Low FPS in CoD4

Hey guys,

I have an m1530 with a T8300, 3 gigs of ram and an 8600mGT and im getting terrrrible frames per second in call of duty 4, single player.

my 3dmark06 is pretty good, 4600, but even with everything on the lowest possible settings in cod4, i get 10-20 fps in action scenes.

My temps arent that bad, but i could be wrong. After playing for a while, my 8600GT tops at 93 degrees.

Ive updated my directx, but that didnt help. I updated my graphics drivers a few months back, are there any newer ones out?


What should I do to get CoD4 running decently?!

Thanks!

 

not that bad? 93 is dangerously high, what bios are you running? btw id get a cooling pad, if that doesnt help keep it around 60's you should get it returned / get a replacement laptop.

****edit: you can also try changing your nvidia properties, right click on your desktop and switch them to performance instead of quality. i dontknow if this will help but i hope it does. keep us posted. good luck :]

 

yikes, 93C?

THe 8600GT is faulty by the way, and dont put it under heavy loads of gaimg, or else that number will keep on rising...

 

hummm, im not use to laptop gaming, because 93 degrees is prefectly fine for a desktop card...

anyways, the reg wont tell me my bios version, but it says it was released on 1/24/08. I know this isnt the new version that dell released due to the bad 8600GT cards, but i never updated because I never had any problems with my card. Should i update to the latest? will it make the fans run at full speed all the time and be really loud?

also, if I keep having these high temps, would they let me exchange? would it be better to wait a while to get a newer XPS? I did that with my ipod haha...

 

I've updated to the latest drivers, and my fans don't run loud at all. they don't run much, infact. Only when I have naval battles in Age Of Empires do they really turn on.

 

What if.... Nvidia claim to have fixed the die packaging problem by using newer materials, but just to be safe, they also lowered the performance of the card so that it would not be possible for it to be damaged from heat cycling... Perhaps all shipments are equipped with a "new" crippled 8600GT?

 

Well that would suck if that is true as I just ordered my 1530 yesterday. I will have to test mine once I receive it.

 

lith07, for call of duty 4 i would recommend the 169.09 drivers for your 8600m gt, these work fine for me.

Also what settings are you using??
i have mine set up on 1280*800, 2x AA, shadows turned off, glow off, and soften smoke edges off, the rest of the things are on i think but they wont make an overly large difference on or off. This set up looks good IMO

Other steps to consider are overclocking your graphics card. although with your current temps i wouldnt recommend this! have you read flipfires guide to undervolting your cpu? This would hopefully decrease the temps of your cpu and in turn your gpu.

Here is the link to his guide. http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=235824

Hope this is all helpful for you

 

oh ps my gpu temp tops out at about 77 degrees C playin games... just to let you know!

 

Have you tried setting your graphics card to performance? It's on balance[performance/quality] by default.

 

Do you mean the battery power plan options (right clicking the battery icon and going to power options), or something in the nvidia control pannel?


Hooligan: I am using the absolute lowest settings possible. Whats would you say your minimum, average, and highest fps at those settings are? Thanks for the info by the way

I think im gonna do the bios update and see if that cools my card down a bit. I can go back to my current bios version if it makes my lappy sound like a jet engine and doesnt improve performance, right?

Thanks for the responses, and I'll keep you guys posted!

 

No, he means in the nvidia control panel (right click anywhere on the desktop, it should come up), click on adjust image settings with preview (on the left hand side). Personally i have mine set to let the 3d applicaton decide, im not too sure how much affect this actually has on performance. Although it is a valid point make sure that your power plan is set to high performance!

Emm average about 30 fps i think sometimes it can go as high as 50/60 but thats rare it usually hovers between 30-40, i think the lowest is probz 23 or something. i find it perfectly playable!

Also how are you chacking your fps? the best way is to call up the in game console (press `) and type /cg_drawfps 1

As far as i know you can go back to your old BIOS, aslong as you have the install file for it?

Did you look into any of the things i mentioned? new drivers? undervolting? i highly recommend them all, you will notice differences in your performance.

Also, have you tried playing any other games? do these show the same low frame rates?

 

ok, updated my bios, and no improvement. I also set my card to performance, and got a little change. Now, the game runs alot better, but when my gpu gets up to around 85, it totally slows down again. So basically i need to cool my card down....

Hooligan: I looked at the undervolting guide an it seems like alot of work. Have other people with m1530s had nice gpu temp drops? Oh and i am using the ingame fps counter. I am also getting the same results with UT3, good until i hit the mid 80's

So do i just have a bad 8600GT? What would you guys do about it?

EDIT: Yea I just ran a test by putting my m1530 on top of a raised box fan to give the bottem some cooling. The results were that the temps never got over 68 and the game ran really well on medium settings. Anyone know of any good coolers for the m1530?

 

Good to hear u got ur temps down, i just prop mine up at the back with game boxes lol.

Not too sure about laptop coolers, but you could try forcing your lappy fans on all the time? i havent tried this myself but it might be a good way to keep the temps down, there is a program called i8kfan that should do the trick, i am just seeing if i can get this to work on my m1530 right not, will let u know the results.

Heres a link to doawnload the program

I8kfan

PS. I havent yet managed to get this program to work myself....

 

Well i tried I8kfan but couldnt get it to work, also tried a program called speedfan, that didnt work either lol.

Anyone know hw to make these programs change the fan speed?

 

hmmm, im gonna try riva, since i already have it. ill let u know

 

Silly question, but how do you get it to display the number of fps you are getting in CoD4?

 

mmm open up the console (using `) then type cg_drawfps or somethng like that lol it will show u all the options u have ull see it.

hope that helps!