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Performance

I asked this question a couple of weeks ago, but I have been away from these fourms for a while.

Situation: lag or visual shutters when entering a new area (even on low settings).  I have a 3.8 Mhz processor, 3 gig ram, and an ATI 9800xt card with 256 memory.

Question:  Is it worth the $200 to upgrade to a 512 AGP card?  Will it help with this situation. (I don't think my MB will accept a PCI-e card)

Its a Dell 8300 Dimension about 4 years old.

 

Thanks

I shoot for the curve... anything above that is gravy.

Comments

  • NeuroXlNeuroXl Member Posts: 291

    Originally posted by WantsumBier


    I asked this question a couple of weeks ago, but I have been away from these fourms for a while.
    Situation: lag or visual shutters when entering a new area (even on low settings).  I have a 3.8 Mhz processor, 3 gig ram, and an ATI 9800xt card with 256 memory.
    Question:  Is it worth the $200 to upgrade to a 512 AGP card?  Will it help with this situation. (I don't think my MB will accept a PCI-e card)
    Its a Dell 8300 Dimension about 4 years old.
     
    Thanks
    well i think you definitely need to re-look up the specs on your machine ....

    a 4 year old dell will NOT be 3.8 mhz ... OR 3.8 ghz for that matter ... i also find it hard to believe you have 3 gigs of ram on that machine ... most boards that dell sold 4 years ago maxed at 2 .... but ... if i take your word for it and you DO have 3 gigs of ram .. you had to have it installed or may have installed it yourself .. in which case i dont know how you could be so clueless about your processor ...

    as for your problems .. IF your specs are correct .. id say theres a 90% chance its due to a driver conflict with that ATI card ... i would invest in a 7600 512 nvidia .. and you can play this game in great greaphics settings ... ( dont buy the BFG 76-- though )

  • LetsinodLetsinod Member UncommonPosts: 385

    Also, there seems to be a ton of problems in lots of game with people running 3 GB of RAM.  Try upping it to 4 or back down to 2.

  • WantsumBierWantsumBier Member Posts: 1,079
    Originally posted by NeuroXl


     
    Originally posted by WantsumBier


    I asked this question a couple of weeks ago, but I have been away from these fourms for a while.
    Situation: lag or visual shutters when entering a new area (even on low settings).  I have a 3.8 Mhz processor, 3 gig ram, and an ATI 9800xt card with 256 memory.
    Question:  Is it worth the $200 to upgrade to a 512 AGP card?  Will it help with this situation. (I don't think my MB will accept a PCI-e card)
    Its a Dell 8300 Dimension about 4 years old.
     
    Thanks
    well i think you definitely need to re-look up the specs on your machine ....

     

    a 4 year old dell will NOT be 3.8 mhz ... OR 3.8 ghz for that matter ... i also find it hard to believe you have 3 gigs of ram on that machine ... most boards that dell sold 4 years ago maxed at 2 .... but ... if i take your word for it and you DO have 3 gigs of ram .. you had to have it installed or may have installed it yourself .. in which case i dont know how you could be so clueless about your processor ...

    as for your problems .. IF your specs are correct .. id say theres a 90% chance its due to a driver conflict with that ATI card ... i would invest in a 7600 512 nvidia .. and you can play this game in great greaphics settings ... ( dont buy the BFG 76-- though )

    Oooops... Sorry it 2.8 pent 4. (typing too fast with not alot of skill).

    It originaly had 512 ram but i have upgraded and filled 3 of the 4 slots with 1gig sticks. One is a dell and the other two are from another source. Could this be a problem if they are not matched?

    is that nvidia a AGP card?

    Sorry if these are stupid questions.  I know enough about computers to be a danger to my system.

    I shoot for the curve... anything above that is gravy.

  • JackdogJackdog Member UncommonPosts: 6,321
    If you are referring to going into Bree or say the Prancing Pony or Forsaken Inn during a crowded time then the stutter you are refering to is the textures of the player characters loading into memory. I am running a E6600 @ 3.2 MHz, 2 gig of performance ram and a 8800GTS with 640 memory and I still get it. The only cure I have found is to drop the texture quality down in Bree or just give the textures 10 or 15 seconds to load.



    I agree with the fact it is irritating but then no game is perfect. I just try to spend a s little time as possible in Bree.

