*WARNING* Do NOT upgrade your PC with today's hardware with expectations of better performance.

jagermonsta · 10-12-2007, 11:24 AM

This should probably be a sticky that way people don't blow thousands of dollars (like I did) on new hardware expecting better performance out of Everquest 2. My New SystemMOBO: EVGA nForce 680i SLI (A1 Version)CPU: Intel Core 2 Extreme (Quad Core) QX6850 Kentsfield 3.0GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache RAM: 4GB of Corsair Dominator Series DDR2-1066 PC2-8500GPU: 2 - EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTX KO ACS3 on SLIHD: Western Digital RaptorX 150GB x2 RAID0MONITOR: SAMSUNG 226BW Black 22" 2 ms (GTG) DVI Widescreen LCD MonitorOS: Windows XP Pro x64 SP2NVIDIA DRIVERS: 163.75Cost: Around $3,000+Reason: I wanted EQ2 to perform flawlessly.Results: Disappointing.So I should of done more research on EQ2. I guess I should of known that Everquest 2 is CPU bound and the fact it also uses only a single core? Should of been obvious right? So now I have these power plant 3d cards working with a single core which is actually slowing me down more then my previous PC setup. "The fix"? Turn off SLI and physically remove one of the $500 3d cards? No thank you. I'm sure there is or will be a MMORPG out there soon that will take advantage of today's hardware. What a bummer. You really gotta put a warning on the box or something. "Works best with 'yesterday's' hardware."

willnotuse · 10-12-2007, 12:09 PM

Well the good news is your system can play the new Crysis fairly well.

jagermonsta · 10-12-2007, 12:27 PM

willnotuse wrote:

Well the good news is your system can play the new Crysis fairly well.

Haha this is true. I'll just have to install Vista for some DirectX 10 action.

Vodr · 10-12-2007, 01:23 PM

Ok few things about your setup, your correct about the cores however you should be good running a single core, as far as the SLI is concerned if you are running in a window and not full screen there is a slowdown in SLI performance with nvidia drivers which is stated in their release documents on the driver at least what I have read on the vista drivers, It may also apply to XP as well since they are tweaking some things.

Go to Vista though as the driver support is much better than WinXP 64 bit ever was and disable UAC. Also Vista may be a bit slower on some things but the early reports of the SP1 beta most people are noticing quite the improvement on speed. The SP1 is expected to release in 1st quarter of 08.

jagermonsta · 10-12-2007, 01:42 PM

I plan to put Vista on another set of hard drives once SP1 is released. However I also plan to get the x64 version which I've read all over the net has driver issues with these 8800 cards. As for full screen, I always run full screen. It just seems that Everquest doesn't work well with 8800 cards on SLI period due to CPU bottlenecking the single core. There are multiple threads/posts about this on the NVIDIA forums dating back from 2006 with people getting the same results today.

Wingrider01 · 10-12-2007, 02:41 PM

Ranadin@Antonia Bayle wrote:

I plan to put Vista on another set of hard drives once SP1 is released. However I also plan to get the x64 version which I've read all over the net has driver issues with these 8800 cards. As for full screen, I always run full screen. It just seems that Everquest doesn't work well with 8800 cards on SLI period due to CPU bottlenecking the single core. There are multiple threads/posts about this on the NVIDIA forums dating back from 2006 with people getting the same results today.

Run SLI on 7950's with a quad processor, 2 gb memory at full graphics with just shaodws turned off, had a pair of 8800's but got tired of the issue with other games outside of eq2 and rma'd them to exchange for the 7950's

jagermonsta · 10-12-2007, 02:55 PM

Every other game I play runs perfect besides EQ2. Kinda hoping for a solution someday that doesn't involve me trading in my new stuff for old stuff. Kind of the idea of the whole thread. The point that EQ2 is only capable of good performance on old hardware.

10-12-2007, 12:27 PM	#3
jagermonsta Loremaster Join Date: Aug 2006 Posts: 304	willnotuse wrote: Well the good news is your system can play the new Crysis fairly well. Haha this is true. I'll just have to install Vista for some DirectX 10 action.

