Starcraft II on M11x - General Discussion

It looks like everybody got the R2, I wonder how does R1 do in Starcraft 2 retail version...

 

I'm having an issue where its not kicking on the NVIDIA gpu, im betting its the same for you. I had to turn it on low to get it to run good.

I added it to the Optiums list, also set Nvidia as preferred card, neither worked. It seems like the game is rendering in the onboard. 99% sure.

When I run a game I know uses Nvidia, the Optimus test program says its on. For SC2 it is off.

 

Here are some SCII vids on the M11x (kinda bad quality).

settings: ultra

link

link 2 better quality (R1)

 

@ tweak155
did you update your drivers?

 

I've got a lot of issues with these videos. First it's from the beta. Granted, I doubt that there have been a lot of changes between the beta and official release, but the vids are nonetheless out of date. Second, they are showing early game play and the frames at the start of the game are nowhere near indicative of late game FPS. Third, it only shows 1v1 and it'd be nice to get some numbers on how the game runs during the single player campaign/2v2s, 3v3s, etc. since I figure 1v1 is probably the least stressful on the system.

 

if any of you are getting random lockups in SC2. Try downclocking your nVidia graphics card. I had random crashes where I had to restart my computer. After lowering my clock speeds, I'm not having any problems anymore.

 

So.. Anybody in this forum got an R1 and a retail copy of SC2?... I want my battery life, manual changing and most of all! Money saving!

 

Yep this fixed it as per my other post.

Now it plays @ medium pretty smooth. I had it at high but I think it was too much during the solo campaign stuff.

I imagine 1v1, 2v2, etc is less demanding at first and probably in general. The art and the scenery during campaign is a lot and processing the different things the computer is doing isn't something that is done during multi. It is pretty cool as it rendered scenes as almost pre-rendered images, but you could tell it was live since I set up the base differently than when it started.

I will try a regular 1 v 1 game against comp to see if it performs better. Overall though I like how it looks even on medium settings.

 

Played real good on the 1v1 on high settings, not a major test but definitely shows a difference in what you're doing.

Plays it to my satisfaction. Heck, even when it was forcing the onboard I could change the settings to low and still have it playable on campaign.

If you want max eye candy you're probably looking at a more beefed up laptop. If you're ok with mediumish+ settings this works well.

 

How does 2v2 play on high?

 

I have the m11x r1, 4gb ram and a 500gb XT seagate hardrive, and let me say, starcraft 2 plays amazing on high settings even in 3v3 100+ units on the screen, it runs awesome, amazing game

 

TXc - have you tried setting most settings to ultra and the post process on low, and shadows on low or medium? You may want to try that and see how it plays. Take care, StevenX

 

Ill take a look for your guys to let you know how it runs, but honestly for me high looks just fine, hell even medium looks good, but ill test it and get back to you.

 

I am on Textures of High and then low for shaders, shadows, and post proc. Although, unless they have it backwards, the game claims that the Post Proc is GPU intensive and the Physics is CPU intensive.

 

What drivers is everyone using?!

 

258.96. About 25-30fps on campaign missions.

 

@Character that is correct.. post is exactly that. Graphic features that are applied after the frame is processed. (blur, etc..) Physics is usually cpu. Depends on game though. Thanks, StevenX

 

Anyone else get a hiccup when motherships get warped in?

 

The thread has no organization for results. Lets try to have a format so we know how people are getting their results.

m11x R2 non-overclocked
Drivers: 258.96
StarCraft II Retail

Graphics Settings:
Texture Quality: High
Graphics Quality: High (Everything else whatever High set it to)
Average FPS in Campaign: 25

Graphics Settings:
Texture Quality: Medium
Graphics Quality: Medium (Everything else whatever Medium set it to)
Average FPS in Campaign: 30

I really want to know how people are getting 40-60 FPS because for me anything below 30-40 is pretty bad.

 

Can someone actually POST FPS screenshots instead of saying "it runs awesome on high"..

