Help! 7568 3DMark w/2400+ & Ti4200???

[PCGuy]

Here is my 2 day old system:

AMD 2400+ Tbred
Asus A7N8X (not deluxe) Bios ver 1001.E
Zalman CNPS3100-Plus Heatsink & Fan
2 X 512mb (1gb total) Micron CAS2.5 DDR333 in slots 1&3
MSI G4Ti4200 128mb 4X (not overclocked)
Western Digital 80GB, 7200, 8mb cache SE
Antec TruePower330

Windows XP Home
Nvidia Detonator Driver ver. 4.1.0.9
Bios ver 1001.E

The system seems to be running stable. The CPU and the Video are not overclocked. When I run 3DMark2001se, my first score was 6980. After updating to the latest Nvidia Driver, my score is now 7568.

This is worse then my old 1500+ score of 9765. Something is wrong!:( I expected at least a score of 12000 out of the box setup. And with some slight tweaking to be in the 14000 range.

I checked out the bios and this is very different from other bios setups I have seen before. I understand everything until I get to the “Advanced Chipset” section, where things start to appear unfamiliar. Here are the bio settings:

CPU External Freq. (mhz): 133
CPU Freq. Multiply, set to Auto at: 15X
System Performance: Optimal
CPU Interface: Optimal
Memory Freq.: By Spd.
Resulting Freq: 166mhz
Memory Timings: Optimal
SDRam Active Percharge Delay: 7
SDRam RAS to CAS Delay: 3
SDRam RAS Precharge Delay: 3
SDRam CAS Latency: 2.5T
FSB Spread Spectrum: 0.50%
AGP Spread Spectrum: Disabled
CPU Vcore Setting: Auto
CPU Vcore: 1.650V
Graphics Aperture Size: 64mb
AGP Freq.: Auto
System Bios Cacheable: Disabled
Video Ram Cacheable: Disabled
DDR Reference Voltage: 2.6V
AGP VDDQ Voltage: 1.5V
AGP 8X Support: Enabled
AGP Fast Write Capability: Enabled

Sorry about the long list, but I figured that someone would ask anyways. I have tried setting the “System Preference” to AGGRESSIVE and every thing stay the same in the bios except the following:

CPU External Freq. (mhz): 133
CPU Freq. Multiply, set to Auto at: 15X
System Performance: Aggressive
CPU Interface: Aggressive
Memory Freq.: SYNC
Resulting Freq: 133mhz
Memory Timings: Aggressive
SDRam Active Percharge Delay: 6
SDRam RAS to CAS Delay: 2
SDRam RAS Precharge Delay: 2
SDRam CAS Latency: 2T
Everything else is the same from here down.

In my opinion, based on the VERY low 3DMark score, there must be something off in the bios. I’m not super good with the bios and just try to go with what others with the similar setup tell me works for them and try it myself. It could be the RAM I’m using, but I have always used this Ram with very good results. And YES, I did make the jumper change to run on 266-333 bus speed on the board.

Bios settings??
Upgrade the Bios??
Ram??

Please help! Thanks

[BipolarBill]

Why is your AGP aperture set to 64? It should be at least half your memory total. Try 256 at least.

[gregmatic]

haha relax man! i got the same "problem". with my AMD 1800+ (not OCed) and GF4Ti4200. i got 7700 3dmarks (driver 28.32). after some snooping around i got to 9600. this is not OVERCLOCKING your card. its just some hidden options to compromise performance for quality.

in your BIOS, inncrease your AGP Aperture Memory (to the max...you have 1GB of RAM u know!).
in windows, go to diplay properties, choose your card's additional properties and select Anti-Aliasing. Disable that. you shld get 9000-10000 3dmarks. u will realise that u are severely compensating visual quality for high frame rates.

i find it funny that u would expect a score of 14000! who needs a Radeon 9700 Pro then? Even a GF4Ti 4600 doesnt achieve that score of of the box. with your AMD 2400 and some tweaking to your card u may get a stable 11-12k score.

i now use my GF4Ti 4200 64MB 3.3ns with AMD XP 2100+ and get 9800 3dmarks. with my preferred quality settings (4x AAliasing) i get 5200.

[gregmatic]

Since u took so much time in typing all those stuff..I tell u more.

SDRam Active Percharge Delay: 7
SDRam RAS to CAS Delay: 3
SDRam RAS Precharge Delay: 3
SDRam CAS Latency: 2.5T

these are your RAM timings. preferrably they shoould be 5,2,2,2 for highest performance. but i think ur RAM can only survive 6,2,2,2.5. this may not improve ur 3dmark score much...but surely to your RAM bandwidth and overall system performance

[Bigjakkstaffa]

Reset all display driver performance options in the control panel to default before running the benchmark

--Jakk:t

[PCGuy]

Originally posted by gregmatic
Since u took so much time in typing all those stuff..I tell u more.

SDRam Active Percharge Delay: 7
SDRam RAS to CAS Delay: 3
SDRam RAS Precharge Delay: 3
SDRam CAS Latency: 2.5T

these are your RAM timings. preferrably they shoould be 5,2,2,2 for highest performance. but i think ur RAM can only survive 6,2,2,2.5. this may not improve ur 3dmark score much...but surely to your RAM bandwidth and overall system performance

I have bumped these timings and everything seems very stable at 6,2,2,2. Maybe I will try the 5,2,2,2 and see what happens.

Thanks for the info, I do appreciate it

[PCGuy]

Originally posted by BipolarBill
Why is your AGP aperture set to 64? It should be at least half your memory total. Try 256 at least.

I have read two opinions on this subject. Some say leave it for very good reasons and some say change it for some very good reasons. I trust what you say, since you have always helped me out in the past and give it a shot.

Thanks for the help! .....ah....Again:D

[PCGuy]

Just a little update here.....

I can't believe how stupid I was:rolleyes:

A friend of mine asked if I upgraded the Chipset Drivers from Nvidia......ah.....well.....ah......it is a brand new realeased board, would new drivers make any diff??? ah......YEAH!!!!:eek:

How about a 3437 difference in the score!!! kind of difference!

I'm now up to 11005 on 3Dmark. Not where it should be, but it's at least respectable.

I haven't ran the test since I got the Dual Mode System memory running again....ie...if you only got two sticks of Ram, make sure to put them in slots 1&3, not 2&3. Yes, yes, I know what you heard, you can run it in 2&3....Well, you can, but you won't have Dual Mode!

Just to let you all know, the only reason I'm using 3DMark is because I play a lot of games and do a lot of graphics. I understand the scores, plus it is very relient on the CPU for good scores, so it fills that need to some degree.

If any of you can suggest a better guage for testing, please let me know.

A 14K score will be coming soon I assure you, without sacrificing video quality. I have seen much better then that with the same CPU and a Ti4600!

More input welcome!:t