Elite Force II windows 7..choppy

[Lightower]

I've been thinking about playing this old game again and decided to take the plunge. Unfortunately this only brings in several ' have to ' walkabouts to make it work with new software and hardware.

To run full screen I used the following command without a problem:

opened the console and typed

r_customwidth "2560"
r_customheight "1440"
r_mode "-1"
vid_restart

The game runs flawlessly but there's this 'hiccup' during movement that is nauseating to say the least...choppy?

Running the program in xp compatibility mode or reducing the screen resolution to 1600x does not help. Tried with and without screen synchronization, opengl.



System:
I7920
Crossfire 5870's
P6T motherboard

I suppose I'm asking too much for an old game to run smoothly?

I can certainly create a video of what is happening to show you in more detail.

Thanks for any input.

Long Live the Borg

[Chriss]

A video would indeed help to identify your issue.

[Lightower]

Originally Posted by Chriss

A video would indeed help to identify your issue.

Here you go:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ap0ba...=youtube_gdata

I disabled the sound and reduced the fraps recording size.

The system consists of a crossfire setup using 2 ATI 5870, quad core i7920. I'm running it in compatibility xp sp2. I noticed that it works slightly better with crossfire disabled.

[Chriss]

I cant make out anything strange.
You can disable two options in the menu that should do the trick, I belive.
Configure->Game Options:

• View Kick
• View Bob

[Lightower]

Originally Posted by Chriss

I cant make out anything strange.
You can disable two options in the menu that should do the trick, I belive.
Configure->Game Options:

• View Kick
• View Bob

Thanks for the quick reply. Still choppy. Frame rates drop as I move around. I'll keep trying various settings.

Thanks.

[Chriss]

Ah, you meant the frame rate, well, that is easy to fix, try each setting, they will fix the frame rate issue. You need to figure out which one it is for you that drops it so much, my guess is the Shadows do:
Options->Video->Advanced:

1. OpenGL Extensions: ENABLE
2. Shadows: Simple
3. Deform Geometry: DISABLE
4. Monitor Synchronisation: DISABLE

[Lightower]

Originally Posted by Chriss

Ah, you meant the frame rate, well, that is easy to fix, try each setting, they will fix the frame rate issue. You need to figure out which one it is for you that drops it so much, my guess is the Shadows do:
Options->Video->Advanced:

1. OpenGL Extensions: ENABLE
2. Shadows: Simple
3. Deform Geometry: DISABLE
4. Monitor Synchronisation: DISABLE

Thanks Chris. It helped a tad. Going to try each setting on an off separately and give it a try.

[Chriss]

If you combine the settings it should work perfectly fine.

The only else reason what could cause this kind of issue I can think of would be if your cpu reduces the clock when it is used in a low amount. The CPU switching could also make troubles, if you have this kind of technology disable it to run the game.

I had this issue with my PC sometimes at some games, so I turned the feature off.

I don't think it is your gfx card, as they usually switch when a 3d application is loaded.

[mjdbb1]

I'm having the same or at least very similar issue. In fact I tried the same level in the video and it plays exactly the same. I don't have any kind of CPU switching enabled, and nothing I can think of that's out of the ordinary. In fact I tried turning down all the video settings as low as possible and still can't get it work properly. I've tried several versions of new and old video drivers.

My system is a Core2 duo, 2.9ghz, 3gb ram. I have Radeon HD 4650 1gb video card on pci-e, as well as a dinosaur Geforce 2 MX 400 (32mb I think) in a PCI slot for a couple old games that don't cooperate with pci-e cards. I actually tried running the game on both and have the same problem.

Voyager Elite Force is even older, and it runs perfectly. Any other ideas what's up with EF2?

[Chriss]

I can't think about anything else than the CPU technologies (Cool'n'Quiet, SpeedStep, PowerNow!), which are activated on default and need to be deactivated within the Bios settings, in the most cases.

That would explain why you can switch in a different GFX card and the issue is still there. When the game uses less cpu resources the cpu does switch, and reduce the clock and then the game needs more resources and the CPU switches back again.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cool_%27n%27_Quiet

Please make sure you have it disabled, double check it!
If you find anything else, please let us know.