 

Yeah when people say it runs "awesome" it doesn't even help because people have different sensitivities to FPS. I know I can't tolerate anything in the 20s and the difference between 30s and 60s is noticeable to me. I like xijulezix's format. I really think people need to start being a lot more specific when posting how 'awesome' the game is running (i.e. graphic settings, 1v1?2v2? campaign mission?, early game? late game? during battles?, etc.)

Even though I have the game I haven't really touched it much. I think a good way to measure FPS is to set up a 1v1/2v2 on these forums; set it up so everyone has the same graphical settings. Keep a track of who has what revision and who has what drivers, whether its OC or not etc. That way everyone's comp is rendering the same thing. Then people either run FRAPS or just keep a track of SC2's FPS tracker and bam we have results.

 

I first set the Overall to Medium. Then I set the Textures to High. Shaders and Shadows to Low. Prost Proc to Low. I got 40-60 consistently. If the map had rain it would drop to the 30's.

If I selected Medium and didn't change anything I would get in the 20's, maybe top 30 like you have. Setting the Shader and Shadows down did a lot.

 

Shaders & Shadows definetly does the trick. Probably don't need post proc to low, I left it at medium with the same results.

The shadow options is for everything on the Map (Shrubberies, houses, lamp posts, cliffs, etc..) & Units. Which does bog the card down.

I wish they would have 2 different shader options for Map & Units like many other games do. I would love to just turn off the shadows for units & keep the shadows for the map on.
**********************************************
New Settings:

m11x R2 non-overclocked
Drivers: 258.96
StarCraft II Retail

Graphics Settings:

Texture Quality: High

Graphics Quality: Medium
After choosing Medium in the Graphics Quality option I left everything at its default except for Shader which I set to low. Changing Shader to low also changes shadows to low. (Credit: Character Zero)

Average FPS in Campaign Mission Excavation: 45

 

Cool, I think the game still looks great even with those settings.

 

Game does still look good, no doubt about that. The map shadows def does make the environment look a lot more dull though. Everyone has different preferences thats why reading so many post saying it runs "great" "awesome" seemed useless to me lol.

 

Hi Guys,

I posted a vid running of SC2 on 1920x1080p on ultra, high and med. Probably need to run on HD to see the FPS

YouTube - Starcraft II on m11x R2

 

Using "High" settings on a i7/4g, game runs great. I can turn textures to "Ultra" apparently, not much of a slowdown, and I'm using the newest official drivers from dell for the GPU.

Great game by the way, I just dont like the region locking.

 

Runs like crap on my m11x i7. On All In (final campaign mission), 1280X720, medium detail settings, shadows, lighting, post-processing all set to low, runs 10-15 fps in big battles.

No clue why it runs like this. It's gotta be the AI coding--it runs 60+ when there's no actual AI processing (units moving, building, etc), but get a big swarm of zerg incoming and the M11X chokes bad. It's almost unplayable. To be honest, if I set everything to ultra it drops by like 3 fps, and setting it all to low I only gain 2 or 3.

I'm not overclocked, turbo boost is on.

258.76 drivers with modded inf.

 

Did you put you system power mode to high performance? I had some really crappy frame rates until I realize I was in the power saver mode. I guess I won't know how intense the AI is until I get that far on the campaign.

 

Yep. Tried that--no dice. That part of the campaign is absolutely nutty, though, with 60+ units streaming in from all sides when things get hectic.

It's absolutely unplayable in a 4v4, too--we're talking, like, 5fps when all players are attacking. I think it dropped to 3fps in a 3v5 comp game during a mid-game attack.

Pretty disappointed It runs all my other games flawlessly...

It's not heat, either--I diligently check temps and they never get above 70C.

 

I'm also getting pretty awful frame rates in the game and I'm pretty sure it's because it's not running off of the 335M, but rather the Integrated graphics. All of my other games run using the nvidia card, however, even though I set this game to use the High-Performance card in the nvidia control panel, it is refusing to run with it enabled. I am getting about 10 FPS in campaign on all low settings. Any help please? (fyi: I have the i7 processor so that shouldn't have anything to do with it)

 

Whitelist the game and try again.

