Making the PC able to run UT3 well - all help appreciated

[Kinnison]

Hello. First of all, this is my machine:

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CPU: Intel Pentium 4 - 3,2 GHz with HyperThreading
Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-8I865GME
RAM: 2 x 512 MB Twinmos DIMMS (PC3200)
VGA: Sapphire ATI Radeon X1950 Pro AGP with 512MB Ram
Sound: Onboard Realtek AC 97 Audio (have it configured to output 5.1)
Speakers: Sweex 5.1 Home Theater set
Monitor: Samsung 17" Syncmaster TFT-LCD monitor.
Software: Win XP Service Pack 3, ZoneAlarm Free Antivirus, latest DX+vga Drivers etc.

for anything else just ask.

**On boot-up the BIOS says ram is not in dual-channel mode. Frankly I dont know WHAT that is. And if it will have an effect on my performance or if I can or not enable it in my current ram.**
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It seems, that when the depth of the area shown on the screen is large (you can see far away on the map) the FPS drop way too much. In Deck map, when I am on one side looking all the way to the other side of the bridge while walking on it, my fps drop a lot, to like 12- 15. As I reach one end of the bridge and now I can see a much smaller area of the map, they seem to come back to good levels, like 30 -40.

I was also playing defiance quite a bit. At the high corridor with the sniper rifle that leads to the UDamage, when walking towards the UDamage, on your left there is an open rectangular area (that gives access to the armor tunnel). From that rectangular area, you can look through a room that has 2 healthpacks to another area. At that point the Depth that is visible is high, and again the fpses drop a lot. But in the armor-pickup tunel that runs underneath the map, the fps is quite high.

I entered a multiplayer match with 16 other people and in Deck it is practiacally impossible to play at all. The fps are horribly low on many other maps too.

Interestingly, the map Gateway is always running perfectly smoothly online or offline, I hope I could run the entire game like that... that map seems to be the only one that runs that well. I think heatray also runs well most of the time but I havent really played it more than once or twice since I got the fullgame so I cant say.

I usually play on the following settings. Texture/World detail 2/2. Resolution 1280x1024. Screen rendering 100%. "blur" effect disabled through ini files.
Anything else just ask.

Given these things that I noticed while playing, and my systems specs, what do you people think is the main bottleneck for me enjoying a smooth UT3 gameplay?

I have tried changing these settings, but the changes in performance are never good enough to make the game smoothly playable. In fact there doesnt seem to be anything different even if I lower my resolution to 1024x768. But my TFT monitor is only nice to look at this one resolution. 1024x768 is very pixelated, even in games where I can turn anti-aliasing on. So I'd very much like to stay on 1280x1024 for now.

One bad thing about my monitor is that its kinda old. I think its like 4 years or something now. What is bad about that is that it has a high response time: 16ms. That is actually noticable in quick fps games, unlike what I thought when I had gotten it. Although there werent that many options for me back then. However, there is no chance I will be able to get another one and there is virtually 0% chance it has anything to do with my FPS so ignore this.

I've been thinking this has something to do with my CPU, since it seems all new games are obssessed with making us spend a fotune to upgrade to a core 2 duo. BUT! To do that I would have to change motherboard, and possibly video card since mine is AGP. I DID spend a fortune on my AGP card (175 Euro or 278$), in order to get one that would give a new lease of life on my old system (since all the good ones that come out seem to be for PCI-e). ALSO, my RAM is no longer used in new mobos, so that would also need to be renewed.

SO, throwing away all of this and spending a fortune to get a newer system (mobo cpu ram video card possibly sound card too) is a no-no, even if I am forced to run on a slower cpu. I just dont have the cash for it.

But, if I was willing to get a small upgrade, in the 50- 100Euro (159$) range more or less, what should I do? Will upping my RAM to 2GBs help at all? Maybe that is all thats needed to make the game fly?

Or maybe there are more tweaks I can do in UT3? I know you would say the obvious "turn res to 800x600 and texture/world details to 1 and screen rendering to 50%" BUT! That would really be nothing like unreal would it?

