26.06.2009, 23:13
People searching Low-End systems will find this thread. Here's some more
advice.
Display Drivers are CRITICAL. Swapping out display drivers, I discovered
that the newest Nvidia drivers that are supported by my card have
a huge impact on the look and performance of the game on my system.
With the older driver, Perfect terrain slowed my computer to a crawl (even with Rambooster)
and the colors looked bland. The newer driver allows me to play on Perfect, with
Visibility set to High--lighting, and detail maxed. Almost no stutters. Colors look rich.
Game gets a tad slow on some maps flying over cities with a pile of flak--
I can live with it and I refuse to tone down my AAA. 95% of the time, the game plays milky smooth. Here is the OpenGL section from my config.ini:
[Render_OpenGL]
TexQual=3
TexMipFilter=3
TexCompress=0
TexFlags.UseDither=1
TexFlags.UseAlpha=0
TexFlags.UseIndex=0
TexFlags.PolygonStipple=1
TexFlags.UseClampedSprites=0
TexFlags.DrawLandByTriangles=1
TexFlags.UseVertexArrays=1
TexFlags.DisableAPIExtensions=0
TexFlags.ARBMultitextureExt=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombineExt=1
TexFlags.SecondaryColorExt=1
TexFlags.VertexArrayExt=1
TexFlags.ClipHintExt=0
TexFlags.UsePaletteExt=0
TexFlags.TexAnisotropicExt=1
TexFlags.TexCompressARBExt=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombine4NV=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombineDot3=1
TexFlags.DepthClampNV=1
TexFlags.SeparateSpecular=1
TexFlags.TextureShaderNV=1
HardwareShaders=0
Shadows=2
Specular=2
SpecularLight=2
DiffuseLight=2
DynamicalLights=1
MeshDetail=2
VisibilityDistance=3
Sky=0
Forest=0
LandShading=3
LandDetails=2
LandGeom=3
TexLarge=1
TexLandQual=3
TexLandLarge=1
VideoSetupId=4
Water=0
Effects=1
ForceShaders1x=1
***********************************************
Note that HardwareShaders=0 but ForceShaders1x=1. Also, Sky, Forest,
and Water are 0. Setting Forest to 0 had a huge impact. I'm using Flushie's Bumpification
mod (love it) and the maps still look gorgeous.
Reinstalling the drivers, I used Driver Cleaner Pro 1.5.0.0 (free), fixed the registry and
swept my system with CCleaner 2.20.0.920 (free--excellent, recommend for anyone to maintain their system),
and did a complete defrag with JkDefrag 3.36.0.2 (free, fast, excellent defragmentation
utility).
Following Fabianfred's lead I turned off my paging file. Helps some--I think, certainly doesn't
hurt. I don't know how much Ram you need before this becomes an option.
Sounds: I've updated my sound card drivers. In setup I have Minimal selected. Sounds better for my comp and is supposed to be the fastest. Don't neglect to tweak your sound settings. Sound is a major performance issue in this game, more so than any other game I've ever played.
Nvidia Control panel: I would like to try Nhancer, but my vid card is not supported, so I make do with Control Panel. Anti-Aliasing is 2x. 2x looks fine--anything higher is a major performance hit for little gain. Anistropic is Application Controlled, which I think in Il-2 means none. Anistropic, on my vid card, doesn't seem to do anything anyway. Vsync is force-off. Vsync does make the game look somewhat nicer, but there is a noticeable performance hit on my system. Texture Quality is set for High Performance. The degradation of image quality is modest and the performance gain is large.
That's about it. Some of this stuff will be specific to my system. The details of the config.ini settings will have to be hashed out by you, finding just the right compromise for your set-up. One of the things I absolutely love about this game is its flexibility. You can tune Il-2 to play on just about anything. Well, maybe not an AppleII or a TRS-80 (ah, Highschool), but almost anything.
Major point: Get the BEST driver for your card. That might not mean the latest driver. But don't assume because the game is "working" without obvious graphics errors that your driver is optimized. My experience proves this is not the case. The right drivers will optimize your frame rates.
