HELP! 9600pro is giving lackluster performance

[Shinare]

Hey all, just got my new 9600p in and installed it. I ran 3dmark01 and got a paltry 10340 on it. With my old ti4200 I was getting 14000+ and that was only an AGP 4x. this leads me to ask "Hey, whats the deal??"

Heres my system:

Asus P4S8X-X
P4a [email protected]
2x 256 PC2100 DDR
ATI 9600pro 128 stock now @ 460/702 stable
40MB WD hard drive.

The only thing I keep noticing is that when I try and enable the "fast write" functionality in the video card settings it is always set to off after the reboot. Its set to enabled in the BOIS and when the ti4200 was in there it was using fast writes and sideband addressing. Could this be the reason my 9600p sucks a$$ so much? How do I fix that?

Help.

edit: using cats 3.10

 

[zandor]

3DMark '03 is pretty much a DX7 benchmark except for the Nature test which uses DX8 shaders, so I wouldn't find it all that suprising if the 4200 at least ran some of the tests faster.

I managed to find a review w/ both board that includes 3DMark 2001. The scores for both of them were quite close, though the 4200 beat the 9600pro by a nose. Have a look here: http://www.tech-report.com/reviews/2003q2/radeon-9600pro/index.x?pg=2

Your scores are still low though, since both of these cards came in at around 14000 in that review. I'm thinking you might have some NVidia driver leftovers in your system. Might be time to reformat or hunt around for some sort of driver cleanup utlility. I think I've heard of something called "Detonator Destroyer" or something like that.

 

[Hal|9k]

Check DXDIAG's Displays tab and make sure Accelerated Textures are enabled.

Make sure you have all the eye-candy off in the Cat control panel (AA, AF, etc.).

 

[Shinare]

Originally posted by Hal|9k
Check DXDIAG's Displays tab and make sure Accelerated Textures are enabled.

Make sure you have all the eye-candy off in the Cat control panel (AA, AF, etc.).

All that stuff is off. I'm pretty much disapointed in the benchmark scores. Especially the 3dMark03 whish was a whopping 1600 something. I will try the det-destroyer and if that dont work, time for a HD wipe and reinstall.

Funny thing is tho, the benchmark scores are so low, but I put this sucker on 4x/8x aa/af and in UT2003 its running flawlessly and looks fantastic at 1024x768 all detail levels are on highest. *shrug* Its all about the games I guess, but I fear any DX9 games I get in the future are going to kill this card. Guess I should have saved my $150 a little longer and got a 9800 when prices fall.

edit: using the OC prog I d-loaded from this forum I was able to max the card out at 460ish/352ish (704ish DDR) stock and 3dmark01 give 11600 now. I wonder if I put these old Tt GF4 ramsinks on I could get higher....

 

[Hal|9k]

DXDIAG/Displays look ok?

 

[Nazo]

Hey, btw, you said that it won't let you enable fastwrite. Have you installed the latest AGP chipset drivers? Couldn't do any harm anyway, right?

Anyway, I still can't help but think that there's just something interfering with the benchmark. Oh, btw, have you ensured that NEITHER of the synchronizations are on in the ATI monitor display settings (the displays tab.) I think I noticed a framerate difference when either one of the syncs were enabled for my display.

Anyway, maybe it's just something wrong with your copy of 3DMark2003. The score you got in 2001 was fairly decent there.

 

[Shinare]

Originally posted by Hal|9k
DXDIAG/Displays look ok?

Yah, DXdiag looks fine, all the acceleration levels are set to enabled. I tried d-loading detonator-destroyer but when I tried to use it, it said there were no nividia drivers found. *shrug*

I might have to just wipe this baby clean. My astounding 1600 in 3DMark03 is really disappointing.

Hey, btw, you said that it won't let you enable fastwrite. Have you installed the latest AGP chipset drivers? Couldn't do any harm anyway, right?

I dont know what exactly "fast write" is under SmartGart but its a little annoying that in my BIOS it says enabled but in ati control panel it says "Off" no matter what. I hope thats not the reason to my problems. I have installed the AGP drivers off my mobo CD (I just got this mobo last month) but I will look to see if there are any newer ones. Fastwrite was enabled for the ti4200 I had in there as well as sideband addressing (something I dont even see in the ATI pannel).

Oh, btw, have you ensured that NEITHER of the synchronizations are on in the ATI monitor display settings (the displays tab.)

I'll have to check the synchro settings again when I get home, but I doubt thats holding me back on 3dmark03 since I get like 1-10fps on most of that anyway.

BTW Thanks for the replies, I'll be able to check more things once I get home in about 7 hours.