Starcraft II and m11x r2

Hey guys, I'm a huge newbie at this stuff so don't be irritated. I've done some reading on these forums the last few days because I am going to receive my m11x r2 next Tuesday and I really want to know if this computer can play Starcraft II without frame lag.

I bought the i7 core with everything else standard and I've noticed a few people have trouble playing the game. I already know to download drivers immediately after I receive the laptop or else SC2 will run slow as hell. However, after having drivers installed, is there a good chance I will be able to play this game without having much frame lag in huge battles?

I plan to play on medium and high for the majority of the settings hopefully. Can people give me some feedback on their results? I checked some of the threads but a lot of them are like a month or two old and I was looking for some current information! THaanks guys!

 

No one can possibly know that for certain. Try it out and if you have problems then post them to the ginormous SCII thread.

 

I have beaten the entire campaign, and I found that if you keep settings on medium and set shadows to low, you average about 45 or so FPS.

Obviously in online play, one would expect 50+ FPS with medium settings and shadows off. I would "estimate" that high settings with low shadows would fetch you about 30 or so FPS.

 

I have only really tried single player but I have recently set everything as high as it'll let me and it still plays great, some slowdown in busy times. overclocked to 166 and turbo on. i7, 8gb, latest modded drivers. Very happy with performance

 

For me it's working perfectly. Doing a lot Co-op with a friend against insane AI.

 

My son and I just got to the Silver level in 2's after beating a team of platinum l;evel players, it was a blast

 

Read the main thread about this here:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/503901-starcraft-ii-m11x.html

 

I read the main thread, but it seems like its just 2 people complaining for 20 pages rather than productive feedback.

 

If you read further enough, the thread finally develops a format and how the specs were revealed. I'm in that thread and have a detailed post on how I produced my FPS rate.

 

also dont forget to whitelist the application.

 

I used to play in High settings and fetched around 30 fps in early & mid way battles. If you're playing 1v1, unless you're doing something crazy like 1 massive win or die push, you should be fine. 2v2's will also do fine in early & mid, but at the end, expect your fps to drop. Also, demanding maps such as dota-clones will eat you alive on high. Overall, high settings will be very very playable where as medium will give you maximum performance.

 

oops, i meant to say "High settings" not highest! putting any ultra on slows it down a lot.

 

My i7 plays it great.

 

One more question guys:

Whats the difference between 2 gb of memory and 4 gb of memory in terms of how SC2 will perform? Is there a huge difference? Thanks!

 

Not flawless though. In huge 200/200 battles with more than one player, it can go as far down as 15fps, especially if one player is massing lings (may go down to 10fps or even lower). In practical games, unless you're playing money maps, it's very rare for both players to get 200/200, so the game runs smooth, but still. Definitely playable though.

 

buuuuuuuuummmmmmmp

 

I am not sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if you ran into some lag.
Really, 4 GB is STANDARD for gaming. You could get by with 2, but it would be cutting it...

 

Hey Noah, I get my laptop this tuesday, do you think you could give me a link to the most updated drivers to use for SC2? I've been looking through the threads but a lot of the numbers are confusing and it seems people are using different drivers ...

 

Just download the dell 257 drivers on Dell. They are on the Dell support page.
While you may run into issues with some other games, it runs great for SC2!!
Though quick question, you own an M11x R1? or M11x R2?
M11x R1- C2D series.
M11x R2- i-core series.

 

Im getting a m11x r2 with the i7 core and 2gb of ram .... I saw some people use the nvidia xxx.xx drivers or whatever, are those the same as the dell 257 drivers? do they perform better?

 

Not sure.
I myself am currently using the modified 258.96
When I was using the 257 dell drivers, they ran SC2 well.
Ran everything on medium with low shadows at a solid 35-40 FPS in campaign (excluding the later missions). Online play would obviously be very smooth at medium graphics.

Before I could do some tests with the 258.96 drivers, my free trial ran out so...I have no clue about any performance increases with the 258.96 drivers.

 

As long as you OC to 160, campaign is fine. Generally the lowest fps you'll go is around 20fps which still feels smooth.

Decided to reformat my m11x i7, before doing so, I briefly tested the 258.96 drivers. Only in the beginning did I see an fps increase, when compared to dell drivers. For example, when watching a replay with dell drivers the fps will max around 82fps in the very start. With 258.96 drivers, it would max out at 87fps. However, later in the game when armies grow, I did not see any noticeable performance increases. What I did notice, for me anyways, the fps fluctuated a lot, for example going from 17fps then jumping to 26fps, then jumping again back to 19fps and so on. The 258.96 drivers did overall feel smoother though. Strange indeed.

 

I just installed 260.63 driver. Played Sc2 and I did not check the fps or anything, but while I was playing, I had settings at high with Ultra texture. I mostly play 1vs1 so mid-game and end-game did not get choppy at all. I haven't tried it yet for 4vs4 or 3vs3, I would probably need to lower settings. But with 1vs1, I think 260.63 runs like a beast.

 

on my M11x R1 with 4gb of ram (OC'd of course) I get 40+ FPS with everything on High.

 

^This. Will play the game, but it will depend on your expectations how pleased you are. You shouldn't have too much trouble gameply wise though. At least for me the FPS doesnt seem to impact my micro (which is garbage anyway )

 

im considering buying a fully loaded m11x r2 and wondering what kind of FPS would i be looking at on sc2 in 1v1 or 2v2 matches online

 

It depends on the map and how long your games last. If it gets a point were you're both massing huge amounts of units, I wouldn't be surprised if the framerate dips down to the 25 range on medium. For 2v2s, expect it to go even lower on medium. Maps like Metalopolis have really irritating regions that slow down the game when you view them. It really sucks if you happen to spawn on the upper right area of the map.

 

It completely depends on the optimization route you take.
Take a look at some of these threads that GREATLY can improve FPS/LAT in SC2
As for the default settings I would suggest MEDIUM for 60 FPS and HIGH for ~40 FPS (I say ~40 because that can drop really fast to 20 FPS, however medium stays very stable for me at 60+-55 FPS)

http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/524257-how-supercharge-m11x-core-i5-i7-um-cpus.html
http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/513360-new-m11xr1-optimization-must-have.html
http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/556910-starcraft-2-optimization-tweaks.html