Horrible FPS drop with SLI (bottlenecking?)

A

Andrizzle

New Member
Hello. I wasn't sure where to post this as I just found this forum and am new here! This looks like where people are posting problems so I'll post here.

First off, I have had the PC since about september of 2008. Everything has been fine as I have not done any hardcore gaming or really (any gaming)

I have been starting to play CounterStrike 1.6 (very low graphic demanding game) and when I play in larger servers (32 people)
Max fps in cs 1.6 is 100 ... I get that until sh!t starts coming on the screen, then i drop to 30s and 40s!

I get really bad FPS drop... My single 7600GT was doing better than my current setup - which brings me to my next thing... SPECS:

Case: Antec 1200
MOBO: EVGA 780i SLI FTW
CPU: C2D E8500 3.16Ghz
Cooler: Zalman 9700
RAM: 4GB Corsair DDR2
Graphics: Two EVGA 9800GTX's in SLI
PSU: Xion 1000Watt
HardDrive: WD Caviar SE WD2500JS 250GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Drives: LG Blu-Ray/HD-DVD/CDROM
OS: Vista Ultimate
Monitor: 22" Acer X223W


I run my computer @ 1680x1050 (and the game also @ this res.)

My only idea is maybe my HDD is bottlenecking my system? (it is my hdd from my old computer and I just transferred it over) I bolded the HDD to show you better.

And before you ask, yes my SLI is enabled! I am so confused as to why my graphics sucks so hard!

Any help would be appreciated!

-Andrew
 
Andrizzle said:
Hello. I wasn't sure where to post this as I just found this forum and am new here! This looks like where people are posting problems so I'll post here.

First off, I have had the PC since about september of 2008. Everything has been fine as I have not done any hardcore gaming or really (any gaming)

I have been starting to play CounterStrike 1.6 (very low graphic demanding game) and when I play in larger servers (32 people)
Max fps in cs 1.6 is 100 ... I get that until sh!t starts coming on the screen, then i drop to 30s and 40s!

I get really bad FPS drop... My single 7600GT was doing better than my current setup - which brings me to my next thing... SPECS:

Case: Antec 1200
MOBO: EVGA 780i SLI FTW
CPU: C2D E8500 3.16Ghz
Cooler: Zalman 9700
RAM: 4GB Corsair DDR2
Graphics: Two EVGA 9800GTX's in SLI
PSU: Xion 1000Watt
HardDrive: WD Caviar SE WD2500JS 250GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Drives: LG Blu-Ray/HD-DVD/CDROM
OS: Vista Ultimate
Monitor: 22" Acer X223W


I run my computer @ 1680x1050 (and the game also @ this res.)

My only idea is maybe my HDD is bottlenecking my system? (it is my hdd from my old computer and I just transferred it over) I bolded the HDD to show you better.

And before you ask, yes my SLI is enabled! I am so confused as to why my graphics sucks so hard!

Any help would be appreciated!

-Andrew
Click to expand...

Your HDD wouldn't be causing this drop in frame rates. I would make sure that SLI is connected properly and that it is in the correct mode. If I'm not mistaken there is a few different SLI modes.
 
Well i go into the Nvidia control panel and bubble the "enable SLI (recommended)"


Other than that.. I dont know of any modes ;[



Vista is 64bit btw... Maybe it has something to do with that?
 
CS being so old doesn't support SLi so you can get issues with it being enabled. Disable it for CS and CS:S if you have it.
 
Andrizzle said:
Max fps in cs 1.6 is 100 ... I get that until sh!t starts coming on the screen, then i drop to 30s and 40s!
Click to expand...

Could you explain what exacly you mean? if you see weird colored blocks comming onto the screen, your cards are overheating for example.
 
Well. I've tried disabling it and using only one card. The FPS drop still happens, but its not as bad as when both are running.


As for what I see, everything runs smoothly when I am not in battle, say once people start coming onto the screen and stuff and I turn my guy really fast - I see like bars of choppyness on things. But this is only when there is alot on the screen.

I can tell my fps drop too, because in CS you can go into the game console and have it display them while playing.


I have been reading online and it seems like things are almost pointing to Vista 64bit having to run Direct 9 and emulate it for CS which causes fps lag or drop. Does this make any sense?
 
yea,.. that is a good possibillity. have you tried running a different game yet? see if it occurs there too. (preferbly a modern game, so it wont have issues with Vista. )
 
My friend has had an issue with his SLI in an Alienware laptop. He ended up realizing it was a driver issue or something. He fixed that, changed the settings and SLI ran great.
 
I found some more information on the modes supported by NVIDIA here. It seems that he must have been talking about this, meaning there is more than just off and on mode :D
 
Yeah there are a few sli modes, SLI Antialiasing where it splits the aa load between two cards, afr where each card renders every other frame, and split frame rendering where each card renders half the image.
 
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