Need help with my new 9800 pro

Discussion in 'Video Cards, Displays and TV Tuners' started by dannnyjos, Jun 9, 2004.

  1. dannnyjos

    dannnyjos Big Geek

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    Hey guys:
    You probably remember me from the "5900" question post. Here's the deal. I returned the 5900xt, and I'm happy about it because I got a 9800 pro on newwegg for $209 US. I've done a lot of benchmarking so far, and the 9800 beats the 5900xt by 15-20% on most games, exept on Open GL of course. Now, this is the first time that I use an ATI card and I'm very unfamiliar with the Catalyst.
    The problem is that every time that I try to run any game at 1600 resolution, my monitor goes bye bye, showing the "out of sync" message. All my games run fine up until 1280 resolution. I guess it has to do with the refresh rate. Can anyone please explain to me how you make your games (Open GL and Direct 3D) run at 1600? I've tried to tweak the card's properties but always the same result.
    Of course, many would say, "it's your monitor", but I honestly don't think it is, here is why:

    1- I never had that problem with Nvidia cards. And the same day that I replaced the 5900xt with the 9800 pro, that's when it happened.

    2- Because this monitor is almost new, only 5 months.

    I always have my refresh rate at 75 Hz. What I'm I doing wrong? I'm almost certain that I need to tweak something in the card's properties. Can anyone please help me with this?

    I already downloaded the lastest Catalyst from ATI, and my monitor's driver is installed. Anyways, thanks for your time. :)

    Specs:
    ASUS deluxe (nForce 2 chip)
    1 Gig RAM
    Athlon 2600+
    ATI-Sapphire-9800 pro (128)
    400W Codegen PSU
    Samsum 955DF 19" Monitor (75Hz)
    Win 2000 pro
     
  2. ninja fetus

    ninja fetus I'm a thugged out gangsta

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    try running it at 70hz and see if you have to the same problem. Then if that doesnt work keep messing around with different rates. that SHOUld solve the problem. well it did for me anyways. good luck
     
  3. Anti-Trend

    Anti-Trend Nonconformist Geek

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    ATI Refresh rate problems

    Try Omegadrive drivers (Omegacorner.com); they're pre-tweaked to support a broader combination of refresh rates and resolutions. In addition, I recommend RefreshForce, an application which locks your refresh rate to the ones your monitor supports natively. The reason RefreshForce is necessary is that certain programs (mostly games) will automatically change your refresh rate to some unholy value automatically, and leave you no choices about the matter. ReForce just forces the proper refresh rate for your monitor to match the resolution it's set at. On a side note, ReForce is *not* a TSR (terminate and stay resident) application; you run it only once initially and then again whenever your setup changes.

    -AT
     
  4. dannnyjos

    dannnyjos Big Geek

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    Allright man, I'll try those refresh programs tonight. By the way, what is the Omega driver? Is it a modified Catalyst? :confused: Do I need to uninstall the Catalyst I have now?

    Thanks for your help
     
  5. Big B

    Big B HWF Godfather

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    Yeah, the Omega drivers are tweaked for actual gaming. If you want your 3dMark score to be the best, these may not be the greatest drivers, but that seems to be more on the nVidia side of things. Yes, you'll want to uninstall your current driver and ATi control panel before hand.
     
  6. dannnyjos

    dannnyjos Big Geek

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    I downloaded the refreshforce and the refreshlock. These programs seemed to solve the problem, at least partially. Now, I can run all Direct 3D games at 1600, but not the OpenGL ones. I got really excited when I tried PainKiller and Morrowind, but when I got to Call of Duty, the same "out of sync" cr*p showed up. Does anybody know why are Direct X and Ogl behaving differently :confused: ? I tried several Games to confirm.

    On Direct 3D:
    Secret Service
    Morrowind
    Painkiller
    Unreal II
    UT 2004
    Sacrifice
    Mech Warrior 4
    FS 2004

    On Open GL:
    Call of Duty
    Quake III
    IL2-Sturmovik
    Wolfenstein

    The problem seems to be consistent, it's only showing up in Ogl.
    Anybody has any idea why? Is there anything I can do? Anyone here has tried running an Ogl game at 1600?
    By the way, I set the refresh rate at 60Hz, when running at 1600. Not even that solved it. :sick:
     
  7. dannnyjos

    dannnyjos Big Geek

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    Yes

    Allright, since the refresh lock didn't fully solve the problem, I downloaded the bigger Omega Driver that Anti-Trend suggested :agree: . I didn't get it before because it was big and I have 56K :( . Well, guess what, the Omega driver solved the problem completely. Now I can play my Call of Duty at 1600 :D .

    Anyways, thanks guys for helping out this ATI newbie ;)
     

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