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+--- Thread: Darunia's New Video Card (/showthread.php?tid=5868)
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
Ok I bought a Radon HD 5570. Assuming that my previous HD 3200 belongs to the same family, then this new one is... 2570 more. However, before I install it, the guy at Best Buy tried to sell me a new power source... he said that if I don't, there's a chance the new card could overload and fry my extant power source. I've never heard of this before. Is it true? If so, I would need to check how much my current power source is. How would I go about doing that? The box on the 5570 recommends 400 Watt or Greater Power Supply.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
Open up your computer and look at the power supply.. It should have the wattage printed on it.
The power supply should be located directly behind where the power cord plugs in.
Darunia's New Video Card - EdenMaster - 17th July 2010
The PSU should be a big obtrusive metal box is one of the corners of your computer, usually right at the top rear. As toven said, where the power cord leads. The voltage should be printed on it somewhere.
And yes, some more powerful cards do require more powerful PSU's to go with them.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
Buy the way... Don't forget to ground yourself when working on your computer...
You can get a grounding wriststrap at radio shack for about $5 and clip it to something medal like the medal part of your computers case (BEST IDEA) . or you can touch a medal faucet first, just remember to stay off carpet.
Also, check your architecture! Is your computer AGP What speed AGP?, PCI Express 1.0, PCI, or PCI Express 2.0? PCI Express 1 and 2 use the same slot type! So Be careful.
Finally... Check your fit.. Is the card in absolutely as far as it will go? Does it have a latch? Is it latched? You should not be able to see the copper conductors on the card riser.
Check and double check.. And you won't blow stuff up.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
Well, I wound up having to buy a 450 watt power source... and I wound up spending three hours with the Geek Squad guy at Best Buy... but it is in and working now. Problem is, I'm not sure there's all that big of a difference... that Star Wars game, catalyst for the whole purchase in the first place, runs moderately better (still not full working speed.) WoW doesn't seem to run better at all! I thought I'd be soaring at 50, 60, 70 FPs... but I seem to get the same 20-40, depending where I am.
I WANT ANSWERS!
Darunia's New Video Card - EdenMaster - 17th July 2010
Do you have any other programs running, particularly a virus scanner?
Darunia's New Video Card - Great Rumbler - 17th July 2010
You should be getting a much bigger performance boost than that. Try downloading the latest drivers for your card.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
The Geek Squad guy uploaded the driver at Best Buy.
And now, at least one of my older, favorite games, Jedi Knight, that I had PAINSTAKINGLY rigged to work on Vista, is all fucked up! The display keeps... I don't know how to explain it... the game runs fine, and the sound is there, but the dispaly... sort of like... parts of the screen get stuck, and the shimmer and flicker... does that make sense? I altered all the display specifications... one option says, "Video Card may not have enough memory for this mode - try a lower setting. Restoring previous settings (OK)." That's bogus... not enough memory? It's a 13 year-old game... on a blazing fast new card... it ran before on my old video card...
![[Image: JKfuckup.jpg]](http://i990.photobucket.com/albums/af30/Fwigglemuck/JKfuckup.jpg)
This is what happens... the game is running smooth behind it, not frozen... but certain frame seem to catch, and they shimmer and obscure the game running behind it.
ADDENDUM: It's official: It fucked up all my old games. Add Duke Nukem 3D and Return the Castle Wolfenstein to the lot. They don't even launch.
Oddly enough, the only thing that DOES still work AND SEEMS TO BE RUNNING BETTER... IS Doom.
And I mean old-school Doom, via the Doomsday launcher.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
Darunia Wrote:The Geek Squad guy uploaded the driver at Best Buy.That's probably because Doom isn't really a 3D game..
And now, at least one of my older, favorite games, Jedi Knight, that I had PAINSTAKINGLY rigged to work on Vista, is all fucked up! The display keeps... I don't know how to explain it... the game runs fine, and the sound is there, but the dispaly... sort of like... parts of the screen get stuck, and the shimmer and flicker... does that make sense? I altered all the display specifications... one option says, "Video Card may not have enough memory for this mode - try a lower setting. Restoring previous settings (OK)." That's bogus... not enough memory? It's a 13 year-old game... on a blazing fast new card... it ran before on my old video card...
This is what happens... the game is running smooth behind it, not frozen... but certain frame seem to catch, and they shimmer and obscure the game running behind it.
