My Dragothic Dragon is unwell :(

[zakelwe]

I have been benching my 5800 with my new AMD64 chip and KV8 Pro mothberoard and although the scores for car and lobby are now higher and nature is about the same due to similar card clocks ( 500/1000) and drivers ( 44.03) my dragon has taken a nosedive both in low and high tests. Not just a little bit, but a lot

before

low = 380+
high = 220+

now

low = 320+
high= 180+

That is an awful lot of points to give away.

The interesting thing is that low is based on video card performance and high tends to also be affected by the system performance, but both mine are hit badly. By changing card clocks and system settings I can get it to go up and down, but not get back the massive drop. My nature and car are spot on, so I do not think there is a big problem somewhere ( like AA being applied by mistake, or running at 266 mem speed by mistake).

For comparison another user with 500/100 and an AMD64 at 220x10 got 350/205 which seems where I should be again

What I have done

1) Installed the software again, Windows 2000, Sp3, VIA drivers ( 2 sets of ) nvidia drivers 44.03 and 52.16. Didn't use DX9, just used DX 8.1b, tried both patched and unpatched new install of 3dmark2001SE.

2) Checked the BIOS settings, AGP is 8x , RAM is at 400 ( 1:1) and 2-5-2-2, no throttling etc etc etc.

3) Checked the card is not downclocking or having aftifacts by running at slightly slower speed ( just slight drop in performance). Made sure it is not in 2d mode. Fiddled endlessly with rivatuner and nvidia control panel.


I was up to 3am and had to get up at 5am to go to work but still my mind fizzles and pops on the subject. Has anyone ever seen a massive drop in Dragothic but no other of the tests ? If you have then I would be most thankful for any words of advice !

Tonight I am going to put in more memory and turn the memory used by AGP in the BIOS down from 128 to 64MB, will try another card to see if the same effect happens, burst into tears and get drunk.

Actually I'll get drunk first then do all the rest.

If the worse comes to the worse I will have to do a search on the futuremark forums, but I just do not want to see 12 000 threads all entitled " Why is my 3dmark2001 score so low ,? " .

At least mine here has a slightly interesting title :p

Please form an orderly queue of people with great ideas, no pushing at the back there Soulburner, you will get your turn...

Regards

Clueless of England