Talk about dissappointing, you know, the excitement of getting a new GPU, you anxiously install it, boot up a game like Crysis or Age of Conan and can't wait to see the performance boost, only BOOM. Age of conan unplayable, Crysis actually running worse. I had a 8800GTS 640 (G80), I could run Conan on mainly max settings, except bloom. Well, I installed my 4870, FPS in Conan is 2-5 fps, at times the game locks up for 10-15 seconds at a time. Crysis, the performance is even worse then my 8800GTS, with constant hitching, my 8800GTS ran it much better. Mass Effect also had a slight decrease, something is wrong here. I un-installed by nvidia drivers, rebooted in safe mode, used driver cleaner. Installed the 8.6 cat, and then hotfix drivers. Is this a driver issue? I plugged both 6 pin power connectors into the GPU. Has anyone else had these issues? The 4870 should eb a big jump in performance from a 8800GTS 640, the benchmarks were outstanding. Specs: AMD X2 5800 + @ 2.8 4 GB Mushkin Ram Xi-Fi Xtreme gamer Visiontek 4870 512 Fortron 500 Watt Blue Storm PSU. HEEEEEEELLLP
List the specs of you PSU. There should be a diagram on the side that states the amps on the 12V rail...that would be where I'll start, That PSU might have been good enought to handle a 8800GTS, but it might not be sufficient for the 4870
While I cannot play down the importance of a solid/stable psu in todays powerfull pc's I can't for the life of me remember an instance where a lacklustre psu caused a shortfall in fps whilst gaming. If the psu the op has is adequate to boot the machine (cards must recieve enough power or they won't power-up at boot) and run games without the machine restarting then I'd say it's more likely a driver issue of some kind.
The PSU can probably supply enough power for the PC to boot. If the card is not getting enough power under load then it's performance will decrease. hence the low framerate experienced. I'm not saying it's definitely the PSU at fault here as I don't know it's specs...but if the op has the latest drivers installed, the PSU would be the first place i'd start to look
I always say, when in doubt, do a full format, install the latest drivers, for the GPU and motherboard, incl the 8.7 ATI hotfix Update directX to the latest version Remember to download the latest chipset drivers for your motherboard
do a clean install of your os and use only hotfix drivers no need to install before other drivers just hotfix and you are reaady to go... I wnet from 8800gt and I realy see the difference now I can max all settings in all games I play at 1680*1050 and the immage quality over all is better than it was on the 8800gt
Vista or xp ? - for me with my 4870 crysis stutters badly in dx10 vista / is better in vista dx9 mode but runs superbly in xp dx9 - looks like the catalyst vista drivers still need a lot of work IMO...
Newfgamer : try to download GPU-Z and check if your card is running under 16x PCIEx mode and not lower.
As long was we are talking psu's Im gonna quickly hijack the thread instead of starting a new one. How does my psu look for a 4870 crossfire? It have everything I need? My psu only has 2 pci spots, and my 4870 had two spots so currently they are both plugged in. I have no idea how its supposed to be set up (paperwork for the card said nothing). http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341002
http://extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine According to this, my PC would not use anymore then 450 watts with my rig, and that is saying every component is under 100% load, and with aging taken into consideration.
Wow, not one person mentioned anything about temperatures? That's where I'd start looking. Hitching usually means that the GPU is too hot. What temp is your card at under load? BTW, you're PSU should be plenty. I mean, aren't the ATI cards supposed to use less power than nVidias?
temps are fine, but I am confused, everywhere on the web, it says the Blue Storm has only 1 PCI-E connector, but I ahve 2 6 pin connectors on mine? Am I missing something here?
The probelm is that with cheap psu's the rating on the box isn't always what you get - It could be that your 500w psu is only really capable of producins 400w!
That would be true if I had a cheap PSU, read some reviews on the blue storm, it is a top notch PSU. http://www.cluboverclocker.com/reviews/power/fortron_source/ax500/index.htm
the psu it's capable of handling the card...but it could be on it's way to wonderland ...i checked the ati psu requirements for the cards and even mine it's good...i have a friend that's running a 2900xt a power hungry card on a psu exactly like mine...try testing the card on a friends rig..see how it performs..
Were you running any tweak programs for your previous Nvidia card? It could be something like Nhancer or Riva Tuner applying some settings to your system that are causing a conflict. If so uninstall them and run a registry cleaner to get rid of the remnants.