I feel like my PC isn't running as well as it should..

[rfas]

It runs well, don't get me wrong.. but I feel like it should be running games a lot better. I generally play: Blacklight Retribution, BF3, WoW (seems to run the worst despite it being the least graphic intensive), Diablo 3, SC2, Skyrim, Borderlands and a few other randoms. It's not super stuttery, but I do get a lot of microstutter and my frames are always less than desirable. What brought this up, was my friend & room mate was letting his girlfriend mess around on WoW. He has a system pretty similar system to mine, but it looked like it ran quite a lot better.. especially in busy areas. I don't even run full ultra.

Specs:
Video: Radeon HD6950 1GB
CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 - 2.83GHz
RAM: 4GB (2x2) DDR2
Motherboard: ASUSTek P5N72 Premium
OS: Windows Vista 64bit
I can provide any other info, but I think that's sufficient.

Any ideas as to why I'm getting subpar performance? Maybe I need a few upgrades or I'm being bottlenecked? I have no idea, honestly. I'd really appreciate some advice. I'm planning on playing GW2, so I'd like to get this solved before it releases.

 

[zander1983]

System looks fine, but I see a pc upgrade in your future soon.

Are all your drivers updated? and what resolution $ settings are you playing the games at?

 

[Pyree]

How much RAM usage?

 

[rfas]

System looks fine, but I see a pc upgrade in your future soon.

Are all your drivers updated? and what resolution $ settings are you playing the games at?

I'm almost positive they are, I know for a fact my graphics drivers are. I'm playing at 1920x1080.. Generally I play at ultra on everything (or try to), but with WoW I play on high, then knock anti-aliasing, tessellation and shadows down to the lowest.

@Pyree: Looks like 2.63/4 with WoW running, if I'm checking it right.

 

[Pyree]

Alright, then it is not background process eating you RAM. Will be back after dinner.

 

[killabanks]

i would say go to windows 7 will definitely help

 

[Pyree]

Go to CCC, what is the gaming settings?

 

[rfas]

Go to CCC, what is the gaming settings?

A-A: Application settings, no morphological filtering, standard filter

Anisotropic filtering: Application settings

Tesselation: AMD optimized and Use application settings are unchecked, bar is at "off"

Catalyst A.I.: Performance, surface format optimization is disabled


Wait for vertical refresh: All the way to Quality

Anti-Aliasing Mode: Multi-sample AA

Open GL: Triple buffering.

It's also maybe worth noting I use V-sync when playing games.

 

[rfas]

Anyone else?