    I miss DAoC

  • WantsumBierWantsumBier Member Posts: 1,079
    Originally posted by Jackdog

    If you are referring to going into Bree or say the Prancing Pony or Forsaken Inn during a crowded time then the stutter you are refering to is the textures of the player characters loading into memory. I am running a E6600 @ 3.2 MHz, 2 gig of performance ram and a 8800GTS with 640 memory and I still get it. The only cure I have found is to drop the texture quality down in Bree or just give the textures 10 or 15 seconds to load.



    I agree with the fact it is irritating but then no game is perfect. I just try to spend a s little time as possible in Bree.
    It is bad there, but I'm not there often (Dwarf).  It even happens while I'm out in the boonies. I just pause for a few seconds and it seems to be ok untill I move to a new area.

    I shoot for the curve... anything above that is gravy.

  • SnarlSnarl Member Posts: 7
    Originally posted by Jackdog

    If you are referring to going into Bree or say the Prancing Pony or Forsaken Inn during a crowded time then the stutter you are refering to is the textures of the player characters loading into memory. I am running a E6600 @ 3.2 MHz, 2 gig of performance ram and a 8800GTS with 640 memory and I still get it. The only cure I have found is to drop the texture quality down in Bree or just give the textures 10 or 15 seconds to load.



    I agree with the fact it is irritating but then no game is perfect. I just try to spend a s little time as possible in Bree.
    Jackdog Pretty much sums it up, I run a 3Ghz P4 w/1.5GB Ram and a 256MB X1950 Pro and Hitch like heck in Bree (Okay I'm not running state of the art...). There is definetly some tweaking required by Turbine, however the games rocks IMHO and I believe Turbine will indeed improve performance,



    As an FYI Hitting the official LOTRO forums the hitching seem to be very common even on some high end rigs..

    Another Guy From Canada

  • Gammit100Gammit100 Member UncommonPosts: 439
    I'm sure the folks at Turbine will fix this issue.  Also, for those with less than stellar systems, realize that the developers probably programmed this game's visuals with room to grow.  The folks at Everquest 2 did the same thing.  I think it's smart.

    MMO games played or tested: EQ, DAoC, Archlord, Auto Assault, CoH, CoV, EQ2, EVE, Guild Wars, Hellgate: London, Linneage II, LOTRO, MxO, Planetside, SWG, Sword of the New World, Tabula Rasa, Vanguard, WWIIOL, WOW, Age of Conan

    image
    image

  • JackdogJackdog Member UncommonPosts: 6,321
    I could really give a darn if they ever fix it or not, it just is not that big of a deal to me. 4 hours of good solid game play is worth 10 seconds of occasional stutter as far as I am concerned.



    Now if the whole game was laggy I would be raising holy hell, but I never get it other than when I am going into a area with a lot of players and then once I am in that area it smooths out. back in beta sometimes I would get it in the boonies but I have not had that happen since closed beta.

    I miss DAoC

  • WantsumBierWantsumBier Member Posts: 1,079
    Originally posted by Jackdog

    I could really give a darn if they ever fix it or not, it just is not that big of a deal to me. 4 hours of good solid game play is worth 10 seconds of occasional stutter as far as I am concerned.



    Now if the whole game was laggy I would be raising holy hell, but I never get it other than when I am going into a area with a lot of players and then once I am in that area it smooths out. back in beta sometimes I would get it in the boonies but I have not had that happen since closed beta.



    I agree, even though I'm running on low settings i lve the visuals. I just wish I could get the full experience.  Gunna go for the 7600 in the morning and see if it helps.

    Thanks everyone

    I shoot for the curve... anything above that is gravy.

  • M1sf1tM1sf1t Member UncommonPosts: 1,583


    Originally posted by NeuroXl
    Originally posted by WantsumBier I asked this question a couple of weeks ago, but I have been away from these fourms for a while.
    Situation: lag or visual shutters when entering a new area (even on low settings). I have a 3.8 Mhz processor, 3 gig ram, and an ATI 9800xt card with 256 memory.
    Question: Is it worth the $200 to upgrade to a 512 AGP card? Will it help with this situation. (I don't think my MB will accept a PCI-e card)
    Its a Dell 8300 Dimension about 4 years old.

