Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: StSanta on February 20, 2002, 08:21:17 AM
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Very weird. My cII566 @707 crapped out some time ago, so I've bought a PIII 1Ghz. Couldn't afford a full motherboard/ram/cpu upgrade, so I just bought the fastest CPU my current motherboard can take.
Tried Medal of Honour - Allied Assault. HUGE difference: am actually getting more than 10fps, and can play with graphics settings very high. VERY big increase in performance.
The problem is, in Aces High, there's really no difference - at 1280*1024 and 32 bit, sitting on the runway I get 26 fps. That's the same or even slightly worse than before. Been meddling around with graphics (which seems changed for some reason), but to no avail: FPS is still low.
Graphics look different than before, but that's probably because I installed new video drivers since I figured that had to be it.
Always thought that the processor was the bottleneck: same fps at virtually all resolutions before, or close to it, except switching to 32bit, where it became a good bit slower. This was true of Rogue Spear, Medal Of Honor and other games.
But virtually NO increase in AH. Very odd. If someone can identify the bottleneck of problem for me, I'd appreciate it.
Setup:
PIII 1Ghz cpu
ASUS CUV4X (think that's the one)
384Mb 133mhz RAM
ASUS V6600 Geforce 1 32MB ram.
CH Fighterstick USB
CH Throttle analogue
SB64 PCI
GC3 gamecard
Drivers for geforce card are 23 something: dated 1-29-2001
Oddly enough, although it is 32 mb: this show up for me:
(http://home1.stofanet.dk/stsanta/mem.gif)
It shows 60121k available memory, but my card only has 32 mb! Bug in AH?
There's also something I best can describe as 'stuttering' when I roll. It is very visible when I look forward-left and roll - when the landscape gets in view, it is as if the FPS is maybe 15 or less, although AH fps says "34" or something like that.
No interrupt request channel conflicts or anything.
Am also getting a 'crackling' noise in Medal of Honor when music is playing at the same time as sound effects. Had that in AH for a bit, but it went away.
The way I see it, it's either the graphics card, but that doesn't make sense, since Ah isn't much eye candy, rather more CPU intensive, or the soundcard. Somehow, the soundcard interferes with the rest of the puter.
Lastly, something I haven't quite worked out yet: Installed the CPU, everything works fine, yet when I start up, the BIOS mumbles something about CPUID not being correct and it therefore cannot update the bios. Doesn't seem related to performance issues in AH, as MOH works well, except the crackle on the voice (perhaps stutter is there too, haven't noticed)
Unfortunately, AH doesn't seem to work without a soundcard, so I haven't been able to see if that is the cause.
Any suggestions, even obvious ones, are welcome.
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its your vid card. bump res to 1024 and you will see big fps increase
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Your vid card is the culprit ...
You see an increase in the other games because the CPU give more processing time to the AI whereas in AH there is none ...
If you have any money left you should afford a Geforce3 Ti 200 and it will be OK.
It shows 60121k available memory, but my card only has 32 mb!
It's because of the AGP which permit the card to use main memory
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Santa, I went from Gf1 to Gf3 and got 30% performance increase in AH with same CPU (K7 700Mhz).
The memory you see is 32 Mb from your GF1 plus 32 main memory accessed by AGP (try increasing AGP aperture to 128 from the bios setup).
As a last suggestion, go to http://www.reactorcritical.com and download and try several TNT2/Gforce drivers, you will find enormous performance increase/decrease with them.
And try to use Dx8.01.
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santa gunthr and I had same sound prob with that mobo
but I have gf3 and get 65 fps
the sound cracking was bad fer me in ghost recon and mohaa demo. and sound was real screwed in sh2
I spent 4 days tweaking and got rid of the sound problems. In the Hardware forum dp a search for your mobo and you can see the steps I went thru. also I went bac to an older vrs of the via 4 in 1st which totally got rid of my sound probs.
Also make sure you have anti aliasing off that may be why it looks different and may give you a few fps.......
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Fillrate.
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I am very happy with CUV4X, works great with 1 GHz PIII and the Voodoo. Awhile back, I went from PIII 650/100 to PIII 1000/133 and saw a huge difference (better than 35% improvement in all games and benchmark software). Even going from CAS3/100 to CAS2/133 RAM made a measurable (although small: about 3 to 5 fps) difference.
