I'm new to the PC gaming world. I just got a brand new Pentium 4 PC at 2.0 ghz with 512 K cache, 256 mb of ram, an integrated 4X AGP Prosavage8 card up to 32 mb, on windows XP home edition. I want to set this thing up for the best possible gaming experience.
I downloaded FMS just to screw around with. When I first installed it, the frame rate at 1024 X 768 resolution rarely exceded 10. I upgraded to DirectX 9.0 and it became a little better, with the average at about 15 and peaks of 25. Even when I do desperate stuff like turn off textures, smooth textures, and fog, the frame rate does not change. Is this how fast it should be running with my setup, or am I doing something wrong? Is my graphics card holding me back?
I'd like to install Aerofly Pro. I know that the graphics of this game aren't the best, but I don't mind so long as I get some decent realism. I want to set my machine up to run other games with good graphics. The expansion pack, which I'll probably get after Aerofly Pro, has minimums that I meet at my current set up (do I need to exceed them for good performance?)

Cody

I'm no 'puter genius, but Great Planes Real Flight G2 runs great on my P3, 1Gig MH, 384MB ram with an Nvidia G2 32B vid card. Your system is much newer and should be more powerful, but I suspect your video card might be a bottleneck. Also, you should down load the latest drivers for video, audio, op system, etc.

Does anyone have any recommendations for a good graphics card?

Cody,
What kind of Mother Board Chipset (Or Mobo if you are using the slang) do you have. In general if you are using the integrated video on your mother board, it usually isn't the best choice for 3d video games. The few exceptions are the Geforce cards from nvidia and the ATI radeon 8500 or 9000 or 9700. I think you said that you have a Savage 3d. These cards pretty much aren't so good. If you weren't able to find a 3d hardware acceleration vs. software acceleration switch within the game, you probably need to upgrade your video card. Your proccessor is plenty fast, and I don't think you have a shortage of RAM, although I prefer 512 megs and up of ram, 256 should be plenty. I would recommend getting a geforce 2 or better, or an ATI radeon 8500 or better. Of course the stiplutaion being that the better card you get the more likely it is going to be able to handle more advanced games/simulations that software developers put out in the future, but of course, the better cards are more expensive. Again if you decide to get a better video card, check www.pricewatch.com. They list the prices of many vendors and online mail-order companies. Check www.maximumpc.com, and www.tomshardware.com for many video card and hardware reviews. I hope I have helped.

Allan

Thanks, PMB, you have. Happy new year!

For mobo, I'm not sure. In the game, however, if you open the file menu, there is an option for Graphics card. This brings up a screen for selecting the card, and the "primary display driver" is all that's on there.

Here's some stuff I found on my hardware:

Video Controller Name : S3 Graphics ProSavageDDR
Video Mode : 1024 x 768 x 4294967296 colors
Adapter DAC Type : S3 SDAC
Current Horizontal Resolution : 1024 Pixels
Current Vertical Resolution : 768 Pixels
Current Number Of Colors : 4294967296
Adapter RAM : 32 MB
Current Refresh Rate : 60 Hertz
Video Processor : S3 P4M266
Inf Filename : oem6.inf
Driver Version : 6.13.10.1067-13.93.34
Monochrome : false
Adapter Status : OK

Processor Name : Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.00GHz
Processor Description: x86 Family 15 Model 2 Stepping 4
Processor Manufacturer : GenuineIntel
Socket Designation : Socket 478
Processor Type : Central Processor
Processor Id : (deleted for security purposes)
Processor Family : Unknown
Processor Stepping : 4
Processor Version : Model 2, Stepping 4
Load Percentage : 7 %
Max ClockSpeed : 2000 MHz
Current ClockSpeed : 2000 MHz
Voltage : 1.4 V
External Clock : 100 MHz
Device ID : CPU0
PowerManagement Supported : false
Upgrade Method : ZIF Socket
L2 Cache Size : 0 Kb
Processor Status : OK


Maybe this will tell you something.

G2 should run very well on your machine. You might have to press 'Escape' early on in the session; I think this is because the cache hasn't yet stored some of the commands.

As a general rule, it's always worthwhile making sure you have all the latest drivers, especially for your chipset (which should be an 850, with a machine like that).

Try visiting both your machine manufacturer's and Microsoft's website for any updated drivers they might have. Also, make sure you have the latest service packs downloaded and installed. This is even more important with newer machines.

David C.

Whenever I go to the Microsoft Website to download the lates updates, the dowload/install screen pops up and downloads the files. The install process, however, never happens. This is driving me nuts. Does anyone know what to do?

Ok, I ran AOL in the background (to provide an internet connection) and upgraded my drivers. The computer promptly crashed. After the on-line crash analysis of Microsoft, they told me that it was because of a new driver. I love computers.

Anyway, I have decided to upgrade my graphics card. Sapphire Radeon 9500 Atlantis looks good what with TV-out and 8X AGP support. My computer says that I have one 4X AGP slot and 3 PCI slots. Does this mean that I can only run graphics cards that are at 4X AGP? Do I have to get my cards in a PCI version?

Cody,
Computers and their ilk can be very confusing and frustrating. I've been in the hardware and software business for several years now, and I find that there are still situations where the problem you are having absolutely makes no sense. Please try not to get frustrated. As to your questions, no you do not have to use a 4x graphics card. If you get an 8x graphics card, it will run at 4x in your mobo. This will slow the card down, but only at a data rate that doesn't exist on todays games. What this means is that even if you had an 8x AGP slot and an 8x video card, you wouldn't really notice any speed difference between it and the 4x version, all other variables remaining the same between the two systems. Whatever you do, do not buy a PCI grapics card. The PCI bus(datapathway) is much narrower than the AGP bus. In other words you can move more data accross the AGP bus vs the PCI bus. More data=higher speed. Also, don't rely on the Microsoft analysis, they are usually very broad assertations that might not be a good answer to your specific problem. As to the AOL lock up, I really don't know what could be causing that without seeing the exact error, along with exactly what you were doing when it occurred. I don't use AOL mysel, but I have always found that it is overpriced for what you get (Fair to middling connection speed, along with a mailbox that is stuffed with SPAM-unrequested email advertising). Oh well enough AOL bashing. I hope I have helped.

Allan

You certainly have. Man, I've learned alot in about 3 days concerning computer stuff!

I'm only using AOL for now with their free offer until I get DSL or something.

So, would the thing about 4X/8X also mean that I would notice no difference between a 4X and 8X card, or were you referring to whether or not I had a 4X/8X AGP slot?

Absolutely! The AGP is run by the north bridge in the chip set which also looks after the main memory (at around 400MHz I believe?) and the PCI bus by the south bridge in the chip set (around 133MHz if you are lucky).

David C.

In current 3d games, as long as everything else remains constant, (same mobo chipset, proccessor, graphics chip, memory), and the only difference is whether 1 card is 8x and the other is 4x, you shouldn't be able to notice any difference. In reality, there may be a 1-2 frame per second speed increase with 8x AGP slot and Card. In most cases there isn't even that much of a difference between the two. There are some games coming out, such as Doom III, that will probably saturate the AGP 4x bus. In this case, an 8x bus would probably improve your speed. But for what you are running, you would see no difference with an 8x AGP slot and card. Your system should really zoom running this program with the raedon 9500. Where you will see a definate difference is in different video card chips. A geforce 4 is incredibly faster than a geforce 2, a raedon 9700 is faster than a 9500 for example.

Allan