CS4 on XP with NVIDIA 8800GT - terrible performance

Question

I'm running CS4 on XP (Boot Camp on MAC) with an NVIDIA 8800GT 512mb. Performance is awful - constantly freezing during playback. The problem persists on After Effects as well. Meanwhile, the entire CS3 suite runs like a champ.
I found Adobe's registry keys that correct an issue with this graphics card and Photoshop CS4 - but it was no help to Premiere or After Effects.
I'm assuming this is a problem at the driver level but thought it was worth posting to see if anyone had found a solution.
CS4 works rather well on my PC(only) workstation with an NVIDIA 8800GTS 320mb.
Any ideas? I really think it's a graphics card issue, but let me know if you think I'm off track. Thanks.
Mac Pro
Dual Xenon Quad 3.2
2Gigs Ram
NVIDIA 8800GT 512
CS3 Installed w/ all updates
CS4 Installed w/ all updates

Answer 1

Model
ugnx-01
proe-04
catia-02
3dsmax-04
maya-02
sw-01
Adobe Test Render
Core2Duo T7300 Geforce 8600 Gt
5.07
12.81
14.13
18.68
27.08
8.96
4:18
Core2 Extreme 9300 Quadro 3700M
17.19
33.66
63.62
56.49
52.72
84.03
1:46
8 X 3.2ghz Xeon W5580 Quadro CX
17.48
48.65
52.95
81.31
91.99
99.04
1:06
4 X 3.2ghz Core i7 965 Quadro CX
27.26
87.53
96.38
108.56
210.73
253.31
0:52
Thanks for the tool, this will come in handy. I will be sure to post the Core i7 965. Unfortunatly I no longer have the dual Xeon Core i7 computer as it was just for a review. Here's some SpecViewPerf10 benchmarks(2 threads) along with adobe primiere pro render times. Keep in mind the test render was not using the quadro render accelerator presets to make it more of a CPU benchmark. As you can clearly see, the single Core i7 computer greatly outperforms the Xeon computer. The xeon computer also had more ram, faster hard drives, expensive intel motherboard, all the most expensive things you could possibly put in a PC. The Core i7 computer was made with cheaper components. I tried multiple SpecViewPerf10 benchmarks with 1-8 threads and nomatter what the Core i7 965 would beat it. Took out one of the Xeon W5580 cores, same benchmarks. Disabled hyperthreading on the W5580, same benchmarks. The Xeon W5580 is still fast, it's just if you are paying $2k per processor you would expect that a single $1k processor would not be better.
Also if you goto http://ppbm4.com/Benchmark.html. You can see your Core i7 920 beat out the Dual Xeon W5580 and W5590.
I was not entirely sure whether you meant the XEON or the Quadro CX in your benchmark tests. Unfortunatly your test tool will not show the power of the Quadro CX. I am sure you are aware, to utilize the Quadro CX you have to use special presets from a plugin. If I used these in the test it wouldn't be a good comparsion tool. I will however give the test a shot and send my results. I see your computer is top currently
In respect to the person previously. It is completly possible for a person who doesn't edit much to use Premiere Pro CS4 on Windows XP and not have a problem. It is also possible for a person to use Windows 95 and not have it crash. Does that make it a stable program still? Consider yourself one of the lucky ones. In a work environment where Premiere Pro is used on a daily basis it is considered unacceptable to have to redo a project once a week due to a bug. Windows 7 has less conflicts with Premiere Pro and therefore you should not use Windows XP. I had to put Windows 7 on all the video editors computers because they refused to use CS4 on Windows XP as it crashed too much.