Frame rate drops on 4870 512mb

[blacklabel67k]

Hey guys I've been having this problem for some time now and I'm just really sick of it. I've updated all my drivers properly. Is this card just not suited for 1080p? (ive got a 1080p monitor) I figured I should be able to almost max the game out with a 4870. Meaning no AA, and not adding AF beyond trilinear. I'm playing freaking firearms source and I can't even get a constant 60 FPS on medium settings.

If it means anything, it seems like smoke, or lots of particles up close cause the drops. Then combined with a 32 man server, it drops twice as bad. But there could literally be no one in the server, I woke up to a smoke bomb, and I still get frame drops.

Here's my specs:

Windows 7 64bit
4gb mem
xfx 4870 512mb (using catalyst 10.6 drivers, I know they arent the latest but this problem has been going on even after updating drivers)
Phenom II X4 2.8ghz (I unlocked the 4th core though)

 

[hunter315]

If its smoke and particle effects causing the slow down then its a CPU issue since the CPU has to calculate where all of the particles are. As most games arent designed to fully use a quad then you are likely better off returning it to being a triple and overclocking it.

 

[blacklabel67k]

Damn this doesnt sound good. I had a mishap with thermal paste where it it spilt onto the outside of the CPU, and a little got in a couple of the pinholes. I cleaned the hell out of it and everything worked fine. Could it have been that or is that no possible?

 

[blacklabel67k]

Perhaps I should repost this in the CPU forum then since smoke and particles and what not are processed by the CPU?

 

[hunter315]

A bump on monday morning would probably help, most people arent on on the weekends, but most of us do cross between forums.

Try turning the smoke quality down a bit if you can, might reduce the load enough to make it smoother.