I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Ever single time I try and play any new games or somewhat new I get often stuttering and bad FPS like with GTA IV, COD 4, Crysis, Sims 3. I'm supposed to have one of the best computers but, its seems like I have the worst?

As you guys can see my specs are very good and now I'm considereding selling my PC and getting a PS3. I like the mods and everything it just seems like I never get over to actually playing the game rather just looking up how to fix this and that? ITS a whole lot of fucking stress!!

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Oi....

Are you going and running these games at max. settings? Because you're computer is good, but it's not one of the best.

Try running those games on Medium, see what framerates you get. Also, update your video drivers, and make sure the games are patched to their latest versions.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Did everything you said even on gta 4 I put everything at the lowest and still gets bad fps or like cod 4 it gets all jagged when I move.

BTW, does anyone know how much it would be worth to sell it? I bought it for $1,200?

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Did you overclock anything in your rig?

Try the 190.38 drivers.

Edit: Woops, ATI card. Catalyst 9.74 or something then?

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

He has an ATI video card. Try Catalyst 9.6 drivers. Also, theres no reason your rig should have problems in any of those games. I get around 250fps solid in COD4 and you should be getting the same as well.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Thats why I f-ing give up on this crap! Too many damn problems I have the 9.7 drivers...

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Try older drivers?
And I'll buy that ram off of you and hard drive. =)

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

You should be able to max out most games with excellent framerates, and play games like Crysis on high-highest settings with acceptable framerates. Did you download the latest video drivers for your card from ATI's site? How about monitoring your CPU/GPU temps with HWmonitor or speedfan (to get some good graphs)? I'm sure your problem is fixable, you've got a very high-end PC, though it isn't quite top-of-the-line.

If you were to sell the PC, I'd do everything you can to make sure it works properly first. You don't want to scam people by selling a system that doesn't live up to its specs, due to possibly defective hardware/a mistake while building the PC (such as not mounting the heatsink correctly).

Edit: talk about fast replies! Also, Kow, he'd probably be better off either keeping, or selling the whole system. Selling it piece by piece is sure to decrease value, unless he can sell them at near-retail price.

Edit2: On second thought, everyone seems to want to tear his system apart, maybe it is a good idea to sell it piece by piece... I'd buy the whole system off of you if I had the money, but I don't, and I won't for a while.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

I'll take the optical drive, maybe the Lycosa, and the Harddive if kow is feeling generous. =p

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Selling the rig part by part gives you WAYYYY more money than selling it whole. If you sell it whole you'll get around $4-500 less

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

I agree on the hassle of pc gaming. I have a beast of a rig, too, but don't have "that" many problems getting games to run. Most games are so poorly ported to the pc it is disgusting. I like the less hasle of console gaming, but it is not the same if you are spoiled on hi-res pc gaming. Consoles have their share of problems too, like poor fps, lack of v-sync & AA, bugs & such.
I would just get a ps3 for gaming & keep a web surfing/light gameing computer if I were you.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Perfect man, I already got an Xbox so yeah...Give me a day or so and I'l post back...

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Yea, PC's are a hassle, I'm sometimes tempted to buy a $100 Xbox, but in the end, PC's work best for me. Plus, I kinda like the adventure of maintaining my PC, upgrading it, picking out new parts, etc. I also do a lot graphics-intensive work other than gaming.

It's funny how few problems the game systems give you compared to PC's. They never seem to get corrupted data, driver problems, etc, though my friend had to send his in to get repaired due to over-heating problems. It was most likely due to his ambient house temperature being 90-95F during the summer, or the xbox being clogged with dust though.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

I have to disagree. If you get a RROD you send it into M$ and it can take weeks to get it back. But if you have something wrong with your PC you can either RMA it or buy a new replacement. Also, you wont have any driver problems or instability problems if you know how to take care of your computer, minor tweaks or actually taking your time to diagnose a problem is simple. Consoles would be the exact same way if you had as much freedom with them as you do with the PC. And from there, are you sure you dont have spyware or a virus? Often times things such as that will drain performance.

edit: are you going to sell your computer? I would find it extremely insulting to everyone that posted in your first thread about building/buying your computer if you took THAT long and wasted that many peoples time you could at least figure out whats wrong instead of jumping ship after it not working for an hour. Have you tried everything? Drivers, spyware check, virus scan, reformat?


Oh really? Because Xbox's dont have the RROD, 3 ring, 2 ring, etc? And xbox drives cant die, their hard drives must last forever too, along with disks never breaking. The same goes for every other system. Its not like the PS3 can go out and run crysis on max details, and if it could it would not be at the same detail level of the current engine such as Crysis 2. Not to mention how damn loud consoles are. The wii is an exception, but even a GPU fan at 90% isn't as loud as those things with their 60mm blow dryers.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

QFT :nodding: I still play my Xbox with games like Doom 3 and the sequel, and a ton of other cool games. And it's lasted for 6 years without a single problem.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

I'm going to add some comments I didn't see posted. Assuming you're not as mentioned, being picky after buying a new rig expecting to use too high of settings on the more resource demanding games (as are GTA IV and Crysis), do you at least understand the concept of proper PC prep/maintenance for gaming? EG updating ALL drivers, including DX and MB chipset, turning off background progs, defragging, malware scans, appropriate swap file space, etc. It can even make a difference what type of defrag tool you use. Some optimize the location of the OS and/or gaming files and it can help to place the more demanding games on a secondary HDD vs the OS drive. I also use AlacrityPC to automatically stop and restart all background progs and non essential services.

