Terrible performance on TF2

I have a Gemstone Blue with an 9500m GS and it just doesn't run smoothly at all. It's an older game, I don't understand why I shouldn't be getting smooth frame rates even with it set to high. I'm running in a fairly low res with only 2x anti aliasing and it still runs like cack.

 

How fast is your processor. Tf2 (and pretty much any other source based game) is cpu bound due to all the physics calculations. I run it max (1440x900, 4xaa) on an p6860 with an 8800mgts and still drop into the 20's when the action heats up on 24 player servers. Hopefully the t9300 I got coming will fix that.

edit: just noticed you are running at low rez, at lower resolutions the cpu is stressed to pump out more frames, the gpu becomes stressed at higher resolutions.

 

It could be the CPU bottlenecking then. My CPU is only 2.0ghz I'm afraid.

This kind of sucks but I couldn't really afford a better laptop. I might see if i can swap out the CPU at some point.

Are there any optomising tricks?

 

A 2.0GHz CPU is plenty fast, don't feel bad about your purchase.

A few things to do:

-Are you using Vista's High Performance power profile?

-Be sure to update your video drivers:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=258626
I recommend 177.92 from laptopvideo2go.com. I have used them on several different systems without problems.

 

What? I have a 9500Gs with a 1.83 duel core and I can run it on max! With no problems. Update your drivers.

 

As I've discovered, the 6920G has a stupid cooling issue - the mesh screen in front of the intake fan can easily get clogged with dust. Removing the back panel and blowing the dust out will improve your cooling vastly.

 

i find this hard to believe, i run on max at 1440x900 and get 30-40fps (15-20 during action)... well unless our definitions of "with no problems" are different i guess. I would classify this as too low fps for a game, but for some reason no matter what i do i cant get any more fps (ive tried lowering every setting except resolution and ive gotten maybe 5-10 more fps, seems kinda weird)

the 9500GS is almost on par with my card as far as im aware

 

Erm, the 9500M GS beats the 8600M GS by a significant margin. It has 32 stream processors compared to 16 on the 8600M GS.

 

9500m GS = Die-shrink 8600m GT. Identical specs, smaller manufacturing process, possible unaffected by the defective heat cycle problem prevalent across 8 series mobile cards.