Battlezone Universe

Battlezone Universe => Archive Vault => 1.3 Public Beta 5: Tech Alpha 5 => Topic started by: swaaye on August 13, 2009, 12:49:58 PM

Title: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: swaaye on August 13, 2009, 12:49:58 PM
I've always wondered just what the option called "Pentium III enhancements" (or similar) in the original BZ2 release did. Does anyone know?
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: GSH on August 13, 2009, 01:01:49 PM
That enabled SSE code (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streaming_SIMD_Extensions (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streaming_SIMD_Extensions), and note that it's SSE1, not any of the later versions) to accelerate lighting calculations. This produced slightly different tints on objects, something that people either liked or not.

BZ2 1.3pb4a uses (and therefore requires) SSE for all matrix math operations. Users could still choose to use SSE for lighting or not. 1.3ta5 moves lighting calculations off the CPU and onto the GPU, and so the SSE lighting code was removed as unnecessary. And so the option to use SSE or not disappeared. 1.3pb4a and 1.3ta5 require a CPU that supports SSE, something I've not heard any complaints over.

-- GSH
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: TheJamsh on August 13, 2009, 01:18:08 PM
ive heard one... but in all honesty.. buy a system built this century.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Zero Angel on August 14, 2009, 05:49:21 AM
Quote from: TheJamsh on August 13, 2009, 01:18:08 PM
ive heard one... but in all honesty.. buy a system built this century.
Lol, exactly.  :-D
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: GSH on August 14, 2009, 11:11:25 AM
To be fair, the original Athlon CPU, while a pretty potent chip in general for the time, didn't do SSE. It was added to the Athlon XP revision of the Athlon, released in October 2001. So, there's a bunch of people with Athlons (up to 1400Mhz) that couldn't run pb4a or newer.

-- GSH
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: swaaye on August 14, 2009, 01:58:12 PM
I've run TA5 on a Pentium III 1400 with a Radeon 8500 and it ran very well. As in completely fluidly. How retro can you go? That hardware is from 2001 or so. It's only about a year newer than the game itself! :)

TA5 is really quite amazing IMO. Offloading work to the GPU makes the game less demanding than ever before.

Quote from: GSH on August 13, 2009, 01:01:49 PM
That enabled SSE code (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streaming_SIMD_Extensions (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streaming_SIMD_Extensions), and note that it's SSE1, not any of the later versions) to accelerate lighting calculations. This produced slightly different tints on objects, something that people either liked or not.
I remember when I originally got BZ2 and I had a early PIII 450. I played with this option and didn't notice much speed change or anything. But I did notice that rendering changed slightly, just by watching the paused scene behind the options menu. I kinda wondered if the option was primarily there to please Intel as a sponsor.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Zero Angel on August 14, 2009, 02:02:16 PM
The original Athlon 'thunderbird' was faster than a similarly clocked PIII, and it was cheaper too. I used to own one and compared to anything else at the time things would just fly. It was my first real bz2 playing machine and even with the crappy geforce2, I could get about 60FPS on medium-low settings (everything turned off except high sky and medium texture/detail settings) and 30 on medium-high (without lighting, reflections and localfog -- but everything else maxed)
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: swaaye on August 14, 2009, 02:03:58 PM
Quote from: Zero Angel on August 14, 2009, 02:02:16 PM
The original Athlon 'thunderbird' was faster than a similarly clocked PIII, and it was cheaper too. I used to own one and compared to anything else at the time things would just fly. It was my first real bz2 playing machine and even with the crappy geforce2, I could get about 60FPS on low settings.

Oh of course TBird was a great CPU. I actually had a Duron 800 @ 1000 for a year or so back then. It's just that today people should probably move on from such hardware and not ask voluntary developers to make their code compatible with it. IMO anyway. :)

Although I did originally play BZ2 on a PIII 450 with a Matrox G400.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Zero Angel on August 14, 2009, 02:11:26 PM
Yea I agree. It seems that a vast majority of BZ2 players are using Pentium III/Athlon XP or newer anyways.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Avatar on August 14, 2009, 03:11:18 PM
Hey...

I'm on an Athlon XP 2000+, 1.67Ghz with 2G of DDR, and an AGP GForce 6200.  BZ2 runs very well on it...

I have half of a Duo-core system built, just waiting for a free paycheck to move up to something a little more powerful...   :)

-Av-
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: swaaye on August 14, 2009, 08:18:36 PM
I'm using a Athlon XP 2000+ as a TVPC. It has only 1GB but has a GeForce 7300 GT. :)
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: bb1 on August 14, 2009, 11:35:30 PM
Aww, you can up that to a 7600 for dirt cheap nowaday.

