AGP "Fast Writes" Consensus w/ Radeons

Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively impact
performance?

2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively impact
system stability?

3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?

Thanks!

--
Tony DiMarzio

"Tony DiMarzio" wrote in message
news
Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
performance?

Enabled or disabled had NO measurable impact on performance.


2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
system stability?

Disabled positively impacted game stability. When it was enabled games would
sometimes crash to desktop without an error message even being reported.


3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?

Radeon 9800 Pro 128mb 256bit
Asus A8V w/ Athlon FX53-939


Thanks!

--
Tony DiMarzio

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
performance?

Negatively .. producing extremely washed out colors in Far Cry.
Simply turning it off fixed that problem.

2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
system stability?

Yes. I immediately noticed jerky screens in the OS.

3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?

Gigabyte ATI 9600XT ... Gigabyte 7ZXE rev 9

johns

"Tony DiMarzio" wrote in message
news
Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation
of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
performance?



This I don't know because I haven't tried both settings on either of my
machines.


2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
system stability?



I have two computers. Machine #1 has a 2.8GHz P4 Northwood C processor
with a Gigabyte GA-8IPE1000 Pro motherboard and a built-by-ATI Radeon 9800
Pro with 128MB. Fast writes are enabled on that system and I've had no
problems except for stuttering/lag in Command & Conquer Generals Zero Hour
on larger skirmish maps.

My second system is an AMD Athlon XP 2500+ with a Gigabyte GA-7N400-L
motherboard with an Asus Radeon 9200SE 128MB. Fast Writes are disabled
and overall system stability is terrific.

Hmm, you've just given me a thought. I may have to re-visit Zero Hour
with Fast Writes disabled on my big computer and see what happens.
However, I'm not entirely sure the BIOS on the GA-8IPE1000 Pro allows you
to change the setting since I've never seen such a setting in there.


3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?



Heh, I guess I answered questions 2 and 3 in my comments above!


Thanks!

--
Tony DiMarzio

Performance loss was minimal.
Stability gained was great.
9700pro on MSI KT4 Ultra

"Tony DiMarzio" wrote in message
news
Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
performance?

2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
system stability?

3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?

Thanks!

--
Tony DiMarzio

"Tony DiMarzio" wrote in message
news
Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
performance?

Neither

2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
system stability?

Neither

3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?

9800Pro. ASUS P4P8090

Thanks!

--
Tony DiMarzio

"Tony DiMarzio" wrote in message
news
Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
performance?

No noticeable difference.

2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
system stability?

Enabled - while playing 3D games, monitor will occasionally appear to enter
suspend mode and won't wake up

Disabled - PC is totally solid


3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?

ATI 9800AIW on Asus P4B533

Thanks!

--
Tony DiMarzio

Tony DiMarzio wrote:
Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively impact
performance?

Don't know, not enough to notice without benchmarking.

2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively impact
system stability?

HUGE gain in stability. As in, it would lock up and/or give a corrupted
display in 2D if I didn't get to it to set FWs off quick enough. Need to
re-check this now though, as a lot of general 3D lockup problems (not
FW-related) were fixed by updating the motherboard's chipset drivers.
Might have affected 2D with FW on.

3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?

9800 Pro, and a manky old PC Chips M810L.

Thanks!

PC-(1)
Asus P4R800-VM 2.8GHz P4 (800Mhz FSB) 2Gb PC2700 Dual Channel
ATI 9800Pro 128mb - fastwrites on, no glitches or problems. Never had to
disable it.

PC-(2)
Asus P4P800-VM 3GHz P4 (800Mhz FSB) 2Gb PC2700 Dual Channel
ATI 9800Pro 128mb - fastwrites on, no glitches or problems. Never had to
disable it.

PC-(3)
CF 968L SFF 2.4GHz P4 (533Mhz FSB) 1Gb PC2700 Dual Channel
ATI (Visiontek) 9500Pro 128mb - fastwrites on, no glitches or problems.
Never had to disable it.

All currently with Cat 4.4's - XP Pro SP1

"Tony DiMarzio" wrote in message
news
Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
performance?

2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively
impact
system stability?

3. and on which Radeon card with which motherboard?

Thanks!

--
Tony DiMarzio

On 7/13/2004 2:29 PM Tony DiMarzio brightened our day with:

Hello everyone. I'd like to start a thread that serves as a compilation of
different people's experiences with "Fast Writes" with respect to
performance and stability on their Radeons.



AthlonXP 2500+ @ 3200, K7N2-L MSI nForce2 Mobo, SB Audigy1

Please respond to:

1. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively impact
performance?



w/ 9800 Pro, 1 Gb Corsair Dual Channel XMS RAM fastwrites *on/off* no
difference
w/ 9600 Pro, 512 Mb Corsair Dual Channel XMS RAM fastwrites *on/off* no
difference


2. Did enabling/disabling AGP "Fast Writes" positively or negatively impact
system stability?


w/ 9800 Pro, 1 Gb Corsair XMS RAM fastwrites *on* caused stability
problems, with fastwrites *off* no problems since.
w/ 9600 Pro, 512 Mb Corsair XMS RAM fastwrites *on* fixed problems in a
couple games, didn't seem to cause problems anywhere.


I had fastwrites enabled for the entire time (except for a couple of
tests) I had my 9600 Pro, I turned fastwrites off two days after
installing the 9800 Pro and have left them off.
The only comparison tests I ever ran were 3DMark and the results were
within the 5% margin of error.


--
"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

- Inigo Montoya
Steve [Inglo]