Running F.E.A.R on my MSI 1039

I just bought F.E.A.R for my MSI 1039.

turion 64 MT-40 2.2ghz
ATI mobility X1600 256MB VRAM
2GB DDR400 RAM
100GB @5400 HD

I started playing last night and at times it would glitch/slow down a little (it was also very hot)

what settings should i play this game at for optimum performance?

it had computer settings and graphic settings?

also do i want the VSYNC on or off?

 

Keep VSync off, it caps the framerate and causes the video card to have lower performance.

You should be able to run at 1024x768 or 1280x800 on medium-high/high settings without a problem, no AA/AF.

 

what is aa/af?

 

Anti-Aliasing/Antistrophic Filtering.

 

FEAR is the most demanding game that I have run on my z81sp (still haven't tried Oblivion).

P4 630 3.0ghz
1gb dual channel RAM
6800go
80gb 5400rpm hdd

I can run Quake 4 perfectly (rarely, almost never, pauses or stutters) on ultra high settings but when I try running FEAR on high settings, even though the fps never drops below 25, i still get alot of random pauses and stutters. I don't know if the latest patch would fix this as loading it always crashes the game after the loading screens.

 

It's actually the amount of RAM you have - newer games can take advantage of 2GB of RAM.

 

Hey Chaz, what kind of performance could I expect playing F.E.A.R. on a W3J with 2.0 GHz Core duo, 2 Gb ram, and MR X1600 256mb?

 

make sure you look at the recommened and minimum requirements of the game before asking.

I would assume you could run FEAR max detail settings/low resolution with AA/AF turned off to average 30 fps.

 

It will play fine. There's really no need to ask whether or not you're going to get satisfactory settings on a laptop like that.

 

Chaz, could you briefly sum up what these two things do in terms of gaming performance for me? And will someone who does not game 24/7 notice a difference with these enabled? Thanks.

 

Hey cgil,
Well AA&AF will have a definate hit in performance but its awsome eye candy it basicly smudges out the jagged edges in your screen which ressults in a much sharper cleaner image. Noticing the difference is very easy because i personally think that images with out aa&af look some what non realistic but thats just me i prefer aa&af over a high res so instead of playing in 12x10 id much rather play at 10x7 with aa&af enabled. Hope that helped if not there always our good friend google give him a shot.

--AWP

 

ok i know this question is for chaz....but i'll answer it anyways (sorry chaz.. )

ok lets start with AntiAlising (AA):

AA is a method used to smooth out lines on the edges of 3D objects...like houses, telephone poles, people etc. But even just lines like telephone lines in a 3D environment can be alised because of the computer 'grid' system display thingy.
There are a few ways a graphics card can deal with these jagged edges.

The first and most oldest way is to inscrease the resolution. Jaggies will look bigger on 800x600 than they will on 1280x800....but even though the jaggy size gets smallet with larger resolution....there is still that annoying stair step effect that you can see when you move around in a 3D environment...so this is the most easiest and least effective way to remove jaggies.

The second way is to use a method called AntiAlising....there are a few ways that GPU's use the AntiAlising method:

The First one is 'SuperSampling'. this method of AntiAlising forces the GPU to render the screen at a higher resolution and then scale and filter it down to the original screen resolution....for example 2x SuperSampling AA @ 800x600 will be rendered in the GPU as 1600x1200 and then filtered down again to 800x600 to the screen....thats how it removes jaggies....by increasing the 'effective' resolution and scaling it down to the 'real' resolution. This method quite old (used alot in the GeForce 2 series) and kills performance....so GPU designers made a new method.

The second Method of AA is 'MultiSampling'. this method of AA allows the GPU to use samples/colors from neghiboring pixels to remove the jagged edges....this method also dose not use as much GPU power as the previous method...but it still uses POWER.