Better yet, try to find some mainstream-low end 8's or 9's. Nvidia's trying to push that stock like nobody's business.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Zero Angel on August 14, 2009, 11:43:40 PM
I'd go with an ATI card if I wasn't serious about running linux. The HD series are pretty good for low-end cards, sort of like how Athlons were back in the day, cheaper AND faster.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: TheJamsh on August 15, 2009, 03:15:44 AM
yeh i've got a mobility radeon HD2600 in my laptop. Its actually really good. Handle's much higher settings much smoother than my nVidia GeForce 7600 LE.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: bb1 on August 16, 2009, 07:00:23 PM
I hit the benchmarks before I hit the shelves.

Phenom VS Core II was a nightmare for AMD, Phenom II vs i7 was lesser so but they still need that extra push to gain the edge. I'll be reeling when Bulldozer is out. I hope.

Same thing with the benchmarks on nvidia cards and ATI. For the same price and demographic, Nvidia usually wins. Crunch time comes around and ATI does what? Staples two cards together.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: swaaye on August 17, 2009, 03:28:43 PM
Quote from: TheJamsh on August 15, 2009, 03:15:44 AM
yeh i've got a mobility radeon HD2600 in my laptop. Its actually really good. Handle's much higher settings much smoother than my nVidia GeForce 7600 LE.
Well compared to that it's probably better yeah but HD 2600 isn't that great. A desktop 7600GT is probably faster, and a GeForce 8600GT is definitely faster. The first mid/low-end DX10 chips were rather disappointing... One thing very nice about them though is their HD video acceleration features.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: bb1 on August 17, 2009, 08:41:20 PM
I did like those HD features...

Until I realized it would entail new widescreen monitor (sexy 24"  :roll: ), new mobo (with PCIe 2.0, new processor for that mobo, and depending on how much of a push I make new memory as well.

CHING CHING BABY!
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: TheJamsh on August 18, 2009, 01:11:27 AM
Quote from: swaaye on August 17, 2009, 03:28:43 PM
Well compared to that it's probably better yeah but HD 2600 isn't that great. A desktop 7600GT is probably faster, and a GeForce 8600GT is definitely faster. The first mid/low-end DX10 chips were rather disappointing... One thing very nice about them though is their HD video acceleration features.

7600 scored FAR lower that the HD 2600. four times the texture memory, faster etc etc. What i like about it is its a very compatible card. No graphics issues yet except with 3DS max 7. But thats out of date anyway...

I dont really see the fuss of HD. It just makes things look less real and too sharp. And its expensive. Just wait a few years until some green-ray thing comes out or whatever, and HD will be cheaper to run.

Plus im on a laptop, not much of a portable computer if i strap a 24" to it eh?
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Vid on August 18, 2009, 08:14:26 AM
7600LE(Light Edition) will perform a good bit lower than a 7600GT, although I never knew a LE existed.

The 7600GT and 2600 will trade blows, but the 7600GT will get a pretty easy win, but it should not be a huge win.
However there's no telling what was lessened on the LE version, so it could be a lot weaker.  I just never knew they had a 7600LE.

Why are lots of new builders buying 4670s, 4870s, and the like, if nvidia produces a better card at the same cost point?  I see quite a few more ATI cards in build specs on technology sites than I do geforce cards.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: bb1 on August 18, 2009, 03:28:25 PM
Green ray would be a step backwards since blue has the lowest nM of all lasers in the visible spectrum ;)
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: TheJamsh on August 18, 2009, 03:39:17 PM
well to start with the LE only has 128mb of memory. pretty poxy compared to my radeons 512
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: GSH on August 18, 2009, 03:50:26 PM
That's still plenty more memory than BZ2 uses.

-- GSH
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: TheJamsh on August 18, 2009, 04:01:41 PM
well i dont know. all i can tell you is my FPS is higher on the laptop.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Zero Angel on August 18, 2009, 06:56:13 PM
Quote from: bb1 on August 18, 2009, 03:28:25 PM
Green ray would be a step backwards since blue has the lowest nM of all lasers in the visible spectrum ;)
Cool, so future lasers might be UV lasers? And then x-ray lasers, and then gamma lasers! We'll probably live to see that too!
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: VSMIT on August 18, 2009, 09:24:01 PM
Quote from: Zero Angel on August 18, 2009, 06:56:13 PM
...and then gamma lasers!
If you survive, let me know.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: GSH on August 18, 2009, 09:33:56 PM
FPS depends on *far* more than the amount of RAM on your graphics card. The amount of RAM only becomes a factor when an app tries to use more textures than fit on the graphics card in a given frame. When that happens, it has to keep swapping textures in/out of the graphics card ram. That's definitely a slowdown. But, a slowdown that's VERY unlikely to be seen on BZ2 and any graphics card over 32-64MB.

