What's the problem I am having or should I get a new Vid Card?

[Latrobe]

I've seen videos and screen shots that people have made with superb graphics for AHII. I've also heard some people are getting over 100 FR's with all hi-res graphics.

Currently I have an nvidia GeForce 8600 GTS, and can play on Hi-res graphics with roughly 60-100 FR's. I also can turn on detailed terrain, water, and local reflections on water and still get 40-80 FR's. However, when I try to turn on bumps on terrain, self shadow, and smooth self shadow I drop down to 20-40 FR's and I get a lot of screen freezing (lasting anywhere from 1-10 seconds, and sometimes a host connetion lost). With the 8600 GTS Vid Card I get 512 MB's of memory and with all of that stuff turned off I only use about 80 MB's of memory, and even with it turned on I only use 120 MB's max.

I know some stuff when it computers, but I'm nowhere close to being a "Computer Nerd" (or "Computer Wiz" as you would probably call it  ), so my question is why would my computer struggle with bump terrain and self shadowing but run great when I turn them off? Are Video Memory and Frame Rates two different things? I only use 120 MB max out of 512, yet only get 20 FR's and screen freezing.


Am I just missing something, or should I just go ahead and get a new, better video card?

[gyrene81]

Don't use any of the shadowing...bump map terrain and detailed terrain/water should allow you to have good frame rates.

[Ghosth]

Agree with gyrene, leave the shadow off.

Play hard, be happy.

[Ghastly]

The video card you are using is definitely underpowered for all the eye candy.  So no, nothing is probably wrong, and yes, if you want to run max/max/max settings it's time to get a new video card.

Before you purchase, I'd suggest posting a dx-diag (or in general, system specs) so that some of the more knowledgeable people here can advise you on whether you are likely to currently be CPU as well as GPU constrained, so that you don't buy a video card that ends up doing you no good because the rest of the system can't keep up with it anyway.

IMO of course.
<S>

[Latrobe]

Thanks for the replies, I had a feeling I would need a new one. We will be getting a new computer sometime, but it certainly won't be anywhere in the near future unless a miracle happens. Here's some specs on the computer I have now.

-------------------------------

System:
     Microsoft Windows XP
     Media Center Edition
     Version 2002
     Service Pack 2

     AMD Athlon 64 Processor
     3700+
     984 MHz, 1.00 GB of RAM
     
-------------------------------

If you have any recommendations for a Computer I should get that would be great as well (I do a lot of gaming).

[Ghastly]

Ugh.  My previous gameplay computer was an Athlon 4600+ based system, with 4 GB of RAM (3.25 usable).  It was the older socket 939 based processor, if that makes any difference (for those more knowledgeable than I regarding the AMD processors).  The system was utterly clean, and used for nothing else but gameplay - and very little else but AH at that.

I upgraded from an NVIDIA 7800 GTX to a 9800 GTX because of issues with the 7800 just before the graphics update in AH, but still found that the system was too underpowered to post consistently good framerates at the level of detail I wanted, which is less than that which you are asking for.

In short, I don't think you are likely to get what you want (everything maxed) with that particular system, although I think it would be quite playable at pretty reasonable settings.

All IMO, based on my own experience, etc.  YMMV


<S>

[TequilaChaser]

Latrobe,
your CPU is the bottle-neck , not allowing you to gain the full potential of the videocard you have........

now, it is possible to do some minor tweaking and get yourself some more frame-rate with higher settings for game detail........

but before advising anything, I suggest you copy & paste at least the top 2/3 rds of the dx-diag, so we can see more of what you have and have your pagefile set at etc..... and if you have onboard sound or dedicated sound card, and what acceleration you are using for directsound.etc.....

hope this helps.......

[BaldEagl]

Even with a new video card smooth shadows could be a frame killer.  As others have said, just turn shadows off and you should be able to run everything else turned up.

If you want to get a nice little performance boost for your machine I'd suggest you add another 1 Gb of RAM.  That would help you a lot and wouldn't cost much.