To sum up:
What I am hoping is to be able to run UT3 in say 30+ fps consistently on the above machine.
1)What would you reccomend I upgrade in the machine for up to 100 Euro? Will adding 1GB ram help at all?
2)What should I tweak in UT3 to improve performance without making it look totally deformed? I would love it if I could play it smoothly at medium detail on my machine. Something tells me it can be done.

Any comments ideas or whatever are all welcome!

[VoodooMaster]

Get 1 more gig of ram it will make the game run smoother for certain.

Also try Brad G's Tweaker >>
http://utforums.epicgames.com/showth...=Ultrons+guide

And Ultrons Tweak guide >>
http://utforums.epicgames.com/showthread.php?t=586697

[Kinnison]

Get 1 more gig of ram it will make the game run smoother for certain.

Thanks for your input, I am checking them out now. Surely the ram will help, but my question is, just what kind of imporevement will that be? Will it make the game playable? Thats what I am interested to know.

On a side note, are you by any chance that girl who used to post on the BnB forums a lot and played lineage 2? If not, ignore my paranoia

[oldkawman1]

Dual channel mode is important on older systems like you have. Do you have the motherboard manual? It will have a chart showing which of the 4 DIMM slots to fill to get dual channel. The memory must be the same speed.and size and yours is. If you only have 2 slots for memory, then your mobo does not support dual channel mode and your memory will be slow.

Your single core socket 478 P4 is real slow. Do not be confused about the high clock, it means nothing. It has not even shown up on benchmarks for years. That CPU is slower than a 1.4 MHz socket 939 Sempron.

You really need a dual core CPU for this game.

[Kinnison]

Yes the motherboard only has 2 slots for RAM. The M/B model is a GIGABYTE GA-8I865GME.
I just checked its printed manual. It says on the "features":
-2 DDR DIMM memory slots (supports up to 2GB memory)
-Supports dual channel DDR 400/333/266 DIMM
-Supports 2.5V DDR DIMMs

[bclagge]

Any money invested in upgrading your current setup will be money poured down the drain.

My advice is don't invest any more money into that computer. It needs a new mobo, CPU and RAM. As sad as it is, you are also going to need to scrap that video card. After you buy the new parts and put it together, you can sell the old stuff on ebay to recoup some of the money spent.

To do it cheap, just re-use the external components and the case, as long as it's not some wierd form factor. Those are things you can upgrade later.

You can perhaps make life easier in the mean time by fixing your DDR problem. First use "Run" from the start menu and input "dxdiag". Check your system memory and see if all 1GB is recognized. If it is, then enter your BIOS while your computer boots and see if there is an option to turn dual channel on and off. You could also perhaps overclock your CPU a smidgen just for kicks.

[Kinnison]

Thanks a ton for your help bclagge. I have checked it many times before and re-checked just now and indeed the RAM is correctly seen by the system as 1GB total. I had heard somewhere that dual channel is a good thing but I thought it best to avoid tampering with it just in case I cause damage to anything if its not supported by my hardware. But I will try to enable it now.

As far as the rest of the PC goes, I know that eventually it will have to be replaced completely, just like all computers. But I was hoping I could at least make this one game, UT3, playable well for a little bit of money. That is because UT is a game with huge lasting value: one could be playing it for more than 5 years even....

As for selling my old equipment, I haven't really ever sold anything on e-bay etc. before so it didnt really come to mind that I would save up money selling my old stuff. But indeed this is a good idea. There are a few other things I'd like to sell too, so your idea is spot on. Thank you.

