Need help with 4870

[icrazycarteri]

Hello everone.
I really need some help with my 4870 1 i dont seem to be getting the framrates i think i should. i have friends with older 512 cards getting more then me in games. Like WoW, Nascar. Basicly all of them we play. im only seeing about 40 in wow when im out of town and about 20 in town. Does anyone know how to fix this or what the problem could be? Maby somewhere it tells you how to set up the ATI Catalyst controle center for best framrate? I have all the setting in the catalyst on High Quality... With Vertical Refresh off...
Other system info:
Vista 32bit
Asus Pq5pr mobo
9550 Quad Core 2.83Gh
4gb ram 1066
650wps
26inch kds
MSI 4870 1 gig
also have the latest drivers from ATI for the 4870

Thanks...

 

[topper743]

It seems like there are a lot of these threads about WOW. Try some other benchmark as a comparison. Try the WOW forums, it seems like WOW requires a patch (3.2) or hot fix to run correctly. You have plenty of GPU there providing the part is functioning correctly. Run 3Dmark06 and tell us what you get.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/

 

[khelben1979]

From what I've understood nVidia is still the best choice if you intend to run World of Warcraft, correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[topper743]

khelben1979. . I hardly know where to start. We have enough ATI v Nvidia threads. Anything to help the OP?

 

[daship]

A OC on CPu will help 3.6-3.8 will help alot.

64bit Os cause you got 4G ram and 1G on your GPU and 32bit can only use 3.2G "Major problem" 3.2- 1 for GU leaves windows 2.2 and Vista itself need 1 or so so ya get 64 bit.

You biggest issue is probably your resolution. Your 24" so i guess your using a big resolution. Your friends are probably lower. Turn down shadows and other settings to fine tune. Shadows is the biggest FPS killer.

Follow the advice and get 40-50 in town and up to 90 out of town.

 

[doormatderek]

all that really matters is your monitor RESOLUTION. If your friends are running something like 800x600 and you're using something like 1600x1200 , of course they would still be getting better frame rates; even with a card a year or two old.
So my question is, what resolution are you playing games at, and them for that matter?

 

[doormatderek]

yup, daship beat me to it. and yes, shadows should be the first setting to turn down to increase your frames

 

[icrazycarteri]

Thanks for all your input guys...

im useing 1920x1200 native resolution, I'm pretty sure there also useing there natice resolution what ever that is on a 24inch.And im not just getting beat in fps on wow but farcry and bf2 also. still cant seem to find any info on how to set up the Catalyst for best FPS maby i'm doing something wrong in there....
Also, After putting in sp1 for vista 32 its showing 4 gigs...

 

[4745454b]

Daship, not true on the ram figures. 3.2GBs includes the GPU Vram.

I agree that the issue is probably the bigger screen.

 

[JonathanDeane]

yeah my vote is to go 64bit too as the first thing (so you get to use all your ram at least)

Another thing to note is at that high of a resolution you may be hitting up against what 512MB's can hold, maybe its swapping out to ram and this is causing the issue ?

Its an odd problem to be sure, I have a 4870 too but the 1GB model and I have no frame rate issues in WoW.... (could be the 8GB's of system RAM and the 64bit os too though)

 

[trkorecky]

From what I've read on this forum, WoW seems to be hit or miss (usually miss) when it comes to actually running well on hardware far more advanced than it should require. The game hardly looks any better than UT2k4, and that game could practically run on anything.

I'd take some of the suggestions here, see if they help. If you have the ability to, might as well install the 64-bit version of Vista. Why? Because it allows you take full advantage of all the RAM/cache in your system and unless you have some antiquated hardware that hasn't been updated, there's really no reason to keep 32-bit alive. Might be a last ditch effort though, I know how annoying it is to back everything up and reinstall an operating system. Follow topper's advice and make sure WoW is fully up-to-date.

 

[icrazycarteri]

JonathanDeane, what version drivers from ati are you useing?