What's holding me back?

[Gazz]

Heya, Im looking for some input from some people who know what theyre on about. I really love playing games to the max, but if theres 1 thing I cant stand is not fluent FPS. My minimum FPS that id like to see is around 60, yet I tend to aim at 120ish FPS.

This is my rigs spec:

Intel I7 860 @ 2.8 GHz.
4 gigs of ram
2x Ati Radeon HD 4870 1GB each, set up for crossfire.
Using a creative fatality soundblaster X-Fi soundcard, platinum championship edition.
Windows 7 64 bit

Running at ultra settings flying thru Elwynn all settings maxxed at 1920x1080 widescreen Im getting 30-ish FPS. Having said that, I do use two monitors atm. 1 widescreen and 1 19 inch normal LCD. I use the widescreen for game, and usually my 19 inch for browsing web, look at vent, etc.

Whats holding me back here? I was certain that those 2 vid cards would get me on at least 100+ FPS. Anyone able to help me out please?

[r3nd]

You're sure you have the drivers installed?

I don't see why you wouldn't see better fps. Maybe add some more RAM, 64 bit can handle way more than that.

[Fuzzykins]

If you're not running Fullscreen (Not Windowed Fullscreen, straight up Fullscreen), you're running on a single card. If a game isn't fullscreen, it can't take advantage of Crossfire, to my knowledge.

[noteworthynerd]

4GB is more than enough RAM for WoW, unless you're multitasking heavily...

2.8GHz is a little slow for an i7, but I doubt that's the problem... How high do you have multi-sampling set inside WoW? I've got a pretty comparable system, and anything after 2x multi-sampling sends my computer into a downward spiral. It might also be the fact you've got 2 gfx cards, I remember reading a few months ago that for older games (like WoW), multiple GPUs actually reduce performance, but that may no longer be the case.

[vesseblah]

Turn shadow quality down few steps, it brings any computer to it's knees.

[General_Typhus]

Hm, crossfire setups are notorious for their low framerate dips, especially with the older cards. I'd highly recommend you make sure your drivers are installed correctly as well.

Make sure you dont have DX11 enabled too...

[Deleted]

You should definately check out your drivers. Ati (amd now) has fixed their problems for their new cards but I don't whether older cards like the one you have is still plagued by ati's driver issues.

Also make sure that your crossfire setup is actually running properly. A single 4870 won't bring stellar performance when you're running 1080 and maxed shadows (they really kill hardware)

[Deleted]

Heya, Im looking for some input from some people who know what theyre on about. I really love playing games to the max, but if theres 1 thing I cant stand is not fluent FPS. My minimum FPS that id like to see is around 60, yet I tend to aim at 120ish FPS.

This is my rigs spec:

Intel I7 860 @ 2.8 GHz.
4 gigs of ram
2x Ati Radeon HD 4870 1GB each, set up for crossfire.
Using a creative fatality soundblaster X-Fi soundcard, platinum championship edition.
Windows 7 64 bit

Running at ultra settings flying thru Elwynn all settings maxxed at 1920x1080 widescreen Im getting 30-ish FPS. Having said that, I do use two monitors atm. 1 widescreen and 1 19 inch normal LCD. I use the widescreen for game, and usually my 19 inch for browsing web, look at vent, etc.

Whats holding me back here? I was certain that those 2 vid cards would get me on at least 100+ FPS. Anyone able to help me out please?

I get 60 fps pretty much anywhere but elwynn kills me to 30 easily. I think it's the trees.

[Blackeyecycle]

I've read in multiple forums that WoW plays smoother in full screen. Give it a shot to compare actual numbers.

[Gazz]

I run at windowed full screen atm, is it true it stops crossfire?

EDIT, seems windowed mode does stop crossfire. However fullscreen didnt raise my FPS in elwynn at all. Is it the RAM thats holding me back then? Or are these cards really outdated? I havent had em for too long, they should last me longer then just a year surely? Drivers are definatly up-to-date, I visit regulary to download the newest drivers. Also, does anyone know if using dual screen stops crossfire from working?

[electrikfuzz]

Unless you have a 120hz monitor you don't need more than 60 fps.

[ispano]

Yeah only SLI works windowed for now. Also WoW doesn't really get much benefit from either setup anyways. I have 2 5970s, ie 4 GPUs and if I use one GPU or 4, the performance is about the same overall, just with 4 GPUs the load is much lighter per GPU. Think like 20-30% per GPU in Org @ 2560x1600

[Fuzzykins]

Yeah only SLI works windowed for now. Also WoW doesn't really get much benefit from either setup anyways. I have 2 5970s, ie 4 GPUs and if I use one GPU or 4, the performance is about the same overall, just with 4 GPUs the load is much lighter per GPU. Think like 20-30% per GPU in Org @ 2560x1600

By windowed, I think he means full screen. Electrikfuzz is right, unless you have a 120hz monitor, you are physically unable to see over 60 fps. Keep vertical sync on. Turn off shadows in Elwynn, as I had issues there too. Combined with the full view distance, the shadows cast from EVERY tree put a lot of strain on my GPU.

