Half life performance tweaking
Sgt_Bilko1
Join Date: 2002-02-02 Member: 150Members
Join Date: 2002-02-02 Member: 150Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Gah</div>I'm posting this here because I see a lot of bad advice going around concerning hardware and frame rates. I posted this in another thread but I want to make sure everyone else sees it. I have a long history of experience with hardware and I don't thinkg I missed any critical points, but if anyone sees somthing that they can add here please feel free.
I just want to clear something up first, being a hardware techie. The overall real world benchmark and game performance between PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect)and AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port) is no more than 10%-12% at BEST, it's the difference between 100FPS and 115FPS, or 20FPS and 23FPS and will not make or break you as far as frame rate goes.
If you are having trouble with you system being slow take the following basic steps to ensure that your system is operating at its maximum possible performance.
1. Get all the critical updates from the Microsoft website, some pertain to fixes regarding games or operating system performance, or prevent crashing.
2. Get the latest video card drivers from the people who make your video card, and NVIDIA owners SHOULD GET the detonator 4 drivers from the <a href="http://www.nvidia.com" target="_blank">http://www.nvidia.com</a> website, all ATI owners get the latest CATALYST drivers from <a href="http://www.ati.com," target="_blank">http://www.ati.com,</a> and all the voodoo owners get a new video card because 3dfx doesn't exist and the driver support is going down hill. A gamer with a voodoo is just asking for FPS pain and suffering in the future. Although, they should work ok with Half-Life, the drivers were teaked for HL not HL mods.
3. Find out who made your motherboard and download any new drivers concerning AGP ports, UDMA, or any other recommended update. Performance can really take a dive if your mobo drivers are out of date.
4. Flash your motherboard bios with the latest bios update THis can ruin your system if you do it wrong, so do some research, really I'm serious.
5. Read the tweak guides at <a href="http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/" target="_blank">http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/</a> concerning how to get the best performance out of your operating system, some default windows settings stink for gaming and need to be changed.
6. Also read the HALF-LIFE tweak guide at <a href="http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/" target="_blank">http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/</a> this includes tweaks for both half life pings and half life framte rates, this one can reall give you a boost if you take the time to read it.
7. Read the tweak guides, but be careful that you don't get in over you head, and read warnings and instructions carefully so you don't blow up your computer.
8. Do the smart thing, and if you're going to upgrade, find a hardware forum somewhere to ask all the wonderful hardware techs of this world like me to reccomend a good system setup so you don't get ripped off.
9. If you're going to buy computer parts, buy them from here, best prices on the web. <a href="http://www.pricewatch.com" target="_blank">http://www.pricewatch.com</a>
if you have any questions about your hardware feel free to email me or PM me, or post here if you like, although if you post here I might not see it unless I visit this thread again. Nothing worse than buying crappy hardware IMHO.
I just want to clear something up first, being a hardware techie. The overall real world benchmark and game performance between PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect)and AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port) is no more than 10%-12% at BEST, it's the difference between 100FPS and 115FPS, or 20FPS and 23FPS and will not make or break you as far as frame rate goes.
If you are having trouble with you system being slow take the following basic steps to ensure that your system is operating at its maximum possible performance.
1. Get all the critical updates from the Microsoft website, some pertain to fixes regarding games or operating system performance, or prevent crashing.
2. Get the latest video card drivers from the people who make your video card, and NVIDIA owners SHOULD GET the detonator 4 drivers from the <a href="http://www.nvidia.com" target="_blank">http://www.nvidia.com</a> website, all ATI owners get the latest CATALYST drivers from <a href="http://www.ati.com," target="_blank">http://www.ati.com,</a> and all the voodoo owners get a new video card because 3dfx doesn't exist and the driver support is going down hill. A gamer with a voodoo is just asking for FPS pain and suffering in the future. Although, they should work ok with Half-Life, the drivers were teaked for HL not HL mods.
3. Find out who made your motherboard and download any new drivers concerning AGP ports, UDMA, or any other recommended update. Performance can really take a dive if your mobo drivers are out of date.
4. Flash your motherboard bios with the latest bios update THis can ruin your system if you do it wrong, so do some research, really I'm serious.
5. Read the tweak guides at <a href="http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/" target="_blank">http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/</a> concerning how to get the best performance out of your operating system, some default windows settings stink for gaming and need to be changed.
6. Also read the HALF-LIFE tweak guide at <a href="http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/" target="_blank">http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/</a> this includes tweaks for both half life pings and half life framte rates, this one can reall give you a boost if you take the time to read it.
7. Read the tweak guides, but be careful that you don't get in over you head, and read warnings and instructions carefully so you don't blow up your computer.
8. Do the smart thing, and if you're going to upgrade, find a hardware forum somewhere to ask all the wonderful hardware techs of this world like me to reccomend a good system setup so you don't get ripped off.