Perhaps it is a windows 7 issue, tried any compatibility modes ?

[mjdbb1]

Chriss,

I disabled Intel SpeedStep in the BIOS, no effect. Any other ideas? Also, I should have mentioned, I am on XP.

[Chriss]

If you could provide a video which shows multiple scenes where the game gets choppy, with the frame rate displaying that would help to do a diagnoses. The video should be much longer than the one we have already, which is showing just a few seconds.
To enable frames open up the console and type in fps 1, then hit enter, type in fps 0 to disable it again.


If that fails please try to enable console logging, open up the console and type in:
logfile 1
The log-file would be in your game directory:
ef2/base/<your-windows-username>_console.log


If that fails too, you would need to set the following start parameters, to the game so the game does log all the errors and warnings:
+developer 1 +cheats 1 +com_printwarnings 1 +logfile 1

Create a shortcut to the ef2.exe, edit it, click on the tab shortcut and add the parameters starting with + and separated with white-space.



Make also sure you have no Mods/Maps and other extras download and Installed for EF2, and that the official Patch 1.1 is applied.


I hope that helps you, if not please provide the contents of the log-file:

1. enter logfile 1 into the console and hit enter
2. quit the game
3. start the game and load a level with the issues
4. play the level
5. quit the game
6. find the log-file and post it here

[mjdbb1]

Here#s a video with the problem. This is on the ATI card. All settings are set to the lowest possible. Let me know what you think.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdaOhauu7Iw

[Chriss]

Okay, it looks like the Hint Portals are not working, if you look into a direction where the map is Intense your frames drop, if you look into a direction where the map ends it goes up to normal.

I suspect the following things:

1. You have any 3d intense Application running like MSN/Blender/3d Max or else programs or even your operating system does use many 3d like effects, which do interfere with the OpenGL driver
2. You have a bad driver, the OpenGL needed for ef2 does not work well

Please shut-down completely all other applications, then run the game. Make sure they are really shut down, not just minimized to tray.

If you are running vista or windows 7, please make sure you run the game in compatibility mode for Windows XP. Try also to disable the fancy animations of the Operating system.

Try to run the game in Window mode.

Try to run the game at a low resolution like 800x600.

Since you both use ATI cards it could be related to the Driver, but I can't say for sure I never update my drivers once I found one which is not messy.

A MX 400 is not sufficient for Elite Force II, even if you have the 64 MB variant, but medium or low settings should work.

[Lightower]

logfile opened on Fri Jul 16 19:52:44 2010

------ Server Initialization ------
Server: m2l2-sfa
Setting up Shaders
Registering lensflare shaders
Loading nodes...
-----------------------------------
Loading camera path from 'cams/m2l3_picard_shot1.cam'...
Loading camera path from 'cams/m2l3_picard_shot2.cam'...
Current search path:
D:\GAMES/base
D:\GAMES\base\pak50.pk3 (9 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak32.pk3 (223 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak31.pk3 (708 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak30.pk3 (936 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak20.pk3 (8193 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak16.pk3 (2347 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak15.pk3 (1456 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak10.pk3 (1468 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak0.pk3 (1064 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak50.pk3 (8 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak2.pk3 (4 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak1.pk3 (13987 files)
D:\GAMES\base\hm_ctf_exigent.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\dm_ctf_voy1.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\ctf_vor2.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\ctf_tartirus.pk3 (25 files)
f:\Setup\Data\ef2.exe/base