The third method is Adaptive Multi/Super Sampling. this method is used in the most newest generations of GPUs..including the GeForce 7 series and (i think) the ATI x1x00 series. (im not quite sure what this method dose...so i cant comment )

So the conclusion is...that its up to YOU if you need AA or not. if jagged lines dont bother you...then you can leave AA off and use the extra GPU power for more frame rates....or turn a few other setting up........but if jagged lines annoy you....you can turn off a few other settings and turn on AA.....but in the end its all up to the user.

now...............

to Antristopic Filtering (AF)
well basicly (to not get into too much detail) what AF Dose is that it Forces the GPU to render and filter textures that are at a distance in the 3D environment....making objects (especially the ground) look more realistic from a distance.
also there are 3 types of filtering....Biliner...Triliner...and Antristropic.
this is also up to the user if they want it on or not.......but unlike antialising...AF dose not use too much GPU power.....so you can turn it on on low (2x) and still get good frame rates

 

Hey thanks a buunch AWP and deedeeman, you guys rock my socks off ;-0 But seriously that's really cool that you guys could help me out cuz I'm just starting to get into PC gaming, and don't really know a whole heck of a lot. So deedeeman, in games like FEAR where most of the environments are close-quarters, could I forget about having anistropic filtering on, and saving my GPU power for anti-aliasing? I ask because everytime I see graphics settings on like benchmarks or something, I alsways see the two turned on together, but I just assumed it was to really put stress on the GPU. Anti-aliasing seems like some pretty cool technology, I'll have to try it when I (hopefully) get a fully loaded W3J....that wasn't to insult Nvidia or anything either,deedeeman, I just threw it out there.....ok. In fact for a really long time I had been looking at a sony fe-690 with the go 7600, but that's off topic, thanks a bunch guys

 

Hey thanks a bunch AWP. So you prefer a lower resolution with those enabled, I'll have to try it when I get my notebook. Well hey what computer do you have, and do you have experience with FEAR using these settings. This is the best looking game I have seen, I'm just curious to know what has/has not worked for you.....thanks again...

 

AA lowers the appearance of things being jagged. It also helps to round out polygons. At higher resolutions though use of this becomes less effective as it tends to resolve itself.

AF improves the view of things you see "in the distance" in games gets rid of a 'blurry view' and makes things appear sharper further out in the distance. AF is graphic intensive despite what has been said above.

 

What drivers are you using? Try updating the ATI catalyst ones if you use those, or try the omegas. Maybe if you had vsync on that was the problem too.

 

i would suggest that u leave AA off and turn on AF on about 4x or 6x.....because you get better quality without sacrifising tooooo much GPU power....but if the jaggies annoy u too much..then you can turn AF on 2x and AA on 2x ..... that will give you a good balance between performance and Quality

My advice: play around with AA and AF and see what you like best between performance and quality....though 2xAA and 2xAF is a good combo!

i personally use 4xAF and 2xAA....and it works for me in every game i play (except maybe FEAR...where i have to turn AA off)

 

Personally I've never been a huge fan of AA. If you've never used it, and then you turn it on, it's not really a "night and day" difference.

AF, on the other hand, is the bee's knees. It eats way less resources from your GPU and the benefits are much more pronounced. I have a hard time playing without it anymore; it makes the textures themselves a bit sharper in the distance, and can really improve the visual quality of a game.

 

Hey, thanks a lot pulp. So yea I kinda figured that I would have to turn it off in FEAR, only because that's what everyone else is saying. But from the videos I've seen of this game, it looks spectacular! I really wanna get it, and it's nice to hear that I won't really notice a difference with the AA on/off. Thanks again...

 

Hey, just wanting to know what kind of performance I could expect out of my laptop, AMD turion 64 X2 TL-60 2.00 ghz, 2 gigs of ram, ATI radeon Xpress 1150 256mb, 100 gig at 5400, thanks, just thinking of buying fear, but want to make sure its worth it with my system

 

hey i have been playing fear on my alienware for quite a while and i can run it fine at maxed out settings but it just doesnt seem right. i figured it would be faster on my new lappy. even when the resolution is lowered it runs kinda slow. i get good fps and then it takes a dump for about 15 minutes. and then it gets fast again. its almost like im running out of vram. any ideas guys and gals?