775dual-vsta + 4GB + HD4670 = slow

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[H]ard|Gawd
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Mar 6, 1998
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I have a really strange problem with this setup and I'm hoping someone here might have an idea what's going on.

Fist of all, here's the base configuration:
- ASRock 775dual-vsta (3.17a BIOS)
- Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 2.13GHz
- 4GB (2 x 2GB) Corsair XMS2 DDR2-1066 (running @ DDR2-677)
- ASUS ATI Radeon HD4670 512M PCI-E
- Windows XP Pro x64 edition

I've had the board and CPU for awhile, but I just upgraded the memory and graphics card yesterday which brings my problem. Whenever I try to play a H264 encoded video clip, the performance is abysmal. It renders somewhere around 1 frame every 4 seconds.

Previously, the system had 2GB of memory and a Radeon X850XT AGP card which played everything without a problem at full speed.

I hadn't changed anything codec-wise, so I expected at least the same performance. For the record, I have both the DivX 7 codec and CoreAVC. I also tried a trial version of the Cyberlink H264 for ATI driver and various media playing software. Even VLC renders at the same slow speed.

After much tinkering, I found something interesting. In VLC, under the DirectX settings, there's an option to use system memory instead of video memory. When I enable that, I can playback the video at around 10 fps which is still unwatchable, but significantly improved.

Does anyone have any idea what could be going on here? This problem is really strange and I can't imagine I'm the first to run into it, but I can't seem to find any information anywhere about it.

One other oddity I should mention... The system only recognizes 3.25GB of memory. The BIOS itself correctly shows 4GB in Setup, but everywhere else (during POST and in x64 XP) it shows 3.25GB. From what I can find, this is a limitation of the VIA PT880-Pro chipset. Could this somehow be causing a conflict with the HD4670??

edit: I forgot to mention playing a MPEG2 1080P clip runs fine. Playing Team Fortress 2 on max settings is fine. Playing Fallout 3 on low settings runs like crap.
 
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You're right -- a clean install of Windows fixed it. Strange because I've never had a problem swapping out a video card before. Oh well, something new I guess. Thanks.
 
The problem is rather simple, which doesn't make it any less annoying.

Windows was, most likely, still blindly loading the AGP driver considering the AGP bus was still present. The driver loading obviously was a cause for conflict.

Rather than formatting, you could have simply completely deleted the entire device enumeration tree from the registry.

It would be best to uninstall every device driver you have installed, as well. Every last one of them. And remove every device possible from the machine.

Granted, this may not always work flawlessly, but it is a good way to attempt avoiding a full clean reinstall.

Or, now a days, you could just install Windows 7 ;)

Just my $0.024917932 :D

--The loon

EDIT: then again you could probably just [re]install the chipset driver, or, if your really good, just edit the registry and remove the agp driver loading and delete all entries for the video & bus drivers.
 
I did try reinstalling the chipset drivers but that didn't help either.

Anyway, thanks for the explanation. I think you are correct as that makes sense and it is something I hadn't tried.

BTW, I have since moved to Windows 7 and everything works perfectly so far. Well almost everything, I have a few videos where the audio is 500ms out of sync, but that seems to be caused by the Aero Glass interface. Not a huge deal really since I can adjust the timing. :)
 
Prior to upgrading to a new MOBO/CPU I purchased PCI-E Radeon HD 4670 and replaced my AGP Radeon x850 XTP and tried to replicate the issue.

That proved very easy - flash in full screen was easy enough :)

I tried everything non-drastic without success.

I trashed the enum tree... with success.

It took a bit more effort, but I think a quick format and reinstall is the better option. I garbled up the devices so bad I reinstalled in order to regain complete stability... I went to Windows 7 as well :)

--The loon
 
That's cool and worth noting if I ever run into that situation again. Thanks for the follow-up and confirmation of the issue! :cool:
 
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