Viper V770 ( TNT2 128MB ) Still Holds its Own

02-19-2002, 11:24 | posts: n/a

I worked on tweaking my Diamond Viper V770 32MB (NonUltra) card yester and put in the Det4 27.42 drivers, enabled AGP 4x, installed coolbits, and tweaked the core/memory speeds from 124/150 to 155/170 and now I am kicking arse in my favorite FPS - counter strike. I have not had any problem with games not running or running badly with this cards, even at 32-bit color at 1024x768 resolution. 
 
Is this out of the ordinary? I should give Aquanox a try just to see what happens as I heard that game loads down even the newest GF3 cards. 
 
The only thing I am concerned about is the that Riva Tuner reports that my card is cable of AGP 1x,2x, and 4x but says 2x is selected. I have the card jumpered for 4x and my bios ( Abit KG7-RAID mobo )set for 4x, so I think its not reading the registry right. I am running Window XP professional. 
 
May I need to use a different Tweaker program with my old card? 
 
What are your thoughts? <IMG SRC="smileys/confused.gif">

02-19-2002, 11:28 | posts: n/a

It is possible that registry is set to 2x even if in BIOS 4x is selected so i suggest getting some kind of tweaker that sets agp rates. NVMax can do it for ya .. <IMG SRC="smileys/wink.gif">

02-19-2002, 14:27 | posts: n/a

Daggummit, NVMax doesn't recognize my card being in the system and errors out. Any other suggestions?

02-19-2002, 15:29 | posts: n/a

Ok, I think I found the problem. I tried 3 different tweaker proggies and finally powerstrip tells me something useful when I selected AGP 4x from adapter information screen - "Your video card supports this feature but your motherboard doesn't..." 
 
I have an AMD 761 CPU to AGP bridge and the drivers are Microsoft (July 2001 is the date). I am running Windows XP and have verified that AMD does not offer driver packs for Windows XP, the same thing with my mobo manufacturer ( Abit ). 
 
Looks like I am stuck for now. Is AGP 4x worth all this hassle? One my mobo I enabled 4x, fast write, and disable AGP Compensation and AGP to ISA emulation. After doing that my computer locked up so I don't that is the way to go (mobo settings) but looks like a driver update is not an option either. 
 
Any thoughts?

02-19-2002, 17:50 | posts: n/a

The difference won't be that great on a TNT card. I have a Geforce 2 V7700Ti and when I enable fast writes I gain aproximately 50 FPS but after running fast writes for a few days my system starts to grow unstable. The gains really do not give me worth while improvements over all so I say don't bother with fast writes, as the performance gain does not out way the possibilities of your system becoming unstable. 4x versus 2x I don't know my motherboard only supports 2x and I get excellent frame rates in all games so I can't complain. 
 
Win98se 
P3 550 
DirectX 8.1 
Via 4in1437(a) 
PC133 SDRam 256 Megs 
Asus P3V133 Motherboard 
Via Apollo 133 Chip Set 
Hercules Gamesurround Fortissimo II 
Asus V7700Ti Geforce 2 32 meg DDR 
Driver: Asus V7700 Ti SGRAM 32 Meg v21.83a

Vector · 02-20-2002, 04:59 | posts: 1,494 | Location: right here

I still have that card in another machine; it's a great card!!!!! <IMG SRC="smileys/cool.gif">