TF2 anyone?

[jackfb13]

I have been dying for a good tf2 match...

Will u pway wit meeeee!!! ahem. Gamertag is in sig I am on all day most weekends.

I wish i had a PS3 so I could play with twilight wolf since he seems to be a fellow tf2 addict


Edit: I will not be on all day today I will be on from 6 to 10pm est if not earlier..

[bicostp]

Get it on PC and I will. (It really is a hell of a lot better. Even if you have to crank the graphics down a lot, there's just so much more out there, like custom maps, Payload, Arena, unlockables... Besides, "graphics aren't everything", right? )

The whole Orange Box is only $10 on Steam this weekend.

[jackfb13]

I do have it on pc, but sadly in a full game my pc can only run it at about 5 fps even with all the settings on low. Sadly, half life 2 deathmatch is the same as well.

[Twilight Wolf]

I wish i had a PS3 so I could play with twilight wolf since he seems to be a fellow tf2 addict

Yeah, and I'd love to play with you, but even if you had a PS3, I couldn't since I hurt my hand in a motorcycle wreck yesterday. I'm not gonna be able to play any PS3 games for a few nights...

And the whole "Orange Box" is only $10 this weekend? Damn, I wish my laptop could handle more system-intensive games than "Half-Life"...

[bicostp]

Post your system specs, both of you. (CPU-z and GPU-z screenshots preferred.) I can help you try to get them going. (Hey I managed to squeeze 25 FPS out of my 2.0 ghz single core Turion laptop with a Radeon 200m...) I'm sure at least HL2 and Episode 1 (plus any mods based on that verion of the Source engine) should run fine. Portal's pretty forgiving. TF2 takes more processor power.

Even if your PC might chug through them now, it's worth it if you plan on upgrading sometime this year. (I mean, 5 games for $10? How could you pass that up?!)

[Twilight Wolf]

Yeah, lousy integrated graphics that can play "Portal" at 5 FPS. (Not for sure, but some low unplayable number like that, especially in the later levels.)

And to be honest, I'd jump on getting "The Orange Box" for $10 if there was a chance of me upgrading within the next year, but I doubt that'll be the case since I'm low on funds and this laptop works perfectly fine outside of gaming. However, if you can actually manage to help me get "Portal" running decently, even at 640x480 windowed, I'd grab up "The Orange Box", like, yesterday.

[Dark-Aries]

Yeah, lousy integrated graphics that can play "Portal" at 5 FPS. (Not for sure, but some low unplayable number like that, especially in the later levels.)

And to be honest, I'd jump on getting "The Orange Box" for $10 if there was a chance of me upgrading within the next year, but I doubt that'll be the case since I'm low on funds and this laptop works perfectly fine outside of gaming. However, if you can actually manage to help me get "Portal" running decently, even at 640x480 windowed, I'd grab up "The Orange Box", like, yesterday.

play the game in directx8 instead of 9. Doesn't look the best, but if you don't play at super high resolutions you won't notice anything.

[Twilight Wolf]

Tried that; the game actually ran worse.

[bicostp]

Hmm, your CPU should be able to handle the games at least as well as mine, since you meet the requirements (1.7 ghz) and yours is dual-core vs my single core. The GMA 950 is the real killer. (Then again it's not much different than my 200m. )

Apparently there's a modified driver for the 950 that helps performance.
http://groups.google.com/group/intel9x-gaming?hl=da" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Here's a demo video of it running Portal:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHbKkZRKYCU" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

And a video on the special drivers:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2aAgFMKAf4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Next, for TF2, you'll want an FPS config. First, set these launch options:

Code: Select all

-dxlevel 81 -window -console -novid

Then copy and paste a config such as this one into Notepad:
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/action/teamf ... pid=437678" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

And follow the instructions for where to save it.

I suggest these changes:

- Add 'dsp_slow_cpu 1' to the end
- Change 'fps_max' to 30
- add 'r_eyemove 0'

You can change these options later in the developer console. Don't worry about screwing anything up; just exit Steam and rename the 'C:\Program Files\Steam\SteamApps\[yourname]\Team Fortress 2' folder, launch Steam again, and run TF2 again and it will be good as new. (And absolutely no console commands will ever get you VAC banned. Never.)

Seems like your laptop's pretty similar to mine, performance-wise. Give it a shot; it won't be pretty but it might be playable. I get between 20 and 30 FPS with a config, DX 8 mode, and everything on low except for models and textures (they're on medium). I also make sure all the AVG processes are terminated, ZoneAlarm has been exited, and explorer.exe is killed to free up some memory.

NOTE: I have no idea if this is going to work with the GMA 950, but you might be able to get it running at a playable frame rate. Thankfully your processor shouldn't bog down too bad unless you play 16-on-16 matches. Try it if you want, but don't blame me if it doesn't work and you spent $10 on Half-Life 2 and its episodes. At least keep in mind that your next PC will run it no problem.

[jackfb13]

I can run portal and all the half life games; they get a little laggy at times but they are playable. TF2 is playable when there is only one other person in the match.

Maybe I'm stupid but i don't know where to find the gpu and cpu-z

[Twilight Wolf]

Thanks, bic - I bought "The Orange Box", so I'll mess with those and let you know how it goes. (I also bought a copy for my sister, even though her birthday's a month away!)

[jackfb13]

http://img19.imageshack.us/gal.php?g=cpuzn.png
There ya go!

[bicostp]

Your CPU is too slow. You can probably get a decent upgrade from that pretty cheap. What brand is your PC or motherboard?

You should be able to drop in another AM2 processor like this one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819103298" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
(Good chance it will work with a custom build, I don't know about an off-the-shelf PC.)

Make sure you've got at least 1 GB of RAM; that makes a big difference.

[jackfb13]

I have 3gigs of ram. My pc is an off the shelf acer.

Do you think if I installed tineyxp it would make a difference? I hate Vista.

[Twilight Wolf]

Okay, a few hours ago, "Team Fortress 2" finished downloading, so I got the launch options and config files set up. Surprisingly, it was playable - just barely. However, as smooth as it may be at the beginning, the framerate tends to take a crap about five minutes into any match, even if there's only one other player, and it thus becomes unplayable. I turned everything to low and ran it 640x480 windowed, and the same problem occurs. It never saves my settings, though, and now I get an "hl2.exe has experienced an error and needs to shut down" message whenever I join a match... Sigh. Oh, well, at least I didn't pay full price for it, but damn, even though it worked better than I expected, I was hoping for it to be better since I wanted to try out the new maps (the only one of those I got to play was Gold Rush) and unlock some cool new weapons (I got to see a Scout on my team use the Sandman). At least I got a taste of what the PC version is like, so I guess I'll call it good enough for now. I'll keep messing with it and see if I can figure anything out...

Surprisingly, "Portal" didn't improve at all, and "Half-Life 2" has the same issue the demo I downloaded has: it crashes and burns totally during the opening sequence when G-Man is talking to you.

Thanks very much for the help so far, bic. If I can get "TF2" running at a decent framerate somehow, I'll let you know and we can play sometime.