I just put together what I thought was a killer system, but it seems to be choking in the games department.
This is the problem. From Doom 1 (you heard it) all the way to Quake 3, Icewind Dale, etc., it intermittently chunks for a second or two, then runs fine, then chunks....
 
Here's the specs:
 
Athlon socket 5 Gigabyte GA-7DXC motherboard
Athlon 1100 CPU (boxed with factory heatsink)
128 MB DDR Unbuffered RAM
Geforce 256 with 32 MB DDR RAM (creative's annihilator pro)
ATA 100 40GB IBM HD
Hitachi DVD (GD-7500)
D-Link 10BT network card.
 
No conflicts, not overheating, and the task scheduler is off.
 
there are a lot of motherboard settings that I'm not real familiar with, but I have the video card settings (BIOS) set like this:
 
AGP Aperture size: 64MB
AGP Fast write: Enabled
AGP Mode: 4X
AGP always compensate: Enabled
(These are the defaults)
 
I left the following settings at default also:
SDRAM ECC setting (disabled)
DRAM timing setting by (auto)
DRAM Ph Limit (8 cycle)
DRAM Idle limit (8 cycle)
DRAM Trc timing value (8 cycle)
DRAM Trp value (3 cycle)
DRAM Tras timing value (7 cycle)
DRAM CAS latency (2 cycle)
SDRAM Trcd timing value (3 cycle)
 
The system Bus range is from 95-133, and I left it at the default: (Motherboard switches)
CPU(109) PCI(33.66) AGP(67.335)
Any change to one changes them all....
 
Another thing that I notice is when I check the physical memory available, there is between 20 and 60 MB free,(out of 128) and I'm not running a bunch of junk in the background.
 
Any help or ideas would be GREATLY appreciated.
 
Thanks,
 
Anubis

Try setting the AGP Aperture size to 32.

Yea, I tried that.. No difference.. I also moved the system bus down to 95 after reading an article on Tweak3d.
(that got the AGP bus closest to 66)
I also tried disabling AGP fast write. No difference.
 
In quake3 it will be running at 60-90fps, then for a second or two become unplayable (3-10fps), then go right back up again.
 
Thanks
 
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by TheRealAnubis on 01/19/01 07:55 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

Post deleted by Take_Out What was in here basically, is that you go to My Computer icon, right click on it, left click on Properties, left click on performance, and you should read a percentage of RAM left to run new stuff, like games.  The percentage should be about 85% to 98%, higher is better. What can sometimes happen, the game has not enough memory to put all the info it wants into, so it has to access the hard drive and this is MUCH slower, causing possibly the slow downs like you describe.
Another item, before I screwed the pooch on edit, was that you can (only in Half-Life as far as I know) add to the command line (found in properties of the icon) this command:
-heapsize 80000   This command tells the computer (I think) to set aside so much memory for the game to use if it wants to. There is another I use that I have no idea what it does:
-zone 4000  Both of these have to do with memory performance as far as I know. Some others are -nojoy -numericping -32bpp (this one is for 32 bit color) -noipx -console. Note that the memory settings are for use with 128meg RAM. Good Luck, Take-Out   <P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Take_Out on 01/23/01 05:09 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

Yea, that seems like it could be true..
See, the minimum setting for the AGP aperture size is 32MB, and it looks like it's reserving that from the motherboard RAM for the video card.. That then leaves me with less than 100MB RAM to start with...
 
Also, are the SDRAM settings needed for DDR (PC2100) RAM ??
 
I may just have to go out and get another stick of RAM.
 
Thanks,
 
Wes

"In quake3 it will be running at 60-90fps"
 
you should be getting 170fps in 640x480x16. if not, yer motherboard has issues. mine does and am getting a replacement

Are you running Win2K? Win2K is a RAM eater and a performance reducer.
Is your CPU clocked at 100 or 133 Mhz? If it is at 133Mhz, why is it set at 109?
I guess you've got PC2100. So make sure your FSB and memory clocks are set to 133Mhz unless, of course, you've got a 100Mhz cpu clock.
 
   - Better go Green than Blue!

Yea, but mine's set at 1280X1024 with everything maxed...

I'm running Win98SE
 
The 95-133 bus settings are the only ones offered.
 
This is the first good system that I've had, so I'm not up on the tweaks.. What bus speed should an Athlon socket 5 1100 CPU be set at?
 
I didn't notice any change in the whole deal going down, and it's just a simple 4 position switch on the motherboard away to do the 133 MHz.  I don't want to overclock, though.
 
