GFX Card Set up for NOOB!

N4sty

Hi Dudes

I have serched my way to this Forum after seeing a coment in another forum about Cyborg drivers and Omega drivers for the ATI Cards.

Ok now having a quick look through the pages here I realise that I am a complete noob when it comes to GFX setup so I would like some help and advice from those that have the time.

Right my system:- P4 1.8 (not overclocked) Abit BD7 mobo (BIOS at std optimun settings), Built by ATI Radeon 8500 64Mb GFX card ( Catalyst 02.3 drivers 2D ver 6.13.10.6166, Package version 7.76-0208156-005727C-ATI) Windows XP Home, 512MB Cas 2 RAM.

Right as you can see above the PC BIOS settings have not been changed by me and the ATI GFX card BIOS is the version as sent from the factory.

Now I play Unreal Tournament and Unreal Tournament 2003. I have been told that UT 1 performs best in open GL mode but I can never get it to run correctly ( I have Epics OPGL patch installed and the 2nd disk extra GFX) The textures are always corrupt (semi transparent and they change colours as you move across them). D3D gives no problems. UT2K3 I dont play much ATM so cant comment on GFX performance here.

My current GFX driver set up consists of Vertical sync turned off ( as this makes UT 1 chug like a traction engine) the screen refresh set to 85Hz in Win control panel and standard everything else as installed.

I understand that there is a problem with the Win XP refresh rates so presume that even though I have set the monitor to 85Hz, it is still only 60Hz? Is this in all applications or just games?

What I would like is a recomendation for driver Install ( be it cyborg or omega) and some setting preferences for all the respective options (to be honest I dont know what half of them do and dont notice much difference with or with out them) Sorry to be a pain....I can imagine you've done this a thousand times!!

Thanks in advance

N4sty ( In da UK)

peroni

Welcome to Driverheaven N4sty.

One of the first thing you sohuld take care of is the dreaded WinXP refresh rate problem with games.
The latest ATI drivers will allow you to override it for D3D games but not for Open GL ones.
So the best way to fix it is to use a small utility called Refreshforce (http://www.pagehosting.co.uk/rf/).

As for the rest my suggestion is to get the latest Omega drivers that contain all the optimizations you need (fbest compromize for quality/performance).
And try to leave the V-Sync enabled as this really improves the way games look (no tearing).

digitalwanderer

If you're new to ATI, throwing Omegadrive's drivers right on top of your current set-up wtihout removing your current drivers would really probably be the quickest/easiest/bestest way. (Oh, make sure you install DX9 first. )

N4sty

Ok Guys

Many thanks for the warm welcome....its always good to find a good forum with good advice and no spam...excellent

Now I have DL the Omega 2.3.55 drivers from Tech Connect and also got RefreshForce as well (DirectX9 is still DLoading, I hate 128K )

Just a couple more not so dumb questions (hopefully) if you dont mind.

Would it be better/safer to uninstall my current ATI drivers and control panel before installing the new Omega ones? I dont have a problem doing this ( I can always follow the guides in another thread on this forum )

What order should I install these programs...obviously DirectX 9 first, what then RefreshForce or Omega drivers next?

Finally what control panel program should I use with the Omega drivers, or do they come with there own modded one as well?

I think thats all folks

Many thanks again

N4sty (In da UK)

peroni

Correct order of installation:
DX9, reboot
Omega drivers, reboot
Refresh force reboot.

The Omega drivers already come with a control panel.
No need to uninstall previous drivers.
Only is something goes wrong then uninstall completely as shown in our guide.

ToshiroOC

Why would you need the refresh force if you are installing DX9? You can handle all of that stuff by going to start->run->"dxdiag"->help->override...

peroni

Because there are also OpenGL games.

ToshiroOC

Touche! I never thought about that, given that almost all of my games currently use DirectX to the exclusion of OpenGl... Good point!

Zardon

funny this is an interesting subject, D3D games and opengl, im going to open a poll in the tech forum.

UberLord

Aside from the OpenGL stuff which Peroni pointed out, overriding via DX Diag forces a refresh rate for all resolutions. Seeing that 99% of monitors have a lower refresh rate for higher resolutions you would have a very good chance of breaking your monitor. This is bad.

Which is why programs like Refresh Force are good as they have different refresh rates for different resolutions

N4sty

Hello again

Ok installed all the Omega 2.3.55 drivers and dircetX9 and RefreshForce. Every thing seems to run ok ( by that I mean no black screens) but Unreal Tournament runs a bit stuttery in 1024*768 medium textures all the other stuff like coronas is turned off yet its FPS is around 80. With High textures it stutters and almost grinds to a hault at 35 FPS. I have not changed the driver settings at all from as they were installed. Now on my old drivers UT used to run max everything at this resolution with the exception of having Vert sync turned off ( it is now on). Any Idears? I have posted the new 3DMark 2001SE marks in the other forum and they dont seem that bad. Bear in mind that Unreal tournament is quite old now and I wouldnt have though it would'nt require that much GFX power to run it.

Thanks
N4sty

O....... I have just run directX.exe and have listed :- directX.cpl is an old version,which could cause problems.

I downloaded Direct X9 ( Runtime) from M$ which was a small file which then connected to the internet and installed DirectX9 (7.9Mb file) could this have been the wrong one?

shuki

you've got the correct dx9. I'll post up a quick guide for winXP users to completely get rid of ATI drivers on their system so you can install the driver of your choice on cleanly. If it looks like too much don't sweat it! And hopefully, you've got a restore point set anyway before dx9 that you can roll back to if need be...

we need to get rid of or "clean" your system of all previous ATI stuff. including the ATI junk that comes complimentary with winXP SP1 heres what ya need to do:

1. unplug nic card or modem from net (physically unplug)
2. create system restore point (if you don't already have one)
3. remove ATI driver from add/remove programs then remove CP from add/remove programs
4. reboot into safe mode (press F8 during boot up)
5. if you've never deleted the ATI inf files from windows (ie search ati*.* and delete) or if you're connected to the net, you'll not be able to cancel out of windows automatically finding new device and installing drivers for it. Let it do it's thing, we'll fix it in a minute heh.
6. Open windows explorer and delete c:\ATI and c:\program files\ATI
7. start->run->search c:\windows for ati*.* and delete all
8. empty recycle bin
9. open regedit (great, must have program!) and delete any ATI (usually 3 together and then one or two in separate places... like one under Installed options for example). That sends them to backup. Then go to backup and select and delete again.
10. close regedit
11. open device mgr->display adapters->uninstall and reboot
11. you should now come back up into windows and if you're unplugged from the net and have searched and fully deleted (emptied recycle bin) all ATI*.* files, you should now be able to cancel out of windows automatically installing your video card drivers. Just cancel out. If you have dx9 on already, go to step 14
12. I would now install DX9 if you haven't done so
13. reboot for dx9 sake
14. install official catalyst 3.0 drivers and CP

N4sty

I appreciate you know a damn sight more than me M8...but what you have advised is the contrey to what everybody else said in the thread. Do you think I have a corupt install of the drivers and DX9 or just the drivers. I have had 3D Marks of 8007 and 8016 as it is.

N4sty