Help with video slowdown...

[NothingToSee]

This has probably been asked before, but if it has I didn't find it. ^_^'

I just installed an NVidia GeForce 6200 video card with 256mb ram. I FINALLY got juddering video problems sorted out by changing drivers, but now, when I use the video capture, the game runs at half speed at best. I have tried with both the latest drivers and the 77.77 drivers and I have the same problem.

My previous card was an NVidia GeForce Ti 4200 with 128mb ram and that would run even at triple speed with the video capture running. Does anyone have any suggestions before I give it up as a bad job and reinstall the old card?

Other specs if needed:
Pentium 4 3ghz processor.
1.5gb ram.

Many thanks for any help.

Atom XX

[KatEnigma]

Does it do it at all sizes and qualities, or just the top one?

There was someone on the BBS with this problem, on an honestly top-of-the-line machine (he tried to blame his X2, which I knew wasn't the problem since I'm fine) , but I forget which video card he had. To my knowledge, he never did solve the problem, after 2 days of trying everything under the sun, I sent him to the Movie board to ask. 

[NothingToSee]

I didn't change the size from when I had the old card installed. It was set at medium size, high quality. I fiddled with it some, but didn't get anywhere.

It's kinda vexing. The only thing I've done is change the video card so that must be where the problem lies.

Thanks for replying anyway. ^_^

Atom XX

[yetyak]

I've got a 6200, and my video capture is extremely slow, no matter what the settings are.  I think it is just the card, mine is crappy.

[dizzy]

The bottleneck for video capture is typically the hard drive, not the video card.

[Pegasys]

I've got a 6600, and my video capture is painfully slow. I do use High/High though.

Make sure you turn off the sound if you won't need the in-game sound. Recording in-game sound slows it down a great deal.

[NothingToSee]

The bottleneck for video capture is typically the hard drive, not the video card.

Yup, but I never had any problems with capture until I changed the card.

I've got a 6600, and my video capture is painfully slow. I do use High/High though.

Make sure you turn off the sound if you won't need the in-game sound. Recording in-game sound slows it down a great deal.

I tried that. It only made a small amount of difference, if any.

I've got a 6200, and my video capture is extremely slow, no matter what the settings are.  I think it is just the card, mine is crappy.

I'm suspecting this is the case. Comes to something when an older, supposedly inferior card with less memory runs the damned thing better.

Hey ho, I guess that unless I can come up with anything else I'm reinstalling the GeForce Ti 4200. Money down the pan -_-; I guess I'll donate the 6200 to the build of a machine for my son out of left over upgrade parts. ^_^'

Thanks for the help and suggestions everyone.

Atom XX

[NothingToSee]

OK - I'm about to chuck the damned comp outta the window.

Reinstalled old card with drivers I was using (66.93) and the problem persists. Not QUITE as bad, but it's still bugging me. System restore will not work for some reason so I can't roll back to before the whole thing started.

I've just done a totally clean install on a brand new hard drive keeping the 4200 in with the drivers I knew that worked and guess what? Same problem.

It's so frustrating when something that should be easy turns into a real chore.

*sigh*

Atom XX

[gethane]

I remember with the base game and with Uni (I think) I could take decent speed movies. Sometimes after Univ for sure, but I think it was after NL, I noticed that now its way to slow to even try to take movies. I have a Nvidia 6600 GT (though not for long, after buying exclusively Nvidia for 8 years, I am DONE with them. The blue screen hourglass issue with using any drivers newer than 15 months old has me pissed. I'm getting an ATI soon).

My impression of it is its something that came with one of the expansions, perhaps like the blue screen hourglass issue did.

[NothingToSee]

I remember with the base game and with Uni (I think) I could take decent speed movies. Sometimes after Univ for sure, but I think it was after NL, I noticed that now its way to slow to even try to take movies. I have a Nvidia 6600 GT (though not for long, after buying exclusively Nvidia for 8 years, I am DONE with them. The blue screen hourglass issue with using any drivers newer than 15 months old has me pissed. I'm getting an ATI soon).

My impression of it is its something that came with one of the expansions, perhaps like the blue screen hourglass issue did.

I don't think it's that in my case. I have all the expansions up to OFB, and this only became an issue the other day when I swapped my video card out.

Does anyone know if a Motherboard could cause a slowdown like this? I ask because when I installed the sims I had a Gigabyte GA8irx motherboard which decided to die a death on me shortly after OFB came out. I replaced it with an Asrock P4V88+ and did a repair on XP instead of a fresh install. I never touched the video drivers afterwards, so could changing them now have had an effect?

Also at that time I had a 1.7ghz processor and even with that it ran the video capture faster than it does now.

yeah yeah, I'm grasping at straws, but it's the only other variable I can think of.

Atom XX

[gethane]

Hmm, you know, I swapped out my mobo back in January, coincidentally, also with an Asrock. Not that model though, a 939 dual sata 2. Hmm, someone above mentioned hard drive as the possible culprit. I had a bear of a time getting the drivers to install correctly. I think I ended up using my Sata 2 drive as a sata 1.

