Curse

ducktape · Apr 18, 2006, 08:34 PM // 20:34

I have an X1600PRO (AGP 256MB) card and it's the first card I've ever had that is halfway decent for games. I only play GW. Sometimes, especially when I've been running a long distance, the textures are really slow to appear. If I stop, the textures will all properly appear after about 2 seconds. It annoys me so

Anyways I was wondering if there are any changes I can make in the Catalyst control panel to make my game still look nice, but have less trouble drawing textures or being choppy. I have the in-game settings at:
1024x768
Terrain at Medium (I had it at high but noticed zero difference at medium)
Reflections at All
Textures at High
Shadows at Medium (High makes the fan on my card louder)
Vertical Sync is on
Post-Processing is on
4X AA is on

I really like how the game looks at these settings so I was hoping not to have to sacrifice the quality settings in-game any more than that. There are lots of things I can choose in Catalyst, but I'm not sure which changes will improve performance without sacrificing further image quality. Should I:

Decrease Mipmap Detail
Enable Adaptive Anti-Aliasing (currently off)
Specify Anisotropic Filtering to 2X,4X..(up to 16X) (currently at Let App Decide)
Change Anti-Aliasing (currently set at Let App Decide)

I've always known better than to expect good performance out of my previous crappy video card, but now that I have a real card I would like to have my GW run nice and look good. If my card can't comfortably run the in-game settings I have chosen, let me know. But if there is something I can change in Catalyst to make GW happier at those settings, that would totally rock

BTW I have 1GB of RAM and a 1.8GHz AMD XP2400 processor in case anyone suspects a bottleneck somewhere else in my system. Sounds like plenty for GW, but you never know.

Sluggs · Apr 18, 2006, 09:06 PM // 21:06

I'm not sure hwo hobbled the x16000 is compared to the x1800s, but you should be able to run max everything with 4x AA and have it smooth.

I have a P4 2.4ghz with 1gb and radeon 9800 Pro and i run with all detail at max with 4x AA in a desktop window. My desktops running 1152x864.

If you're finding its slow, and you have the latest drivers, i would think the video card is not your problem.

that said, have you checked to see if the x1600 has some specific problem with gw? Its unlikely but not impossible.

Blade Rez · Apr 18, 2006, 09:15 PM // 21:15

It is plenty, but usually, I like to play 1280x1024, then 1024x768. Try running 1280x1024, with 0x aa, and see how you like it

this is back on my radeon 9200SE+ my 6200

ducktape · Apr 18, 2006, 09:15 PM // 21:15

Not really that it's slow, just when I'm running, the texture drawing can't really keep up about half the time. When that happens, I stop running, it's fine in 2 seconds. I run from monster group to monster group (about 2 radar lengths) and it's fine. Running longer distances? Texture lag. Wouldn't that be settings in the card?

Blade Rez · Apr 18, 2006, 09:16 PM // 21:16

Ok with textures, just dl latest drivers, if those don't work try maybe OMEGA drivers.

Also, get the latest version of DirectX

ducktape · Apr 18, 2006, 10:56 PM // 22:56

What are OMEGA drivers? I got the newest Catalyst (6.4) and the newest DirectX (April package) a couple days ago, that's all the video drivers I could think of. I also got the newest chipset drivers for my mobo, wondering if that would do anything, but haven't noticed a difference yet.

EDIT: I got the motherboard drivers because every time I sign in at the Windows password screen, when it starts to load the desktop I get two 1/2 inch high black bars across my screen that go away after a second. Plus, whenever I opened the Catalyst control panel, the screen would flash black for a second and then show the Catalyst logo. It's annoying, but since it only bothers me for a couple seconds out of my day I haven't messed with it anymore. It's been doing that ever since I got the card though. Does that mean my card is damaged?

Serafita Kayin · Apr 19, 2006, 02:02 PM // 14:02

It's a known issue with the Cat 6.3-4 drivers. ATi knows about it, they just don't care.

And yes, that's more than enough to turn everything all the way up. Go for it.