The M2TW hardware thread: please post all hardware queries here

[sapi]

vastator, you could be running three copies of m2tw all at highest on that system and not get any lag at all

[Dexter]

Hy there .. hope this is the right place to ask my dorky question
My system is 2,6 Ghz Intel Celeron whit 1280 DDR 2 ram - one 666 the other 533 mhz ... know that this lowers the other one to ... 256 DDr Nvidia 6200 TC but when i dit raise my ram over 1 GB it says it`s 512 MB - why - 80 Gb Maxtor whit 7 Gb free after M2TW is installed .. 2 partitions 7 GB foe WinXp2 and the big partition for games mp3 etc.

1. wy does the video ram change - not onboard video card
2. whit medium settings version 1 bigger battels are fustrating .. sloppy performance .. specially wen laying seige to citadels
3. more ram more free space new video card ? what would help ?

thanx

[sapi]

Hey

1) The 'tc' in that card's name indicates that it does not in fact have on board ram but 'borrows' system ram for use in video rendering. This isn't ideal for gaming, as you might guess.

2) Have you tried turning bloom and shadows off? They seem to be the big killers...

3) I don't think that there's much you can do with that system except learn to live with it. The cpu's likely to be part of any percieved problem and you can't get rid of that without upgrading practically the whole thing

[Dexter]

... d`oh .. i only bought this pc last year in october .. paid 450 euros for it .. damn ... well this is it ... going home to play lumberjack whit it ...

Will try to set shadows to min , an no bloom ... would upgrade to 2GB ram help ?
Thax for the help

[sapi]

Hey

I'm not sure about the ram upgrade (i personally wouldn't bother) but turning shadows and bloom down should give you a performance increase without affecting how the game looks too much.

And i'm not sure of the exchange rate atm, but 450e is likely to equal 1000aud, and that's about what i'd expect for that price - so no need to murder the salesperson...yet

[Dexter]

dont worry sapi ... i will not murder him/her ... just skin them alive >:) - not really -
well honestly ... it seems a new video card vould be needed ... only prob is that the good ones all are over 100e .... to much for my budget ... but the ram is cheepier ... some 100e 1Gb at 666 Mhz ... but than agin it may not solve to much... i did try to play on lover settings like all an min but the difference in performance was neglectable .. and shadows were set to low - it seems this was the trouble -... will try tonight turning bloom and shadows off ..
thanx again !!!

[sbroadbent]

As mentioned, that card is a very poor choice.

Essentially it has 64MB of it's own memory, and gets the rest from system memory. Here's some more details:

http://www.guru3d.com/article/content/191/


Regarding the system as is, I'd definately look to getting a better video card. You should be able to get a decent card for a good price, and presuming the board has a PCI-e 16x slot you should be able to salvage something out of the system. You may not have the budget for a better video card, but it's what WILL give you better performance than what you have now. you could spend money on RAM or CPU, but you won't notice nearly as much performance improvement than a better video card.

Here's what I'd look to "upgrade" in this order:

- Video Card (something with atleast 128MB (of it's own) RAM, if not 256MB).
- Memory. Depending on what FSB your processor runs at, getting 533 or 667 RAM may not make alot of difference. Your celeron like my old system may only run at 400Mhz Front Side Bus, which means that the system will clock it down to 400Mhz. Only if you are going to be upgrading or Overclocking would you want to consider higher rated memory.
- CPU (I ran a Celeron 2.26 with a Radeon 9800 Pro, and it provided playable performance, so you shouldn't have too many problems with the CPU... in addition, I am running only 512MB of RAM in that system).

The best option would be to see if you can sell the system to someone who may not necessarily need a gaming system, to try to recover some if not all of what you originally spent, and look to build a new system.

Some recommendations:

Intel: Anything in the Core 2 Duo family, or
AMD: Any X2 processor

RAM: Dual Channel and a minimum of 1GB. 2GB if you budget allows for it.

Video: Minimum of 128MB Video RAM, but look at the specs like Pixel Pipelines/shaders, memory bus size, and clock rates. A card with less video ram, but higher clock rate and memory bus size would outperform one that has more ram, but less of the other stats.

Finally, go to http://www.tomshardware.com/index.html and read up on the various technologies. THG has charts that show you the performance of different CPU's, GPU's, etc so if you're looking at a couple different options, it can give you an idea on which is a good value for the money.

[Dexter]

thanx for these links sbroadbent, helped a lot. By the way my motherboard is a Foxcon Core 2 Duo and it supports DDR 2 from 533 - to 800 Mhz .. that`s the reason why i bought it in the first place / only prob it has just 2 slots for ram :( ...
Would it be alright if i send you a full system spec ? - for a better wiew of the possibilities of upgrade or system evaluation ..