I just got my dad a BIOSTAR M6VCF for $30, which is a micro ATX board with the same VIA chipset as the CUV4X. Performance is now identical (as it should have been given that all other components are the same in our computers). The PCCHIPS PC133 mobo it replaced based on the SiS chipset really crippled my dad's performance: about 1/2 the fps in any 3D game.
We can finally play games together without unfair fps differences.
Would a board with an Intel chipset run significantly faster than a CUV4X with the 1 GHz PIII? I don't feel the need to gamble at this point because I now have two computers running both stable and fast with Windows 98SE. The VIA 4in1 drivers were less than optimal a year or two ago, but they really rock now :)
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Downlaoded latest VIA drivers: gave me a little bit of extra fps, but not much.
Running at 1024 gave me about 5 fps top: not worth it.
Wonder why Streakegle's system runs so much better than mine?
Gonna try to find DX8.01. Got 8.0a installed.
Feh :/
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Santa, DX8.1... it's at http://www.microsoft.com/directx
-SW
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1) Check BIOS for the vid memory setting. Increase AGP aperture to 128 or 256 in BIOS (when you can access it).
"when I start up, the BIOS mumbles something about CPUID not being correct and it therefore cannot update the bios"
Ew. Try removing the CMOS battery for 10 mins and then putting it back in.
2) If you have VIA chipset, get the newest drivers. They really important
3) Try taking out your sound card. Just a wild guess.
4) Hope to god you dont use a WINMODEM.
5) Install dx8.1 (I thought 8.1 was required for AH now)
6) disable anti-aliasing on vid card
7) Check SAFE MODE / DEVICE MANAGER , check under monitors and video adapters .. remove all that arent the ones you have. If duplicates, remove them all and restart.
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Originally posted by StSanta
Downlaoded latest VIA drivers: gave me a little bit of extra fps, but not much.
Running at 1024 gave me about 5 fps top: not worth it.
Wonder why Streakegle's system runs so much better than mine?
Gonna try to find DX8.01. Got 8.0a installed.
Feh :/
I'm running a P4, 1.7 with a nVidia G Force3 card (64meg) and I've never seen less than 46 fps, with the mid 60s being typical, 76 fps at the very best. Res is set at 1152 with a 19 inch monitor. Looks like you need to upgrade your video card to get a marked increase in frame rate. At least, that's where I'd look first.
My regards,
Widewing
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I have the same Asus Gforce card, and an Asus v4( something) Motherboard. pIII 800 and i get well into the 50's on the runway. I'm running 32 bit 1024 res.
I'll check what drivers i'm running, but i have no problems with that card including furballs in the smoke.
NUTTZ
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gf3 same mobo as Santa but a piii 866 and get 55-65 fps I have sblive pc128. The newest via drivers are not always the best I reverted back to an old build and it cleared up my problems.
Goto to lephturns site or read his ah bbs sig he recomends different det drivers for each type of gf card. Again new is not always better.........
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Hey Santa you brat.
Is the Geforce SDRAM or DDR ?
That makes a huge difference.
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StSanta,
I agree with others about the vidcard settings being part of the problem. I went from Dx8.0a to Dx8.1 and got a minimum of
20 fps increase.
*It worked for me, I assume no liability for what it may do to your system. Your actual fps may vary. Subject to RAM availibility, tax, title , and license extra. No interest rate inferred. See local internet for available models.
Hope it helps
Texman
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Did anyone besides me notice all previous posts were by senior members? Gotta post more!
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The Voodoo 5500 wasn't at its fill rate limits and is very well documented for its scalability with CPU speed.
I have major problems with 1600 x 1200 x 32 with x4 FSAA, but 1024 x 768 x 32 with x2 FSAA looks better than any other card at higher resolution and/or FSAA and runs fast (60 to 70 fps flying level at alt), though I still get playable framerates with 1024 x 768 x 32 with x4 FSAA or 1600 x 1200 x 32 with x2 FSAA.
GeForce cards tend to be optimized for the card to do most of the work by itself, so changing the processor speed has much less effect on it.
Having seen the difference between Voodoo and Geforce side by side (image quality versus speed), I won't be upgrading my Voodoo until a manufacturer equals its image quality or games become unplayable. I just wish 3dfx had not gone out of business before making a driver with full DX8 support (though in all honesty it only has major bugs in two games I have tried: X-Planes and Warbirds III).
