Geforce2 speed freak problem

[Guest]

I searched around the board but could find nothing similiar.
I am having a really annoying problem with my Annihilator2 (Creative Labs).
Inside games, in any resolution, the card will drop FPSs and recover again, drop and recover, like goes from 30+ to 0 then back to 30. It happens on intervals of 5 to 10 seconds.
This freak event manifests itself when I am standing still or moving, on any game, be it OpenGL or Direct3D. The game will drop its video speed and then recover, then drop again... Soo annoying.
Anyone have any idea what this is?
My specs:
Processor: P3 800/133
MoBo: ASUS P3V4X
Memmory: 256 SDRAM/133
HD: Atlas V SCSI
Adapter Card: Adaptec 19160
Sound Board: SBLive Value
Drivers: Detonator 3
OS: Windows 98.

Would appreciate any leads, thanks!

-Onisciente

 

[smn198]

Any hard disk activity? Try running task monitor or what ever it is 98 uses to see if annother process is hogging system resources.

 

[RavenPrime]

A few ideas.
1) Turn off any background tasks. Before starting the game, hit ctrl-alt-del once and look at the list. The only program that has to be there is Explorer.

2)What video settings are you playing at? I have not seen any benifit to playing at higher than 1024x768 16bit color. Also, at this resolution, I don't see any benifit from FSAA which I keep off.

3)Which version of the D3 drivers are you using. Some are more stable than others. I am using the D2 drivers because I can't get any of the D3 drivers to work correctly on my system.

4)I don't know if your BIOS has the setting, AGP Fast Write or something similar but disable it.

😎 James

 

[Guest]

Thank you for the fast feedback with some tips guys.
I dont think its harddrive activity, it sits mostly idle. But I will check.
Also ravenprime, I will turn off all background tasks and try again. I just didnt because with the same kind of tasks on my previous system (P2 400, with Voodoo2) I never experienced something like this.

2) I was originally playing at 1204x768x32 if I remember right, I dropped to 800x600x32 and the same problems occur.. (FSAA is off, unless for Monkey Island 4, wich it makes a huge difference)

3) I dont remember right now, once I get home I will reply to this message with their version.

4) It does, and its off.

I might try Det2 drivers, version 6 or something? To see if they are better, some people say Det3 is just bad for them, but im new to the GeForce area, so I dont know better.

Once again, thanks for the replies.

Oni

 

[Guest]

!!!!!!!!!!!!!! PROBLEM SOLVED

Was so easy, thanks for the suggestion, it was some app (I think one of those cOlor calibration ones) that was making that!!! Once I closed all apps in the background it was OOOOOOOOKKKKKKK!!! WOOOOOOOOOOT THANKSSSSSSSSSSSS

 

[Guest]

!!!!!!!!!!!!!! PROBLEM SOLVED

Was so easy, thanks for the suggestion, it was some app (I think one of those cOlor calibration ones) that was making that!!! Once I closed all apps in the background it was OOOOOOOOKKKKKKK!!! WOOOOOOOOOOT THANKSSSSSSSSSSSS

---

Edit: The problem is back, it was working fine, now even with everything closed its screwy... If it worked just when I turned my puter on im starting to wonder if it could be heat.

 

[RavenPrime]

Some people have reported that the fan on thier geforce card either doesn't spin or spins the wrong way.
Try running your system with the case open, check the fan, and see if you have problems. Running your system with the case open and well ventillated is a good way to check for overheating problems.
Also, I found out the hard way once that if one of my cables was sitting over the processor, my system would shut down. Make sure the spaces inside your case over the processor and graphics card are open. Trapping air is a quick way to overheating.

😎 James

 

[Guest]

I have had the exact same problem twice before. Both with different motherboards. What fixed my problem both times, was to flash my motherboard bios with the most recent bios flash from the manufacturer. Funny thing on the second time, is that I had already flashed my bios earlier. But a couple of days later, the problem started up. So I re-flashed the bios (having remembered somehow the problem from the first board) again with the same upgrade I downloaded earlier, and the problem went away. Been several weeks now.

Hope this helps.

 

[Guest]

Problem solved. This time for real.
Asked a friend of mine why my case was blinking its power led. He asked if the MoBo had heat detection, wich I said yes. He then told me it was too hot and I should cool it, I opened the case, put a fan beside it and the problems stopped, geforce stopped hiccuping too.
It was heat .