Always forget that I can't edit posts here, but if mods want to move this thread elsewhere please go ahead, I came from another similar thread to here, wasn't sure what the best place for it was as it's not necessarily ancient hardware and it refers to multiple Windows versions in my testing.

FWIW I did also try the game on Windows 11 on the i7 and it works as expected.

Possibly a driver related issue. I ran Chaos Theory on my i5-3570K with a GTX 970 using (modified) 355.98 drivers under WinXP + SP3. No problems whatsoever, and excellent performance all around.

I suggest using MSI Afterburner and turning on the monitoring tools, to check CPU and GPU utilization while the game is running.

Yep drivers would be the cause, you can try a different version of the AMD driver as well, have you installed any patch on the game? that usually helps too.

You could also try disabling hdr rendering in game video options, also try using vsync, some games are just broken in many ways specially 2000-2010 era games, if you use hardware way to fast or system specs that are way above the recommended and push the game way to far, it may start giving some trouble.

As an example, in my Windows XP machine I played once this game Battlefield 1942, without vsync i got around 100fps, but the game was unplayable, your movement thru the map was very slow and sound of the game was very "chippy", enabling vsync and capping the game at 60fps fix my issues at all. You can give it a try because you have enough horsepower there to run that game to have stutters all the time.

Turns out the issue was the Realtek audio drivers for my mobo audio. I disabled it and used a cheapo Sabrent USB audio device, and it works fine. I knew it couldn't be a GPU thing because I tried 4 different GPUs, what a relief... Now I need to find a dedicated soundcard that sounds half decent and works with XP.

vindasal wrote on 2025-05-05, 10:51:

I need to find a dedicated soundcard that sounds half decent and works with XP.

Good to hear its working!!, try the Creative Labs SB0880 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Sound Card, is the sound card I have on my Windows xp build and it works so good and have EAX compatibility.

vindasal wrote on 2025-05-05, 10:51:

Turns out the issue was the Realtek audio drivers for my mobo audio. I disabled it and used a cheapo Sabrent USB audio device, and it works fine.

Interesting,

Now that you mention that, this kind of happened to me but with a other game but this one was in a different scenario, it was with Forsaken in Windows 98, in the built in benchmark the game was having a constant 75fps, but when I play the normal game I was having drops of 55fps and having stutterings all the time, It was weird because it was not the GPU I have a FX 5900xt so later I found out that the music of the game was affecting the game it self, never find a technical solution so I just turn the music off and issue solved.

bosquetor0602 wrote on 2025-05-05, 18:31:

vindasal wrote on 2025-05-05, 10:51:

I need to find a dedicated soundcard that sounds half decent and works with XP.

Good to hear its working!!, try the Creative Labs SB0880 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Sound Card, is the sound card I have on my Windows xp build and it works so good and have EAX compatibility.

Do you happen to know how many watts the SB0880 draws? I haven't had a dedicated soundcard since original PCI was the standard. I have enough PSU headroom, but I prefer to keep it around 50-60% used at most for longevity. Otherwise this looks like a good option.

vindasal wrote on 2025-05-05, 21:00:

bosquetor0602 wrote on 2025-05-05, 18:31:

vindasal wrote on 2025-05-05, 10:51:

I need to find a dedicated soundcard that sounds half decent and works with XP.

Good to hear its working!!, try the Creative Labs SB0880 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Sound Card, is the sound card I have on my Windows xp build and it works so good and have EAX compatibility.

Do you happen to know how many watts the SB0880 draws? I haven't had a dedicated soundcard since original PCI was the standard. I have enough PSU headroom, but I prefer to keep it around 50-60% used at most for longevity. Otherwise this looks like a good option.

I really dont think it uses that much power draw for it to be a concern, it takes power from the mobo itself, just make sure you have enough PCI express X1 or x4 slots on it available and you will be good to go.

But if you want real numbers it all depends on the motherboard and the type of PCI express lane, but normally you are looking at around 10 watts in a x1 lane, in my personal opinion power consumption of a sound card should be the least of your concerns because in general it does not draw that much power like a GPU in the other hand. But always check you motherboard manufacturer manual for more details about maximum watt draw per pci lane.