this vortal coil stuttering VERY BAD

[WAR_Nuker]

so i walk with a vortigaunt and he gets this glowing orb and we take the elevator back up to alyx so he can eat the orb and share his powers with the other vortigaunts to try and revive alyx - and then gman comes out and says stuff.

when i get to this sequence of the game, it starts stuttering so bad that theres no sound and the screen refreshes like once per second...literally. i notice it happens right when the vortigaunt starts glowing blue throughout his entire body. this is pissing me off cause this is probably a really important part of the story and i can barely make out what gman is saying. i tried updating my video drivers...i tried the latest omega drivers and the official ati drivers and neither fixed the problem. technical support page didnt help at all either.

heres my system information given from steam:

Processor Information:
Vendor: GenuineIntel
Speed: 2795 Mhz
2 logical processors
1 physical processors
HyperThreading: Supported
RDTSC: Supported
CMOV: Supported
FCMOV: Supported
SSE: Supported
SSE2: Supported
3DNOW: Unsupported

Network Information:
Network Speed:
IP Address: 192.168.0.XXX

Windows Version:
Windows XP (32 bit)
NTFS: Supported

Video Card:
Driver: RADEON X850 Series - Secondary
DirectX Driver Name: ati2dvag.dll
Driver Version: 6.14.10.6727
DirectX Driver Version: 6.14.10.6727
Driver Date: 29 Sept 2007
Desktop Color Depth Not Detected
Monitor Refresh Rate Not Detected
DirectX Card: RADEON X850 Series
VendorID: 0x1002
DeviceID: 0x5d4d
Number of Monitors: 1
Number of Video Cards: 1
No SLI or Crossfire Detected
Primary Display Resolution: 1024 x 768
Desktop Resolution: 1024 x 768
Primary Display Size: 14.17" x 10.63" (17.72" diag)
36.0cm x 27.0cm (45.0cm diag)
Primary Display Type Not Detected
Primary Bus Type Not Detected
Primary AGP GART Not Detected
Primary VRAM: 256 MB
Primary Monitor Vendor Not Detected
Primary Monitor Model Not Detected
Supported MSAA Modes: 2x 4x 6x



Game Display Settings
Half-Life: Source Resolution: 1024 x 768 (Windowed)
Half-Life: Source MSAA Level: 6x
Half-Life 2 Resolution: 1024 x 768 (Windowed)
Half-Life 2 MSAA Level: 6x
HL2DM Resolution: 1024 x 768 (Windowed)
HL2DM MSAA Level: 6x
Counter-Strike: Source Resolution: 1024 x 768 (Windowed)
Counter-Strike: Source MSAA Level: 4x
Lost Coast Resolution: 800 x 600 (Windowed)
Lost Coast MSAA Level: 4x


Sound card:
Audio device: SoundMAX Digital Audio

Memory:
RAM: 510 Mb

Miscellaneous:
UI Language: English
Microphone: Not set
Media Type: DVD
Total Hard Disk Space Available: 149620 Mb
Largest Free Hard Disk Block: 34141 Mb

 

[AciD]

When sequence starts wait 15-20s ans save/load.

 

[Asknoone]

Yes, when I played the PC version release day I had the exact same problem. Game pretty much dies. Happens in the end, too. I've bought the 360 version since so I didn't need to fix it.

 

[Iron_cube]

This part is just about your ammount of ram, really.

1gb and more fixes this.

 

[MJ12]

Happened to me too, pisses me off like no other.

 

[WAR_Nuker]

i tried the saving midway through the sequence didnt work. i can try installing the game on a computer i use at work and see what happens. they got ati x600 but they have 2gb of ram on em.

 

[MJ12]

I had to result to youtube for this part and the ending =(

 

[WAR_Nuker]

it doesnt say what the minimum system requirements are on the back of the orange box...this could have been good to know. and yeah i might have to go to youtube as well if upgrading my ram is my only fix.

 

[Asknoone]

I listened to Gman through the GCF files so I could continue playing. The ending I had to wait for youtube, and then eventually I just played it on the 360.

 

[fido139]

Stuttering

You need much more RAM. Throw in another GIG, that should fix the problem. When I went from 512Mb to 1.5Gb there was a world of difference in performance.

 

[Gordon-Shepherd]

there's a workaround,
just do this in your launch options.

-dxlevel 90 -applaunch 220 -heapsize 256000
this fixed it for me. still stutters a little bit, mind, but it's much better than the unplayable ****up it was before.

 

[WAR_Nuker]

thank you so much that worked like a charm. out of curiousity...what do those parameters do? are they going to make other parts look strange or something?

 

[soulslicer]

how come you are playing at such low settings on a radeon x850 card?

 

[Bulletbrain]

thank you so much that worked like a charm. out of curiousity...what do those parameters do? are they going to make other parts look strange or something?

What really does the trick is the "-heapsize 256000" which allocates 256MB of your RAM for the game's usage. Since you have only 512MB in total this is the max amount you can safely allocate.

The commands wont make anything look strange, but based on your screens you seem to be running at very low quality settings. With your system you can easily set model detail, texture resolution, shader detail, shadows to "High"... and turn on HDR, motion blur and such...