    Thanks
    well i think you definitely need to re-look up the specs on your machine ....
    a 4 year old dell will NOT be 3.8 mhz ... OR 3.8 ghz for that matter ... i also find it hard to believe you have 3 gigs of ram on that machine ... most boards that dell sold 4 years ago maxed at 2 .... but ... if i take your word for it and you DO have 3 gigs of ram .. you had to have it installed or may have installed it yourself .. in which case i dont know how you could be so clueless about your processor ...
    as for your problems .. IF your specs are correct .. id say theres a 90% chance its due to a driver conflict with that ATI card ... i would invest in a 7600 512 nvidia .. and you can play this game in great greaphics settings ... ( dont buy the BFG 76-- though )

    Windows XP only sees 3 gigs of ram. If you have 4 gigs installed it'll not recognize that extra gig as system memory and assign it to peripheral duty.

    Games I've played/tried out:WAR, LOTRO, Tabula Rasa, AoC, EQ1, EQ2, WoW, Vangaurd, FFXI, D&DO, Lineage 2, Saga Of Ryzom, EvE Online, DAoC, Guild Wars,Star Wars Galaxies, Hell Gate London, Auto Assault, Grando Espada ( AKA SoTNW ), Archlord, CoV/H, Star Trek Online, APB, Champions Online, FFXIV, Rift Online, GW2.

    Game(s) I Am Currently Playing:

    GW2 (+LoL and BF3)

  • M1sf1tM1sf1t Member UncommonPosts: 1,583


    Originally posted by Gammit100
    I'm sure the folks at Turbine will fix this issue. Also, for those with less than stellar systems, realize that the developers probably programmed this game's visuals with room to grow. The folks at Everquest 2 did the same thing. I think it's smart.

    Please don't compare the great programming skills of Turbine with the shotty programming of EQ2. EQ2 is not future proof. Sure they slapped on bump mapping to everything but EQ2 does not even utilize dual core cpu's like LOTRO and it is very cpu bound.

    Games I've played/tried out:WAR, LOTRO, Tabula Rasa, AoC, EQ1, EQ2, WoW, Vangaurd, FFXI, D&DO, Lineage 2, Saga Of Ryzom, EvE Online, DAoC, Guild Wars,Star Wars Galaxies, Hell Gate London, Auto Assault, Grando Espada ( AKA SoTNW ), Archlord, CoV/H, Star Trek Online, APB, Champions Online, FFXIV, Rift Online, GW2.

    Game(s) I Am Currently Playing:

    GW2 (+LoL and BF3)

  • tombear81tombear81 Member Posts: 810
    8000 GTS 640MB, 3 gigs DDR and dual core athlon 64 4200 * windows XP home edition.



    There is some hitching in Bree but not massive amounts. I play with everything switched on full apart from landscape lighting reflections and also tend to turn down crowd quality when entering bree.



    Everywhere else is fine apart from the odd occasional stuttering which lasts around 20 seconds and stops. This is rare.



    Be aware that some servers in Europe at least... are very populated so this makes the problem even worse. Bree is always much worse during peak times so I beleive this hitching is due to players. Archetw as also bad during the game launch. Its now much better in archet.





    Though on another note this game makes my card run hot !
  • tombear81tombear81 Member Posts: 810
    Originally posted by M1sf1t


     

    Windows XP only sees 3 gigs of ram. If you have 4 gigs installed it'll not recognize that extra gig as system memory and assign it to peripheral duty.
    Additionally.... Someone correct me if I am wrong....



    I beleive that most motherboards can address 4 gigs of RAM using 32 bit addressing. With 64 bit adressing this number is increased.



    Vista you can go crazy with RAM if you have a 64 bit processor.

    Windows XP home is gimped (thanks M$) and supports 3 Gigs. 2 Gigs for user space and 1 gig for kernel (e.g. drivers)

    Windows XP Profession is 4 I think.... 3 for user space (apps)n and 1 for kernel space( drivers again)





    Incorrectly matching RAM can cause problems. I beleive the rule of thumb is to have similar frequecies  (e.g. all DDR 400) and also CAS latencies (e.g. 2, 2.5, 3 are usual numbers) .... This can be checked with CPU-z a nice utiilty.



    Once again some correct me if I am wrong.
  • LobotomistLobotomist Member EpicPosts: 5,965
    I dont get it people



    The game runs as smooth as butter on my 2.5 years old PC - just 1 gb ram



    -



    Oh you have stuttering when entering Bree ? Or Prancing Pony ?



    There is a slider in graphic settings - that removes exactly this. Put it to ZERO , and you will never stutter when around masses of players



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