Please help me with my FPS while playing Warcraft :)

Hello all, a couple weeks ago i bought myself a new alienware laptop. The main reason for me choosing to go with alienware was for playing Warcraft. The spec of my machine is :-

Processor : Intel Core i7 Processor 620M(2.66GHz,4MB cache)
Display : 17in WideUXGA 1920 x 1200 - Beyond HD (1200p) - RGB LED
Memory : 4096MB (2x2048) 1333MHz DDR3 Dual Channel
Hard Drive : 500GB Serial ATA (7200RPM)
Optical Drive : 8X DVD+/-RW Drive
Graphics : Dual CrossFire 1GB ATI GDDR5 Mobility Radeon HD 5870
Operating System : English Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium (64 BIT)

Does anyone have an idea what kind of fps i should be getting? At the moment im only getting 30fps with the game settings at good (this is both in battlegrounds and when standing around in capital cities). If i turn the settings upto ultra the fps will drop below 20 and to me it just doesnt seem right for the money i paid?

Does anyone have any idea why this is so? Will i need a better machine or to upgrade some of my components (processor, RAM)? I found some threads about cores not being used on my processor but tbh i know very, very little about these kind of things so i wouldnt know where to start . Any info that you could give me would be greatly appreciated, thanks for taking the time to read and hopefully someone can help me?

 

Keep in mind mobility 5870s have the power of a desktop 5750.

30 FPS is more than normal for this computer if you have shadows set to ultra. Warcraft is VERY unoptimized in terms of shadows and even my machine (Desktop, i7 920 4.42ghz, 2x EVGA 580) can't run it with more than 40-50 FPS in certain places.

My advice? Turn shadows to good and leave everything else ultra (Which looks better and runs WAY better IMO, it softens the shadows edges a bit) and see what you get in terms of FPS. Also go into Catalyst Control Center and either turn crossfire OFF (For WoW) or turn "Adaptive AI" in the 3D Settings to Normal or Off. WoW doesn't take advantage of multi GPU setups and there have been cases of running two GPUs at once bogging FPS down.

If that doesn't work make sure your drivers are up to date and turn on vsync to smooth things out a bit.

There isn't much you can do because you aren't exactly using blazing fast specs which "Full Ultra" would run smoothly on... Too many people think their new computer (regardless of specs) can run everything on ultra because "its new and they paid a lot"

 

Are you sure you aren't running in stealth mode? Only different between your setup and mine is the processor (although WoW is a processor heavy game) and I can get up to 200 FPS unless I limit it down to 60 on the higher settings. On full ultra 30 FPS is normal in Org.

EDIT: O yeah forgot about the shadows those have to be set down lower :/
EDIT2: Removed my stupid,..

 

There's no integrated graphics card in the R2.

 

Changed all my settings to ultra besides the shadows like you said and disabled crossfire X and it worked like a charm im soooooo happy !!!!! Thanks very much for the fast response use guys are the best !!!!!

 

turn ON crossfire, OC your CPU a little bit and will do ok. had same issue couple days ago, throttle stop helped.

 

WoW does not use Multi-GPU capabilities. Having it on can only create problems...

How do I know? Because I played WoW from release all the way up into Cataclysm... Both crossfire and SLI do not work and the second GPU does not receive any usage as indicated by MSI Afterburner (A very popular GPU overclocking and monitoring tool)

Don't believe me? Heres the system I'm currently typing from.

 

not arguing with u buddy, just stated the FACT that after OCing a little bit (only increased multipliers to 27 already improved fps) was enough.

 

Yeah I'm having a blonde moment day..

They have it enabled in fullscreen mode on WoW now but it is correct that it doesn't work properly.

 

For Warcraft 3 (not WoW), setting at max resolution 1920x1200 (you can set this by e tweak in registry) the Fps is supposed to be as high as 60. Thats right, 60fps while playing. This sometimes can be 58,59 or lower while loading, starting, etc. but once playing you should get 60 with xfire enabled.

 

I agree that setting everything to ultra EXCEPT shadows (which should be on good) is the way to increase FPS (works for me and many others)

I do NOT agree that WOW does not use crossfire/sli.
On both my R1 (with 260m SLI) and my R2 (w/5870 crossfire) sli and crossfire worked fine.

How do I know, well despite my second card getting hot I also have gpuz showing it increasing clocks to gaming speeds, HWinfo32 showing that they are both working and I get better FPS

I am not at that machine so I can't insert a picture but hopefully this will suffice
[insert] Totally Awesome Picture that shows my complete Awesomeness!!![/insert]

D.

 

I also notice a pretty good change in fps when going from one GPU into CrossFire.

 

I have to agree with the folks above...I see a pretty descent increase in FPS with crossfire enabled vs not enabled. Not saying that it's as optimized as it could be, but I do see a difference. That being said I only play WoW in full screen mode, so can't comment on windowed.

 

From my semi-limited experience with it, WoW only uses CFX in fullscreen mode. When I was playing (after they released the WoW fixes in the drivers etc) CFX didn't work in windowed mode at all.

 

I have everything on ultra, with shadows on high, @1920x1200 with 8x AA, and the only time i see it drop in the 30's is if im in downtown Org during prime hours.

also, you can run the game in DX11 mode which makes the game run much better on DX11 cards.

 

I can also confirm this

 

this is flat wrong. using dual GPU's gives me a noticeable FPS boost, and I have no issues. Both of my GPU's heat up. I am in Deepholm right this second. disabling crossfire at the exact spot im at drops me from 55 fps down to 37.

 

I would sugest the OP to have a look at this thread. Lot of infos and yes, at least on fullscreen you can definetly tell the difference between CF and no CF.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...warcraft-cataclysm-m17x-r1-r2-discussion.html

ad maiora

 

I have been playing in windowed mode for the ease of looking at other things, and I had been getting 28 FPS in Ogrimmar 50+ everywhere else with CrossfireX enabled and everything in ultra. In fullscreen my frames jumped from 28 - 45+ in Ogrimmar. Well, I took someones advice (earlier in this post) and dropped my shadows to high......WoW!!!! I gained at least 20+ fps in Ogrimmar in windowed mode and in fullscreen I am at 80+. Just that one setting has made a huge jump. Also, I have the direct x 11 exe going on. I tried turning off crossfire X and I do see the difference both in windowed and fullscreen mode. Not sure if this helps you at all.