Poor Performance

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IntegraCL

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I recently upgraded to a 3GHz Pentium 4. Going from a 1.5GHz to a 3GHz I was expecting some sort of performance increase but I am honestly not noticing it. I installed (fresh) Windows XP, but it ran slow and often hung so I installed Windows 2000. Windows 2000 is stable but it just is not giving me the performance I expected. The boot-up time takes a while and the general applicationg loading takes longer than even my old 1.5GHz. Mainly, I built this computer for playing games so I ran 3DMark. I got a score of 2995 which I believe is pretty low. I have replaced my video card, hard drive, and my power supply but only the hard drive gave a small increase.

My setup is:
Intel D865GLC Motherboard
Pentium 4 3.0GHz 1MB Cache CPU
Kingston PC3200 512MB Ram
MSI FX5700 256MB Video Card
Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Platinum Sound Card

At this point I am honestly not sure what else to check or replace. I went for the cheapest motherboard when I purchased all of my stuff so maybe that is the problem but I wanted to see what you guys think. Any help is appreciated,
Thanks!
 
Make sure that you dont have multiple programs running (like an obscene amount) and you don't have a ton of processes going. This will slow it down. Also make sure that you scan for adware and spyware. A good program to use for this would be spybot search and destroy and also adaware. Also make sure that you have all the updates for your windows xp (www.windowsupdate.com).
 
Why would he have to tweak his OS? That has nothing to do with it either. Just follow what I originally posted and you should be fine.
 
Hey Check your MB Bios using the MB guide Manual or download from Intel site.

- External Clk (dont try OC this one)
- AGP Fast Write - ON or Auto
- Video Cache - UC (UnCached)
- Video Shadow - Enable
- Pages C000 - DFFFF - ALL Disable
- PCI Delayed - Disable
- PCI or IDE Prefetch = OFF or Disable ***
- PCI Latency = min. 32 and dont try less than
- IDE UDMA - Auto or Enable
- IDE Smart Cable - Enable (to see if any erro on HD)

For the XP OS check for DMA ( u may use Intel Software )

For the FX5700 Check for AGP 8x and AGP FW both enable
(I sugest the RivaTuner but, be carefull using this one)

I hope that those above aid u ;)
 
guys guys... you are all correct. His problem could lie in all of the stated areas listed above. Personally I would agree that purchasing the cheapest motherboard is a BAD idea for future reference. When I purchase a new system I check reviews of any motherboard I plan on purchasing since the motherboard is the single most important item you can purchase due to the fact that it is what allows future upgrading and it is what all your peripherals plug into. Buying cheap motherboards usually means cheap performance caused by performance bottlenecks. I always look for a board with a fast FSB and wide range of options.
Second, your operating system plays a huge part on performance. I would highly recommend printing this article and performing all the tasks included in the guide. Click here to print/view TweakTown Windows XP Tweaking, From Reformat to Relax by Koroush Ghazi. When I did this on my system I noticed a HUGE performance boost, and it was free! Rebooting was so much faster and I learned a great deal. Benchmarks were also up a small but decent amount.
When I tweaked my BIOS I noticed a large performance boost as well. My 3DMarks score went up an extra 100 points, combined with the 50 XP tweaking gave giving the system a score of 1769 when it was 1624 prior to optimization. This may not sound like alot but I can tell a difference when playing games and opening programs. Windows doesn't lag anymore and seems alot more reliable. Check out this link: The Definitive BIOS Optimization Guide and TweakTown BIOS Tuning Guide

Upgrading your RAM to dual channel and possibly purchasing a better video card are your best options to increasing performance on your system. I hope that helps.
 
Intel D865GLC Motherboard
Pentium 4 3.0GHz 1MB Cache CPU
Kingston PC3200 512MB Ram
MSI FX5700 256MB Video Card
Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Platinum Sound Card

With that graphics card you can expect a 3000-4000 score in 3dmark. its not that low. Also, you have to make sure your motherboard supports the FSB of your chip. Make sure that the FSB in your BIOS is set to what your chip is as well. Im not sure what that is as you have a pentium chip and i only use AMD.
 
Yeah, the 3DMark score I posted was for my old system, which is still functional and includes:

AMD Duron 750
640 MB PC133 SDRAM (1x512MB, 1x128MB)
eVGA GeForce FX 5700LE 256MB DDR
Creative SB Live! 5.1
GA-7ZX Motherboard (BIOS ver - AMI 62710)
Windows XP Professional
 
Never go with a cheap mobo. Always make sure its a good one from Asus, Abit, or Gigabyte. I have heard multiple "sluggish computer" stories from people with that mobo. Try a decent one and it will get better.
 
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