When I get out of school in May, I will be looking to build a top end system, but so far I know I don't want a Radeon 8500 or a GeForce 3/4. I am hoping the next generation due out in December time frame will balance speed with image quality. If not, I may settle for Radeon or GeForce 4, whichever looks better side by side with AH and OFP.
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Thank you everyone for your input. Am gonna try a few final things before I surrender and just let it be the way it is. Been fooling around with drivers left and right now. Looking at some Geforce tweaks that might help.
Thanks for input :).
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Whow.
Turns out I did NOT have DX8.1 installed - only 8.0. Now I get 40-50 fps on the runway at 1280*1024 32 bit.
Unfortunately, graphics is still screwed a bit - need to find another detonator driver. And it still stutters in 32 bit, but that's related to the video card. Some sound problems now: not hearing cannon sounds when I'm firing into the ground. hearing the rounds hit the ground instead. Goonna have to check that out.
Animal, yer quite right: it's an SDR card. I really ought to get meself a new one.
Thanks everyyone for your help - I really appreciate it :)
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StSanta,
Perhaps you should uninstall the three web servers you're running on ur machine, the porn sites are rubbish anyway. I want my money back:D I can't get into the leather fetish site cause mandoble and apar are hoggin all the bandwidth:p
:D ;) :D :D ;) :D
Gremlin.
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Gremlin, my affiliate program with HTC enables me to support my dru...err, enables me to buy my medicine.
Also, there's a cost in producing all the mpgs and jpg's. While sheep are relatively cheap to come around, the Playboy models really want some cash before they start fondling the horses. Overpaid bimbos.
I can see on my log list that you're particularly interested in the Men And Horses section - did you see the film featuring the old AH faces - Hangtime, Creamo and the gang? Pretty good eh?
The gem however must be The AK's and the Ewe. That set me back one year of subscription for AH for all AK's. Well worth it. Wulfe in particular really has talents.
The leather section has had bandwidth problem ever since I advertized on CH1 in the main arena - apparently, there's a lot of closet LW in there. I am glad to report that the biggest download by far up to date is me in my leather g-strings made from bishrook baby skins buttocks - if it's good enough for them, it's good enough for me. I didn't get many requests on that one until I added the metal studs on the inside.
Rubbish you say? Yes, I can see on the log file how you like rubbish. Am considering adding a section called "Gremlins picks" - but that'd be futile, since it'd be everything on the site. And, some might misread it as "Gremlin's pics", and I already got a section with your pictures on it.
Ooops, I probably shouldn't have said that. And, I should say, that shiny thing that looks like a camera mounted on the roof of your bedroom: it's just a shiny thing that looks like a camera. It ain't a camera. At all.
:D
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Santa, do your vid card and sound card share IRQs? that could cause soem stuttering/lost sounds. That would be especially possible if your sound card is in the slot next to the AGP slot. You can check it via Device Manager (forgot where it is exactly and am at work so can't try).
Lapa
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sound card (sb anyway) are best in slot 3 and its own irq (5 is usually left open). You can disable stuff you dont use to free up irqs as well......
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lapa, yeah, looks like they share interrupt channel. Odd. Will have to toy a bit with that.
Seems to be fixed now.
After DX8.1, I got a huge frame rate increase. After Lephturn directed me tothe proper drivers, stutter is minimized, everything is clear.
Will have to see if I can reproduce the sound problem. it isn't crackling anymore, and the test flight I just did registered all sounds properly.
BIG thanks to everyone! It is very much appreciated - I think you can realize how much if you iamgine a poor desperate man finding that his fps is lower after an upgrade, only to, through a series of steps, see it increase, get better, get sharper.
Thanks a bunch!
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If you still have problems, it is likely related to your video card and sound card sharing an IRQ. That's a bad thing. :)
Depending on what mainboard you have, you can likely solve the problem by moving which slot your soundcard is in to one that isn't shared. As somebody mentioned above, often the 3rd PCI slot has it's own IRQ, but you should check your mainboard manual to be sure.
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Glad to hear you found the problem, and yes, DX8.1 was an upgrade in 3D performance for me too (though not as dramatic) :)
Sounds like you are getting about the same performance I am... which makes sense since we have the same mobo and cpu.