Yours truly
nodlew
advice.
Display Drivers are CRITICAL. Swapping out display drivers, I discovered
that the newest Nvidia drivers that are supported by my card have
a huge impact on the look and performance of the game on my system.
With the older driver, Perfect terrain slowed my computer to a crawl (even with Rambooster)
and the colors looked bland. The newer driver allows me to play on Perfect, with
Visibility set to High--lighting, and detail maxed. Almost no stutters. Colors look rich.
Game gets a tad slow on some maps flying over cities with a pile of flak--
I can live with it and I refuse to tone down my AAA. 95% of the time, the game plays milky smooth. Here is the OpenGL section from my config.ini:
[Render_OpenGL]
TexQual=3
TexMipFilter=3
TexCompress=0
TexFlags.UseDither=1
TexFlags.UseAlpha=0
TexFlags.UseIndex=0
TexFlags.PolygonStipple=1
TexFlags.UseClampedSprites=0
TexFlags.DrawLandByTriangles=1
TexFlags.UseVertexArrays=1
TexFlags.DisableAPIExtensions=0
TexFlags.ARBMultitextureExt=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombineExt=1
TexFlags.SecondaryColorExt=1
TexFlags.VertexArrayExt=1
TexFlags.ClipHintExt=0
TexFlags.UsePaletteExt=0
TexFlags.TexAnisotropicExt=1
TexFlags.TexCompressARBExt=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombine4NV=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombineDot3=1
TexFlags.DepthClampNV=1
TexFlags.SeparateSpecular=1
TexFlags.TextureShaderNV=1
HardwareShaders=0
Shadows=2
Specular=2
SpecularLight=2
DiffuseLight=2
DynamicalLights=1
MeshDetail=2
VisibilityDistance=3
Sky=0
Forest=0
LandShading=3
LandDetails=2
LandGeom=3
TexLarge=1
TexLandQual=3
TexLandLarge=1
VideoSetupId=4
Water=0
Effects=1
ForceShaders1x=1
***********************************************
Note that HardwareShaders=0 but ForceShaders1x=1. Also, Sky, Forest,
and Water are 0. Setting Forest to 0 had a huge impact. I'm using Flushie's Bumpification
mod (love it) and the maps still look gorgeous.
Reinstalling the drivers, I used Driver Cleaner Pro 1.5.0.0 (free), fixed the registry and
swept my system with CCleaner 2.20.0.920 (free--excellent, recommend for anyone to maintain their system),
and did a complete defrag with JkDefrag 3.36.0.2 (free, fast, excellent defragmentation
utility).
Following Fabianfred's lead I turned off my paging file. Helps some--I think, certainly doesn't
hurt. I don't know how much Ram you need before this becomes an option.
Sounds: I've updated my sound card drivers. In setup I have Minimal selected. Sounds better for my comp and is supposed to be the fastest. Don't neglect to tweak your sound settings. Sound is a major performance issue in this game, more so than any other game I've ever played.
Nvidia Control panel: I would like to try Nhancer, but my vid card is not supported, so I make do with Control Panel. Anti-Aliasing is 2x. 2x looks fine--anything higher is a major performance hit for little gain. Anistropic is Application Controlled, which I think in Il-2 means none. Anistropic, on my vid card, doesn't seem to do anything anyway. Vsync is force-off. Vsync does make the game look somewhat nicer, but there is a noticeable performance hit on my system. Texture Quality is set for High Performance. The degradation of image quality is modest and the performance gain is large.
That's about it. Some of this stuff will be specific to my system. The details of the config.ini settings will have to be hashed out by you, finding just the right compromise for your set-up. One of the things I absolutely love about this game is its flexibility. You can tune Il-2 to play on just about anything. Well, maybe not an AppleII or a TRS-80 (ah, Highschool), but almost anything.
Major point: Get the BEST driver for your card. That might not mean the latest driver. But don't assume because the game is "working" without obvious graphics errors that your driver is optimized. My experience proves this is not the case. The right drivers will optimize your frame rates.
Yours truly
nodlew