ADDENDUM: It's official: It fucked up all my old games. Add Duke Nukem 3D and Return the Castle Wolfenstein to the lot. They don't even launch.
Oddly enough, the only thing that DOES still work AND SEEMS TO BE RUNNING BETTER... IS Doom.
And I mean old-school Doom, via the Doomsday launcher.
At least in the sense that it's not crunching polygons.
Doom made 3D work because it had a library of sprites drawn from every angle stored in a thing called a WAD file if I remember correctly.
I would try updating your DirectX drivers next.. Your video card driver might not be supported on your DirectX patch level.
Get the latest DirectX Patches [here]
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
I downloaded and installed the patch from your link. No difference in anything.
Doom made 3D work because it had a library of sprites drawn from every angle stored in a thing called a WAD file if I remember correctly.
Correct.
Let's recap:
Brand-new, high-end video card: Radio 5570.
Barely any noticeable difference... SOME difference, but not very much on WoW and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed.
Older 3D games (Jedi Knight, Duke Nukem 3D, Return to Castle Wolfenstein) no longer work right. Jedi Knight plays, but has the above-documented display craziness. Neither Duke nor Wolf will launch at all.
HalfLife, oddly enough, runs fine.
All of them ran fine before the new video card.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
Are you running the games in 7 or Vista compatibility mode?
You can use that to tweek graphics card requests..
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
Duke and Wolf are in "Windows XP (Service Pack 2)."
Update: Age of Empires II: The Conquerors Expansion works fine.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
Try setting the game to run in 256 colors and select disable visual themes.
If that dosn't work try reducing the OS version.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
Jedi Knight took a lot of coaxing to work in the first place. It had to run in a window mode during the menus and cutscenes, but then it could be full-screen during the levels. To attain this balance, I had to edit the launch code... big pain in the ass... but I digress. I took your recommendations, and they did not fix that bizarre mirror-flashing phenomenon. At any rate, anything I do to JK won't fix the problem... because, there is a larger problem that is effecting all the games... Duke, Wolf and JK, while experiencing it differently, are all suffering from one master problem that has to do with the new card. They all worked fine before the new card. Thus the new card is the fault, or some aspect of the new card... Furthermore, I wonder why WoW's frame rate isn't flying like I was led to believe. I wonder if all these problems don't have a common error between them.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
You could try downgrading the graphics card driver. Sometimes that helps. Or reverting the graphics card driver back to the old one...
Select the card in device manager..
Right click on the graphics card in device manager...
Click properties...
Click driver tab...
Click roll back driver.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
"Roll back driver" is ghosted-out when I get into that window.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
Darunia Wrote:"Roll back driver" is ghosted-out when I get into that window.Try clicking remove driver...
Then see if the windows driver works better.
If it doesn't go back to the same place and select 'update driver'. This will cause windows to go out on the web and look for the best suitable driver for your system.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
If that doesn't work.. Go to the ATI Web site.. And manually install a older video card driver.
Darunia's New Video Card - Great Rumbler - 17th July 2010
Have you gotten the latest driver for your graphics card yet? If not, do that.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
Great Rumbler Wrote:Have you gotten the latest driver for your graphics card yet? If not, do that.Yea, he said the BustBuy guy installed the latest driver, and that's when this fucked up sandwich began.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
I'm getting 18-25 fps in the capital city on WoW. That''s what I was getting before on my previous video card.
Darunia's New Video Card - Great Rumbler - 17th July 2010
Take the card back and get a new one.
If it still messes up, get an NVIDIA.
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
I hate to say it, but GR might be correct..
Artifacts in 3D games are a sign that the card may be malfunctioning.
You say the card requires a 450W powersupply?
I would have bought higher.
That's not really all that much...
My Pentium 4 machine has a 700W power supply in it and it's almost ten years old.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 17th July 2010
The new video card specifically says 400 watt. I bought a 450 watt power supply. It ought to be more than ample. Can the card be defective...? And still function as it does? Some things run fine... it can't be defective, can it?
Darunia's New Video Card - etoven - 17th July 2010
Darunia Wrote:The new video card specifically says 400 watt. I bought a 450 watt power supply. It ought to be more than ample. Can the card be defective...? And still function as it does? Some things run fine... it can't be defective, can it?Remember.. If your processor is drawing 200W then your card is only getting 250W. 450W seems kind of low to me for a modern video card and your processor type.
