Slow... F... P... S...

[Scorpiоn]

Okay, now this is really frustrating.  I did a complete reformat and had a fresh install of XP.  I then installed motherboard drivers, Firefox, all Microsoft critical updates, East Asian language support, Alwil antivirus, NVidia drivers, Intellipoint, Intellitype, Battlefield 2 with no patches, and Half Life 2.

And now I still have those friggin' FPS issues! My previous XP install was just perfect until about when I installed antivirus and the Battlefield 2 patches.  Which one was the culprit, I don't know.  What could I be overlooking?  What on earth can I do?  I have an

[Ivan]

What are the Specs... and the freespace on each drive

[Scorpiоn]

Hardware Configuration
Athlon XP 3000+
MSI K8N Neo (AC'97 Sound)
GeForce 6800 (BFG)
1024 PC3200 RAM
RAID1 2x Hitachi 250 GB
Memorex DVD+/-RW
Memorex DVD-ROM
Memorex CD-ROM
600w PSU

Drive Configuration (Partition/Used)
C: 75.1/12.7
D: 195/33.7
E: 195/14.6

D and E are unchanged from their previous states.

[GeForce]

Is the FPS issue system-wide or just in games? In either case it's gotta be a graphics card issue, but you've got the latest GFX drivers so I cannot see what the problem could be?

Only thing I can suggest is completely remove all gfx related things, drivers and all, even the default windows ones. Then re-install everything.

Jon

[Jared]

I don't know if this has any effect on anything, but last time I reinstalled everything fresh, the newest video card drivers were the culprit of VERY bad FPS..

Just my thoughts/experiences..

[Scorpiоn]

I tried reverting back to the 77.72 drivers in lieu of the new 77.77 ones.  I still get the same odd performance.  About the only time in Half Life 2 I can get good performance is if I'm looking at the floor, or if I'm in a small room with only one character.

Could it possibly be anti-virus?  Is there anyway software (like a patch) could jack with hardware?

Jared, what version drivers are you using?

[Jared]

umm, let me see.....DXdiag.exe shows em at.....

6.14.10.56.55

Which I do believe is the 56.55 set..

Kind of old, but they do the trick when the newer ones where giving me trouble....

Jared

P.S. This is for my geforce FX5700LE (256mb version)

[the_autopilot]

Try reinstalling the drivers (cleaning first with driver cleaner). See if that works, if not, try the next step.

Then uninstall battlefield 2. A lot of people have been reporting problems with that game, especially with the patches.

See if that works.

[Scorpiоn]

I did the driver cleaner routine, and then installed the 77.30 drivers (included with Battlefield 2) and I still get bad stutters.  I don't even have Battlefield 2 installed at the moment.  I uninstalled it and I'm just trying to get Half Life 2 to work like it used to.  Even in the opening scene, where the "background" changes behind G-Man's face, the sound stutters a bit everytime the scene changes.  The when you're actually in the tram, I get about 2 FPS. :P

Damn you Battlefield 2!  >:(

[Scorpiоn]

Perhaps a clue?

During Half Life 2, I get decent - not great; decent - frames, but the second a character appears on screen, the FPS plummets.  Even stupid NPCs like leeches will cause the FPS to die.  Also, I noticed that Command and Conquer Generals runs fine, but the videos (image and audio) are horribly stuttery.  I haven't had this video problem with Generals since my Gi 4200 days.  I seriously suspect the patch did something to my hardware.  Just a nagging suspicion.

[Jared]

Could it be related to an Anti-ailising setting being changed by the patch?

[4_Series_Scania]

Play about with your AGP apperture size in your BIOS, I've had issues with BF2 , all is well now however @ 1024x768 with everything on "high"

Another consideration is sound drivers, try experimenting with software or hardware in BF2's audio settings, if that fails, in your audio propetries in DxDiag, set sound acceleration to "basic" thisd fixes no end of fps issues that I'd previously blames on my crappy gfx cards.
I realised I had other issues when I still had stutters wonce I'd bought my 6800GT thats overclocked to Ultra speed.

Good luck, you'll get there.  ;)

[Scorpiоn]

Thanks for all your help [British mode]lads[/British mode], but like I always do, I went with the nuclear option.  I love puttering with hardware, but nothing frustrates me more than software.  I tend to reformat when faced with any kind of problem.  But it worked this time!

I installed over XP on it's native C partition, but it seems something from the D or E snuck back in.  Just to see if Battlefield 2 didn't really fudge up my hardware, I installed XP, Direct X 9.0C, NVidia 77.30 drivers and Battlefield 2 on a 250GB Hitachi IDE, and it ran fine for awhile.  I installed Half Life 2 to continue tests, and things got squirelly.  I went ahead and reformatted my SATA 250s, and so far everything's good!  Half Life 2 runs like silk, and my PC laughs at Command and Conquer Generals, oh and Battlefield 2 runs fine as well.

3 reformats and a bunch of cautious installs later, things seem to be stabilized.