Power To The People

[aljude]

I recently updated my lagging PC to:

Gigabyte S-Series Motherboard
Athlon 64 x2 6000+
PCI-E GeForce 9600GT
4Gb RAM

I still had the odd problems with stuttering, but found it was the graphics card that was sucking all the power from the rest of the machine.
When I updated the power unit from 350W to 500W the machine came alive. No stuttering now, even if I run FS9 with virus checker and defrag in the background.

O.k. It cost a few bob, [pounds sterling], and it does dim the lights a bit when i boot up but in the long run it's the dog's nadgers.
With today's graphics and the cards to go with them it's always worth spending a bit more and getting more power. I never thought the 350w power unit would fail to supply, still you live and learn.

If you don't have a quick PC try logging off and back on as a different user, then you can stop all the services you don't need as well as the network connection and virus checker. This speeds up the system quite a lot.

Tony

[sprocky]

I recently updated my lagging PC to:

Gigabyte S-Series Motherboard
Athlon 64 x2 6000+
PCI-E GeForce 9600GT
4Gb RAM

Nice package - compared to mine
(Laptop, 1.6GHz Intel 945 chipset, 1.24GB RAM, 60GB HDD; flying in Heathrow area the fan is running like a race car engine on a straight track while the AI slows the FPS rate to seconds per frame)

...and it does dim the lights a bit when i boot up...

But your room will be warmed up in minutes

[campbeme]

I had that problem with my laptop cooking it self. Went to PC World spent £20 on a heat sink for a 17" Laptop powers 3 mighty fans off USB. Well worth the money keeps it alot cooler runs alot better.

Mark

[MIKE JG]

If you don't have a quick PC try logging off and back on as a different user, then you can stop all the services you don't need as well as the network connection and virus checker. This speeds up the system quite a lot.

I gave this a try and the computer itself definitely runs much faster. However I saw no improvements in my FPS in FS9, in fact they were actually lower. To me that indicates that my lower FPS are a result of the graphics card and RAM combination and not necessarily CPU speed or memory at this point. But that's good information to know.

[BadPvtDan]

I'm just not sure the graphics card has much to do with it. I noticed a huge improvement in fps when I upgraded CPUs and no improvement when I went to a higher-end video card.