Thanx for the help - appreciate it !!!

[sbroadbent]

thanx for these links sbroadbent, helped a lot. By the way my motherboard is a Foxcon Core 2 Duo and it supports DDR 2 from 533 - to 800 Mhz .. that`s the reason why i bought it in the first place / only prob it has just 2 slots for ram :( ...
Would it be alright if i send you a full system spec ? - for a better wiew of the possibilities of upgrade or system evaluation ..

Thanx for the help - appreciate it !!!

A more thorough list of the components would help, though probably be best to send through as a PM, unless others would have any opinions.

A useful Freeware program to locate more information about your componets is CPU-Z

The most useful information are these:
CPU tab: Processor (Specification, Instructions), Clocks, Cache
Cache Tab: L2 Cache
Mainboard Tab: Motherboard, BIOS, and Graphic Interface
Memory: General and Timings
SPD: Everything except timings table listed under both Memory Slot Selections

Optionally you could take a screenshot of each of the tabs listed above if you didn't want to write it all out (though I wouldn't post them here).

What is the model number of the Hard Drive and is it SATA or PATA?

[Katana]

at long last, i'm poised to make my return to the glorious world of pc gaming. this fall, while playing the company of heroes demo, my pc just crapped out. i'm farily certain it was psu failure, but, since it was just before my university studies began, i haven't really had time to fix it since - plus... well, it was a little long in the tooth back then, so by now it's positively antidiluvian. anyways, summer is just around the corner, and in addition to a respite from writing papers it brings with the the prospect of cash with which to build a new pc.

i want to build a comp that will run m2tw like butter. i'm talking thousands of troops on max detail, flaming shells and arrows zippin' around, elephants stampeding, babies crying, ground shaking, ass-kicking total war. i'm lookin to spend around $2000-2500 CDN to do it, but i'm a bit lacking in technical expertise. i've installed ram, new video cards, psu's and fans before, but i've never built my own frankenstein. any advice you knowledgable chaps could give me would be much appreciated.

suggesting specific comps is fine and well too, but keep in mind that i'm probably 2 months away from putting the finishing touches on my new rig, so some prices or products might change a bit.

cheers!

[Katana]

my god, i've killed the thread!

boom! headshot!

[Katana]

ok, ok. in case anyone cares, here is the rig i have picked out (this is somewhat subject to change as i won't start ordering parts for another month):

- antec 900 ATX case
- nvidia 8800gts (320mb model, also: will probably add another one in SLi in November or thereabouts)
- intel core 2 duo 6300 CPU (will likely overclock at a later date)
- western digital 320gb hd (may add a second later on if necessary)
- seasonic 650w psu (alas, no modular cabling but A+ in all other regards)
- 2gb corsair dd2 ram @800mhz
- msi p6n mobo w/SLi support
- samsung 19" widescreen LCD monitor

including s&h, the whole thing comes to about 1500USD on newegg, and the only things left to pick are what version of windows vista i'll use, my keyboard and mouse, and maybe a new set of headphones if my current ones crap out before may.

let me know what you think. how will it perform with m2tw? is it a good gaming rig in general?

[Aaronyman]

THIS IS MESSED UP!

I quite a good computer. radeon 9500 pro , athlon 64 3200 cpu, 2 gigs of ram (1 gig of one kind, 1 gig of another)

something very strange is happening when i play this game. I can play custom battles fine, but when I go to Grand Campaign, anywhere from 1min to 5 minutes after i start, it freezes. EVERYTIME! I can't even escape the game, I have to restart my computer manually...

anybody else having this problem or anybody have any solutions

btw: i have already went to my catalyst control center and turned the AI thing off...didn't work

thanks in advance

[sapi]

@katana.

Looks good, although I'd get something a little better than an e6300 (probably a 6400 - shouldn't be that much more)

@aaronyman

Might be heat.

I can't see it as a failing of the system if custom battles work fine...

[Aaronyman]

Oblivion played fine, maxed out. Far Cry fine, maxed out. Splinter Cell Double Agent, fine. yeah, so I don't think it's the system

I dunno what to do really, might just give up on this game.

I doubt heat is the problem if it plays these other games that well.

[Katana]

@sapi

i was planning on getting a 6600, but after talking with some guys on the tom's hardware forum, i've decided to get the much cheaper 6300, buy some nicer ram with the extra money, and overclock it if i decide it's not fast enough.

[sapi]

@aaronyman - oblivion played fine maxed out on that? I find that very hard to believe....what resolution was that on?

