aekaek

Hi,

I got myself a new computer and it has really bad performance playing WoW. Even if I set the lowest graphic setings in the game I cannot look around without lag.

I have a AMD Athlon II x2 220 GHz and 2 Gb of ram
I have an ASUS 9500 AT graphic card (not new but put in to replace the onboard graphics)

Anyone has any idea why the performance is so bad and what I could do abhout it?

Thanks

Anders

Neshi

have you removed the onboard videodrivers and installed video drivers for that particular videocard?

__________________
If one does not attach himself to people and desire, never shall his heart be broken. But then, does he ever truly live?

Life is just too damn short for if's and maybe's

blibbax

Just to check, is that an Nvidia 9500GT (as opposed to anything else, e.g. ATI Radeon 9500)?

__________________

aekaek

Hi,

I have installed the new drivers but I am not sure how to remove the old ones. How can I secure that the onboard graphics is deactivated and drivers removed?

Since I have an nVidea control pannel installed together with the drivers and it sais GeForce 9500 GT I guess it is an nVidia card.

By the way, I have Windows 7 Pro as OS.

Regards

Anders

iPlayer

Do you load other stuff while playing WoW?
The slowdown is generalized?
While overclocking that CPU could help the situation*, you might be in need of more RAM. Might as well check for malware that could be slowing your system.

*insert disclaimer

__________________

aekaek

Hi,

I ran some performance diagrams while rotatiing in WoW. The memory went to 60 % when starting and reamined there. The CPU got some work to do when rotating but did only reach 60 % max. Still there was lag in WoW at lowest graphic resolution.

In the nVidia control panel it sais that it should ruin the graphics excellent for Wow.

Iīm stuck what to do. I have run Wow on old computers with Pentium 4 which ran much faster.

/Anders
Regards

iPlayer

And that was all in highly concurred areas of the game?

Just in case: Is the monitor plugged to the discrete card?

__________________

blibbax

Get GPU-Z and see if GPU load hits 100% while gaming.

__________________

aekaek

Hi,

Yes, I have attached the monitor to the extra graphic board.
When I try Wow I am in a generally non-populated area. So it shold be mostly the graphics I test. If I increase graphic details, the update frequency reduces further so even at pretty low graphic details there is almost no update. It seems like my graphic board is not really used.

How can I monitor GPU performance? I did not find that under the general Performance Monitor selections.

By the way, It should say 3 GHz on processor speed.

Maybe I have done something stupid, I bought at business PC and thought I could use it with a decent graphics card. Maybe something else limits my performance (the board?). What I bought was a HP Pro 3125 MT. It is not that the PC is only intended for gaming, but it is fun to run some games once in a while.

/Anders

Dyre Straits

Check the HP website for any updated motherboard and chipset drivers for that particular motherboard.

What is your Internet connection like? Do you play other online games? How do they compare?

Did you go into the BIOS and disable the onboard/integrated display adapter? If you're intent is to use only the discreet card, you need to do that.

__________________

aekaek

When doing another test I saw that probable one of the kernels go up to 100 % which is probably why the lag comes. What I canīt understand is why the CPU need to work so hard when the graphic board should do the job. Was not able to access the GPU-Z.
It was not possible to remove the graphic card in the setup what I could see. The nVidia is set primary.
I removed any ATI software I could find. There is still an atiedxx.exe running. I donīt know if this is something I need to remove.

iPlayer

Blizzard games tend to be cpu intensive.

Did you try looking for driver updates as Dyre suggested?

__________________

Dyre Straits

Please explain: Was not able to access the GPU-Z

Were you not able to download it, or, it didn't run, or.... ???

To download it you need to use that link that was given and scroll down to the bottom where it says...

Downloads

There is a blue bubble with arrow that you must click in order to download the most recent version.

Also, with Windows 7, you can go to Device Manager, expand the list for your "Display adapters". Highlight the one you wish to have removed. Then, use the Uninstall option that shows up at the top in the options icons.

NOW...VERY IMPORTANT, when you begin to Uninstall this, there is a Check Box that you need to check in order to uninstall the drivers as well.

I would recommend that you do this with both the onboard graphics and then the nVidia card.

Reboot and let Windows install the NATIVE ... that is VGA ... drivers for any graphics card it finds. This may take some time, so, DO NOT interrupt this procedure. Windows may prompt to reboot. So, at that time, do so.

At this point, leave the onboard graphics card alone. Instead, install the most recent drivers that support your nVidia card. Now, here's one thing to keep in mind: That card is pretty old. AND, it may not be fully supported under Windows 7. This is something you have to check on with nVidia. Since I don't use nV cards, I don't have any expertise to offer in this respect. But, it's very important that you get the most recent drivers that actually do support that card under Windows 7.

Finally, I also highly recommend that you download CCleaner. Piriform - Download CCleaner, Defraggler, Recuva, Speccy - Millions of users worldwide! Run the Cleaner option and then also run the Registry option. This will clean up anything that needs to be cleaned up from the system. Be sure to run the Registry option a few times until it doesn't find anything else to clean up. (FTR, I've sometimes had to run it 3 times to get to this point.)

Good luck!

__________________

pispy

Hi there Aek,

Sorry to hear of your problem with graphics in the game..

I play WOW occasionally and have had those same problems occur...

Normally what would happen is that when the patches would come out... the coders would add in new coding that would create problems big time with the hard ware in folks computers .. mostly the graphics.. or sounds..would be affected. So when patch day came around alot of us addicts would brace ourselves and go hard core checking all our hardware and especially the graphic cards while in the game.

