Great little utility I found for setting PCI latency.

[RoundEye]

I was having stuttering problems with Half-Life 2, after updating the drivers, setting the game options ect., it was still there. I ran across THIS page looking for help.

It talked about a PCI latency tool, that seemed to help, my video card was set at the max which was hogging up the bus too long. I lowered it from 255 to 32 and it seemed to help quite a bit. I uploaded it HERE, in case anybody wants to download it directly.

Here's a little more info from RojackPot, if you need it.

Common Options : 0 - 255

Quick Review

This BIOS feature controls how long a PCI device can hold the PCI bus before another takes over. The longer the latency, the longer the PCI device can retain control of the bus before handing it over to another PCI device.

Normally, the PCI Latency Timer is set to 32 cycles. This means the active PCI device has to complete its transactions within 32 clock cycles or hand it over to the next PCI device.

For better PCI performance, a longer latency should be used. Try increasing it to 64 cycles or even 128 cycles. The optimal value for every system is different. You should benchmark your PCI cards' performance after each change to determine the optimal PCI latency time for your system.

Please note that a longer PCI latency isn't necessarily better. A long latency can also reduce performance as the other PCI devices queuing up may be stalled for too long. This is especially true with systems with many PCI devices or PCI devices that continuously write short bursts of data to the PCI bus. Such systems would work better with shorter PCI latencies as they allow rapid access to the PCI bus.

In addition, some time-critical PCI devices may not agree with a long latency. Such devices require priority access to the PCI bus which may not be possible if the PCI bus is held up by another device for a long period. In such cases, it is recommended that you keep to the default PCI latency of 32 cycles.

[Sid]

Downloaded... Thanks

[The Dude]

Downloaded... Thanks

[HowlingPhoenix]

I've been using this for a couple weeks..I set mine to 64 and it works great.

[Brent]

hrm

[RoundEye]

hrm

OK, all-mighty video god, what's that mean?

:2cool:

[Mark]

does this work on any chipset ?

[Sid]

OK, all-mighty video god, what's that mean?

:2cool:

I thought he was the video pimp

[RoundEye]

does this work on any chipset ?

I think so.