Is my CPU holding me back?

You don't have to replace anything urgently if you don't want to. The P4 is pretty bad when it comes to game but it sure as hell won't keep you from playing them. It isn't a Celeron, it can still push a couple frames per second. Seriously, just save your money and wait to see what July brings for us all. In the mean time, enjoy your rig for what it is.

 

Thank you for illustrating my worst fears. The good old days were the past 5-6 years. AMD kicked the hell out of Intel, who dwarfs AMD btw, which resulted in great bargains for all of us. Even to this day, the performance difference from my $150 dual-core AMD (highly overclocked) isn't enough to justify a total system overhaul. I saved myself a ton of money by doing what I did a year ago and I don't regret it.

My objective is a TOTAL system overhaul every 2 years and I think that I will achieve this goal because my my current rig was built in March of '06 and, contrary to popular crapola, Crysis won't be released until the NEXT generation of GPU 's is on the market.

 

I paid $60 bucks for my little CPU. It's no dual core but she games like a bat out of hell. 27.9s 1M isn't much to scoff at.

But yeah I agree, if you're smart about shopping for the right product at the right time, you can save a lot of money, enjoy nice system upgrades, AND feel great about an informed purchase that will last you.

 

I didn't want to make a new thread to ask more or less the same, so allow me to ask it in here :>

I'm currently using an AMD 64 x2 Dual core 4400+ (2.2mhz) with 2gb ram (2x 512 + 1x1024) and a XFX 7800GT (left side specs).

I've been suffering from low fps in wow (like 20-25 max) which, compared to other people and reviews i've been checking, it is really low since they usually rate the card to have between 50 and 70fps (and i'm nowhere near that). My question is if there is any problem within my system or if i should upgrade something (which?).

Thanks for your time.

PD: I'm running win XP prof SP2 (forgot to write it)

 

What are the settings you are using? Res, details, AA, AF, Vsync...?

 

Fun thing is i have everything set to low in game and 1024x768, no AA, Vsync off..

 

The P4 is ok at Company of Heroes. I get an average of around 70fps while benching, with everything on high or ultra, except shadows. Also the Quake Wars beta runs at a steady 60, so I guess ill just wait until july.

 

How long have you been experiencing the problem? Have you upgraded from an ATI card in the past? What set of drivers are you using? What games are you playing? What are your average idle/load temperatures?

 

Sorry for the delayed answer, work came up and totally forgot :>

I've been experiencing this problem for sometime now, not sure in months, but at least 2 or 3. I tried to figure by myself what was the problem but nothing came up. Tried all the normal drivers (both older versions and newer). Tried reinstalling Windows XP aswell but still the same.

As for ATI, i have not had an ati card in this pc, when i bought it 1 year ago i also bought the 7800GT.

I'm currently using 94.24 for Win XP(latest). I've also tried 93.XX (the ones b4) and a couple more like 77.77 (when support for the card was added) and 82.12 (modded ones that everyone seemed fine with). Nothing improved. In the end i decided to go back to 94.24 as they were the latest and there was no point in using old ones if improvement was null .

At the moment i'm only playing WoW and sometimes C&C3, wow runs around 15-25fps in cities and around 20-25 in raids.

C&C3 runs smoother and even though i haven't checked fps, game with loads of units around and effects was not making my game suffer from performance.

And about temperatures, here we go (from everest):

Idle:
Motherboard - 39 °C (102 °F)
Processor - 40 °C (104 °F)
CPU Nr 1 / First Core - 35 °C (95 °F)
CPU Nr 1 / Second Core - 37 °C (99 °F)
Aux - 36 °C (97 °F) (not sure what is this)
GPU Diode - 50 °C (122 °F)

With WoW Loaded in the middle of city(lots of ppl):
Motherboard - 45 °C (113 °F)
Processor - 46 °C (115 °F)
CPU Nr 1 / First Core - 46 °C (115 °F)
CPU Nr 1 / Second Core - 46 °C (115 °F)
Aux - 36 °C (97 °F)
GPU Diode - 55 °C (131 °F)

Thanks for your interest and help

 

P4's lifespan is over. Do yourself a flavour and get a Core 2 Duo in July after a price cut. I suggest E6420 though. AMD's phenom CPUs are said to be 40% faster than the Conroe Core 2 Duo CPUs at the same clocks. But then Intel also has improved C2D in their plan to strike down AMD.
Getting something like E6600 will be exciting but I am afraid it cannot be long when much superior products are out.

 

Hey xelnag that 7800gt isn't going to give all that great of fps as i know as i owned 3 of them at one time. Even in sli there performance wasn't all that great compared to what the x1800/x1900/7900series could do. Just a fair warning for ya. Usually if you keep the resolutions around 1280x1024 your be fine with that card.

 

Well a 7800GT with a decent CPU SHOULD perform very well at 1280X1024 and lower. It should run most games on very settings. They're definitely showing their age at this point, but they're not bad cards.

 

what type of cpu this guy got? im sure it wont hold them back, cpu limitation are rare in gaming unless its physics or OpenGL(Doom types)
ahh time for bed, cant type straight.

 

...you would be quite suprised...

 

I guess that upgrading is my only choice then, i was thinking about it for some time anyways. any recommendations? I currently have a 420W psu, would that suffice for a 8800GTS/ATI and what would be best?

 

The 8800GTS requires a 480W psu with 30A on the 12v...though im not sure what the HD2900XT requires, but either way, your going to need a new PSU if you want a top of the line series card.

Either one of these would be pretty decent for an 8800
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817152022
or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817182017

 

S.O.S also for me!!!

I need advice(what should i change to my 1.5 year old pc) after i get a 7900GT.
Specs
Intel Pentium 4(Prescott-2M) 630, 3000 MHz (15 x 200)
Intel Battle Lake D915PBL
Intel Grantsdale i915P
2048 MB (DDR2-533 DDR2 SDRAM)
NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GT/GTO
nVIDIA ForceWare 93.81
Am i missing something
How can i have more fps for example on f1-2006(gp4). I'm not quite so happy with my 7900gt.

 

Well your computer would perform much better if you overclocked your CPU. Have you tried multiple different driver sets? Finding a good driver match for the particular games or applications you're going to be running is essential and lays the foundation for the optimum performance on any machine. Have you ran any benchmarks to make sure your computer is performing as it should?