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So what was the fix?
Or should i only be getting 20 fps on the runway with:
abit kt7 RAID
1.4 ghz Tbird
GeForce II MX 400 (32 meg)
768 megs 133mhz (micron/cas2)
2 x WesternDigital 30 gig hard drive @ 7200 rpm running RAID +0
PCI512 SB
When nothing but sky on the screen i get 50+ fps, but sitting on the run-way or tower, and ecspecaily the hanger, i have total crap FPS
AGP apature(SP) size is already set to 128, ive tried all settings and that seems to be the optimal setting.
im considering buying a raedon 8500 this weekend, but rent, cable, car payment and insurance all due..ahh screw it, who needs groceries!
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Originally posted by StSanta
Lastly, something I haven't quite worked out yet: Installed the CPU, everything works fine, yet when I start up, the BIOS mumbles something about CPUID not being correct and it therefore cannot update the bios.
This one I can fix.Clearing the cmos won't help.When this board came out,the 1ghz cpu's didn't exist.
I owned the Asus P3V4X motherboard,and got the exact same error message while using their latest official bios.
I went to Asus beta's bios section,found the one for my motherboard,flashed it,and the problem was solved.
I suspect they never made any effort to make them official as that mobo is now 2-3 generations back.
I'll check after work to see if they have a beta bios for your board.They had sveral revisions of yours...was it just CUV4X?No c or d on the end?
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Originally posted by Am0n
So what was the fix?
Or should i only be getting 20 fps on the runway with:
abit kt7 RAID
1.4 ghz Tbird
GeForce II MX 400 (32 meg)
768 megs 133mhz (micron/cas2)
2 x WesternDigital 30 gig hard drive @ 7200 rpm running RAID +0
PCI512 SB
When nothing but sky on the screen i get 50+ fps, but sitting on the run-way or tower, and ecspecaily the hanger, i have total crap FPS
AGP apature(SP) size is already set to 128, ive tried all settings and that seems to be the optimal setting.
im considering buying a raedon 8500 this weekend, but rent, cable, car payment and insurance all due..ahh screw it, who needs groceries!
Hard to say without you telling us what resolution that is.
FWIW, the Geforce II MX cards are sorta crap. The 400 is better than the 200, but they're still not particualrly powerful. Not in the same league as the GF2 Pro/Ultra/Ti. Alot of prefab manufacturers like SystemMax & whatnot throw them in there because people see the GeForce name and think they're gettig a rocking card. But they're at the bottom of the GF heap.
Some folks may warn you away from the 8500, but I'm happy with mine. The drivers were CRAP for a long time, but the latest release is solid & fast. I get higher framerates & 3DMark scores with the 8500 in both my Athlon 1.4 and my 1900+ than I do with my GeForce 3. Haven't checked the prices in about a month, but I paid considerably less for my 8500 than I did for the GF3.
D
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1280x1024x32 (not going to run 16 bit, i know its faster)
pretty sure thats what it is set at, im at work now so i cannot know for sure.
in 3dmark 2000 i score 5600 on the defualt benchmark.
Yea i know the geforce II MX are the low end cards. with sdram and slow GPU cant expect much from it. But with the rest of my system i figure i should be getting better frames despite the bottle-necking graphics card.
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First on the issue of BIOS version for CUV4X:
I have the official version of 1009. They sent me the beta early on, but it finally became official awhile ago. If you can't find it in the ASUS downloads, let me know, I have all my drivers/bios stuff burned on a CD ROM. I am not sure which bios version I had when I got my PIII 1GHz, probably 1009 beta? But I never got any warning message about not recognizing the cpu.
Second on the issue of the GEFORCE 2 MX 400:
I have a DELL computer at school:
933 MHz PIII
GEFORCE 2 MX 400
Win2000 w/Service Pack 2
At 1024 x 768 x 32 no FSAA with DirectX 8.1 and the latest NVidia Detonators, it gets about the same frame rates as my Voodoo does with FSAA x2. It seems to take less of a hit from smoke/airfields as well: 50 to 70 fps at all times (50+ fps on runway), where as my Voodoo gets 35 to 90 fps with the norm being 45 to 65. So I wouldn't say the MX 400 is a total bottleneck. My complaints with regard to NVidia are always in the direction of image quality. I can't see much difference between no FSAA and FSAA x4 beyond a huge fps hit, so I don't even bother to run FSAA at school. Whereas if I run my Voodoo without FSAA, it is much faster than the MX 400 and still looks better ;) With FSAA, Voodoo makes MX 400 graphics look like stick figures :)
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StSanta, what operating system are you using? The reason I am asking is this. I recently installed a new mobo, and cpu along with 256 DDR memory. Anyway, I just changed the boards out placing a new board with an athlonXP 1600cpu and the new DDR, pluged in the same hard drive , CD ROM and floppy and away I went. I also have a GeForce3Ti 200 video card. Guess what, I hardly showed any increase in frame rates also.
