Please help me fix my slowdowns.

[wackyiraqi77]

Normally I can solve issues like this, but New Vegas has put me at my wit's end. Here's my issue. I own and ASUS G73 with the Mobility Radeon 5870, 6 gigs of ram, i7, etc, etc. New Vegas SHOULD be working fine with Ultra settings from what I have read. I know for a fact my computer can do it, because it does. Sometimes. But most of the time, the framerate is very choppy. To illustrate my issue a bit better, here are some odd occurrences I have experienced. The slowdowns were really annoying me, so I installed the NVSE4gb mod. Upon starting the game, it was choppy for a few seconds but then worked fine. It was working ok up until today when I started playing again. Now the framerate is back to crap. So in an effort to try and fix it, I installed the dx9dr.dll or whatever it happens to be called. That did nothing for me. So I started up AMD GPU Clock tool and over clocked my GPU to 650 core and 1100 mem, up from 600 and 1000. This did nothing at first. But after playing for a few minutes, a miracle! The game jumped briefly but then began running at an extremely high framerate. This lasted about 2 or 3 minutes, at which point, the game froze. I closed the game and windows notified me that the graphics driver had failed and then recovered. So I clocked down my card to normal, tried playing again, crap framerates are back. So now I am here.

 

As an interesting sidenote, my computer tends to run hot when stressed graphically. Yet, New Vegas doesn't seem to stress the graphics card at all. My gut is telling me that for some reason beyond my comprehension, New Vegas is not using my GPU at 100% capacity. I can't prove this, but the fact that my fans almost never spin up tells me that something is wrong.

 

Any ideas what the hell is wrong with my computer? New Vegas?

 

Update: I just tried playing New Vegas again. It was incredibly clunky for a couple minutes and then just magically started working. The game played very smoothly for about 10 minutes. At this point, the game froze and not long after, grey vertical bars appeared on the screen. Clearly a failure of the GPU drivers.

 

2nd Update: Here is what I think is going on. I have a cooling pad for the laptop. When I leave it off, the game begins to run smoothly. If I keep it off for long, the card will overheat and/or the drivers will fail. If I turn the pad on after the game begins to run smoothly, I seem to be OK. If this is the case, then WTF?

Edited October 22, 2011 by wackyiraqi77

[Bitdman]

I don't have a laptop so I'm not familiar with any issues with them. Do the graphics cards in laptops have a fan or is the pad your only option for cooling? how much memory do you have? What utilities and mods do you have installed? Is it Steam version?

[JimboUK]

Pop it open and check the fans, even a tiny bit of dust in the wrong place can slow the fans down and cause it to overheat. I'd get rid of the overlock as well.

[wackyiraqi77]

Pop it open and check the fans, even a tiny bit of dust in the wrong place can slow the fans down and cause it to overheat. I'd get rid of the overlock as well.

 

As I said in the OP, I did get rid of the overclock. I know what my issue is. For some reason, my GPU doesn't seem to realize that New Vegas is running, and so it doesn't clock up to maximum. I haven't quite figured out how to fix this yet.

[bben46]

1. Back off on the graphics settings - it will run cooler

2. Clean the fan & air channels - as said by Jim_uk, Dust will cut down on the volume of air getting through. Some laptops have a hatch you can open to get to the fan.

If you continue to allow it to overheat it will fail. And unlike a desktop, when your graphics component fails, the laptop is scrap.

[wackyiraqi77]

It isn't an overheating issue. I can't stress this enough.

[blove]

On battery or AC? Could be a throttling issue.

 

What BIOS revision? The latest is 213. 211 had a fan fix for the 5870.

 

There is a vBIOS update for the G73, but I did not see it listed in the ASUS G73 Downloads. It is rather complicated.

[MyGoodEye]

Now, you say it's not an overheating issue, but it does sound a bit like if you keep your computer cool, the game plays better... I guess that's kinda common sense.

 

I know for a fact my computer can do it, because it does.

So, assuming you're correct and it's not purely overheating, I'd say that you're asking your computer to run a marathon at a sprint. So what you know "for a fact" is that your computer can do it for a limited period of time... I don't think that you can automatically infer that it can do it for an unlimited period of time... but anyway...

 

As far as I know, NEW VEGAS (and by extension, GAMEBRYEO) don't entirely "know" how to optimally utilize high-powered GPUs. When playing (and modding this game) you HAVE to remember that it's based on a (technologically speaking) pretty damn old game engine and as good as it may have been, it's been retired for a reason.

 

Most of the processes, I've found (in unscientific trial and error) seem to be handled by the CPU (including NPCs)... I monitor my graphics card with the software it came with an at no time does F"NV ever get over 50% use... kinda of a drag. RAGE, on the other hand, is eating up GPU-power like a delicious dessert.

 

I'm managed to push it a bit more using the NEW VEGAS CONFIGATOR (notably by activating most THREADING options (not audio!))... it's on the NEXUS and, I think, it's must-have.

 

Find the NEW VEGAS STUTTER REMOVER and cap your FPS at a comfortable number... in this way, you'll not see the drastic differences as obviously. Using FRAPS (or whatever) take an educated guess at your "average" FPS (under stress, like with multiple NPCs fighting) and then cap it at about 10FPS under that (not going below 30FPS I suppose).

 

Past that, the best advice is (as BBEN says) back down your graphics. Cut the AA a bit and drop the ANI

 

This is exceptionally handy in illustrating that "ULTRA" may not really matter all that much:

http://www.geforce.com/Optimize/Guides/new-vegas-tweak-guide

 

Good luck.

 

- David

[wackyiraqi77]

It isn't overheating. I monitored my temps playing the game and never get over 70 on the GPU. If it helps any, I tried running New Vegas at the lowest possible settings, and got the same bad framerate. Interestingly enough, I threw the d3d9.dll into my Vegas Folder and it began running perfectly, but then the performance decayed to minimum again. Changing the graphics settings, lowering the resolution, nothing helps. I should have never mentioned the overheating because it's a non issue at this point. :/

[Fonger]

Interestingly enough, I threw the d3d9.dll into my Vegas Folder and it began running perfectly, but then the performance decayed to minimum again.

experimentally

 

try this again

 

if it returns to speedy

 

your problem lies with UAC