Creative x-fi means less fps

Scougar · 14 Feb 2008 at 12:07

Have been using my on HD audio with my Asrock board since my Live 5.1 didn't seem to work bizarrely. I was more than happy with the output, but saw a good opportunity to buy on MM the fatality FPS (with Xram etc).

I installed it (had to select 2nd pci slot) and had turned off the onboard audio in the bios, but retained the HD audio drivers in case I needed to revert due to crackling etc. I ONLY used the latest drivers from the Creative website and not any of the apps, as I'd heard they were a bit of bloatware (will check them out later).

Note: I only currently have some pathetic 2.1 setup as the HC system is now downstairs with the plasma since my NF2 board (that I bought the HC system to play games with

) supported DD, but creative don't with games

Getting to the point
Anyway, I tried BF2 and couldn't really discern any difference in sound quality even with it on ultra and EAX5, so I tried COD4. What I noticed was that before my fps was hovering just above 60fps in bad situations, and then going to 90+ (had seen 200fps on occasion), but now I was getting on average 50-55fps, and dipping to say 43fps at times.

Have I done something wrong on the installation as I thought that the creative board was meant to speed things up (take some of the strain from the CPU etc). Bit dissappointed at this stage as I was hoping for a slight increase in frames and not a reduction.

Matthew

Scougar · 14 Feb 2008 at 13:08

I realise it doesn't use the xram on COD4, but it is dedicated hardware anyway, so I was assuming it would be faster than integrated solutions, and that's what I have seen in the reviews of the x-fi range.

And when going from 65 to 55 it makes quite a difference

I don't think a 10fps hit is how its meant to be?

Matthew

Scougar · 15 Feb 2008 at 14:55

Bendmark? Any info or links for that?

Matthew

Scougar · 15 Feb 2008 at 16:13

Really? No probs when I just installed the pure drivers with say BF2 with options.

I can't actually find the proper game mode software app on the creative website though, so if you know which app it is for the basic applications install, I'd appreciate it. (I don't have the original disc yet unfortunately).

Matthew

Scougar · 15 Feb 2008 at 23:01

Well I haven't actually uninstalled the onboard drivers, but other than performance they don't 'seem' to be conflicting. Will give it a shot

Helmet> I was curious and wondered if creative had installed any app, so looked in the start menu and found the control panel you mentioned

Handy. Seems EAX is set to be on? If I don't use it in a game, does it still run (perhaps causing the drop in fps?)

Matthew

Scougar · 18 Feb 2008 at 09:44

I am running XP mainly (as can't get ATI 3870 drivers to work with vista, I get blue screen of death on boot).

Am using latest creative drivers, and uninstalled the Onboard HD drivers. It made ZERO difference to the fps rate. Hmm... Will recheck with disabling the EAX on the console etc.

Matthew

Scougar · 20 Feb 2008 at 10:55

Turned off EAX and CMSS in the audio console and still has not increased my fps to previous levels

(lacking about 10FPS)

Hmm...

Matthew

Scougar · 21 Feb 2008 at 10:34

Hmm.. right. Not positive at the moment, but I think it may be down to settings I chose. In order to 'improve' performance previously, I deselected 'glow' and softshadows. I turned them both back on an it seems to be a bit higher, but would still dip to 40-45fps at times. Will do some more checking, as it may just be a CPU limited situation now, and with the creative card in, the 2.6Ghz may not be able to cope well enough with this modern card?

Matthew