Really slow Graphics

[Rex Anglorvm]

I'm hoping somebody on here can help me with a problem. I have a PC with the following specs.

Intel Core2 Quad 6600 2.4Ghz
2048Mb (2X1024Mb) Dual Channel DDR2 800Mhz Memory
320MB nVidia GeForce 8800 GTS 560M PCI-Express VGA Card


The problem is lag, I have updated the drivers for my video card, monitor, Bios, motherboard and tried turning down all the graphics option within MtW. Yet I still have slow jerky graphics, does anyone have an idea what the issue could be? I should say that the PC is about a year old, and the problem seems to have started about a month ago.

Grateful for any assistance, as I'm missing my total war 'fix'

Sorry, all the above aplies when I try to play RtW too

[Brusilov]

What graphic settings are you using in-game?

Have you attempted to see which services are running in the background? I used to use msconfig for this and go through each one manually but now I used Advanced Windows Care Personal from IOBit (it's free but you'll have to google it as I am at work).

The other things to do is to make sure that your hard drive(s) are defragged.

The other thing to consider that it's (MTW and not M2TW) is that these games only use a single core of your memory.

Did the game ever run smoothly?

[Rex Anglorvm]

Thanks for the reply, I have de-fragged my drive only recently, but did do it again over the weekend. Both M2TW and RTW and all my mods had run smoothly until about a month ago.

Thanks for the IObit tip - I will give anything a try at the moment - I have turned down a lot of the settings and it now runs more smoothly, with the occasional lag.

Just to give you the picture, before this problem started I had a siege battle with my full-strength english army and 3 mongol armies in Jerusalem with all the option on 'full' (huge units etc) without a single problem. I could run battles of this scale in both EB, RTR and SS 6.1 without any problems, I may try Optimizer software next.

[Yojimbo]

What graphic settings are you using in-game?

Have you attempted to see which services are running in the background? I used to use msconfig for this and go through each one manually but now I used Advanced Windows Care Personal from IOBit (it's free but you'll have to google it as I am at work).

The other things to do is to make sure that your hard drive(s) are defragged.

The other thing to consider that it's (MTW and not M2TW) is that these games only use a single core of your memory.

Did the game ever run smoothly?

At his specs it wouldn't matter if the rest of his pc isn't optimised. I have a 2160 2gb 667mhz ram and a 8800gt and get lag also. if updatign to the 8600/q6600 im getting for etw doesnt solve it im going to be annoyed.

[Brusilov]

At his specs it wouldn't matter if the rest of his pc isn't optimised. I have a 2160 2gb 667mhz ram and a 8800gt and get lag also. if updatign to the 8600/q6600 im getting for etw doesnt solve it im going to be annoyed.

Can't you see that a PC that has a bunch of services running in the background, a hard drive that is a mess will run slower than one that has been tidied up?

[irishron]

A pc that is optimized and with the background garbage disabled will always run faster especially games. Proven years ago even on DOS.

[Brusilov]

A pc that is optimized and with the background garbage disabled will always run faster especially games. Proven years ago even on DOS.

Exactly. An underpowered system will always be underpowered but you can still make it go (even) slower than it should without proper maintenance ( defrag, services running in the background, dust in the case etc).

[Yojimbo]

Can't you see that a PC that has a bunch of services running in the background, a hard drive that is a mess will run slower than one that has been tidied up?

oh without a doubt i do it myself I have mine stripped down to the bare minimum. What I mean is with his specs RTW shouldn't be lagging at all, since its an older game. I can run mtw2 on all max specs besides AA wich crashes the game if i turn it too high @ 1600x1050 with no lag but rtw, with more than 2400 men at max settings same res lags like crazy and says I have too many men for my spec. I do understand tweaking and optimising. I have every service I can turned off and very little starts with windows I defrag once a month i uninstall uneeded windows stuff and manually trim the fat, do reg tweaks to fix little annoyances, that sort of stuff.

[Brusilov]

I think many people have found that M:TW (the original version) simply does not work with an 8 series nvidia card (there are other posts in the forum about that).

The defrag is one of the usual housekeeping tasks that should be done with PCs every now and then.

Have a look at your page file - there are various bits in the forum that suggest various values to set it to.

Edit: Here is one such post: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=100384

[Rex Anglorvm]

Thanks for the link - I will try some of the tips out

[Martin N]

I have this on my gtx 280, You cannot use a new graphics card with this game, i dont know why it just wont have it. But i know you wont like it, you will just have to play medieval 2 with it.

Just do what i did and put together an older computer if you really want to play it, it doesnt even need alot at all, like 800mhz cpu should do it if i remember.

[christof139]

Yeah, 8000 series Nvidia cards will not play the older TW games. However, newer ATI cards will. So, maybe get a couple of ATI 2600XT's for Crossfire mode or a single 4670 (terrific sub $100 card) or two 4670's for Crossfire mode, and you will have the equivalent of Nvidia 8600 through 9600 series cards, but better quality AA with the 4670 but not with the 2600XT. 3650 and 3800 series ATI cards should also be fine, but make sure you get GDDR3 or DDR3 on the video card, at least 512MB of it.

Chris