handle 1: marco_console.log
----------------------
Loading client emitters...
WARNING: invalid alphaFunc name 'GT128' in shader 'chainalpha'
...loaded 21300 faces, 920 meshes, 118 trisurfs, 0 flares
WARNING: reused image sysimg/2d/pauseicon.tga with mixed glWrapClampMode parm
MUSIC_LoadSoundtrackFile: song suspense not found, command skipped in music/m2l2-sfa.mus.
MUSIC_LoadSoundtrackFile: song suspense not found, command skipped in music/m2l2-sfa.mus.
MUSIC_LoadSoundtrackFile: song suspense not found, command skipped in music/m2l2-sfa.mus.
Couldn't load song: sound/music/klingon/klingon_sfa2_success.mp3
WARNING: invalid alphaFunc name 'GT128' in shader 'chainalpha'
Couldn't find image for shader imodflash.spr
CL_InitCGame: 1.59 seconds
copy D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\current.spv to D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\SaveGame1279324367\SaveGa me1279324367.spv
Done.
copy D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\current.spv to D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\SaveGame1279324463\SaveGa me1279324463.spv
Done.
Loading game...SaveGame1279324463
copy D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\SaveGame1279324463\SaveGa me1279324463.spv to D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\current.spv
------ Server Initialization ------
Server: m2l2-sfa
-----------------------------------
Current search path:
D:\GAMES/base
D:\GAMES\base\pak50.pk3 (9 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak32.pk3 (223 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak31.pk3 (708 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak30.pk3 (936 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak20.pk3 (8193 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak16.pk3 (2347 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak15.pk3 (1456 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak10.pk3 (1468 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak0.pk3 (1064 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak50.pk3 (8 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak2.pk3 (4 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak1.pk3 (13987 files)
D:\GAMES\base\hm_ctf_exigent.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\dm_ctf_voy1.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\ctf_vor2.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\ctf_tartirus.pk3 (25 files)
f:\Setup\Data\ef2.exe/base

handle 1: marco_console.log
----------------------
Setting up Shaders
Registering lensflare shaders
Loading client emitters...
WARNING: invalid alphaFunc name 'GT128' in shader 'chainalpha'
...loaded 21300 faces, 920 meshes, 118 trisurfs, 0 flares
WARNING: reused image sysimg/2d/pauseicon.tga with mixed glWrapClampMode parm
Couldn't load song: sound/music/klingon/klingon_sfa2_success.mp3
MUSIC_LoadSoundtrackFile: song suspense not found, command skipped in music/m2l2-sfa.mus.
MUSIC_LoadSoundtrackFile: song suspense not found, command skipped in music/m2l2-sfa.mus.
MUSIC_LoadSoundtrackFile: song suspense not found, command skipped in music/m2l2-sfa.mus.
Couldn't load song: sound/music/klingon/klingon_sfa2_success.mp3
WARNING: invalid alphaFunc name 'GT128' in shader 'chainalpha'
CL_InitCGame: 0.32 seconds
Couldn't load song: sound/music/klingon/klingon_sfa2_success.mp3
------ Server Initialization ------
Server: ent-deck8
Setting up Shaders
Registering lensflare shaders
Loading nodes...
Loading level strings for level: ent
Identical string id: RomulanMaleHoloDesc1
Identical string id: RomulanMaleHoloDesc2
Identical string id: RomulanMaleHoloDesc3
Identical string id:

RomulanMaleHoloRadar
-----------------------------------
Current search path:
D:\GAMES/base
D:\GAMES\base\pak50.pk3 (9 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak32.pk3 (223 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak31.pk3 (708 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak30.pk3 (936 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak20.pk3 (8193 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak16.pk3 (2347 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak15.pk3 (1456 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak10.pk3 (1468 files)
D:\GAMES\base\pak0.pk3 (1064 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak50.pk3 (8 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak2.pk3 (4 files)
D:\GAMES\base\locpak1.pk3 (13987 files)
D:\GAMES\base\hm_ctf_exigent.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\dm_ctf_voy1.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\ctf_vor2.pk3 (20 files)
D:\GAMES\base\ctf_tartirus.pk3 (25 files)
f:\Setup\Data\ef2.exe/base

