8800GTX and Mass Effect

Hello everyone,

I'm on the M15x with 4gigs ram(but vista 32bit, so only 3gigs registered), 8800gtx, and T9300 core 2 duo.
When I play Mass Effect (maxed specs, 1920x1200), there is lag. This wouldn't be so surprising if my GPU wasn't at only 73degrees Celsius. I just updated the driver to 180.43, and even before the lag was around, but not as bad. Also, before the new driver, the card would get in the high 90's in temperature. Is it the driver?
And if so, which drivers are working best for the 8800GTX?

Thanks

 

could be assisted by the fact you are maxing out the resolution....

 

You're missing the point here....
And I've tested it on lower res's. Still an absurdly low temp with some lag.

The problem is that before, I had lag and high temps, so at least the card was working. Now it's low temps and still lag.

 

"lag" as in "low fps"?

 

had you made the point you played (tested) it at lower resolutions before i may not have missed the point. your original post said no such thing.

 

Yes well, again that is irrelevant.


Whizzo:
Yes, frames drop a good bit, but usually during busy moments, like fighting. If you know the game, it even drops in fps during the decryption of whatever it's called when you are breaking into locked boxes and such.

 

Would you mind using fraps, so we can get some exact #s on your frame rates?

 

It could be your updated driver. In addition you might want to try updating Mass Effect as it may have not been ported that well from the 360.

 

Ah..yes..patches. Welcome to the world of PC gaming. You definitely need to patch up the game.

 

I'll work on the fraps!
For now, does anyone have any recommendations for a good all-around driver?

 

PC version of Mass Effect embarrasses the 360 version.

177.92, Alienware's 179.13 or Dox's Custom 180.43.

 

how does 180.43 perform? i've heard it's optimized for FC2 and doesn't perform as well for other stuff.

 

179.13, that is what i use for mass effect and for me it works fine. If you have acquired the game illegally then that is the reason, they have put in a safething that produces a lag and also the starmap is not working.

Also the normal stuff, check so that stealthmode is not engaged.

 

Ha, if the starmap didn;t work, then you couldn't get too far....
I've only played mass effect with the 180.43
I attempted AOE3 and it wouldn't run.

 

The 8800GTX does not run at full speed in XP-32 with ANY other drivers other than the official ones on Alienware's site. NOT even the beta drivers posted on the support section for the 8800GTX 175.80BETA also downclock. This is a known issue but you can feel free to post on the official thread on their message board. You will ONLY see full clock speeds in game with the official 165.32v drivers. This ONLY applies to the 8800GTX The same card I have.

 

Yeah only the official ones stop it from being downclocked . Is their a fix to this though?

 

Installed 179.13 last night. The game still took ages to load, and lagged. GPU temps again didn't raise above 70 degrees C.
I think I'm going to try 165.32 as pervay said, but are there any known glitches with that? Is powermizer still enabled for that?

Also, Napbree:
In your sig, you have that you have the driver for the 9800 on your 8800. How does that run? A good idea over the 8800's?

 

If you're on XP, I think you're out of luck. I've been using regular 180.43 and recently Dox's 180.44, and have had no issues. You wouldn't happen to be on stealth or power saver, would you?

 

I'm on vista 32bit, so I'm good there!
And no, everyone, I don't have stealth mode on.

I'll have time today to try out a few drivers, so far I know the old official Alienware, and the Dox 180.44
Hopefully these fix it!

 

Not necessarily. 167.43 is a fairly old one but it still works with full clocks in XP and it's a little bit more recent than the official 165.32v drivers.

With powermizer enabled:


With powermizer disabled:


You don't necessarily have to disable powermizer to get these clocks since it'll automatically upclock itself to those speeds whenever you do something intensive. This is just a demonstration that 167.43 has the proper clock speeds for XP.

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=16854

 

My clock speeds have actually been on that same level...I'll test over a longer period of time to make sure they're not dropping anywhere.
Still, the temp does not go above 70, when I have had it around the high 90's before. hmm.

 

Installed Dox's 180.44, problem solved! Perfect frame rates on Mass Effect 2 at highest settings, and lower temps than I used to get! Only high 80's now

 

hey le meow...
can ya post the linky for the 180.44 drivers?

 

nevermind...found it here about half way down the page.

 

how is 180.43 vs 180.44 (both from Dox)?

 

dunno whizzo...
i dont even have the .43 version as i am not able to DL anything from the network i am on right now...
i will be able to here in a little bit from a different internet connection within the week.