@katana - I suppose you're right

[Aaronyman]

for the most part, everything was maxed out, I kinda forget whether it was 100%, it may have been all but 1 or 2 settings.

WAIT A SECOND!

wow, this shows how much I know...my graphics card is a x1950 pro, not 9500....sorry about that, typing fast, didn't double check.

any ideas on what could be making my computer freeze 1 to 5 minutes into the grand campaign?

I tried reinstalling, no dice. it's really frustrating, cuz my roomie has this game, and I love watching him play it.

[Scot's Pike General]

alright, rethought my laptop. A HP T-5600 , a NVIDIA GeForce Go Force 7600 graphics and 256 mb memory video card, 1.83GHz processor, a 1440-900 pixel resolution screen ( 17'), 100 GB Hard Drive at 5400rpm, all for the mail in rebate price of $1,349.

[Furious Mental]

Recenty I bought a new computer with an 8800 GTS, I have read that medieval 2 has several problems with the 8 series of nvidia cards. My particular problem is that the shadows do not render for trees, rocks and other assorted overgrowth in the battlemap. Are there any particular drivers I can download that will fix this issue?

[Katana]

aw, what a pity. i couldn't tell you what to download if you're drivers are screwing up (other than to get the most recent ones and have a little patience), but your comments raise my hackles - the system i'm probably (95% sure) going to buy in a month - check it out here - uses a 8800 gts. bugger.

just to clarify, what model of 8000-series nvidia card are you using? what driver version? what os? also, how does it run in general (outside of the errors, i mean)?

EDIT: Language ~sapi

[BlackAxe3001]

Recenty I bought a new computer with an 8800 GTS, I have read that medieval 2 has several problems with the 8 series of nvidia cards. My particular problem is that the shadows do not render for trees, rocks and other assorted overgrowth in the battlemap. Are there any particular drivers I can download that will fix this issue?

Make sure you are using shader model 2 instead of model 1.

Make sure your shadow options are turned up too, and not on low.

[Furious Mental]

aw, what a pity. i couldn't tell you what to download if you're drivers are screwing up (other than to get the most recent ones and have a little patience), but your comments raise my hackles - the system i'm probably (95% sure) going to buy in a month - check it out here - uses a 8800 gts. bugger.

just to clarify, what model of 8000-series nvidia card are you using? what driver version? what os? also, how does it run in general (outside of the errors, i mean)?

EDIT: Language ~sapi

Its a Leadtek Winfast 8800 GTS 640 mb. My OS is windows xp home on sp 2, and I have tried using drivers 94.20 to the 100.87 beta drivers and none of them seem to fix the issue. Outside the shadow issue everything runs great, with all the maximum possible settings at a 1600 x 1200 resolution. However, not rendering overgrowth shadows surely makes some performance difference. Is it possible to edit some game files to force the tree shadows, or at least to check whether they are indeed on?

[Atalus]

Having a problem reinstalling TW2. I just got a new hard drive. Reinstalled Windows. Authenticated Windows. Installed Video Card and did all the drivers. But when i goto install the game i get past my key and all that jaz but then I get a error :

Feature Transfer Error
Feature: Main
Component : Bin
File: (nothing there)
Error: Access is denied

[Atalus]

Fixed through reinstalling windows and remembering to Format the drive first

[Scot's Pike General]

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/HP-Pa...oductDetail.do

ok, now tell me, would this cut it?

[sbroadbent]

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/HP-Pa...oductDetail.do

ok, now tell me, would this cut it?

High-end graphics and audio: NVIDIA GeForce™ Go 7600 graphics and 256MB of dedicated video memory—

With the above mentioned video, I'd definately say you'd be good to go.

[Scot's Pike General]

well, what about the processor? its only a 1.7GHz and the minimum is 1.8.

[sbroadbent]

With current generation processors a Ghz minimum requirement is generally irrelevant. In particular, the requirement I've seen is for a 1.8Ghz Celeron or 1.5Ghz P4.

A 1.83Ghz e6300, like the one I have rolls over Intel's older 3.4Ghz P4 Extreme Edition. Why? Because it can do more instructions per clock cycle, therefore it need not be clocked as high. It's exactly why AMD's lower clocked processors had for several years dominated the performance compared to Intel's netburst processors.

The T5500 in that laptop is of the Core 2 Duo generation, therefore you'll have absolutely no problem regarding the CPU. Where you should be most concerned with is video and RAM, which that laptop should have no problems at all.

For further details on why Core 2 is so fast skip down to "What makes the Core 2 Duo so Fast?":

http://www.short-media.com/articles/core_2_duo

[Scot's Pike General]

thanks. this is gonna save me about $450, and a whole mess of time.