Also, yes the card can be defective and still function as it does. Typically when a card has issues with it's GPU only certain instruction sets are effected. So for the most part the card behaves normally, only when certon instructions are called, does it malfunction. And typically it's the instructions dealing with 3D handling that tend to misbehave.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 18th July 2010
I took it back to Best Buy and they put in a new one, a different brand. The Star Wars game runs acceptably now... but WoW... I can't figure it out, but WoW runs no differently. I got 10-22 or so FPS in the big city, and I get about the same (or less) with the new card. I just can't understand it. Everyone else (at least claims) to get 60fps... I don't know...
Darunia's New Video Card - Great Rumbler - 18th July 2010
Try messing with some of the graphical settings and see what happens.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 18th July 2010
That was of course the first thing I did and it made the slightest difference, and did not give me what I would expect. I updated my Windows Index Thing and it went from 3.6 to 5.6. Again, I mean most programs... well, Star Wars anyway... flow nicely, or at least better... but not WoW. I can't figure it out. I tweaked the in-game displays. It made virtually no difference. But, I dropped $200 to boost the video abilities. And wow is by no means a high-end game. WHY WON'T IT FLY?
Darunia's New Video Card - Great Rumbler - 18th July 2010
WoW should be able to run pretty smooth on most machines and your machine is certainly better than most. It doesn't make much sense.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 18th July 2010
I honestly am baffled by WoW's continued poor performance.
My CPU is 1.8 GHz. This Star Wars game recommends a minimum of 2.4 GHz. (but it still runs semi-acceptably.) That said, what is the normal CPU power today? What do you all have, how much would it cost to upgrade it, would that make WoW (Or anything) smoother?
Darunia's New Video Card - EdenMaster - 18th July 2010
CPU's go up in price quite sharply the more powerful they are. Right now I have a 3.0 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo which ran me about $170 when I built this system about a year ago. Replacing a CPU, however, is a much more delicate operation than a simple video card installation, and failures can be quite costly. You'll need that Geek Squad for that one for sure.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115037
Darunia's New Video Card - Great Rumbler - 18th July 2010
Darunia Wrote:I honestly am baffled by WoW's continued poor performance.
My CPU is 1.8 GHz. This Star Wars game recommends a minimum of 2.4 GHz. (but it still runs semi-acceptably.) That said, what is the normal CPU power today? What do you all have, how much would it cost to upgrade it, would that make WoW (Or anything) smoother?
Did you say you've got a quad core? A quad core at 1.8 GHz should be more than enough to run any modern game smoothly.
I mean, I've got a 2.66 GHz Core 2 Duo and I can just about any game just fine, although some of the newer games do have to come down a notch or two.
Darunia's New Video Card - EdenMaster - 18th July 2010
Great Rumbler Wrote:Did you say you've got a quad core? A quad core at 1.8 GHz should be more than enough to run any modern game smoothly.
I mean, I've got a 2.66 GHz Core 2 Duo and I can just about any game just fine, although some of the newer games do have to come down a notch or two.
Same, I've yet to find a game that my rig can't handle. Don't be fooled by the lower GHz, if it truly is a quad core, your 1.8 would trump ours easily.
Darunia's New Video Card - Darunia - 18th July 2010
Taken directly from Windows System profile:
Processor: "AMD Phenom™ 9100e Quad-Core Processor 1.80 GHz."
So I don't know what it is then. WoW should be flying. But it's not.
Darunia's New Video Card - lazyfatbum - 20th July 2010
Update adobe
Update directx (especially if you need 10.5 or 11 on the higher end)
Check your internet connection speed (google), what is your ping in WoW?
Those artifacts are caused because something is blown out on the card, either it got jolted by a previous owner and returned or Best Buy fucked it. It is also possible your RAM is ganked. Test your ram (google)
Never, ever, ever trust anything from the geek squad. I applied there with my extensive knowledge on calibrating televisions and monitors and properly calibrating sound equipment from THX's standards (thank you limewire) and they literally told me to make up shit in order to get the customer to buy more krap. For example, tell them their existing surround sound uses outdated technology that may cause problems for their new TV, then show them a catalog of high-end surround sound.
Darunia's New Video Card - Dark Jaguar - 20th July 2010
Wrist straps are a ripoff. Just touch some metal to discharge your latent charge before you touch anything in there and you'll be fine.