Rig underperforming?

[Deleted]

As the title says I think my rig isn't pulling what it's supposed to, here are the specs:

CPU: i5 2500k 4.4Ghz
Mobo: Asus P8P67 Pro
CPU cooler: Thermaltake Frio
Ram: G.Skill Ripjaws-X DDR3-1333Mhz CL7
GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD 6950 2GB
PSU: Corsair 750HX
HDD: Samsung spinpoint F3 1TB

Have everything maxed out with 1920x1080 resolution, normally I'm capped at 60 fps with vsync on but during some fights the fps just goes to shit.
For example on Rhyolith I drop as low as 30, on heroic domo it hovers around 45-50 and so on. I have tried dropping shadows, but that seems to have no real effect on anything as far as I could tell, have also tried dropping other settings with little to no success really.

Am I just expecting too much from my system, or could there be something wrong with it? I've heard and read that people with similar setups are getting far better results, is this just people bragging without anything to back up those claims with or am I getting worse results than they are?

My computer Isn't over heating either, so that shouldn't be the problem. My drivers are up to date and I clean my computer regularly.

So am I right at thinking somethings off or is this the kind of performance I should be getting?

[vesseblah]

Have everything maxed out with 1920x1080 resolution, normally I'm capped at 60 fps with vsync on but during some fights the fps just goes to shit. For example on Rhyolith I drop as low as 30, on heroic domo it hovers around 45-50 and so on. I have tried dropping shadows, but that seems to have no real effect on anything as far as I could tell, have also tried dropping other settings with little to no success really.

Nothing will run WoW at maxed settings without dropping below 40 during some AOE phases, so it's totally normal. Keep shadows one step from max, that should give best tradeoff for picture quality vs speed. Also make sure you have all settings in AMD drivers on "let game decide" instead of trying to force any AA/AF modes, otherwise you will get reduced performance in WoW and many other games.

[Patchouli]

Nothing will run WoW at maxed settings without dropping below 40 during some AOE phases,

An I7 at 4.0ghz+ and crossfire 6970's can easily complete that task...

[Shakadam]

Sounds about right imo. There is no "normal" computer that can manage a constant 60+ fps with no drops whatsoever in WoW.

[Deleted]

aslong as its above 30fps should be ok. when it goes under that it skips frames and makes it annoying. still playable but i wouldn't like to play if i couldnt hold higher than 30fps.

[vesseblah]

An I7 at 4.0ghz+ and crossfire 6970's can easily complete that task...

And then you wake up to reality and see 30fps in 25-man raid. Old i7 is weak compared to 2500K/2600K when it comes to maxing out WoW fps in busy places like cities and raids.

[Cyanotical]

Nothing will run WoW at maxed settings without dropping below 40 during some AOE phases, so it's totally normal.

you know better then to make an absolute statement like that

[vesseblah]

you know better then to make an absolute statement like that

I'll take it back when you provide video capture of you doing [Many Whelps! Handle it! (25 player)] with the video quality slider pushed to ultra on 1920x1080 or higher resolution and framerate not even once dropping below 60. Again, nothing will run WoW at maxed settings 100% of the time.

[Wries]

An I7 at 4.0ghz+ and crossfire 6970's can easily complete that task...

Crossfire 6970 over the top extreme overkill for playing WoW in a common screen resolution. And no perfect 60 fps I really doubt can be had at all situations in this game.

I'll take it back when you provide video capture of you doing [Many Whelps! Handle it! (25 player)] with the video quality slider pushed to ultra on 1920x1080 or higher resolution and framerate not even once dropping below 60. Again, nothing will run WoW at maxed settings 100% of the time.

Thinking of trying this, pushing it to 5 GHz HT off and see how close I get ;o. But have a feeling I'll meet a BSOD mid-fight or something ^^

Any guild I can borrow?

[Skelly]

Are you running Fullscreen, Fullscreen (windowed) or windowed?

[vesseblah]

Thinking of trying this, pushing it to 5 GHz HT off and see how close I get ;o. But have a feeling I'll meet a BSOD mid-fight or something ^^

I've heard (although never seen any proof) that dual xeons at 5GHz and tri-SLI can do around 45-50fps on "many whelps". But considering my PC drops to 15 there while it runs everything else at 40-50 I really doubt that Cyanotical will get much better success either.

[Cyanotical]

I've heard (although never seen any proof) that dual xeons at 5GHz and tri-SLI can do around 45-50fps on "many whelps". But considering my PC drops to 15 there while it runs everything else at 40-50 I really doubt that Cyanotical will get much better success either.

would make a fun challenge, but not something i can do till i get new monitors, im either 1440x900, or 4320x900, but i don't think the res is the main issue with aoe, it's probably more do do with the combat log, which makes me wonder if a 64bit wow client would solve this

[glo]

would make a fun challenge, but not something i can do till i get new monitors, im either 1440x900, or 4320x900, but i don't think the res is the main issue with aoe, it's probably more do do with the combat log, which makes me wonder if a 64bit wow client would solve this

You could easily test this by turning off the combat log. :P

I think another issue is how poorly the game engine handles large amounts of particle effects.

[vesseblah]

but i don't think the res is the main issue with aoe, it's probably more do do with the combat log, which makes me wonder if a 64bit wow client would solve this

Yep, combat log and spell effects of running large amount of concurrent AOEs in small area is what kills the framerate totally. You can simulate the effect (partially) by hacking particle density higher in config.wtf if you want to

[Cyanotical]

You could easily test this by turning off the combat log. :P

I think another issue is how poorly the game engine handles large amounts of particle effects.

your computer still has to process the combat data, regardless of if you use the UI log, the main issue isn't hardware, its software, wow is very badly optimized for modern hardware, running 32bit across 3 cores is pretty weak

[vesseblah]

wow is very badly optimized for modern hardware, running 32bit across 3 cores is pretty weak

No action games can handle multiple threads too well. Timing between threads will be an issue, especially when the game is all about latency sensitivity. Also there's no AI or physics modeling in WoW at all that would run on client side, all of that is handled by servers which means the game client is very hard to split into threads.

[Neeko]

An I7 at 4.0ghz+ and crossfire 6970's can easily complete that task...

i7 2600K @ 4.7 Ghz
GTX 480 SLI
Corsair Vengeance 1866 MhZ CL 9 16 Gigs
ASUS MAXIMUS IV P67
Raid 0 OCZ agility 3

and it happends to me ALL the time, so, no, ur wrong

[Yohassakura]

Have everything maxed out with 1920x1080 resolution, normally I'm capped at 60 fps with vsync on but during some fights the fps just goes to shit.
For example on Rhyolith I drop as low as 30, on heroic domo it hovers around 45-50 and so on.

With V-Sync on, your frame rate if below 60 will cut to 30, or with triple buffering on, it will drop to 45. Without V-Sync on, it may just drop to 50, though without you trying it out, I got no idea... Still running a 775 socket core 2 duo myself...

Essentially this means that with double-buffered VSync, the framerate can only be equal to a discrete set of values equal to Refresh / N where N is some positive integer. That means if you're talking about 60Hz refresh rate, the only framerates you can get are 60, 30, 20, 15, 12, 10, etc etc. You can see the big gap between 60 and 30 there. Any framerate between 60 and 30 your video card would normally put out would get dropped to 30.

^ Go there to read more if you want.

[Deleted]

Are you running Fullscreen, Fullscreen (windowed) or windowed?

Fulscreen (windowed), will see tonight if running in fullscreen improves anything.