New Build and Poor Rates (5850 & X2 550 BE)

jbranum

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Sep 16, 2009
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MB GIGABYTE GA-MA790XT-UD4P AM3 R

CPU AMD|PH II X2 550

VGA HIS| HD5850 1G RT

PSU ANTEC| NEO ECO 620C 620W RT

MEM 2Gx2|ADATA DDR3


I just built this system about a week ago. I already had a harddrive with win 7 64 bit loaded from my previous build, along with a case, monitor and what not.

Anyways, I built this system hoping to be able to play newer games, and while not at 60+ fps, I was hoping for playable rates. I just bought Bad Company 2 and installed it, only to find that I can barely see what's going on because of the framerate late. My monitor is 1680x1050 and dvi connected. I tried playing the game at the lowest possible settings, at 1024x768 and every combination of the two. I downloaded the new DirectX just to be sure, along with the newest ati drivers.

I'm baffled as to what's going on. Are there trouble-shooting tthings I can do to figure out exactly what's wrong? I know 3dmark won't work on 7-64 bit, so I can't compare my scores, is there another program?
 
Solution
You mentioned already having a harddrive with win 7 from a previous build. Did you reinstall windows 7 to start with a fresh copy?

Lots of people have had to do some things to clean off old versions of ati/nvidia drivers before installing the 10.2 ones for cards like the 5850. You are using 10.2 drivers and not whatever was on the cd that came with your card?

GlenK

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Feb 25, 2010
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You mentioned already having a harddrive with win 7 from a previous build. Did you reinstall windows 7 to start with a fresh copy?

Lots of people have had to do some things to clean off old versions of ati/nvidia drivers before installing the 10.2 ones for cards like the 5850. You are using 10.2 drivers and not whatever was on the cd that came with your card?
 
Solution

jbranum

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Sep 16, 2009
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I did leave win 7 on the HD and didn't reinstall.

I also used a driver cleaner pro program to try and get rid of everything, and then install the 10.2. Not sure. It's sort of playable at 1024x768 on multiplayer, but in the thick of it, I can't aim or anything. I guess I need to buy a second drive and move stuff over to reformat and fresh install.
 

False_Dmitry_II

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There are a couple of things, the reinstall might help. I'm surprised it ran.

If you're talking about online only gameplay, then you've got possible network/internet issues.

Why did you pick a dual core? there are faster athlon II x3's for less money.
 

jbranum

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Sep 16, 2009
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I picked up the dual core because a friend picked it out mainly. I would have gone with something else, but wasn't sure about amd (always been intel, but needed a smaller budget this time around).

I'm going to try running my 8800gt and see if it makes a difference or what happens, as the card might be bad. I tried running the 5850 in 3dmark vantage and got a whopping 2920. That is in comparison to similar systems that got a 12k+.

Are there ways to troubleshoot this beyond reinstalling windows 7? I don't have a backup drive to offload the data (500+ gigs) onto to reformat, so I'd have to wait on that until I had an adequate storage.
 

jbranum

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Sep 16, 2009
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o my. I didn't know 7 would do that.

I'm going to try using the molex->pci to power the card and see if it makes a difference. I wish I had someone local to help me troubleshoot this to figure out which part of my new build isnt right. Thanks for all the help and I'll post back after I've tried some stuff.
 

tsd16

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Jan 11, 2008
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Are you saying you didnt have the card powered with your 12v pci-e connectors?

Yeah, Im surprised your system even booted up using an HDD with windows already loaded on it from another system.

I have a 5850 and an i7 920 and bfbc2 runs smooth as silk maxed out at 1680X 1050.
 

jbranum

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Sep 16, 2009
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Sorry for the confusion. I used both the pci-e to connect the card originally. A friend mentioned that the psu could have a faulty wire/rail and not be providing enough power. The only way I thought to check that was to try a different set of power connections (the molex->pci-e) that I know work and seee what happens.

I'm also going to try switching out and putting my 8800gt in there, see if it makes any difference in my 3dMark Vantage score.

As for the windows reinstall. is there a way to do that without losing all of my movies/installed files on the harddrive? I don't have a backup currently (going to buy one if I have to) and would like to retain a portion, if not all of the files.

I know these questions are beyond the scope of the original post, but thanks for any help you give.



On a side note. Since apparently the Phenom II X2 550 BE isn't the optimal choice for gaming, what is a processor that will perform for what I need (mostly newer games on medium-high setting)? I should have never gone away from tom's... :(
 

jack_attack

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Aug 26, 2009
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Again, windows.old. It will save every single thing you had previously.

Phenom II X2 isn't the best AM3 chip out there, but it isn't the worst. If you feel like you need more CPU, look into a Phenom II X4, AMD's best right now.
 

jbranum

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Sep 16, 2009
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Well, to clear this up, I reinstalled windows and had no trouble. Started up a the game and easily a 1000x improvement. I should have done that in the first place, but I got lazy and didn't realize it. Thanks for the tips.


As for the processor, I think I'll stay with the x2 550 for now. I'm able to stock-cool it to 3.6ghz with just the two cores (opening all 4 cores was a bust, I may try 3 later on) and might buy a good cooler in the next few weeks and take it to 4.1~ (seems to be the breaking point for the chip on air and my board with any chip).