-- GSH
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: bb1 on August 19, 2009, 11:46:58 AM
I'd rather have the GTX 1gb than a 4890 2gb, if only for the huge 512bit buffer on the GTX.

If ATI could squeeze a 512bit buffer on their GDDR5... The skies will open and the birds will sing.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Vid on August 19, 2009, 04:27:30 PM
I thought the GTX only has a 448bit buffer?
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: bb1 on August 19, 2009, 04:40:42 PM
Only on the 260. It is actually the 512 bit memory from the 280+ with a few defective or underperforming blocks cut off or disabled.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: swaaye on August 24, 2009, 03:12:55 PM
There's nothing wrong with ATI's current lineup. Their lineup before the 38x0 series was the issue. Radeon 2400, 2600 were very meh and 2900 was a furnace and slow compared to 8800 usually.

NV's options below 8800 were poor back in '07 too, but still better than ATI's 2400/2600 for games. 8600GTS was significantly less than half as fast as an 8800 series card and was slower than the cheaper 7900 options. But then they brought out the 9600GT which was great, and 8800GT/8800GTS 512/9800GT/9800GTX that are all based on G92 and great. The GTX 260 and 28x are awesome boards in many ways but too expensive compared to ATI's top stuff. They probably cost quite a bit more to build than a ATI 48x0 due to the huge GPU and the 512 bit bus.

The current landscape has ATI and NVIDIA on equal footing basically except ATI is much more aggressive with their prices. ATI has sweet options at every price point.

Quote from: bb1 on August 19, 2009, 11:46:58 AM
I'd rather have the GTX 1gb than a 4890 2gb, if only for the huge 512bit buffer on the GTX.

If ATI could squeeze a 512bit buffer on their GDDR5... The skies will open and the birds will sing.
GDDR5 on 4870/4890 give ATI an effective 512-bit performance because it's quad data rate. The physical 256-bit bus gives ATI a much cheaper board (a lot fewer traces), and it may not even be possible to put a 512-bit bus on their GPU because it's a good bit smaller than NV's GTX 2x0 GPU. You need room for all those pads on the GPU packaging. This cost savings is a win for both ATI and us (see prices.)

I think the only disappointing aspect of 48x0 is that they use a lot of power when idle. A lot more than a GTX 2x0 card.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: BNG Da BZ Fool on August 31, 2009, 02:28:23 PM
I have a P4 2.4g dual core, 256m of ram, and an ati radeon with 64m on the board, but should I increase the cpu ram as I recall from the manual it can support up to like 2g. Would that help BZII run better. I understand that BZII is mainly cpu driven, so would more memory help move things along faster during game play? Tanks, BNG. The video board is not that great, but is faster then the original integrated one that came with my pc...just thought I'd ask as I've installed extra memory and other components on past systems without problems.
Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: GSH on August 31, 2009, 02:51:16 PM
Windows XP really needs 512+MB to begin to run smoothly; at 256MB ram, you've barely got enough to start Windows without it hitting the HD pretty hard. With RAM prices *dirt cheap*, you can usually get 2GB of RAM for $15-30. (Granted, if you've got a oddball memory format, it can be more expensive. And if your MB choice is anything like your choice of modder's tools, BNG, you're very likely to have an oddball memory format.)

I'd go to http://www.crucial.com/ or http://www.kingston.com/ to figure out what type of memory your system takes. Then, take their part #s, and go to http://www.newegg.com and get the same thing for a little less. I don't go for the cheapest RAM makers, as they tend to flake out, but Kingston's been quite reliable for me. My rule of thumb: if you can max out your ram for $30 or so, do it. It'll make everything faster.

-- GSH

Title: Re: The old Pentium 3 enhancements option
Post by: Zero Angel on October 12, 2009, 04:37:23 PM
Yes, most definitely increase the memory. One reason why most AV's bog down a computer is becaus they consume a lot of memory (expect your average antivirus to use at least 128MB of RAM with all of its background processes and services put together, some of them like McAfee consume around 256MB) The windows XP kernel and default services probably consumes a little over 128MB on its own, so that taken together with an antivirus, expect things to slow down because both of those things want to use up all your RAM, which causes most of your system's resources dedicated to constantly accessing the swap file your hard disk which slows EVERYTHING down. Upgrading to 512 will speed up your Windows XP quite noticably, and 1GB will speed it up even further, after that the returns diminish quite a bit unless you're doing tasks which really tax the memory (like editing large, multi-layered images in photoshop or playing high-end games).