Graphics problems with World of Warcraft

Question

I've got a very specific problem. I recently bought the World of Warcraft game for my brand new laptop, and have been having video problems since nearly the beginning. I have an ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 Pro Turbo 128MB video card with an Inspiron 8600 just for reference.   I've asked about this on another forum I'm a part of, but haven't gotten any solution yet. I figured I'd see if anyone might have ideas. At times during play, certain parts of characters or terrain textures will stretch off into infinity forming jagged/blocky spikes, gradually increasing until it fills the whole screen with jagged blocks of color. I also sometimes get small horizontal lines of noise that multiply as I move the mouse around. I only have problems with this game, and apparently it's a widespread issue as many other players have complained of the same thing. There hasn't been a fix-all solution that worked for everyone.   I've tried all the suggested options from the game's technical support, updating my directx drivers and checking to make sure my video drivers from Dell are updated. I've set all the graphics options in the game to minimum levels. I've added a string onto the end of the runline for the game that is supposed make it run in opengl (added -opengl), this one solution has worked for many people, but not for me. I started wondering if heat could be an issue, but I don't know why my laptop would be overly hot, or if it even is.   I can't figure out what starts it happening in the game, no specific event or situation triggers it. Anyone happen to be in the same situation or have any ideas? I can only try so much on my own without risking doing something bad to my laptop, I'm not confident enough in my technical abilities to try anything too complex.

cademetz · Answer

(begin EXTREME sarcasm) An I8600 with an MR9600 get hot??? NEVER(end EXTREME sarcasm)
The MR960 easily sees temp of 100C in a I8600. Dell apparently is comfortable with this... I on the other hand nearly had to sue Dell for nearly causing a heart attack at the age of 23.

In any case, since the problem is wide spread, I would suspect driver incompatibilities with ATi drivers and/or poor programming on the game side. However, the problems you described (textures, etc) extending into infinity are issues I have generally expereience when pushing the overclock on my GPUs too far (hence heat issues). I would recommend using a program called i8kfangui; many Inspiron users run this program. Just do a search on google for it. With the program, you should be able to control your fans' speeds and potentially keep your GPU a few degrees cooler which may help with the rendering problems.

Hope this helps.

odups · Answer

Went ahead and downloaded the utility for the fan speeds. It seemed to help, I was able to play for a while. But eventually it still overheated, probably when my graphics problems started. The temp history graph shows a gradual increase in temp until it hit about 70-75 degrees Celcius, the CPU load matches up with it too. I've changed the settings so my fans are on high pretty much at all times, but is there some other way to lower temps in the CPU? At least now I can see a corrolation between my problems and something that might be causing them. I couldn't see any pattern to it happening before, but the timing of the temp increase and my graphics problems makes me think this might be it.

cademetz · Answer

The CPU temp shouldn't be causing a graphics problem, but rather the GPU temps. This should be the black line (by default) in i8kfangui. If your GPU only hits 70-75C, then your video card is NOT overheating (or it would be a seriously defective card). The MR9600 should be hitting near 100C under heavy use. Now, if your CPU is hitting 70-75C, you have a REAL problem... that is far too hot IMHO for the Pentium-M; I have never seen my CPU get that hot. Well, if I force the fans not to run, and run Prime95 I can get my temps that high... but even then, when my CPU hit 70C, the BIOS took control from i8kfangui and turned the CPU fan on. Within 10 seconds, the temp was below 55C. At low fan speeds, and Prime95 running, my temps don't go above 52C. Also, just to check... you are running the A03 drivers from Dell?

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Graphics problems with World of Warcraft

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