handle 1: marco_console.log
----------------------
Loading client emitters...
WARNING: reused image textures/env/env_dark.tga with mixed mipmap parm
WARNING: reused image textures/env/env_dark.tga with mixed allowPicmip parm
WARNING: reused image textures/env/env_dark.tga with mixed mipmap parm
WARNING: reused image textures/env/env_dark.tga with mixed allowPicmip parm
...loaded 4113 faces, 3641 meshes, 29 trisurfs, 0 flares
WARNING: reused image sysimg/2d/pauseicon.tga with mixed glWrapClampMode parm
WARNING: reused image models/weapons/assault_rifle/viewmodel/assault_rifle_01.tga with mixed mipmap parm
WARNING: reused image textures/env/env_gen-grey.tga with mixed mipmap parm
Couldn't find image for shader models/char/hazardteam/sf-base-female/body.tga
Couldn't find image for shader models/char/misc/b-female-display-red.tga
Couldn't find image for shader models/char/misc/base-female-body-red.tga
WARNING: reused image models/weapons/photon_burst/worldmodel/photon.tga with mixed mipmap parm
WARNING: reused image textures/sprites/beam_photon.tga with mixed glWrapClampMode parm
CL_InitCGame: 1.86 seconds
Loading camera path from 'cams/cam_igm1_deck8_1.cam'...
Loading camera path from 'cams/cam_igm1_deck8_2.cam'...
Loading camera path from 'cams/cam_igm1_deck8_3.cam'...
Loading camera path from 'cams/cam_igm1_deck8_4.cam'...
Loading camera path from 'cams/cam_igm1_deck8_5.cam'...
copy D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\current.spv to D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\SaveGame1279324944\SaveGa me1279324944.spv
Done.
WARNING: reused image models/sky/textures/iceplanet-clouds.tga with mixed mipmap parm
WARNING: reused image models/sky/planets/swampplanet-shadow.tga with mixed mipmap parm
Loading camera path from 'cams/igm1_EntIntro.cam'...
copy D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\current.spv to D:\GAMES\base\save\Marco\SaveGame1279325041\SaveGa me1279325041.spv
Done.
----- Server Shutdown -----
---------------------------
----- CL_Shutdown -----
RE_Shutdown( 1 )
Shutting down OpenGL subsystem
...wglMakeCurrent( NULL, NULL ): success
...deleting GL context: success
...releasing DC: success
...destroying window
...resetting display
...shutting down QGL
...unloading OpenGL DLL
-----------------------

[Chriss]

The log looks perfectly normal, so it is nothing caused by the game itself, internally. So it must be something outside the game, like with the drivers.

Perhaps you want to try older drivers, if nothing else helped so far. Sometimes newer drivers have features disabled which makes them faster in newer games but gives troubles in older games.

[mjdbb1]

Seeing as this happens with both the ATI card and the nvidia card, I think the drivers may be unlikely. I'll try the oldest drivers I can for the card.

[mjdbb1]

I tried the oldest ati driver I could for my card, and the problem does not exist. I also tried older nvidia drivers and a geforce 8400 pci and performance is awful.

Only problem is the older ati drivers give me problems in newer games. Any other suggestions, or am I just stuck choosing between this old game and all the newer games?

[Lightower]

Originally Posted by mjdbb1

I tried the oldest ati driver I could for my card, and the problem does not exist. I also tried older nvidia drivers and a geforce 8400 pci and performance is awful.

Only problem is the older ati drivers give me problems in newer games. Any other suggestions, or am I just stuck choosing between this old game and all the newer games?

I'm going to wait for the next set of drivers to be released on the 21st of July. Apparently a common problem with Quake games and these latest set of drivers.

Thanks Chriss for your analysis...you've confirmed the problem in being the drivers.

[mjdbb1]

Lightower...where did you get this information? I'd like to read it.

I don't have much hope because it's not just the latest set of drivers, I had to go back to 9.11 to stop this problem. 9.12 and later have this problem.

[Chriss]

Problems have been always in the ATI drivers, that's why I stick to a driver once I found one which does not mess.

I believe to recall that AMD was announcing better drivers for the future since they acquired ATI.

But I'm glad we figured it out

[Lightower]

Originally Posted by mjdbb1

Lightower...where did you get this information? I'd like to read it.

I don't have much hope because it's not just the latest set of drivers, I had to go back to 9.11 to stop this problem. 9.12 and later have this problem.

Read here:

http://www.quakelive.com/forum/announcement.php?f=27

[mjdbb1]

Ever get around to trying new drivers for this issue?

[thx4theammo]

I have the 11.2 drivers for my Radeon HD3870 and it's still choppy (Windows 7 64 bit)

[thx4theammo]

holy crap... in all seriousness, if you rename the exe from EF2 to quake3 the problem goes away