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Reccomended tweaks to get your older pc running games quite well. What a wordy title!
#1
Reccomended tweaks to get your older pc running games quite well. What a wordy title!
Since I currently have a sub-par graphics card and RAM (working on it), while playing games (such as Oblivion or Minecraft) I have needed to optimize games, and my pc, in order to get acceptable framerates. I thought that as long as I'm doing some research, other people might as well benefit. I apologize if this is hopelessly rudimentary to some of you.

First: download Game Booster 3. It's freeware, and it's really easy to install and set up. What it does is halt any processes your pc is running that aren't required to run games. It increased my performance by 40%, and I'd say it adds about 5fps to any game I play. This (+mods) actually allows me to play Oblivion on nearly max settings (though still not smoothly) on the laptop gpu which is currently sitting in my tower.

Second: If you're running a Java based game (because Java is a RAM hog) like Minecraft this is especially useful.
Open the task manager, go to processes, find your game client, right click on the client, hover on 'set priority' and set it to 'high'. Be aware that if you're running several high-end programs, this may lead to instability. This increased Minecraft's fps from about 10 to about 20, so it was a big help. I tested this on the Killing Floor though and it didn't help at all, so it really depends on the game.

Third: find mods. Many games, due to rushed releases or inefficient programming (*angry stare at Oblivion*), have a lot of horrible memory leaks and questionable design choices. Certain mods can greatly increase fps. For example, I'm running Oblivion bearably on almost max settings with a mod for low-poly LOD and low-poly grass. It looks almost exactly the same as without the mods, but together (no joke) they added about 20fps. There really is no reason not to download some mods like this Smile

Fourth: search for a '.ini' file. Certain games have .ini files which you can edit to slightly improve fps or stability. Games that come to mind are Morrowind, Oblivion, and the Killing Floor. These .ini files will look like a notepad icon but with a gear on top.
For example, in Oblivion you can edit the amount of cells you want to store in your RAM. You have 1GB of RAM and as a result get about 5fps? Just tell the .ini not to cache any cells. You'll have to wait through longer load times, but you can really help the fps on a low-end system. It won't be a miraculous change, but it'll help. There are many guides online to tweaking the .ini, so refer to those for details.
Tweaking the .ini in Morrowind gave me an extra 10fps. In the Killing Floor, maybe an extra 3fps and it stopped the stuttering.

In addition, tweaking the .ini can make an old game like Morrowind look much nicer. You can push back the fog beyond the default limit, add more shadows, or make the water transparent so you can actually see slaughterfish. you can also darken the nights, etc. Just make sure to back up your .ini before editing, and follow the guides.

Five: turn off dynamic lighting. Textures are the single most important part of making a game look good, and luckily they're also the easiest for lower end systems to run smoothly. You'll almost never need to lower texture resolution. It's the dynamic lighting effects, bloom lighting, and shadows that really kill your frames per second. Disabling dynamic lighting should be the first thing you cut if you try the steps above and still can't get an acceptable framerate.

That's it for now. I hope that helps somebody. Remember to back up your files before you start downloading mods and tweaking things.
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