If I may point out something here and it is on the WOW site and I hope it is ok to post here... it is regarding the minimum requirements to play the game..


WindowsŪ System XP/XP64/Vista/Vista64/7** OS (with the latest Service Packs or updates):

- Intel Pentium 4 1.3 GHz or AMD Athlon XP 1500+
- 1 GB or more of RAM
- NVIDIAŪ GeForceŪ FX or ATI Radeon™ 9500 video card or better
- 25.0 GB available HD space
- 4X DVD-ROM drive (Downloadable Installer also available)
- Broadband Internet connection
- Keyboard/mouse

and at the bottom of the requirements they have

*Note: Due to potential programming changes, the Minimum System Requirements for this game may change over time.

There is also a recommended specifications available.

WindowsŪ System Vista64/Windows 7 OS:

- Dual-core processor, such as the Intel Pentium D or AMD Athlon 64 X2
- 2 GB RAM
- 256 MB NVIDIAŪ GeForceŪ 8600 or ATI Radeon™ HD 2600 or better
- Multi-button mouse with scroll-wheel

So I'm no computer genius but your card maybe struggling because it is just out of spec for minimum requirements to play the game. My comp is slightly lacking due to me old graphic card as well. Perhaps some comparison with the minimum requirements and what you have now will help with where part of your systems problems occur?

Another problem I encountered was anti aliasing. I had no clue at the time what that was but I would lag out badly in low and high populated areas.. so I went over my settings and turned that off and heck I could actually move around again.

Anyway I hope this helps you.

iPlayer

It's an Nvidia 9500GT graphics card, not an ATI 9500. He also mentioned that the issue persists even at the lowest graphical settings.

__________________

pispy

Yeah I'm aware of what he said Iplayer, thank you for mentioning this however there is the part also that due to potential programming changes, the minimum requirements for this game may change over time. Try every second patch

I was one of 10 officers in a guild of which one of their goals was to chase the high end content. Come patch day was often chaotic due to hardware compatibility problems with the game or in other words something was broke due to coding which often rendered half of the best raiders useless. And often times Blizzard would sneak in some pretty coding in without mentioning it.. and so you have the patch to patch the patch from the patch before the other patch scenario going on. But hey thats another story

blibbax

I do know people who play the game fine on lower cards than a 9500GT. Imo, the problem is that either the GPU is malfunctioning, or the game isn't using it properly.

__________________

aekaek

Hi,

First I want to thank everyone that tries to help me out. I feel a bit lost and I donīt beleive there is any use to call HP since they probably say I need to buy a new graphic card from them.

I managed to install GPU-Z and it give about 50 % load when running the game.

I could only find my new card under Display adapters so probably I have managed to remove the old stuff.

I ran CCcleaner.

So Iīm stuck again. Could it really be the an Athlon II running at 3 GHz could not run Wow decently? I have other computers in my household like a 2,6 GHz Pentium 4 with an old 128 Mb graphic card that runs just fine.

Could it be WIndows 7 (64 bit)?

iPlayer

Try disabling some non essential services, programs and eyecandy(aero). Not enough RAM might be the issue. You could also try reverting to XP.

__________________

aekaek

RAM memory is only used to 50 % ...

iPlayer

That's with WoW loaded? Pretty sure it used over 1GB for me. Guess it's going to the page file..

__________________

blibbax

I've not played WoW in quite a while, but I've definitley seen it hit 1.5GB.

__________________

aekaek

It only goes up to 1.05 Gb.

Hmm, since I was foole by one performance picture showing only the total CPU, not divided on kernel, could it be like the two CPU:s are sharing the 2 Gb meaning 1 Gb each. That would mean that 1 Gb actually means full. Or the graphic card onboard, still has the 1 Gb. I tried to start Word, Excel and Powerpoint simultaneously and it does not go above 1 Gb which indicates that this actually could be the cause.
It could also match th ebeheviour in Wow. When I rotate in one place it is very slow in the beginning but eventually it goes OK as long as I do not move.

Any expert out there who can verify?

Dyre Straits

I suggest you try to Set Affinity so that your CPU is using only one core. See if this doesn't improve the overall all performance of WoW:

NOTE: Although these instructions are for Vista, it's close enough to the same as Windows 7.

How To Set Core Priority In Multi-core Processors- Win vista | TechStroke

__________________

blibbax

I'm no expert, but:

Firstly, applications capable of using one CPU core can actually use all of your memory. Both cores have access to all of the memory, they don't split it between them.

Secondly, I'm pretty sure WoW is capable of using multiple cores simultaneously.

__________________

aekaek

I have now upgrade to 4 Gb RAM. No difference in performance.
Any more suggestions? Could it be a bad motherboard for gaming?

aekaek

I was looking at the running processes and found that aticlxx.exe was running.

Isnīt that related to my old card? If that is the case, how do I remove it?

Dyre Straits

That is correct. It has something to do with the ATI External Event logging.

I found this on another forum that describes how to end it and get rid of it...

Go to Admin Tools, then Services .. look in services list for AMD External Events Utility - stop the service. Then open a command prompt with elevated ( admin ) rights and type -> sc delete "AMD External Events Utility" and that should clear it up ..

Good luck!

__________________

iPlayer

Try disabling Vsync, if it's on.

Is your GPU by chance running with 2d clocks while you game?

Do you notice a lot of HDD activity while you do those tests?

__________________

aekaek

I removed service as suggested and removed vsync. Still problem remains ...