In the meantime, I have used the UT3 Tweaker V5.0 that VoodooMaster proposed and it has made the game much more playable, albeit graphically disappointing. But it will be feasibile to play online in a meaningful (competitive) manner now, so that is OK. Any other ideas or suggestions or anything please everyone, feel free to post them. Thanks a ton

[DscytheX]

Hey Kinnison, I think the reason it tells you this on start up is because one of the dimms is not seated in the right slot to enable dual channel. On the board you should see the ram slots have 2 different colors. Mine has 2 black and 2 blue. Just make sure that your RAM is sitting in the same color slots. Let me know if that works =)

[oldkawman1]

Yes the motherboard only has 2 slots for RAM. The M/B model is a GIGABYTE GA-8I865GME.
I just checked its printed manual. It says on the "features":
-2 DDR DIMM memory slots (supports up to 2GB memory)
-Supports dual channel DDR 400/333/266 DIMM
-Supports 2.5V DDR DIMMs

OH, my bad. It's an LGA775 board but an old one and does not support any C2D. You could get a Pentium D, but it may not work well.

It is also so old it may not support Dual channel on your memory brand or type. many older mobo are very picky what memory works in dual channel mode.

You should plan on a new CPU + mobo + ram + GPU and start saving up.

[Kinnison]

Hey Kinnison, I think the reason it tells you this on start up is because one of the dimms is not seated in the right slot to enable dual channel. On the board you should see the ram slots have 2 different colors. Mine has 2 black and 2 blue. Just make sure that your RAM is sitting in the same color slots. Let me know if that works =)

No, I am afraid thats not the case. There are not 4 but 2 slots, both coloured orange. I will try to find a setting in my BIOS to enable dual channel, and also something else that you made me think of: I'll try to exchange my 2 DIMM's positions, perhaps that will *somehow* help enable it

By the way its been great to be aboard the team

[Kinnison]

OH, my bad. It's an LGA775 board but an old one and does not support any C2D. You could get a Pentium D, but it may not work well.

It is also so old it may not support Dual channel on your memory brand or type. many older mobo are very picky what memory works in dual channel mode.

You should plan on a new CPU + mobo + ram + GPU and start saving up.

I dont know whats C2D maybe its dual channel... pentium D: excuse my ignorance but isnt that a notebook oriented cpu? I havent been keeping up in the last few years with computer developments. You are right about saving up for a new system though. The hard part is... saving up I have a part time job with low pay so it will take long. But I will most likely get instead of ram, a new mouse. Currently I am using an extremely basic one that actually goes nuts every once in a while and tilts my view to the sky by itself (o0). It is a simple Sweex optical one. I am planning on getting a Logitech MX518 instead. I'll look into the pentium D but probably I'll leave things as they are. On the lowest possible settings the game is kinda playable :P

[DscytheX]

good to hear Kinnison I'm glad you're enjoying TAW and I'll be taking care of Saturdays practice so perhaps we'll talk about your pc and getting UT3 running a little smoother over TS then. Talk to you later

[Kinnison]

bumpy-bumpy

[UnskilledPRO]

C2D = Core 2 Duo

That Logitech MX518 is well worth the money it costs been using mine for three years now. I hope i will be able to keep it until USB is replaced

You should be able to make a cheaper upgrade by buying a really cheap mother board and new DDR2 RAM. There are some really cheap ASrock mother boards that support APG and PCI-e graphic cards. http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.as...Roe865PE&s=775 for example supports AGP cards and is really cheap (50$?). Before anyone flames me, i think this is not a good motherboard, but it will be sufficient to allow him to upgrade his computer in smaller steps as it supports DDR2 and C2D CPUs.

I bet that if you look around on some online shops you will find even cheaper motherboards that support DDR2, C2D and AGP.

If you buy a crappy motherboard for almost nothing you can upgrade it later when you can afford a new graphic card aswell Yet be able to use newer parts on it (ram and cpu).

for 80-90$ you should be able to obtain a new motherboard and 2-4GB DDR2 ram.

err... guess it's time to shut it now and see how you respond :P

[Kinnison]

lol!

sounds like a strategic move for my situation, thanks for spenging time to ponder my predicament and help out

This is one approach that I will try to keep in mind, although I will have to do more research on it. But I think the mx518 will be the first thing for me to get, since no matter what kind of pc I end up with it will still be needed

oh by the way, nice entry on your keyboard there in your sig LOL!