The reason that I set it down to 95 is because an article on Tweak3d about the Geforce256 said that it shouldn't have the AGP bus set above 66.  The only settings that come close are the 95 MHz (AGP at 63.33) or the 133 (AGP at 66.6)
 
I just tried it on the 133 setting and the system wouldn't boot up...

Well ill supprised that that system even ran quake 3 at all.  I pick up an early Micron DDR Athlon system at best buy after my old IBM crapped out(which was a replacement for a laptop......the only reason i owned a manufactured tower).  The preformance on that thing with a gig tbird and a TNT2 Ultra was worse then my classic athlon 600.  I had to disable the sound to even get around 3 fps.  Didnt take much time for that system to go back, I think it was around 3 hours.  Somethings wrong with the 760's or atleast the first runs of them?

That's really weird.  THG saw nothing that startling with the new chipsets.  I'm thinking it's the Micron/Best Buy thing.  Try www.alienware.com.  They build very good systems from the reviews I've seen.

I didnt really have a choice in the matter.  Sold my hand built p233 tower for money on a laptop for college.  Laptop died, didnt really need/want another one so got a IBM tower.  Then the IBM died, but I had a p3 733 815E system built already.  Then got the micron amd DDR gig system(to see what it would do/maybe swap out the chip and board to my system), it sucked major a$$.  Seeing a pattern here.  System from best buy are complete crap, but once they have your money all ya can do is keep getting crap system from them or store credit.  Thats why my p3 733 system got a new GF2 Pro, 19" FD trinitron, Altec Lansing AC56 speakers, and a joystick courtesy of Best Buy.  And the 733 system is still running with out a hitch.  Hand built is the way to go for sure, stumbled into store bought systems for a while.  Best of all I sold the p233 to my aunt and its still running just fine too.

Quick idea:  Check your Via 4-in-1 drivers.  A missing or corrupted installation could crap up your performance.
 
Tom Mc
 
Even a fool, when he remains silent, appears wise.

Of course, there are no FSB over 133Mhz as of yet (at least, that I know about). A 200Mhz FSB is actually a 100Mhz FSB double pumped (hence DDR). To set your FSB at 100Mhz, your Athlon must be made to be clocked at 200Mhz. If your Athlon is clocked at 266Mhz, then set your FSB to 133Mhz.
You'll need PC2100 DDR SDRAM if you run the FSB at 133 or 100Mhz. If you use PC1600 DDR SDRAM, you will need to run the FSB at 100Mhz. So you can't use PC1600 with a 266Mhz enabled CPU.
 
   - Better go Green than Blue!

Ok,
 
It's PC2100 DDR Unbuffered RAM, and the system bus is set at 100.  I tried setting it on 133 and it wouldn't boot up.
 
How can I tell if my Athlon is clocked at 200 or 266?
(or is the above result the answer??)
 
Anubis

If it boots at 100Mhz, you've got a winner!
Or you could try these applications from AMD :
 
http://www.amd.com/products/cpg/bin/amdcpuid.exe
 
http://www.amd.com/products/cpg/bin/cpuinfo.exe
 
 
 
 
   - Better go Green than Blue!

Hey,
 
I tried both of the apps, and neither one says anything about bus speed.. Am I missing something?
 
Also, I got a hint about the RAM earlier and I think that may be a big part of it.. Does the AGP video card hog up your system RAM?  I have practically nothing running and I'm still down to 40-70MB free physical memory.
(I just ordered another stick of 128)
 
Anubis

Well, you usually can tell the FSB by the part number on the CPU, but that would mean taking the heatsink off.
 
The system may supply a bit of its RAM if the card can't supply enough of his under heavy loads.
 
 
 
   - Better go Green than Blue!

No problem !
 
Just tell me what to look for and I'll do it !
 
Anubis

Try the update about the AGP from AMD and a update from Win2000 that might work.
 
Overclocking is the key to computer.

Hey there,
 
You have some nice equipment.. I built a similar system to what you have with only a few differences... I went with an ABIT KT7-RAID mobo w/ tbird 1.1 GHz, 384 PC133 memory and Anihilator 2 Ultra 64 meg.. I had a few issues at first.. first thing to always check is bios revision.  My system was slugish and locking up.. I had K7 optimization set at optimal and AGP fast writes with AGP writes /reads enabled thus giving greater performance.  Abit released a bios on 12/12/00 and JUST 3 days later another one.. come to find out, they removed the K7 Optimization option in the bios.. they didn't even say that.. they just said it was to fix minor issues such as the north bridge chip enhancements with AGP fast writes.. After I flashed the performance was out of this world... so if you haven't checked for an updated bios for that Gigabyte motherboard, you might try it, even if the revision doesn't list changes that you think will help fix issues with your motherboard.  If