 

Yeah the single player runs like crap on mine too.. the multiplayer is better, but not as smooth as it did in the beta phase2

 

Some improvement...I got All In up to 15-20 fps in big battles by overclocking to 160mhz and leaving turbo boost on. I did 160mhz with turbo boost off and it was unplayable (5fps).

Tried these settings with a 3v5 comp stomp...biggest battle was 15 minutes in, I was using 15 carriers (120 interceptors) and a mothership vs. about 40 ground units and a mid-sized base...fps was around 12 in that battle. It was 25-30 when combat wasn't happening.

Interestingly enough, my framerate would plummet to 10-15 whenever the CPU was attacking another player, like a few seconds before the units would show up.

It's gotta be the i7 ULV CPU, then--it can't handle the AI processing with lots of units. I think that's more Blizzard's crappy programming than anything else since this comp tears up other games that are also CPU demanding..I hope they clear it up with a patch.

 

@tears: It is whitelisted.

Also, just to be clear, I've checked the nvidia control panel icon that shows which programs are using the GPU, and SC2 is actively using my GPU when I get this awful performance. It's thus not because of Optimus.

 

Maybe the drivers you guys are using is whats causing the low frames. I had the stock video driver i was getting like 10fps in the campaign. with the 257.30 driver I'm gettings a solid 40-50fps

 

One last update for now:

I played Belly of the Beast, which is one of those tactics missions with low unit numbers and no base to build, and it ran 40-60 fps constantly, even with High texture detail. For me, it only seems to slow down when there's AI processing happening, and when it's on a large scale it drops me to 10-15. Still 160mhz OC, turbo boost on, 258.76 drivers.

 

I'm not that far along but I'll try to test the final mission, I hear it gets pretty crazy. BTW I'm using the 257.30 drivers too, no problems with SC2.

 

ill try and go back to the dell beta drivers to compare to the modded info 258.69 drivers/

 

SC2 is running well for me at medium graphics settings in the campaign.
Though it does kinda get choppy when bajillions of units are on the screen.
Currently using the 257.30 Dell Drivers.

 

I'd try it on my R1 if one of you guys will give me a trial pass. I'm more of a Diablo fan though.

 

i have a question about the graphic driver. I am using the dell driver 197.72 that the posted on their page on June 29. I guess the newer from nvidia 258.96 would increase the performance for sc2.
However, what are the cons for upgrading driver from nvidia? Will my m11x no longer support the switching between graphics? i really need my intergrated for watching movies and doing light stuffs. Thanks
My m11x is R1...

 

The 258.96 don't support the M11x R1.
The M11x R1 uses a special hybrid driver and because of this, you cannot install the latest nvidia drivers for the graphics card.
The best you can get are the dell drivers.

 

on a 2v2 i avg 45+ frames on high using the new drivers

 

@Noah and All - you can use 258.96 with the M11x R1. It has to be switch to discrete graphics only (no switching). This means it is always on the Nvidia Card. I know because I have been running the 258 series for almost 1.5 months.



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where can i get the latest and greatest drivers from nvidia for r2 m11x that would work best for sc2 even if they are BETA?

 

I'm not playing SC2 yet, but I /think/ people most people are using the newest from Nvidia - 259.96 WHQL.

Follow this instructions here:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/499208-nvidia-verde-notebook-driver-258-96-beta-discussion-relating-11xr2.html

 

those are not installing for some reasons on my m11x r2 i7

i installed dells latest and greatest. anyone else having problems?

 

Did you follow the very detailed and easy to follow instructions on how to install those drivers?

 

You need to use the modded INF file to install any drivers from nVidia's website. If you just download the drivers and try to install them, you will get an error message saying something like "No compatible devices found" or something along those lines.

You'll need to:
1) Download the drivers you want to use from nVidia's website (258.96, in this case).
2) Unpack the drivers into some folder or directory. If setup.exe automatically runs, then just cancel out of it.
3) Download the nvdm.zip file.
4) Unpack nvdm.zip to wherever you saved the nVidia driver package from step #2. You will know you did this correctly when it asks you if you want to overwrite the existing nvdm.INF file. Choose yes.
5) Now, run setup.exe. This should install drivers properly for you.