new Inspiron 9400 with 7800 giving TERRIBLE 3d performance

Hi
I just got my new 9400 today and first thing I did was I formatted it to remove the bloadwear, then reinstalled windows and got the official dell 7800 (78.59) drivers and all the other chipset drivers etc.

My 3dmark05 scores are around 450 (NO THAT IS NOT A TYPO!!) and when i run quake 4 on medium quality it is jerky.

I have a desktop with a geforce 6800 128mb and it gets about 6 times the performance.

Ive tried different drivers, 3 different mobileforce ones inclusing the newest. I make sure to remove the drivers completely before installing new ones. Ive tried reinstalling directx as well. no luck. I have the laptop plugged in at all times and it is set to give max performance (AA off, powermizer MAX).

I also noticed DVD playback is a little jerky in powerDVD when switching to full screen at full resolution (i have the higher res screen), I'm not sure if thats normal.

Please help! What should i do??! It is not overheating and sandra gives me the expected benchmarks for CPU and RAM.

Thanks

 

Those 78.59 are a bit old. Get some 8X.XX from www.laptopvideo2go.com Thats a horrible score, all I can say is wow.

 

lol thats a 1/4 of the 3dmark05 that my ATI x300 gets

 

it sounds like something else is at issue. if you're having a problem with video playback, that's not the gpu, that's the cpu. if it's jerky, something else is the culprit. and/or it's multiple issues.

EDIT: maybe it's a performance setting in the vid card app. doesn't the ati (and i assume, by extension, other card makers) have 'powerplay' or something that drops the vidcard settings?

 

Dear lord.... thats exactly why I would be afraid to reformat my HDD.

 

i don't think it was the reformat. Reformat is suppose to help your system, and I'm not talking about just a little amount.

If you looked at the before and after pictures of an hdd, especially like defrag image, you would see how much the junkware is hurting your system.

Something else is wrong. Not sure if it is the driver you are using or what the problem is.

How much is your CPU?

 

You must have done something wrong with your reinstallation. My E1705 T2500 2GB Ram 7800 Go did 3826 3d Mark 05 all stock no overclocking.

I don't know if overclocking or using different drivers will void my 4 year warranty - so I asked Dell about this first before I try to overclock.

I just hope Dell come up with faster 7800 Go drivers as this card is slow right now with the current drivers. But it's fast enough to play Call of Duty 2 at 1920 x 1200 resolution well.

 

3826 with the 7800go on 05?? I get 3550 with my 6800 go stock.

 

Yes - 3826 is whaqt I got stock. I guess the current drivers really need updating. And I'm scared to overclock my settings because I don't want to lose my 4 year warranty.

 

Overclocking voids your warranty?!

Wow.... that sucks badly.

 

Which driver are you using? And is Mark06 different from Mark05 in rating?

 

Ok i'm currently using the most recent mobileforce driver (83.60) but ive also tried various versions between that and the official dell drivers on the website. Someone mentioned that the CPU may not be performing properly, but if that was the case why would sandra be giving me the expected results? its a centrino duo 1.83Ghz (and yes, I do see both processors in device manager).

I dont see how I could have messed up the reformat, all I did was wipe everything and reinstall windows, then install the drivers in the order graphics, chipset, sound, LAN.

I'll try a reformat AGAIN using the guide posted on this forum, but i severely doupt it will improve my 3d performance. I get the feeling that there is a bottleneck somewhere else, and if it isnt the CPU or RAM.. then it could only be the PCI Express interface or something like that..

Any more ideas?

 

RESOLVED!!

But.. I have no idea why!!

I had a think about what people were saying that it may be the a problem with the CPU, so I did what i usually do when something doesnt work properly, I uninstalled one of the CPUs (they show up seperately) in device manager. It then asked me to reset, but I thought I should disable the un-nescessary hardware that I installed drivers for like the LAN and Sound devices. I then reset. Windows reinstalled the CPU.

and behold.... solid 3d performance! So i re-enabled the sound and LAN, reset again and everything was still fine!


