Fraps Performance
 

I'm trying to record at really high settings/fps/etc.
1680x1050 res (full size)
60fps
Sound

The problem is that the fps can't hit 60. Instead it's around ~45. There has to be some sort of bottleneck. I'm willing to buy some new hardware if I can find it. Any ideas?

E6400 oc 3.2ghz
2x2gb DDR2-800 5-5-5-12 RAM
6 hard drives
8800GT

The game I'm trying to record is WarCraft 3 TFT.

The fps you set Fraps to record at will be the maximum fps you get whilst recording. Makes sense no?

...and for the record 30 or 29.97 fps will be fine for most things.

Yes it makes sense. I set the max to 60fps and I want to record at 60fps. Problem is it doesn't record at the max 60fps.

Maybe so, but I want to play and record in real-time, so that means 60fps, even if I'm going to convert it to 25 or 30fps later.

Taken from the support section of fraps:

Why doesn’t Fraps show above 30fps, 60fps, 75 fps (or any other framerate) in my game?

This can be due to several reasons.

Many games have internal limits that prevent them rendering faster than a certain framerate. In some cases this can mean they are locked at a maximum framerate of only 30fps.

Another possibility is that you have Vsync enabled. Vsync is used to synchronise the output of your graphics card with the display of your monitor. When your graphics card has finished rendering the next frame it waits for the monitor to finish displaying the current one before switching to the new one. This means that the maximum framerate you can obtain will be equal to the refresh rate of your monitor (which is usually 60hz, 75hz, 85hz, or 100hz).

If you disable Vsync then your graphics card will continuously render without waiting for the last frame to be displayed in its entirety. With fast graphics cards this means that your monitor may switch to a new frame halfway down the screen. This effect is known as tearing as there appears to be a visible line separating two different halves. Due to this, you should generally leave Vsync enabled except when benchmarking.

WarCraft TFT maxes at 60-64fps, depending on the resolution. The recording framerate however, jumps up and down around 45fps; this means sometimes it's like 40fps, sometimes it's 50fps.

Vsync is off. Even if I had vsync, it's supposed to be capped at 60fps, but the fps does not reach that.

I've been through the basics already. Give me some advanced solutions.

Edit: Ps. Why is there all of these kids trying to sell drugs and viagra on this subforum? Where's the admins and mods??

drop down some graphical option , its may be dumb and its may be TFT but its one of the first thing that downgrade the Fps , and imo recording anything beyond 30 fps is completely useless you will not see any difference after the rendering if the raw file is @60 or 30

also try to record from Replay instead of live playing ( if you already didnt ) , maybe it can make up the Fps

What's the point of recording high res, high quality video if I'm going to turn down the graphics settings? As I said before, I want to play AND record at the same time, in real time. I don't want to make it harder on myself and play at low fps. Recording from replay is not the same as live playing.

^^^ I agree as well, the FPS wont make a difference really, but...I do have another question, is your footage stored on the same drive that holds your Fraps?
I would suggest putting Fraps on a different drive and keep your footage in another stored drive.

I think you mean to store my recorded footage onto another drive than my operating system and/or installed games. I have them saved to my D drive, while my operating system is on my C drive.

Quoting your first post here "There has to be some sort of bottleneck". The only way to fully investigate your bottleneck after you confirmed you have tried all the basic steps is to go through your system 1 component at a time replacing it and testing. Nothing more to say really, this problem has been documented before by many people visiting not only this board but similar sites.

Class it as an ongoing issue perhaps.