High Shadows Vs. Low Shadows - Help me out HL2.net'ers!

[Risiko]

Alrighty.

So, I'm trying to find a couple ways to lower the graphical stress on my processor to try to improve my framerate a little. I decided to try lowering shadows - after all, shadows are generally known to put the stress on CPU's a lot more than on graphics cards. I did so, and, to my surprise, I didn't notice any visual difference with the shadows. Not only that, I didn't notice a difference in framerate either. So here's the task that a few of you could fulfill: help me in identifying if lowering shadows has any effect whatsoever. Is it bugged? Is it just bugged for me? Or maybe there is a difference but I can't notice? Help me out here .

Comparison pics are welcome . Let's see if lowering or raising shadows has any effect on image quality or framerate.

 

[Crusader]

Low detail shadows look like blobs. High detail shadows look like shadows

 

[B3@$T]

I had lowered my shadows and actually everythign that was on high 2 low and I didnt notice any fps difference at all. So it really does not change anything. I guess it maybe will give u a fps or so but nothing special. Hope that helps.

 

[Risiko]

Low detail shadows look like blobs. High detail shadows look like shadows

Wow, that sucks for me. I don't mind changing it over to blobs since I know it'll help my FPS...but when I choose 'Low', they don't turn into blobs. They are as detailed as ever.

Darn. Oh well, I'll send a bug report and hopefully it'll be fixed in the final version.

 

[kin83]

You can disable shadows in your console with the command:
r_shadows "0"

Shadow quality is determined by r_shadowlod (I think). It defaults to -1. Set it to 1 for less detail.

 

[Risiko]

Thanks you kin, I really appreciate it.

 

[Risiko]

I can't seem to edit my previous post...

Anyhow, I'd like to just mention that turning off shadows gave me a 10-12% performance boost. It is mainly useful when lots of people are on screen. If you've got an AMD64 proc, it might not help too much, but if you have an AMD 2500+/3200+ for example, it should help a lot.