final say on dell inspion 6000 performance?

one thing i don't think i'll ever understand:

my old laptop is a toshiba satellite with 2.2 GHz p4-m 400MHZ , 512 MB 233 MHz ram, 60 gb 5,400 rpm hd, 64 mb Geforce4 460 Go (agp 4x)...anyways, this machine is like 3 years old and it consistently got 60 fps on doom 3 and half-life 2 on 800x600 and all medium (without AA and directx 9 effects).

i look everywhere online and the system that i got (inspiron 6000 w/ 1.73 GHz P-M 533 MHz FSB, 512 MB 533 MHz ram, 100 gb 5,400 rpm hd seagate (after market), 128 mb ati x300 PCIExpress) is reported of getting about 40 fps on doom 3 and halflife 2.

no matter what, the ram is faster and there's more memory for the ati as well as a faster structure (pciexpress 16x vs agp 4x), shouldn't it be at least as fast in frame rates? it makes no sense...can anyone with similar systems provide any input? is it because on the new inspiron, it is using the new directx 9.0 effects?

 

First off, that ati x300 card is 64 megs dedicated, the other 64 megs is taken from your system memory. The x300 is an extremely low end video card and im not surprised you got better results from an older nvidia card. Chances are the core clock of that ati x300 is lower than your older video card? IM really not sure, one thing I am sure about though is that the Inspiron 6000 is NOT A GAMING MACHINE, for that you need the Inspiron 9300. Maybe you should take advantage of dells 21 day return policy? Then buy a 9300 there are currently 30 percent coupons out which is what I used in July and paid 1477 for my 9300 with 80 gig 5400 rpm drive, 6800 nvidia go 256 meg video card, wxga+ ultrasharp screen 1400x900, Intel 2915 Wireless, put my own gig of memory in it and a 24xcdrw/dvd rom drive.

Now if you dont want to return/exchange your 6000, its possible that since you only have 512 megs of ram in it and like I said, the video card is stealing 64 megs of that for its own purposes, this may be the source of your troubles too? Wireless has alot of active processes and with only 512 megs you may have alot of that memory tied up. ALso perhaps you need a patch for that game??

Sorry your having problems and I hope you did your research before buying a laptop but like I said the 6000 is not a gaming machine and doom is quite demanding. Contrary to popular belief, pci express cards currently dont perform much better than agp solutions although the extra bandwidth is there its not really taken advantage of by all the hardware in your computer at this time.

As I see it your four options are First, return/exhange the laptop, Second contact ATI, Third Get some more Ram and Fourth, check the Doom Website for a Patch??

Good Luck

 

clarification: the 64 mb version of the x300 has hyper memory (32 on the card, 32 from system). the 128 mb version is dedicated to the card.

the x300 is nowhere near the 6800 on the 9300, but i've played HL2 and Doom 3 all the way through with little to no problems at the game recommended settings.

 

yet another ignorant person bashing the x300... I have doom3 on medium settings and getting 75-90 fps with hardly a hiccup. And yes to confirm x300 with 128mb is dedicated to the card, the 64meg version is hypermemory

 

mmmm no, that is not true, see ATI's website.

At any rate, did the poster find what the problem was????

 

Delvien, try playing FEAR on your ati x300, let us know how it goes please.

 

just for ****z and giggles going to try FEAR see if it runs hehe

 

easy boys.

delvien, no need for personal attacks.

congelach, it doesn't matter what the ATI site says, the x300 128 meg card offered by dell is 128 dedicated. the 64 meg card is the hypermemory version. when the 6000 first was available with dedicated graphics; both the 64 and 128 meg cards had discrete memory. at some point, dell switched the 64 meg card to the hypermemory version. the 128 meg version remained and remains fully dedicated.

 

I am running FEAR at 99-126 FPS with all settings on LOW.

 

thanks guys for your help.

Delvien: have you tried medium and high? how does that compare?

 

I wasnt that brave, but going to try it now.

 

Well actually its awesome on medium graphics, low cpu . heres a screenshot

 

is that an x300 u are using on FEAR Delvien?
Will the x300 128 Dedicated be able to handle FEAR at a considerable framerate?

 

Delvien, how many FPS on medium settings? And did you OC the video card, or are you running it with stock settings? Also when it's on medium graphics what's the resolution at?