I now get 4108 on 3dmark05 with newest mobileforce without overclocking, thats with the nvidia driver set to maximum performance, rather than good quality.

has anyone managed to improve on that with a 9400 without overclocking? I heard that the newest drivers may not give the best performance.

 

You know, speedstep could have been your problem. On benchmarks, I have to use CHC for the cpu to run the fastest.

 

I'll do some tests using CHC to check if that was the problem, when i get the chance.

 

I'm using the xtreme G drivers (the second most recent version) . 3dmark06 score is about 1736 I believe.

 

I got 2168

 

Okay,

I got 5376 with optimal overclocking using the 83.97 mobileforce drivers from tweaksrus.com. This is hardly pushing this GPU, temperature remains the same even with maximum manual overclocking it just turns the fan on when it reaches 82 degrees and reduces the heat to 72 degrees and turns off. This GPU is seriously, seriously UNDERCLOCKED by Dell. Look at the specs on the nvidia site for this card -> 400 mhz not 250mhz as dell ship it. Something is seriously wrong here????

Conspiracy theory are abound on the main 9400 forum in the review area...

 

5376 seems like a really good score. I'll try overclocking later today. Where did you get the 83.97 mobileforce drivers?, I cant find them anywhere on their site.

EDIT: do you mean the 81.97 drivers?

 

use the 81.97 driver thats what i'm using i got a score of 5791 in 3dmark05 using the optimised overclock setting. Although for some reason if i unplug my laptop ac adapter it reverts these settings back to dell default (i think its just my profile doing it)

Stock standard with no overclock i got 4050 straight up for 3dmark05 using the 81.97 driver

 

Yes I meant 81.97 driver sorry. Reapper21, do you leave yours set at that overclock setting (5791 must mean you are running about 385/920 or so???) or do you use the DETECT OPTIMAL FREQUENCIES setting or do you go with no overclocking???

What is going to provide the best performance at the safest possible level? Even 385/920 is slower then what the nvidia webiste says this card should be running at STOCK. Wouldn't overclocked mean running this card above 400mhz aren't we running ours underclocked in any of the above scenarios???

What does everyone think here?

 

Since we are on the topic of drivers... If I'm not planning on OC'ing this guy, which nVidia driver provides the better performance?

GTX version:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_mobile_81.94.html
or

standard Forceware for Media Center:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxpmce_81.98.html

 

Flames: I run 350/850, which is not max and not even "detected optimal", but I don't want to push it too much. Even though the core/memory would thoretically be able to handle 400/1000 (or whatever nvidia says), the limit is in the cooling. There is only one heatpipe, and therefore can only dispel so much heat from the gpu. I'm sure if people modded it with the two heatpipes from the GTX and/or some as5, it would clock better... but why go to the trouble. If you want the best performance, you'll buy a M170 with a GTX (which I think is *also* underclocked compared to the nvidia specs). We all knew the limitations of the 7800go before we bought the laptop, right?

I bought the laptop because I needed something to play the newest games, but only because of compatibility (aoe3 runs best on pixel shader 3) - it doesn't matter to me if I get another few fps.

 

I'm curious, what drivers are you using Garbuckle? What is your average temp and do you use any fan control program like i9kfangui? Mine is @300/800 right now because I don't want too high or too low. But I don't like how the fan turns on @80c then off when it lowers the temp, and I am afraid to use i9kfangui since the official site says that the dual core users should not install fangui till version 2.4, but I would love a program that let you have the fan on high all the time. I don't care about the battery since this lappy is always connected to the ac adapter.

 

I use the 83.60 desktop drivers from laptopvideo2go (see my signature). You need to use the INF and read the NFO they have there as well. I don't use any fan program. The driver I use keeps the GPU at 60 degrees when at idle. The temp will go higher when I run games, tho.