Just received 1647... is this correct? (starcraft 2 related)

Here are the specs:
Intel CoreTM i5 540M processor (2C/4T, 2.53-3.06 GHz, 3M L3)
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5730 - 1GB
320GB 7200 RPM SATA Hard Drive
4GB, DDR3, 1333MHz 2 Dimm
15.6 inch Wide Screen 16:9 900p HD+ WLED LCD, W/2.0 MP, XPS 1645
Intel 6200 Wireless-N (2x2) HM,CNB

I'm running thru the campaign at the moment and I was under the impression I could run this game at "high" settings and still get good framerates. At the max resolution and "high" settings, it is definitely very laggy. Is this everyone's experience?

According to device manager, my ATI driver is 8.762.0.0 (8/3/2010). Is there a better driver to use?

I'd also like to note that I'm currently using a 90W adapter if that makes a difference here.

 

I just ordered the exact same system as you have, same specs and all. I tried to read up on the 5730 as much as I could, and from what I could tell that card should be able to run most games reasonably fluently at 1366x768 resolution. It's sort of a mid-level performance card, and I think at 1600x900 you may need to tone down the eye candy a bit. I also went with the 1600x900 and for World of Warcraft I have no expectation of running it at max settings.
You could change your resolution to 1366x768 (the horror) or just adjust the graphics settings.

 

90W is throttling your system, get a 130W from Dell -- *should* still be free.

Other than that, I believe a 5730 is ranked about in the 40-50 range on most Notebook GPU benchmarks, comparably to 5870 mobilities and so forth.

 

I think the 90w is fine for your config.

What sort of fps are you getting? ctrl alt f will toggle frame rate display in game. If you experiment with settings, you will probably find the following game setting tweaks helpful - slight visual changes that will give huge boosts in fps.

Reflections- Turn this off.
Post Processing- Set this to medium.
Shadows- Set this to medium. From there, you can increase your performance greatly (mine increased an additional 20%) by setting the shadowmapsize=1024 and softshadowTaps=6 following the directions here: The comprehensive variables.txt thread! - Forums - StarCraft II

Those 2 variable tweaks will likely become the standard in a future game patch, so why not enjoy the benefits now?

That being said, there's one or two missions where you just won't get good fps. There's a mission where the lava rises every few minutes where you will have to deal with low fps, probably half that of other missions.

Since I like to be somewhat competitive in online play, I set my shaders to medium to maintain 60+ fps in most 1v1 games, even at 1920*1080 with the older 4670 card. I personally think setting shaders to medium is the way to go for online play, especially for larger games like 4 on 4.

 

Thanks everyone for your input.

I am getting a 130W adapter (still free) this coming week. I have a spare 90W from my old M1530 so I'll still have both.

I played a couple games on b.net last night (2v2) and it seemed to work fine at med settings. I'll definitely have to take a look at frame rates (thanks for the tip!).

On a side note, I should be getting an upgrade to the 1080p LCD instead of this one since my M1530 screen had a resolution higher than 900p.

 

Just a fair warning to you then My XPS 16 has a 1920x1080 resolution -- it's pretty taxing on most modern games, especially SCII -- don't underestimate that game! Also, there's a way to cap your FPS to 30 and I found the game much smoother after that.

 

Do tell!

10char

 

I'm getting 60-70fps during normal harvesting and stuff. When the battles happened, I got too excited and forgot to look. haha

 

The only way to lock the fps to a value is using the method listed in my link above. The variable is called frameratecap or something similar.

It's a matter of preference whether or not to cap the framerate. With a locked framerate of 30, WATCHING the game (such as a replay) will probably look slightly better, but there's a good reason that there is not a framerate cap on by default: the feeling of input lag. A framerate of 30 will mean your mouse will take ~33ms (milliseconds) to move, whereas at 60fps it will take ~17ms. You might say "who cares" but this value is added on top of other lags, including internet connection for online games (probably 15-60ms), lcd lag (6-8ms, estimate) and mouse lag (8ms for a regular mouse, 1-2 ms for gaming mouse).