Viper-X 4890 3DMark06 score lower than my 4850?

Titanion

Distinguished
Dec 8, 2002
1,510
6
19,795
I had an ASUS 4850 512MB DDR3 card, but a friend offered to buy me a 4890 for a birthday present if I gave him my old 4850. So I got my Sapphire Viper-X 4890 1GB DDR5 card in the mail today. I installed 9.6 driver and ran the 4850 before I took the card out. I got just under 10k for a score on 3DMark06. Then I uninstalled 9.6 and rebooted. I then put in the 4890, booted up, and then reinstalled 9.6. But when I ran 3DMark06, I got just under 6k for a score. I ran the test twice. Anyone have any ideas why this new card is not getting a higher score?

I have been around for a while, and I was not one of the people that asked why their Nvidia 5200 scored less than their Ti4200. What is the deal here?

I want this card to work? Is it working?
 

daedalus685

Distinguished
Nov 11, 2008
1,558
1
19,810


Well it could.. but that wouldn't cause these problems.

Where on earth did everyone get the idea that not giving a card enough power makes it go slower??? That has been a common statement today.

Anyway, is it stuck in 2D clocks?
 

ill b ben

Distinguished
Mar 5, 2009
216
0
18,690
Whilest that can be true, it still doesnt clarify the loss of ''speed''.

You should try removing the drivers again and clean it with drivercleaner or some sort, and test it with some games. Id imagine ud still know the fps you got out of your 4850

goodluck
 

daedalus685

Distinguished
Nov 11, 2008
1,558
1
19,810


A bottleneck can rob scaling, it won't make it go slower than an inferior card.....

Anyway, there was a bug in XP that was causing the 4800 series to sometimes get stuck at 2d clocks, check that the card is ramping up when a game loads.
 

Titanion

Distinguished
Dec 8, 2002
1,510
6
19,795
I cought it being stuck at 500Mhz... 500 is the lowest setting for the ATI Overdrive... I bet the GPU is running at 500Mhz during the 3DMark tests... I uninstalled 9.6 and went to 9.5, but I got the same results...

I also played Halo1 in Windowed mode so I could read the GPU measurement on the Overdrive tab, and it kept going back and forth from 240Ghz to 500Ghz...

How should I try to increase the GPU? This card is set to 870 and 1050, respectively?
 

Titanion

Distinguished
Dec 8, 2002
1,510
6
19,795
I downloaded a new version of GPU-Z and looked back at it after running Aquamark, and it showed that some entire tests were ran at the 500MHz mark, yet others were running at the overclocked 955MHz I have it set at. I should have gotten over 100k with Aquamark, but was in the 50Ks instead.

When I load up games and play for a while, then toggle out, it shows the GPU running at 955. In Titan Quest, I went through a portal to go to a new town, and ran around in the new town for a minute.... when I looked at the GPU-Z tracking, it showed that it dropped down to 500MHz during the portal transition but then went back up to the 955.

Is this card being too smart for itself during the 3D tests and downclocking during when it thinks, "This isn't worth the powder."

 

daedalus685

Distinguished
Nov 11, 2008
1,558
1
19,810
The card down clocks depending on the load. I don't know the cutoff where it goes from "2d" to "3d" clocks. But in most games (loading screens etc) it will bounce up and down.

You can set GPUz to log to a file and whatnot, so you can compare load to the core clock.

The card isn't being "too smart" or anything like that. This feature works fine for 99% of people. Either there is a driver issue (there was at one time a problem in XP with the card not clocking up or down correctly, though I thought it was fixed) or the card is broken. You an keep trying to remove and reinstall drivers, or RMA the card i suppose..

Though I'm still not sure this is your issue. But generally this behavior is due to power play not working correctly.

If you want to try it, you can modify the bios to turn power play off, but this will void the warranty.

While you wont get the same scores as a review benchmark with the CPU you have, there is no reason it should perform slower than the 4850 unless the 4890 is broken (or some other silly issue).

You are running xp 32bit?
 

daedalus685

Distinguished
Nov 11, 2008
1,558
1
19,810


I would agree if it were just running like crap. But no matter what crazy cpu limitation you run into a more powerful card shouldn't reduce your performance.. give you almsot nothing extra sure, but negative scaling makes me think something else is at play.

Though you are correct, of course, that the cpu is far far weaker than this GPU, and should probably be upgraded (along with everything else since this is as good as it gets for 939).

It has been a long time since I've dealt with 939 though.. not exactly an area I remember much about.
 
When I went from a pair of 7900GT's to the 8800's my fps went from a rough looking 35 -40 @1680 x 1050 to 8 - 10 really good looking fps, CPU gagging at it's best, try the mental image of a fluffy duckling being force fed a water melon to get an idea of how bad the slideshow was.
 

josherrr

Distinguished
Jul 22, 2008
46
0
18,530
uh your in trouble i get 12401with my 4830 1 gb sapphire clocks oced at 800/1200 on a DELL

driver cleaner reinstall try rivatuner?
 

daedalus685

Distinguished
Nov 11, 2008
1,558
1
19,810


I'm glad you took the time to read the rest of the thread..