10-12-2007, 02:41 PM	#6
Wingrider01 Loremaster Join Date: Nov 2004 Posts: 5,999	Ranadin@Antonia Bayle wrote: I plan to put Vista on another set of hard drives once SP1 is released. However I also plan to get the x64 version which I've read all over the net has driver issues with these 8800 cards. As for full screen, I always run full screen. It just seems that Everquest doesn't work well with 8800 cards on SLI period due to CPU bottlenecking the single core. There are multiple threads/posts about this on the NVIDIA forums dating back from 2006 with people getting the same results today. Run SLI on 7950's with a quad processor, 2 gb memory at full graphics with just shaodws turned off, had a pair of 8800's but got tired of the issue with other games outside of eq2 and rma'd them to exchange for the 7950's __________________ Fixing computer issues, one SOC7 at a time. Yes Jim, the user has experienced the dreaded PICNIC error

10-12-2007, 11:24 AM	#1
jagermonsta Loremaster Join Date: Aug 2006 Posts: 304	This should probably be a sticky that way people don't blow thousands of dollars (like I did) on new hardware expecting better performance out of Everquest 2. My New SystemMOBO: EVGA nForce 680i SLI (A1 Version)CPU: Intel Core 2 Extreme (Quad Core) QX6850 Kentsfield 3.0GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache RAM: 4GB of Corsair Dominator Series DDR2-1066 PC2-8500GPU: 2 - EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTX KO ACS3 on SLIHD: Western Digital RaptorX 150GB x2 RAID0MONITOR: SAMSUNG 226BW Black 22" 2 ms (GTG) DVI Widescreen LCD MonitorOS: Windows XP Pro x64 SP2NVIDIA DRIVERS: 163.75Cost: Around $3,000+Reason: I wanted EQ2 to perform flawlessly.Results: Disappointing.So I should of done more research on EQ2. I guess I should of known that Everquest 2 is CPU bound and the fact it also uses only a single core? Should of been obvious right? So now I have these power plant 3d cards working with a single core which is actually slowing me down more then my previous PC setup. "The fix"? Turn off SLI and physically remove one of the $500 3d cards? No thank you. I'm sure there is or will be a MMORPG out there soon that will take advantage of today's hardware. What a bummer. You really gotta put a warning on the box or something. "Works best with 'yesterday's' hardware."

10-12-2007, 12:09 PM	#2
willnotuse Loremaster Join Date: Aug 2005 Location: East Coast Posts: 479	Well the good news is your system can play the new Crysis fairly well.

10-12-2007, 01:23 PM	#4
Vodr General Join Date: Jan 2005 Posts: 305	Ok few things about your setup, your correct about the cores however you should be good running a single core, as far as the SLI is concerned if you are running in a window and not full screen there is a slowdown in SLI performance with nvidia drivers which is stated in their release documents on the driver at least what I have read on the vista drivers, It may also apply to XP as well since they are tweaking some things. Go to Vista though as the driver support is much better than WinXP 64 bit ever was and disable UAC. Also Vista may be a bit slower on some things but the early reports of the SP1 beta most people are noticing quite the improvement on speed. The SP1 is expected to release in 1st quarter of 08.

10-12-2007, 01:42 PM	#5
jagermonsta Loremaster Join Date: Aug 2006 Posts: 304	I plan to put Vista on another set of hard drives once SP1 is released. However I also plan to get the x64 version which I've read all over the net has driver issues with these 8800 cards. As for full screen, I always run full screen. It just seems that Everquest doesn't work well with 8800 cards on SLI period due to CPU bottlenecking the single core. There are multiple threads/posts about this on the NVIDIA forums dating back from 2006 with people getting the same results today.

10-12-2007, 02:55 PM	#7
jagermonsta Loremaster Join Date: Aug 2006 Posts: 304	Every other game I play runs perfect besides EQ2. Kinda hoping for a solution someday that doesn't involve me trading in my new stuff for old stuff. Kind of the idea of the whole thread. The point that EQ2 is only capable of good performance on old hardware.