GX640 Crysis Performance Problems

So I recently bought Crysis, and my GX640 isn't performing nearly as well as I thought it would be when playing this game. I tried playing around with the graphics settings with things like textures, object quality, shaders, water, and physics on high and everything else on medium. With these settings, my fps would be around 30-40 in less open areas like forests, but in open areas, my fps would drop to around 23-30, especially during a firefight. The weird thing is, setting everything to low doesn't do much; it only improves the fps by about 5.

My computer is always plugged in and on the "gaming mode" provided by MSI's eco. My Catalyst version is 10.11. I also use the program Game Booster to close background programs and processes I don't need.

CPU-Z says my cpu is running at 2.5 GHz (I have the 430m), and GPU-Z says my gpu's clock speed is 625 MHz, so it doesn't look like a hardware problem. Also, my temps, while a little warm for the cpu, seem fine. The highest my cpu has gotten during Crysis is 88 degrees Celsius, and the max for the gpu was around 80.

I've heard of other GX640 users running this game fine on higher settings, so does anyone have any idea what could be wrong? Is there an older catalyst version that runs better? Is there something else that I can do (other than overclocking; my computer gets hot enough, lol) to improve my laptop's performance?

 

Is the drop in FPS only at a particular location or does it happen regularly?

 

The drop in fps happens in firefights and large expansive areas where there isn't much blocking your view. More confined spaces such as forests where you're surrounded by trees and vegetation receive the best framerate. One particular area that I noticed a drop in fps was where you're supposed to rescue the hostage from the North Korean camp (second level I think). There are a lot of enemies and buildings, and I got a pretty steady framerate of around 23-27 during that part.

 

Have you tried 10.12 or downgrading all the way back to 10.8?

 

Unfortunately ppl on nbr thnk the gx640 is some kind of god wen it comes to gaming. However the reality is that it sucks when playing crysis and only crossfire setups or a powerful single card like the 5870 can play it on enthusiast settings. On my gx640 i get around 30-40 fps average on most levels on high settings until i hit some of those bigger levels. My fps begins to drop dramatically and its unplayable. On crysis warhead the train level makes my fps average at around 13 id say. Just play this game on all medium because on some parts of the game it is a lot more intense than others. The gx640 struggles to handle crysis on high settings at native res, its just the 5770 is only a mid range card thats why. However most other games I can easily play on high or max it out.

 

If you think your FPS sucks now, wait until you get to the last levels. The Radeon Mobility HD5850 will scream for mercy.

 

No, I haven't, but I'll definitely try that. I looked at the 10.12 release notes though, and it didn't mention any performance increases for Crysis. I can't remember, are the 10.8 drivers the ones the GX640 came with?

After reading these, it seems I have expected a little too much out of my GX640. While this makes me feel better, there are three mysterious issues that are still confusing me:

1. It seems my GX640 has more trouble with the game the longer I play. This seems to suggest my laptop is getting too hot, but my temps (in my first post) seem fairly normal.

2. My frame rate really suffers when there are many enemies, buildings, or both. Oddly enough, when this happens, setting all the graphics settings to low doesn't really do anything in this situation.

3. I talked to my friend the other day who has a Sony Vaio with a mobility radeon hd 4650 graphics card. He told me he can run the game well with most settings turned to high with a few others at medium. However, his screen is only 720p, so he runs the game at a much lower resolution than me. Would the resolution differences explain why my laptop isn't running the game much better than his?

 

Yes, you should run Crysis at 720p if you want mostly high settings.

I would take 720p at high over 1680*1050 at medium any day.

Read this: TweakGuides.com - Crysis Tweak Guide

and this: Crysis Hardware Performance Guide - Features at GameSpot (look at the resolution tests on page 2, for every step up in resolution you lose 10fps at high settings.

You should not just have everything at high or medium, when a game is tweaked properly there will be a mix of all settings.

 

Unless you really overclock, Crysis in high settings will run slow. I went through most of the game at high settings 1920x1080 res, and only the last snow levels+ the final fight proved that high was too much.

I usually got over 30fps+ on average ,with minimum around 25, but I also use near 900/1030 clocks on my GPU. Lowering the res and mixing settings will get you the best performance while still looking good enough.

 

Crysis isn't even fun after you beat it, I don't even have the game on Steam (which is rare) and have never played it on this computer. Play a real game instead.

 

Here are the settings I would use based on the Tweakguies and Hardware performance guides:

Try 1600*900 or 1680*1050 then 1280*720 or 1280*800 (if your screen has a 16:9 or 16:10 aspect ratio)

Shaders - Very High
Object - Medium
Shadows - Medium
Textures- High
Physics - Very High
Volumetric Effects - Medium
Game Effects - Medium
Post Processing - Very High
Particles - Medium
Water- Very High
Sound - Very High

This should not happen, make sure you patch (update) Crysis and more importantly your graphics card.

If your machine is still struggling at low settings then run 3dmark vantage and 3dmark 06 and compare to other owners of that graphics card and laptop.

The MSI GX640 should average 50+ fps at medium and 40+fps at high @ 1024*768 in the ingame GPU benchmark ( http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-MSI-GX640-i5447LW7P-Notebook.30776.0.html). Use this as a guide to see if your GPU is defective.

 

Minecraft?

 

Thanks for the response. I will try those settings later tonight. I was able to update my drivers to 10.12 and run 3dmark06 now, though, and I got a score of 11548. That seems pretty standard, so I think changing some settings in Crysis should probably do the trick.

 

I just wanted to thank everyone for their help and insight. A special thanks to ARom for the settings you gave me to try; I have now beaten Crysis all the way through with those settings, and not only did the game look good, it played very well, too. I think turning down the object quality was the biggest help. It seems like such an obvious thing to do now, since the areas I lost fps were often large, expansive areas with many things to draw in the distance. But anyway, thanks again, everyone!