Hi all.

Just took delivery of my new PC - Alienware X51 (I know...) - first gaming PC I've owned, couldn't afford a beefier model and couldn't be bothered to make my own, just want to play games like Medieval 2, Empire & Napoleon on higher settings.

The spec I have should be more than capable of maxing out all of the settings (with AA, grass & shadows off - don't care about them), but when I play M2TW (Third Age mod) on even medium settings it's laggy like on the PC I replaced! Empire & Napoleon work well on High/Ultra settings, but not Medieval 2?!?!?! WTF?

I have (according to systemrequirementslab.com):

Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-2600 CPU @ 3.40GHz
CPU 3.4 GHz Performance Rated at: 11.90 GHz
8GB RAM
nVidia GeForce GTX 555
DirectX 11.0

All of these spank the minimum and even recommended settings, so why is Medieval 2 still lagging badly on medium when newer games work fine?

I have a 23" monitor capable of 1080p or HD or whatever - could it be the resolution I'm trying to use (1920 x 1200 or something...)? Any recommendations?