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Slow Frame Rate On Fast Machine

by Scott Doerrfeld · in Torque Game Engine · 07/20/2006 (12:36 pm) · 10 replies

I just purchased a new laptop for development and for some reason Torque performs very poorly on it. Much worse than my much older machines. Here are the average frame rates running the same TGE mission on three different machines (OpenGL mode):

System: IBM Thinkpad
Video Card: ATI MOBILITY RADEON 9000 - 32 MB
Average Framte Rate: 42 fps

System: Dell Optiplex GX620
Video Card: ATI MOBILITY RADEON X600 - 256 MB
Average Framte Rate: 42 fps

System: Dell Inspiron E1505 (just purchased)
Video Card: ATI MOBILITY RADEON X1400 - 256 MB
Average Framte Rate: 20 fps

As you can see my TGE mission performed least favorably on what should be my best machine. This is quite shocking to me, considering my new laptop runs other 3D games like a dream. What could be going on here? Are there known issues with TGE 1.4 having trouble with newer video cards?
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Torque Owner Clint S. Brewer
#1
07/20/2006 (12:55 pm)
I haven't tried that card so not sure. So you are saying other games run just fine and just as fast or faster on this machine, but your torque one does not?

is your game built in release mode on that system?
do you have the same or greater amount of ram?
no bizare power management settings? If other games run fine I wouldn't expect it though.
is your laptop plugged in? I know if I unplug my x300 using laptop it switches into low power mode and things run pretty slow, plug it in and they zip along.

good luck

Torque 3D Owner Sebastien Bourgon
#2
07/20/2006 (12:57 pm)
I would check to see if maybe your system has alot runing in the background or something.

MGT recently purchased a similar laptop as yours (X1300 instead) and gets pretty damn good framerates (50-60+) in our current project.

Torque Owner Dave MacIsaac
#3
07/20/2006 (1:14 pm)
Your not alone there is some issues with new gear and TGEwww.garagegames.com/mg/forums/result.thread.php?qt=45724

Torque Owner Scott Doerrfeld
#4
07/20/2006 (1:56 pm)
Aaah. I forgot to mention something that distinguishes my new laptop --- it is dual core. Judging from your post, Dave, that could very well be the issue. Sebastian, is your new machine dual core? I hope this is a problem that gets fixed for the next release of Torque!

Torque Owner Pauliver
#5
07/20/2006 (2:14 pm)
If the problem is in fact that your machine is dual core you should set torque to only run on one core.
instructions:

Start up your torque project
Hit Ctrl-shift-escape
navigate to the processes tab
locate the process 
right click the process and set it to only run on one of your cores

Torque Owner Dave MacIsaac
#6
07/20/2006 (2:28 pm)
That's only for a 64bit windows box No? 32 bit window you have no control over dual core

Torque Owner Paul /*Wedge*/ DElia
#7
07/20/2006 (3:09 pm)
No, it works just fine on 32bit windows. You right click on the process and choose the "Set Affinity" option, which lets you set how many cores the program runs with.

Torque Owner Dave MacIsaac
#8
07/20/2006 (4:01 pm)
Ok just tried that and the frames still are low this is weird stuff

Torque Owner Scott Doerrfeld
#9
07/20/2006 (5:54 pm)
Changing to single processor seemed to improve my frame rates.

Torque Owner Jouni Miikki
#10
07/20/2006 (9:17 pm)
Mission: starter.fps.

System: Fujitsu Siemens 1437g
Video card: ATI MOBILITY RADEON X700 - 128 MB 1024x600
avg fps: 200-300 on windowed mode, fullscreen same (that fps counter just jumps so much, I'm not sure how to read it, does metrix(fps); really work? :D)

How huge mission do you have? I think starter.fps and those which comes with the engine are quite light missions and hence the high fps's.