[Gazz]

Looking at my performance monitor. It seems my CPU is using about 15% during wow. My ram is usually around 80% though. Im getting different results whilst googling the problem. Looking at my catalyst driver it says crossfire IS enabled. I've seen people post that crossfire still works when running the fullscreen mode on 1 monitor, even if the other is only displaying a webpage or whatnot. Others say it doesn't. Oh how I love the consistency of the internet. If only people who knew the definitive answer would put stuff online it would be so much easier to find the right answer

[vesseblah]

If only people who knew the definitive answer would put stuff online it would be so much easier to find the right answer

Turn shadow quality down few steps, it brings any computer to it's knees.

Don't ignore the obvious solution. Your PC is just too slow to run WoW with everything maxed out.

[ispano]

By windowed, I think he means full screen. Electrikfuzz is right, unless you have a 120hz monitor, you are physically unable to see over 60 fps. Keep vertical sync on. Turn off shadows in Elwynn, as I had issues there too. Combined with the full view distance, the shadows cast from EVERY tree put a lot of strain on my GPU.

He confirmed that Crossfire was not working in Windowed mode. I confirmed that, also stating only SLI will worked windowed for the moment.
Because if it's windowed, whether it's fullscreen or not, it's still windowed and Crossfire will not work.

[Gazz]

Don't ignore the obvious solution. Your PC is just too slow to run WoW with everything maxed out.

Thanks for useless reply. The topic name is whats holding me back. So, whats holding me back. Dont have anything usefull to say then go troll somewhere else.

As for the FPS question. I dont know about you guys but I definatly notice a difference between playing something at 60 fps and playing something at 125 FPS. It simply looks smoother. I dont need 125 FPS on wow, not at all. But first person shooters I DO aim at 100+. I can see it smoother, and it does effect my gameplay.

Back on topic, I am not referring to first person shooters with this post, im referring to wow. I want to run it smoother, and im not sure if its because

A, CPU not fast enough
B, RAM is not enough
C, graphic cards are too old
D, Im setting it up wrong, as in, dual monitors preventing crossfire (cant find consistent answer on google)

I could try to manually disable the second monitor by using the catalyst control centre when gaming. Though previous tests I havent seen a big difference, usually just 1 - 5 FPS

[Fuzzykins]

Thanks for useless reply. The topic name is whats holding me back. So, whats holding me back. Dont have anything usefull to say then go troll somewhere else.

As for the FPS question. I dont know about you guys but I definatly notice a difference between playing something at 60 fps and playing something at 125 FPS. It simply looks smoother. I dont need 125 FPS on wow, not at all. But first person shooters I DO aim at 100+. I can see it smoother, and it does effect my gameplay.

Back on topic, I am not referring to first person shooters with this post, im referring to wow. I want to run it smoother, and im not sure if its because

A, CPU not fast enough
B, RAM is not enough
C, graphic cards are too old
D, Im setting it up wrong, as in, dual monitors preventing crossfire (cant find consistent answer on google)

I could try to manually disable the second monitor by using the catalyst control centre when gaming. Though previous tests I havent seen a big difference, usually just 1 - 5 FPS

Your PC is too slow to run everything on max. He's not trolling, he's 100% correct. Get over it.
Your CPU is not fast enough, your graphic card is too old, and your crossfire could be acting up. If you're going to get defensive when someone tries suggesting something, then I advise you go elsewhere. Also, doing your own tests before asking for help would be great, thanks. Also, you don't notice a difference. If you had a 120hz monitor, I'd understand if you noticed the difference between 60 and 120 fps. However, 60 hz monitors are INCAPABLE of showing above 60 fps, as you can't have more than 1 frame per screen refresh. Get it? The reason vertical sync limits your frame rate to 60 is that it's your monitor's refresh rate, and it would make no difference above 60, even if it was 10000+. It's just additional strain on your graphics card.

Edit: Don't turn this into an "Oh my GOD! I can see above 60 FPS though!" argument. The human eye IS capable of seeing above 60 fps, whether you want to agree or not. It's just the limited monitors that are able to display above that.

[Gazz]

I dont quite appreciate it when asking what is holding me back, someone says your shit is too old. I know its holding me back, hence im asking, what part of it is holding me back, hence his comment is useless. Your comment is usefull. I used to be a sergeant in the military, I can handle criticism just fine thank you. Im not asking people to do any tests, im asking for knowledge that I lack and am unable to find useing the means of google. Hence I come on forums, asking for input by people who can put up REASON behind why they think something. That will help me understand whats going on here.

So if I understand you correctly, you claim everything is too old. What is the thing that is holding me back most though. What kind of upgrade would get me the biggest bang for the buck, what is 'bottlenecking' me. Thats what im after.

[Majesticii]

His computer is fast enough for fuck sake, it's an i7-860. This game is just a big texture database, and when you're flying over an area with lots of objects, like elwynn with the trees and such, your harddrive constantly needs to load. Try using a Raid0 setup with 2 fast drives, or install wow on a solid state drive. I can run wow on ultra NO problem with an i5-760 gts250! But then again i have wow installed on a OCZ vertex2