 

[Bolt_Crank]

The Radeon x850 is 1.5 or so generations away from the current...

Playing in fullscreen mode would probably have helped a bit...

And turning off FSAA and MSAA or at least lowering them to 2x at the most...

I used to run an x850, it was a good card, but far from the most powerful...
I never got the chance to test it in Episode 2, but at 1024x768, and 2x FSAA, HL2 never dropped below the 40FPS mark... You should still be able to run everything at FULL... HDR, possibly not, but that's about it...

And yes, more ram, lol.

I was also playing them on a older, slower processor...

Try to close any programs you're not using... Multi-tasking with that little amount of ram isn't good for performance...

 

[Irksome]

Wow, I didn't even know about this. I didn't have any issues when I played through, and I played through on the first day.

 

[Bolt_Crank]

Wow, I didn't even know about this. I didn't have any issues when I played through, and I played through on the first day.

You've got a beefier video card and more ram than the OP

 

[WAR_Nuker]

when i took those screens i had dropped the video settings all the way to see if that would fix it...but it didnt...but i just left it like that. now its set with those launch settings and i put all my video settings back to normal and it looks and plays great.

also what kind of vid card you guys got these days anyhow? i got this x850 2 years ago

 

[kingkuttar]

I changed my PPS to 0x18000000 and it fixed the stuttering in every HL game.

 

[Bolt_Crank]

when i took those screens i had dropped the video settings all the way to see if that would fix it...but it didnt...but i just left it like that. now its set with those launch settings and i put all my video settings back to normal and it looks and plays great.

also what kind of vid card you guys got these days anyhow? i got this x850 2 years ago

I'm running an HIS Radeon X1650 Pro 512MB, PCI-E version...

Oddly enough, my old Sapphire Radion X850 GTO got similar, if not better scores in the Vista Experience Rating index...

But totally gets spanked in gameplay...

ATI wise, if you don't care about DX10, the X1950 seems to be the one to get... Otherwise, for the best gaming power, find yourself a high-end nVidia card...

I'm holding out for the next generation of ATI cards, lmao

 

[WAR_Nuker]

I changed my PPS to 0x18000000 and it fixed the stuttering in every HL game.

what does that mean?

also, im not gonna touch vista for another 2 years or so. maybe ill get a card thats been outdated for about 6 months to a year i think id be satisfied with that.

 

[Bolt_Crank]

If you're still running AGP, then you might have a little trouble with that...

As it is, though, you can get a card that'll run Ep2 good for less than $120...


Unless I turn my MSAA and my ASF to the higher settings, I never stutter... Except for when I have my shotgun set to have 427 pellets and I shoot a wall up close...

 

[Max_Fall]

Thats why i saved money and bought things for my pc,well that and cause the game looks so bad on low :-(

 

[Hydra]

I have 512 MB ram and Geforce 7950 GT, and I have absolutely no problems.

This event called "Hydra" will not enter this thread any more.

 

[kingkuttar]

PagedPoolSize.

http://www.halflife2.net/forums/showthread.php?t=131328

Try this.

 

[Frraksurred]

The work arounds are sporatic unfortunately.

I have 2 gigs of XMS Pro with 2 OC'ed 7800 GT's in SLI (512Mb VRAM) plus the perameters " -novid -heapsize 102400" and I still get the stuttering issue at the end and occasionally at the Gman scene... regardless of my quality settings.

This has to have some Source engine or graphics driver issue related to it, at least in some fashion.

 

[xX NoTe 2 SeLf]

had the same problem ... just turned on closed captions and watched it like a slideshow ... watched on youtube also

 

[Bulletbrain]

The work arounds are sporatic unfortunately.

I have 2 gigs of XMS Pro with 2 OC'ed 7800 GT's in SLI (512Mb VRAM) plus the perameters " -novid -heapsize 102400" and I still get the stuttering issue at the end and occasionally at the Gman scene... regardless of my quality settings.

This has to have some Source engine or graphics driver issue related to it, at least in some fashion.

I hope the 102400 was a typo cause it should have been 1024000. Anyway this parameter worked for my crappy 512MB RAM system. The scenes now play like any other part in the game.

 

[Pepske]

Hey guys I have portal on my Main computer but i also wanna install it on my backup computer. The computer is a little old but i just wanna know can i play on it with these.

Windows XP
1.10GHz Intel(R) Celeron(TM) CPU
248MB of RAM
Trident Video Accelerator Blade 3D/ProMedia

Cheers.

 

[Xendance]

Never heard of it so I doubt it.

 

[Frraksurred]

Agreed. Your chances are slim, sorry.

 

[Frraksurred]

Delete please.

 

[Frraksurred]

I hope the 102400 was a typo cause it should have been 1024000.

It was not a typo. I had gotten the perameter from another website that HAD typed it incorrectly. Consequently I'd been crippling my games without even knowing it (not sure why I never stopped to think about it).

Anyway, I fixed it and replayed the game without a single hiccup. I understood the ending before, but it was amazing how much more powerful it was hearing Alyx all the way through it. Stellar.


(Sorry for the double post)