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"Tweaking" My Video Card - Help

LoneKnight's picture

Hey gang. I've always had trouble running DS2 on my computer.

It lagged a ton, so I bought a slighly better video card, and it still lagged some. It was bearable, but still quite annoying when I'd have to walk away from the computer to wait for a region to load after I teleported to it.

A friend of mine told me that the game should run fine with my video card, and that all I needed to do was "tweak" it to work better.

Below are my computer specs:

Video Card: RADEON 9250
- Display Memory: 250 MB
System: Dell Dimension 3000
- Pentium 4 CPU
- 2.80 GHz
Free Space on PC: 10 Gigs
Virtual Memory:1536 MB
Sound: SoundMAX
Direct X: Version 9.0

Okay, those were my specs for my computer. So, any idea of what can be changed or tweaked to allow better performance for DS2?

firebat's picture

Did you install the latest drivers for your vid card?

Sharkull's picture

...and don't forget about sound too (I've had some nasty problems with bad sound drivers hogging system resources). I assume you've defragged your HD, and closed extra stuff running in the background (which can hog CPU cycles)? Try running at a lower resolution and object detail level...

Oh yeah, I remember some people have had problems with AA (anti-aliasing) and AF (anisotropic-filtering) settings... Try turning them off (or to "application preference") in your advanced display settings.

Strider978's picture

How much physical ram do you have?

Download the latest version of DirectX 9c from Microsoft's download page..

Open the AGP graphics aperture in your motherboard settings to 256mb if you can, it's usually set at a default 64mb - but the higher the better, IMO.. some people may disagree, but try it anyway!

Make sure that you have Windows Media Player 10 installed as this will ensure that the majority of your codecs are up to date..

When testing your card's settings out - always start with lowest settings and gradually increase them until the card reaches it's max capability - bottom-up is always the best way to test...

Is that SoundMax AC/97 onboard sound? If so, get a cheap soundcard, as this will take some of the load off your processor..

LoneKnight's picture

Thanks, guys. I'll work on your suggestions and get back to you on the results.

a couple of other tips..

If you increase the amount of RAM you can to increase the size of your Windows paging file as well (- make it about two-and-a-half times the amount of RAM to fully optimise it..)

- getting a cheap sound card will ease the load on your CPU ( - as it also powers the onboard sound!) - remember to switch off the A/C97 onboard in the BIOS settings

- if you decide to stick with the A/C97, make sure that you have the latest WDM drivers, as some of the latest ones give additional 3D support..

LoneKnight's picture

I've been far too busy to do it....but I plan on doing it this weekend. I'll say how it goes.

Get RivaTuner 16.5, good for tweaking video advanced options for D3D & Ogl

http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=163

Also to free the CPU u can reduce the PCI latency of your PCI/AGP card with this tool.

http://www.aim4it.myp-place.us/downloads/PCI_Latency_Tool_3.0b3

I know the default for nvidia devices is somthing like 248 which is a waste, and most recommend 192 or less you can even push it down to 64 without problems, although i did notice a lost of 2-3 fps at that point. Other devices u may see are HD controllers and motherboard hosts, often thing that have 32,16,8,0 setting can't go anylower without a loss in stability or performance.

I my self have a AC97 onboard audio, you'll find that buying a soundcard with not give a major increase in proformance, unless u get a new X-FI card, which is a waste gaining only 5-8 fps...

My Rig:
Motherboard: ASUS K8V SE Deluxe
Processor: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 2800+, MMX, 3DNow+, SSE, SSE2 ~1.8GHz
Memory: 512MB RAM DDR400 Kingston ValueRam
Video: NVIDIA GeForce 6800 128MB 16x6(unlock mod)
Sound: AC'97 SoundMAX Digital Audio

Hope this helps u get more bang for your buck. :o

Templarian Arch Sorcerer's picture

There should not be any trouble at all for running DS2.

My oldest rig :

Pentium 4, 1500 Mhz @ 1850 Mhz (overclocked)
Extra Fans and heat sinks
Nvidia GeForce 3 Ti500 64 MB
768 mb of ram
Creative something sound

Still runs Ds2 with good graphics. Cool

Thats because DS2 is largely processor based, notice your old is oc'd to about the speed of my processor, mine is 1.880 ghz (though I can oc it to 2.5 ghz).

But honestly freeing up more time with the cpu for other devices can help, I tested DS2 with a fresh install of nvidia driver 84.56 in which the PCI latency was 248, then tested it again with the lagtency pushed down to 192.

Setting:
1024x768x32
Adanced Shaders
All Complex Shadows
Max Object Detail

Originally I was getting 30-50 fps during the beach siege, after the tweak 66-100.

Decreasing the time the video card had the cpu's attention allowed the DS2 engine to have more time with the cpu resulting a increase in performance . Wink

LoneKnight's picture

Many thanks. I have tomorrow off from work, so I'll do what I can.