Radeon 9000 & directX 9.0c = graphical hiccups

gunde99 · Mar 12, 2006, 08:54 PM

Hi!

I have trouble playing som games that used to run smoothly before. I'm not really sure when this happened cause I didn't have time to play for a while. During this time I installed directX 9.0c with winXP SP2. When I got back to play I noticed that after a while, the game started to run kind of choppy for 5-10sec and than run smoothly again for 20-30sec before getting slow again. I figured I have to upgrade my drivers but DELL didn't have any ATI drivers newer than 2003. The sound drivers are from nov 2004. So i found Omega-drivers and installed the newest version each time it was released but none of them solved my issue. Actually, some of the drivers made things worse with flickering screen and distorted graphics (only in 3d-games). The one that worked best so far are the version 2.6.83 (Catalyst 5.11).

What could this be, and what can be done to solve it?

Thanks!

my specs:
GFX MODEL:
Mobility Radeon 9000 AGP, 64 MB
LAPTOP MAKE and MODEL:
DELL INSPIRON 5150
CPU:
Mobile Intel Pentium 4, 3.0 ghz
MEMORY:
512 MB RAM 256x2
HARD DRIVE:
60 gig

the games that won't work:
Medal of Honor Allied assault
Call of duty
NFS Underground 2

The game that still work:
Rome total war.

fobis · Mar 12, 2006, 09:22 PM

Did you make sure you uninstalled all your old drivers and cleaned them with DriverCleaner Pro before installing the new ones?
Also, it could just be that SP2 overwrote all of your chipset drivers and such. So you may have to download those from Dell or from Intel and install them again.
Hope this helps,
-fobis

gunde99 · Mar 13, 2006, 12:34 PM

Thanks fobis!

I think I solved it.

I followed your advice and I also installed this great utility which controls the fan: http://www.diefer.de/i8kfan/

With these improvements I was able to play for about 15 minutes before the problems came along.

The computer gets very hot very fast so I thought that it was an heat issue. The fan wasn't working as hard as I remembered it to, so I looked at the DELL support pages to see what can be done against the heat build-up. There I found a thread explaining that the power settings actually changed the CPU-speed. I changed the scheme from Laptop to Desktop and the CPU speed got up from 1600 to 3200 MHz. Perhaps this is well-known but for me it was big news. I was now able to play for about 20 minutes without experiencing any problems. The fan is now working at its maximum as before. Case closed

Sorry for bothering you. I thought it could have been some magical setting in Omega Drivers that I missed.

BriK · Sep 15, 2006, 09:47 PM

Updating to SP2 can overwrite your chipset drivers?

Any way to check this?

I am having a problem where my laptop starts flickering after playing dark ages of camelot for a few minutes...this problem just started a few months ago, it ran DAOC fine before...I am not sure what started it...I have been thinking heat, because I tried everything else...but I cleaned it with compressed air from a compressor at work (lots of pressure and it is dry air)...I updated to directx 9c...I uninstalled and reinstalled ATI drivers 6.8 using driver cleaner...I did memory checks...its quite possible that the problems started about the time I updated to sp2 but i cant be sure cause i have been living with this problem for a long time as my laptop is for a buffing bot in DAOC while I actually play on my desktop PC...I had windows auto updates off for a long time, but one day decided to update and included was sp2...

Do you actually think sp2 could have over writen the chipset drivers?

...and by "chipset drivers" which drivers do you mean...the motherboard...or something else?

I have a 3.2ghz laptop with xp, ati radeon mobility 9700 with 256, 1gig of ram...

Mar 12, 2006, 08:54 PM	#1
gunde99 DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Mar 2006 Posts: 2 Rep Power: 0	Radeon 9000 & directX 9.0c = graphical hiccups Hi! I have trouble playing som games that used to run smoothly before. I'm not really sure when this happened cause I didn't have time to play for a while. During this time I installed directX 9.0c with winXP SP2. When I got back to play I noticed that after a while, the game started to run kind of choppy for 5-10sec and than run smoothly again for 20-30sec before getting slow again. I figured I have to upgrade my drivers but DELL didn't have any ATI drivers newer than 2003. The sound drivers are from nov 2004. So i found Omega-drivers and installed the newest version each time it was released but none of them solved my issue. Actually, some of the drivers made things worse with flickering screen and distorted graphics (only in 3d-games). The one that worked best so far are the version 2.6.83 (Catalyst 5.11). What could this be, and what can be done to solve it? Thanks! my specs: GFX MODEL: Mobility Radeon 9000 AGP, 64 MB LAPTOP MAKE and MODEL: DELL INSPIRON 5150 CPU: Mobile Intel Pentium 4, 3.0 ghz MEMORY: 512 MB RAM 256x2 HARD DRIVE: 60 gig the games that won't work: Medal of Honor Allied assault Call of duty NFS Underground 2 The game that still work: Rome total war.

Mar 12, 2006, 09:22 PM	#2
fobis DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2005 Posts: 716 Rep Power: 51	Did you make sure you uninstalled all your old drivers and cleaned them with DriverCleaner Pro before installing the new ones? Also, it could just be that SP2 overwrote all of your chipset drivers and such. So you may have to download those from Dell or from Intel and install them again. Hope this helps, -fobis __________________ MacBook Pro Mac OS X Leopard 10.5.4 Intel Core 2 Duo 2.33GHz 2GB DDR2-677 ATi Mobility Radeon X1600 256MB 120GB 7200RPM SATA HDD

Sep 15, 2006, 09:47 PM	#4
BriK DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Sep 2006 Posts: 5 Rep Power: 0	Updating to SP2 can overwrite your chipset drivers? Any way to check this? I am having a problem where my laptop starts flickering after playing dark ages of camelot for a few minutes...this problem just started a few months ago, it ran DAOC fine before...I am not sure what started it...I have been thinking heat, because I tried everything else...but I cleaned it with compressed air from a compressor at work (lots of pressure and it is dry air)...I updated to directx 9c...I uninstalled and reinstalled ATI drivers 6.8 using driver cleaner...I did memory checks...its quite possible that the problems started about the time I updated to sp2 but i cant be sure cause i have been living with this problem for a long time as my laptop is for a buffing bot in DAOC while I actually play on my desktop PC...I had windows auto updates off for a long time, but one day decided to update and included was sp2... Do you actually think sp2 could have over writen the chipset drivers? ...and by "chipset drivers" which drivers do you mean...the motherboard...or something else? I have a 3.2ghz laptop with xp, ati radeon mobility 9700 with 256, 1gig of ram... Last edited by BriK; Sep 15, 2006 at 09:49 PM. Reason: PC config

Mar 13, 2006, 12:34 PM	Thread Starter #3
gunde99 DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Mar 2006 Posts: 2 Rep Power: 0	Thanks fobis! I think I solved it. I followed your advice and I also installed this great utility which controls the fan: http://www.diefer.de/i8kfan/ With these improvements I was able to play for about 15 minutes before the problems came along. The computer gets very hot very fast so I thought that it was an heat issue. The fan wasn't working as hard as I remembered it to, so I looked at the DELL support pages to see what can be done against the heat build-up. There I found a thread explaining that the power settings actually changed the CPU-speed. I changed the scheme from Laptop to Desktop and the CPU speed got up from 1600 to 3200 MHz. Perhaps this is well-known but for me it was big news. I was now able to play for about 20 minutes without experiencing any problems. The fan is now working at its maximum as before. Case closed Sorry for bothering you. I thought it could have been some magical setting in Omega Drivers that I missed.