I mentioned this in the tech help section of the BBS. I changed from an athlon950 to an athlonXP 1600 and expected to get a very sizable gain in FPS. I am running windows98SE as my OS. StSanta if you did not reinstall windows, windows is right now not seeing any special instructions that your new cpu needs to operate at its' full potential. I think Bradys told me this, can't remember, but I think it was him. Anyway your BIOS reads the new cpu's presence, so when you bring up system info it's tells you the new CPU is there, but unless you reinstalled windows, windows methinks still thinks your old cpu is there. Try reinstalling your OS if it's windows. I think then you will see the change you expected. I reinstalled win98SE and my Mad Onion Bench 2000 score increased dramatically, and my FPS went from 26 on the runway, to 60. Hope this helps.
Hajo
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Great News.
Still I can shoot down StSatan so easily!
:D
Aces High runs very very smooth with Pentium III-800MHz and GeForce 3, at 1280x1024 32bit. :) I also have ever used Creative GeForce 256, it had very poor performance at high resolutions and colors...
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Mitsu
Stab./JG1 "Oesau" (http://www.dd.iij4u.or.jp/~nobo/jg1/)
"Who wanna smell my Ho-5 cannon?"
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Alright, thanks chaps. Will try putting the sound card in a different slot and see if that helps.
Couldn't find the BIOS drivers on ASUS site - not a good site design there. Also have a bad history with flashing BIOS's. Last time I downloaded the correct file and program from ASUS, checked the checksum and verified it, flashed the bios and...
Nothing. BIOS was busted and I had to hack my way around it.
Hm, special instructions not being seen by Windows? Not too sure about this. Guess it's possible, but I'd expect the OS to be generic code - it does the job of translating through the layers down to machine code. I gotta reinstall win soon anyhow.
am0n, you really should be getting more fps with your system. Perhaps your problem is similar to what I had?
Thanks everyone for yer help :)
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i flashed asus 1009 a while ago np here at all...........
Also hajo is right if haven't already reinstalled windows after you upgraded your cpu you really should.......
If you mess with your irqs get that sound blaster on its own and if ya have a spare put yoyr graphics card on its own
Also get rid of that sb legacy crap you wont need it unless u play really old games. Remove it from config.sys and autoexec.bat
Hers my IRQS I have same mobo as you but piii866 and gf3 same ram 384
0 System timer
1 Standard 101/102-Key or Microsoft Natural Keyboard
2 Programmable interrupt controller
3 NVIDIA GeForce3
3 ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering
4 VIA Tech PCI to USB Universal Host Controller
4 VIA Tech PCI to USB Universal Host Controller
4 ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering
5 Creative Sound Blaster PCI128
5 ACPI IRQ Holder for PCI IRQ Steering
6 Standard Floppy Disk Controller
7 ECP Printer Port (LPT1)
8 System CMOS/real time clock
9 SCI IRQ used by ACPI bus
10 (free)
11 (free)
12 PS/2 Compatible Mouse Port
13 Numeric data processor
14 Primary IDE controller (dual fifo)
14 VIA Bus Master PCI IDE Controller
15 Secondary IDE controller (dual fifo)
15 VIA Bus Master PCI IDE Controller
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I might as well ask this one
I get a wierd vertical refresh glictch when I pan my views looking at the ground
I see the ground textures seperated
it's hard to describe
anyway, not sure how to fix it but you guys know everything in here.
also, is there any way to improve my network performance? I get upwards of 80-100fps offline, 30-50 online. is that a network card hangup and how would i go about tweaking it?
PIII800Mhz
256mb ram
Geforce2 GTS 32mb
Netgear FA311 10/100 network card