I don't exactly remember when my video taking slowdown occurred. I just know that now I don't even bother to take sim movies

[NothingToSee]

I don't exactly remember when my video taking slowdown occurred. I just know that now I don't even bother to take sim movies

It's especially frustrating as last week I made my first Sim Music Video. It was something I did on the spur of the moment because I'd taken a ton of video and the idea just came to me so I did it.

I wanted to make a version 2 as the video I'd taken was quite jerky because I'd summoned 30+ sims to the Crypt o Night club and they were all getting into fights (which was the whole point of the video.) I decided to upgrade my video card first and I've landed myself in a huge mess where I can't take video with even 3 or 4 sims anymore. -_-;

So I'm quite... peeved. ^_^'

Well, seeing as the gigabyte motherboard came back to life later (although I wouldn't trust it too much,) I might take the time to experiment and see if I can get things back to the way they were.

Atom XX

[Hegelian]

I replaced it with an Asrock P4V88+ and did a repair on XP instead of a fresh install. I never touched the video drivers afterwards, so could changing them now have had an effect?

You should probably try a clean install of XP, especially if the Asrock uses a different chipset from that on the GigaByte.

While SATA offers tangible benefits over IDE, in real life its speed advantages are largely theoretical unless you are running multiple drives.

Most video editing requires gobs of RAM to work smoothly; I see no reason for TS2 video to be an exception. Once you have your chipset drivers in order, you might want to double up on the RAM if you intend to work with video.

Issues with nVidia drivers and TS2 are well-known, although I myself am not in a position to discuss them with any authority. However, keep in mind that the 6200 was a budget part when released in 2004 and is what I would consider seriously underpowered for TS2 with only 4 pixel pipelines, slow GPU and memory clocks, and a 64-bit memory interface in most cases (not to mention being essentially obsolete). There's only so much you can expect from a $40 part.

[Process Denied]

I have a NVIDIA GeForce 6800XT--and I have blue screen a lot and slowdowns.  I usually find that is caused by a combination of my excessive downloading and an over populated neighborhood.  If I go to a new neighborhood or take out my downloads then it takes off like the devil.  My download folder is creeping up on 5 gigs.  I feel like it has to have to do with memory.  My husband won't let me have another gig of ram--I only have one gig now.  He also took out my other hard drive leaving me with only 40 gigs.  My motherboard and case are also power hungery.  When I upgraded,my comp was now three times faster,but I downloaded 3 gigs of content and the computer ened up being about the same as my old one.  I did have a lot of driver juggling also.

[gethane]

Its happening to me and I'm playing a clean game right now, almost maxis only (well 151 MB, down from 3 GB). And a new hood.

[NothingToSee]

I replaced it with an Asrock P4V88+ and did a repair on XP instead of a fresh install. I never touched the video drivers afterwards, so could changing them now have had an effect?

You should probably try a clean install of XP, especially if the Asrock uses a different chipset from that on the GigaByte.

While SATA offers tangible benefits over IDE, in real life its speed advantages are largely theoretical unless you are running multiple drives.

Most video editing requires gobs of RAM to work smoothly; I see no reason for TS2 video to be an exception. Once you have your chipset drivers in order, you might want to double up on the RAM if you intend to work with video.

Issues with nVidia drivers and TS2 are well-known, although I myself am not in a position to discuss them with any authority. However, keep in mind that the 6200 was a budget part when released in 2004 and is what I would consider seriously underpowered for TS2 with only 4 pixel pipelines, slow GPU and memory clocks, and a 64-bit memory interface in most cases (not to mention being essentially obsolete). There's only so much you can expect from a $40 part.

OK, first off when I installed the Asrock, the first thing I did was sort out it's chipset drivers. I know I didn't specifically mention I had done that, but you shouldn't really assume that I fucked up that spectacularly.

The one thing I didn't change was the video driver. I've been running the game under this setup with no problem for a few months now. the problem started when I changed the video card/driver. After reinstalling the 4200 it seems to be not quite as bad, but it's not as good as it used to be.

Also, as I said above, I've done a complete clean install of XP on a brand new hard drive (with chipset drivers.) Installed the sims, no CC and the problem persists.

As for RAM, Up until now it's been enough. Hell it was OK when I only had 1gb. I am intending to up the ram at a future date though.

And, I know it was a cheap card, but I was hoping it would be some kind of step up from the 4200. I suspect I'll be sticking with the 4200 simply beacuse it seems to run slightly better than the 6200, and I'll be putting the 6200 towards building a machine for my son. I'll just have to save up for a higher end card, (or steal hubby's Radeon when he isn't looking. )

And I don't run SATA drives. I have 2 IDE drives. Currently a 60gb and a 160gb. The 60 GB is being replaced shortly.

Atom XX

[KatEnigma]

I would have said that the difference between the old and new cards was that on the old card, the game was dropping down to DX7, like it's supposed to do on cards that weren't designed for DX9. But re-replacing the card should have then fixed the problem.


I have an old Radeon 9200 I could sell you cheap. LOL  Maybe the problem really is Nvidia, again.