCI-E link stuck at 1X for example.
Also, are you playing in fullscreen or a window? Not every card/game will run at full speed in a window.
Do you have V-sync turned on? This will limit the games FPS to your monitor refresh rate-usually 60 for a flat panel, it can be higher for a CRT.

 

[rolli59]

Are you running 3dmark all at the default resolution of 1280 x 1024?
Have you tried any in game benchmarks?

 

[Jrams116]

Yea I ran 3dmark at default and of course I did in-game tests, I did them with the crysis demo, cod4, cod5, and left 4 dead, all underperforming at the same amounts of FPS with the 3 cards. I downloaded everest also and made sure the pci express was set to 16x and it was. This is amazing ... im pissed off !! I forgot to add I downloaded some ram stress program and ran it for about an hour on both sticks and I got no errors on either of them. Im about to give up on this thing

 

[Shaitis_06]

CCC -> V-Sync off, and ejnoy.

 

[Jrams116]

Shaitis what is CCC ? If you mean turning off vsync in all the games yes I have done that to each and every one, Just a few minutes ago I pulled out one of 2gb sticks also to see if it was a RAM problem and nope, everything still performed the same.

 

[Jrams116]

To the above poster = /. I have re-installed windows 7 twice, and today I installed windows xp sp3 and STILL.