Graphics Awsome Video Card, but bad FPS :-(

Hello all,
I just installed a NIVIDIA e-Geforce 7800gs agp 8x video card yesterday. I am a big time rps and strategy game player and FPS means alot to me. I have updated everything i know to update and i am still averaging 20-40FPS on average settings with 1085X768 resolution. I am looking for advice or for a missing link to get the kind of Frame rates this card should be getting. I am open to any suggestions and hope that the host of knowlede you guys posses is enough to help me! Thanks for any input. Below is a list of my computers components:
2.6 Intel Celeron Pentium 4
soyo dragon lite MOBO
1.5 mb of ddr ram
80 gb ata 33 hd
***NVIDIA E-Geforce 7800 GS

PLEASE HELP ME INCREASE MY FRAME RATE!

 

Do you mean "FPS" (First Person Shooter) instead of "rps" ?

Which game/s are you refferring to particularly ?

Um, "1.5mb of ddr ram" would be a tiny amount, do you mean 1.5 gigabit ?

What graphics card did you have before ?

Looking at the component list its entirely possible you managed to go from GPU limited to CPU limited, Or potentially memory limited (Or other less obvious problems for that matter) Without a bit more detail its hard to even guess as to whats actually happening though.

 

Well, the Celeron is bogging things down. Seeing that you can't have 1.5 megabytes of RAM, I'll assume that's 1.5 gigs. And I'll also assume you mean either FPS or RTS game types. Also if that hard drive is actually ATA/33 that'll be a bottleneck to some degree, but shouldn't affect framerates (just loading times).

 

What games are you getting 20-40fps on? And what settings are you running these games at?

 

Without question it's your CPU. The Celeron uses the P4 architecture which is heavily dependent upon things like cache, FSB and memory bandwidth and this is exactly where Intel cuts corners to bring in the Celerons cheaper (and intentionally choke them so the P4's can look good). The Celeron @3ghz is still often slower than a P4 @2ghz, if you want to see the potential of your wonderful gfx card you must upgrade your CPU, it's simple as that. Currently even a 6600GT (a good mid-range card) would be held back by your Celeron @2.6ghz, a 7800GT coupled with it is just a waste. I'd recommend at least a P4 3.4ghz minimum to begin to let a 7800GT stretch its legs.

Of course the mobo chipset, speed of RAM and even Windows' background tasks can all become factors too but to a much lesser extent. To a degree it shouldn't matter what game you play nor what detail settings you use as a 7800GT should play all current games very well with maximum details at 1280 res or often higher. Just to cover your system spec; 80GB is very small by today's standards, even 300GB HDs are pretty cheap now and as said ATA33 is old although it will only take things longer to load but not truly affect performance. BTW ATA33 only has a maximum speed of 33MB/s with most modern HDs averaging around 60MB and peaking around 100MB/s, however it is likely it is actually ATA133 (133MB/s). Finally as others have said it's surely 1.5GB (ie. 1536MB) you mean.

 

Er austin he actally states 7800GS, the point is still perfectly valid though, glad to hear it from someone who's actually kept up with intel CPU's (I knew p4 = bad, celeron = bad .. but thats about it )

 

P4's are not bad - wish people would stop saying rubbish like that. Intel may not be as quick as AMD in gaming but they are deffo not bad. Had a 3.2 northy before current setup and can honestly say that only a small visible difference can be seen in games.

 

It is 1500 mb of ddr ram. What I am looking to increase is my Frames per second. You guys mean to tell me that with this intel celeron 2.6 ghz, 1500 mb of ram, and Nvidia e-Geforce 7800 gs and the best frame rate i will get is 20-40? Please help me if it all possible.

Games I play/avg FPS:
BF2/30-40
CSS/20-40
Fear/15-35

I play all of these games at less than full settings at a resolution of 1024X768 60hz. Please help me!!!!!!!

 

The best thing you can do for your system is drop in a 3-3.4GHz P4, that celeron is a serious bottleneck in your system, you won't be getting anywhere near the most out of your video card

 

Yeah, stick a nice P4 in it and you'll notice a big boost in programs, games and the general OS.