9. If you're going to buy computer parts, buy them from here, best prices on the web. <a href="http://www.pricewatch.com" target="_blank">http://www.pricewatch.com</a>
if you have any questions about your hardware feel free to email me or PM me, or post here if you like, although if you post here I might not see it unless I visit this thread again. Nothing worse than buying crappy hardware IMHO.
Comments
<a href="http://www.techspot.com/guides-gaming.shtml" target="_blank">http://www.techspot.com/guides-gaming.shtml</a>
there you can find ALL the commands for HL that ivolve tweaking audio,video and ping.
I do have some good tweaks though, considering my system i think it runs most things fine and even better than some better computers.
-PD
*edit*
PregineDive i take offense from ur avatar, i dont think that should be in the NS forums, there may be lil kids around, or ppl with gf's that they just dont need to see other ladies like that
No, instead they should download the <a href="http://www.wicked3d.com/technology/wickedgl.htm" target="_blank">Wicked GL drivers</a> for a huge performance boost. If the "Buy me" nagscreen bothers you, try to find an older version, they're still floating around the net and are almost feature identical.
And Peregrine, I like the avatar <!--emo&:)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'><!--endemo--> (and I'm pretty sure it also conforms to PG-13, the Middle Ages are over, you know).
Thanks for the info Bilko. All those HL commands will help mucho. And the Windows 2K section will help me squeeze out some more 3DMarks... <!--emo&;)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=';)'><!--endemo-->
On the matter of PeregineDive's sig:
I'm sorry, but I agree with Elowind, The general manner and style of the forum goers around here is very good, and I think PeregineDive's avatar does not really suit the nature of this Forum. If people want to look at pictures like that I'm sure they can find them elsewhere on the internet.
I find it kinda funny that people are all paranoid about their kids seing anything remotely sexual in between their violent games.
But yeah, on the subject of tweaking, <a href="http://www.speedguide.net/" target="_blank">Speedguide</a> has some cool stuff on it to check your connection to the internet, like their TCP/IP analyzer. That's a handy tool for cracking down on latency and packet loss.
Nvidia bought 3dfx a while ago, taking the top engineers and tossing everyone else aside. There may be a few straggles left making drivers for the cards, but I see voodoo cards being much too slow to handle next generation games based on the Unreal 2 engine and such.
f3rret - Yeah it's quite funny how, in the sense you are talking about, some parents would rather block out violence and sexual activity from their kids lives rather than educate them on it. I guess they are banking on the kids figureing out everything on their own, man that's even more of a scary thoguht =p
<!--EDIT|Sgt. Bilko|Aug. 08 2002,08:46-->
Bah, I actually agree with you, but don't you think that this avatar does not really suit or fit in with the forums, and that is encourages people to go even further <!--emo&???--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt='???'><!--endemo-->
its the tought that counts man <!--emo&;)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=';)'><!--endemo-->
it doesnt bother me too much, seein how i can just scroll past, i was just sayin ya kno?
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td><b>Quote</b> </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"><!--QuoteEBegin-->f3rret - Yeah it's quite funny how, in the sense you are talking about, some parents would rather block out violence and sexual activity from their kids lives rather than educate them on it. I guess they are banking on the kids figureing out everything on their own, man that's even more of a scary thoguht =p <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
my GUESS would be most ppl in teh forums either no longer live with their parents, dont care what there parents think, or their parents just really dont care, seein how half l ife in a way is violent, and as for "pretty" ladies (well those who enjoy showing themselves) are everywhere these days, magazines, tv, internet.. everywhere else, so u might as well get used to it, or ignore it
<a href="http://www.readyroom.org/perfgde_1.html" target="_blank">Windows XP/2000 Tweaking Guide</a>
Carbon14- Good point. That avatar may be okay, but then someone would take it one step further, then another step, then another step... THEN it'll get out of hand.
Sgt.Bilko- What you said is true, but I sorta meant that society says that violence is okay, but sex is not. I don't want to sound like a hippie, but sex is about love, and violence is about hate. Which one should we be exposing our kids to?
EDIT: To stay on topic: My system is fairly overpowered for HalfLife, so I don't need to worry too much about tweaking anything except TCP/IP. But this is all good info, in general! Keep it coming!
<a href="http://forums.dayofdefeatmod.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=43785" target="_blank">http://forums.dayofdefeatmod.com/forums....d=43785</a>
Its for the DoD forums (hope the NS team doesnt mind, its just a sticky i have there about voodoo cards and such) and it basically explains everything on my computer, and everything that i have found to work best with voodoos and HL in general. Some details are dod related, but all of the info on that page can be used to tweak ANY HL mod out so far.
I hope you guys dont mind the link, i just found it easier than using copy and paste for 15 posts that may as well be overlooked by people who dont need them.
Hmm, who knows, maybe ill make a voodoo support post after NS comes out too <!--emo&:)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'><!--endemo-->