I see comments like this all the time and then I find the person making them has like 80 or 90 processes running in the background, never defrags their HDD, or something else that falls under typical neglect and/or naivety. The fact is the spec you have, though not what I would build, is WAY faster than my old rig and should smoke both those games compared to what mine can do, yet I have played both several times through, albeit with the expected lag in some spots.

Another thing about some games is they either have very high resource settings options (often effects not needed like blur) and/or are terribly optimized, or require console commands to get the best out of them performance wise, as is the case with Crysis. I use about 4 basic console commands with Crysis and with GTA IV using the new patch, I turn off shadows and play some missions at night. Both Crysis and GTA IV should be played with selective vs all-at-one level settings if your gear is not the absolute top shelf available.

You shouldn't have to play without shadows and at night with GTA IV like I do, but basically everyone can benefit from at least SOME console commands in Crysis, and certainly EVERY avid PC gamer should know their system well and maintain it properly. Anyone that is gung ho enough to build their own system should not be unfamiliar with all the other nuances it takes to get the most out of today's high end and often poorly optimized games. Thoiugh I do not agrew with what many have said about Crysis being poorly optimized. You just have to be realistic with settings for the most part and know that some commands are needed, even to unlock your full VRAM potential if you have 512MB or more.

I seem to recall having posted the tweaks I spoke of for Crysis on more than one occasion and it was met with apathy and angst, vs seeing it as valuable info. A lot of what it takes to be successful at high end PC gaming is patience and respect for useful info and understanding the need to do a little tweaking with help from others. PC gaming is not an automatic easy thrill ride merely for having bought and assembled high end parts. Even if you've done all the above and thoroughly tested what drivers work best, today's games can often require added attention, be it adjusting CPU affinity on multi core CPUs, or even the priority of the exe the game uses. For instance some have actually had to set Ghostbusters to Low system priority to get it to run well even on i7 spec.

To a large degree I understand and sympathize with those whom feel the pain and frustration of very poor PC game developing, porting and beta testing. However it doesn't exactly help if by chance you are expecting too much from your hardware or naive in any way about maintaining and prepping it for PC gaming. To have the attitude of packing it in for a console after a few months is not the kind of mentality one should have when pursuing one's first build. You have to be more flexible than that to excel at it, and if not, you'll never know if you could have succeeded at your goal of high end gaming on a PC.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

After I posted my comment, I realized something...I really only use my 360 to stream movies to my TV downstairs. I can't remember the last time I actually used it for gaming.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Yeah m8, you should seriously listen to what >Omen< said, I've experienced the same kinda problems in numerous games: Call of duty 2 actually gains a 10-20FPS increase when I enable the Sli option even though I only have 1 card, I also use graphical tweak cfg that helps get the most out of my VRAM. Another example: I play Splinter Cell at it's maximum settings, but it only played at like an average of 23-36 fps, and then I realized I never patched it and when I did update it, my average seriously went from 23-36 fps to 39-50 fps. It's the little things that can make big changes sometimes.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

One of the things that's still absent concerning Crysis is a patch made from the performance optimizations put into Warhead they said they might make if Warhead sold well. It would be nice if CryTek could release such a thing.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

Well it seems I am not into PC gaming anymore and I'm gonna' sell my PC and get a cheap laptop...

If you guys want some of my Hard Ware well then Private Message me or post on the forum I'm about to post in one minute.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

What does the Red ring o' death mean anyways? I saw some dirt-cheap 360's for sale that had that problem, and the seller said it was fixable. Of coarse all of your points are true, but if they ever happen to break, they are overall much cheaper to maintain if you have 0 technical knowledge. While they work, you can boot up and play almost immediately, with no hassling over installation problems, driver problems, getting the right settings with the right FPS, etc. They are all standardized, and (most) game builders take advantage of this to make sure your game runs right. Also, if I recall correctly, I've never heard my friend's 360 or wii the times I've played with him. Maybe the fan was broken, which is why it died at this time of the year, with these record-breaking temperatures. :uhm:

To put it simply, Game systems are designed for those who have virtually no technical knowledge, and don't want to spend hours learning/tweaking things to play a good game once in a while. Maybe Yellowboy assumed it would be the same with a PC.

Re: I think I give up on PC gaming?
 

"Red Ring of Death" refers to a change in color of the light on the 360 power button, which is normally a green semi circle. When it turns red it's an indication the system has shut down, which is almost always caused by overheating.

Hardware wise there have been 3 incarnations of the 360. The first upgrade was a smaller die size CPU called the Falcon chip, which requires less power and produces less heat. These models shipped with smaller, lower wattage power adapters.

The last incarnation of the 360 involved upgrading the GPU (graphics processor) to a smaller die chip called the Jasper. Some have said RRoD still can happen, though it seemed to be less prevalent even with the first upgrade.

I recommend getting the latest incarnation and better yet, invest in a laptop cooling unit to place under it, esp if you plan to engage frequently in long gaming sessions and/or live in a hot climate with no air conditioning. The LT coolers can be had for around $20