 

What would I do in order to pop another chip in there. I am assuming that is what you guys are talking about. Give me an example of a cost and what i would have to do thanks....

 

Thanks Bladestorm , I'm not sure how I missed that. The 7800GS is a step down from 7800GT, it's similar to a 6800GT so still deserves a fast CPU such as a P4 3.0ghz.

"Soyo dragon lite MOBO" is not enough info as there are several models. Your mobo is almost certainly Socket478 for which you'd want any P4 based on the NorthWood core (P4C) which have 512K of "L2 cache". The newer and plentiful Prescotts (featuring "1MB of L2 cache") are not good in Socket478 as they are no faster, much hotter and less compatible. Best bet for a NW P4 would be 2nd hand, eBay perhaps so do a search and keep track of their ending prices. Some unwitting person would probably pay a fair price for your existing Celeron 2.4ghz, do bear in mind a P4 2.0ghz would be a noticable upgrade but as said it would be madness to get any P4 slower than 3.0ghz.

 

Frame of context for "Bad" = relative clockspeed to power ratio, "Bad" as in not "Good" and "P4" as in not "P4D or PFEE or whatever and of course all being used with the subject of games.

 

Good luck finding a P4 northwood. They seem pretty rare nowadays, even on ebay. The ones you will find are pretty expensive (atleast $100), so it almost makes sense just to buy a new cpu-mobo combo for like $115 and get the same speed increase, but with updated (sort of) hardware. I just wouldn't necessarily limit yourself to a 478 northwood, look at other options from AMD too...it may be cheaper or more practical just buying a new cpu and mobo.

Update: Damn, processors are expensive. I remember when my friend got a 2500+ AthlonXP and a mobo for $99 when the P4 2.8 HT was the processor of choice. At newegg, I can't find anything under $100, even refurbs. I remember back in the day a 2500+ used to cost ~$50 at newegg. Is there a silicon shortage or something? Everything midrange is still the same at ~$200-300, but cheap athlonXP's are no more. I guess ebay is the answer.

 

I got my xfx 7800gs yesterday and I get great fps. Fear runs smooth at 1280x960 with med to high settings. You are no longer limited by gfx but by cpu. Your best bet would be a total upgrade, x2 s939, 7800gt.

 

I think the idea is that the new socket out later this year will take over as high end, socket 939 becomes middle/low end and 754 is phased out completely, just that the new socket hasn't come out yet .. so 939 is currently both mid end and high end, with the low end just about being 754, though since its already been in the process of being phased out for a while now, supply are low and prices consqeuently not.

 

AFAIK AMD plan to phase out both 754 and 939 and offer all their products under the single new 940-AM2, possibly even Opteron too. From what I recall 754 may outlive 939 albeit minorly as the Semprons will be the last to move to 940-AM2. As we move into 2007 I genuinely expect new 754 & 939 products to become rare but 940-AM2 should stick around for a very good while. Unfortunately things aren't looking any longer lived on the Intel front where major changes are afoot as they change over from sweaty P4 derived offerings to under-nourished P-M offerings.

 

S939 is going to outlive S754 according to the roadmap anyway

 

It must have changed then since the last time I checked it, last I heard AMD were ceasing production of both 754 & 939 in Q1 2007. Anyway I'm happy enough with my 939 setup, I'll wait for all of the enthusiasts to sell off their 939 A64-X2 dual-cores, grab one cheap and then wait for 940-AM2 to both mature and drop in price before even considering switching, that will be 2008-2009 by my reckoning.

 

Here is a old review with your 2.6ghz Celeron included Clash of the Rons As you can see that Northwood based Celery is about as fast as a herd of turtles A used P4B or C *doesn't look like your board supports presshot* would be an excellent drop in replacement, or you can pick up a skt754 Sempr0n&board combo Outpost has this killer deal on a 3100+&board combo for about the same money, and seriously improve you gaming performance on the cheap. Sempr0n runs really cool so you can grab a $10 cooler for it and be good to go.

EDIT:LOL I just noticed the OP is 2 months old.