Cannot run Counter-Strike 1.6 well

I can't understand why my laptop cannot run CS1.6 at a decent steady framerate.

Acer Travelmate 6292
Intel Centrino Duo 2.0ghz
2gb RAM
Intel GMA X3100
WinXP Pro & Vista Business (Dual-Boot)

I realise that integrated graphics aren't great for gaming, but I swear I get better fps in CS:S (still unplayable) than I do in CS1.6. It's pretty much steady at 99fps until I get near other people and especially when they start firing. Typical fps in a firefight is 20-25 fps. Terrible considering the age of this game.

My old laptop ran it perfectly (steady 40-99 fps at all times);

Fujitsu Lifebook S-Series
Intel Centrino 1.5ghz
512mb RAM
Intel GMA 82825/82855

Also other old games like GTA3 can't run steadily, even at 640x480 with 16bit colour.

Any ideas? Or is the X3100 really just that bad?

 

have you tried updating your graphic card driver? maybe it might help

 

I've installed the latest drivers on XP and installed Vista to try the latest drivers for that also.

 

Cut your configuration in half, and it's still way too good for that game, and can ace it! There's something severely wrong here. It has to be a driver issue.... Maybe contact Acer ?

 

Id have to point to the drivers.

Your specs should definately handle that game no problem. Hardware is good so it must be a software issue

 

Just to sort things out, XP is better for gaming on the X3100 right? What I don't understand is that I get 99fps until people are on screen with gunshots etc.

I'll email acer support.

Is it possible for perfrormance to be restricted? Because this laptop is purchased through my school (they force a particular laptop on us, hence my not having a Dell XPS right now) and I'm suspecting they've done something lol.

nLited clean install of XP with latest drivers btw (I've gone to the extreme to try and get this to run half decent eh )

 

Definately a driver issue.

When i was going through different nvidia drivers i had an issue where wen some one shoots at me or threw a nade the fps would spike. Used a different driver and fixed it.

 

Ok, thanks, I'll have a look through the archived drivers then.

 

Latest driver doesnt always mean its the best.

 

Also make sure that you're not running in any power saving modes.

 

So you're having the same issue on XP and Vista? Did you try installing drivers from the chipset manufacturers instead of the OEM? And flipfire is right, you want the most stable driver, not the latest driver. Giving up a little performance for stability is essential. And what about Aero - does it run OK? Or are there performance issues with that too?

 

hi i am also a owner of X3100 and you just have to accept that its crap for all games, my old GMA 945 runs a lot better. X3100 can play all games but at a low framerate. It can play Half Life 2 on medium high settings with 20-25 FPS. But it also plays HL1 on the same Frame rate.

The gma 945 plays however HL1 at 99 FPS all he time and HL2 all on low settings and 5-7 FPS

 

Yeah, but the performance is better in XP probably because I'm running Aero in Vista (which works beautifully, no hitches there, full glass and all effects and very responsive).

I installed the graphics drivers that I downloaded from the intel site.

Anyone else with an X3100 that can recommend certain drivers?

 

I'm really hoping for a solution too here; I have a 400 dollar desktop [Acer] (family computer, used for checking e-mail and stuff) that has a GMA3000; it has trouble even with Half-Life 1 and CS 1.6, but not stuff like Urban Terror, which is a Quake III Arena mod.

Any help guys??? I've updated drivers, lowered settings down to the LOWEST resolution, still no dice

By the way FPS for Counter-Strike 1.6 is like 25-30 during a firefight

 

Urban Terror doesn't even run well on my laptop

 

I had the same problem with my hp dv 2000. I have a turion 1.6ghz, nvidia go6150 and 1.5gb ram. My computer would suck playing 1.6, but when i played source with the same settings i would get higher frame rates. I think it may be somthing to do with the coding of the game. I tried getting new drivers but it did not make much of a difference.

 

I tried an older X3100 driver and it was worse than the newest, there was only one old one available at intel.com. I've managed to get CS:S running at 30-80 fps, so it's perfectly playable except for the fact that it's at 640x480 which makes seeing things kinda difficult (I need a way to run a custom widecreen resolution like 960x600 or something).

Even TF2 runs at a steady 30 fps.

Counter-Strike 1.6 still struggles though. I've reformatted my entire hard drive and installed a freshly nLited XP (offtopic: cut 370mb off the install), tried older drivers, not so good and gone back to latest.

I have the chance to trade this laptop with my sister, who also has an Acer Travelmate, but I think it would fare much better than mine:

Intel Core2Duo @ 1.63ghz
ATi Mobility Radeon X1600
1gb RAM

However she doesn't really look after her stuff and it has some minor damage, and her name is engraved into it and it's battery life is about half of mine.

I don't know what to do

 

x1600 is a lot stronger you will be able to get up to 20000 points in 3dmark2001 and 2000 in 3dmark06.

X3100 gets only about 500 in 3dmark06 and about 5000 in 2001

 

Yeah I think I'll do it. I'll just see what I can do about the physical damage to her machine.

Also, how good will the x3100 get? If intel finally get around to making some decent drivers will it be much better for gaming?

 

yes it would be better but not that much, X1600 would be at lest twice as good no matter what drivers Intel came up with

 

maybe your ram is bad?

 

Check your wifi or ethernet drivers. I've heard that Vista doesn't play nice with OpenGL, try setting to game to DirectX rendering.

 

I highly doubt it. Brand new laptop and everything else runs as expected.

What has Wifi and ethernet got to do with fps? (they work fine anyway)

I've tried all rendering modes, the only one thats fine is software but I'm not using that. I'm running an nLited XP Pro SP2.

 

hit ctrl alt delete when ur in the game and enter windows task manager(vista) and click processes then find counterstrike and right click that and click set affinty and deselect one of your cores. and see if that helps at all. i know thats a common problem with older games

 

If anything, that made it worse. I'm on XP btw.

 

You said that the game's performance tanks when you have a lot of players in view, so that seems wifi/ethernet related.

 

Did u try commands like:
cl_updaterate 101
fps_max 101
rate 25000
sv_maxupdaterate 101
????

 

That would affect my ping.

Those commands are irrelevant really, my ingame pings are fine, it's my fps that's bad

fps_max is at 101 already anyway.

 

Highly unlikely it has anything to do with his connection.

Try playing on single player to completely rule out the network connection

 

Single player with bots has same results, I've been playing CS1.6 on my old laptop for years on the exact same ISP/connection.