hl² - High fps or high resolution?

[Parabolart]

In my case: (No VSync)

[u]
Resolution--------------AA---------------Shader---------Water------avg.FPS--[/u]

1024*768--------------none--------------Low--------------Yes---------25-35
1024*768--------------none--------------High-------------Yes---------15-25
1024*768--------------2x----------------High-------------Yes---------15-20
1024*768--------------none--------------Low--------------No----------70-90
1024*768--------------none--------------High-------------No----------50-80
1024*768--------------2x----------------High-------------No----------30-70

Low REs (can't see AA in 640*480 anyway)

640*480---------------------------------Low--------------Yes---------70-80
640*480---------------------------------High-------------Yes---------50-60
640*480---------------------------------Low--------------No----------100+
640*480---------------------------------High-------------No----------80-100+

Which one would you choose?

 

[Acert93]

1024*768--------------none--------------High-------------No----------50-80
1024*768--------------2x----------------High-------------No----------30-70

Those two both look ok. Another option would be 800x600 with the second option. That would probably run 40-75ish and would look nice. Although not sure how much AA would help at that res.

My suggestion: play at whateve rez you find most enjoyable to play at

 

[Psychanalysis05%]

1024*768--------------none--------------Low--------------Yes---------25-35

Nice balance there, and the water is just too damned pretty.
The only thing that impacts performance for me really is texture quality, it causes me to stutter uncontrollably.
So I have that on medium and everything else on high, I generally get around 30-60 fps, with 40-50 being average.

 

[joule]

What are your PC specs?

 

[Parabolart]

I'm currently playing at 1024*768 2x AA and low shading.. shading only changed the game at the wasteland water.. which there's no more of.. So it runs pretty fine. Mostly 40-60 (without flashlight that is)

I wonder if I upgrade my nvidia driver to 67.02 forceware from my 66.93 it would go faster. But I mostly don't mind. It's not like Its slow as hell and I can't even shoot.

 

[Parabolart]

What are your PC specs?

Oh, texture quality doesn't change anything on mine... Haven't tried it, kept it on default on High.

 

[joule]

Oh, texture quality doesn't change anything on mine... Haven't tried it, kept it on default on High.

Your system specifications, please?

 

[Parabolart]

What are your PC specs?

AMD Athlon XP 3200+ 2.4ghz
Geforce FX 5700le 256mb
1 gig ram pc3200 400ddr
SATA harddrive 120gig

 

[Psychanalysis05%]

Not great.
P4 2.8
512 ddr
Radeon 9000 (I know, that sucks ass, but I can't afford shazbot because I'm married.)

Keeps me happy though, there's isn't a single game around now that I can't play on medium or higher. The only 2 'recent' games I even get bad frames on are Doom 3 and Halo.

 

[joule]

AMD Athlon XP 3200+ 2.4ghz
Geforce FX 5700le 256mb
1 gig ram pc3200 400ddr
SATA harddrive 120gig

This seems to be the best in your tight scenario, I think.
1024*768--------------2x----------------High-------------No----------30-70

 

[A2597]

Umm...wheres the 1280x960 6xaa 16x AF 80FPS option?

 

[magictorch]

I'd much rather have a better frame rate - mine varies wildly between 100+ fps (which is far more than I need) and approx. 35 fps, which is about as low as I'm prepared to let it go. I play on 800x600, high everything, reflect world, and no AA/AF. I think it looks great!

 

[Ennui]

gaming is more important than seeing, so logically frame rate and playability take precendence to visual quality.

I run everything on medium with a year old dx8 card, and it still looks beautiful and has a good framerate.

 

[Exclamatio]

with single player gaming i always go for looks

i usually only play single player to chill out and just enjoy gaming

when id like a challange i play online and thats when i worry about fps

 

[smeece85]

wow, reading paraolart's average fps readings makes me feel good about my comp....

I got a
pentium M 1.7ghz
1gig RAM
and an Nvidia geforce 4200 Go 64mb

and set to widescreen rez 1280x800
with shader high, texture high, model high, water and filtering trilinear and everything else low I get an average of 55 fps

thats pretty good for a laptop right?

 

[SpoonCrab!]

Id like to see your system information for your laptop, i aint doubting you but its alittle iffie to me :dozey:

 

[Digital_Junkie]

I got a
pentium M 1.7ghz
1gig RAM
and an Nvidia geforce 4200 Go 64mb

Is what he said. If by Pentium M you mean Centrino then I can believe it. Those CPU's rock so hard if they had a desktop version it would crush the A64s.

My Athlon @ 2.42GHz, ASUS Radeon 9800XT, and 1GB Corsair XMS can run about 60 to 85 FPS at 1280x1024, all high quality, reflect all, and 4x AA 16x AF. It's still playable at 6x AA but at 1280x1024 you really can't see any difference.

Texture quality really depends the most on how much memory your GFX card has. 256MB is highest quality for sure, 128 may do highest (most likely medium), but I can only see a 64MB card running low quality textures.

 

[Mr.Wotsit]

Surely, from those results, 800x600 is the obvious choice...
Am I missing something here?