How to boost your Doom3 performance by 40% on ATI hardware

mobility 9700?

Ok, tried this file on my laptop, which has a radeon9700 mobility (its a Dell 9100 laptop)

Here's the deal:

I cannot update my ATI drivers to ANYTHING other than the drivers that come with it?!?! Which are "Dell 7.953 xxx" which are based on Catalyst 4.3 as far as I am aware...

The problem is that Doom3 randomly locks up during the timedemo, unless i update to newer drivers. As soon as i do update my drivers, to something like the DNA 4.9b's or the Omega ones, i get really bad 2D curruption. My icons in windows leave trails and all sorts of weird things happen!!!

Can anyone tell me how I would keep the existing 2D drivers, but update the OpenGL ones so I can run Doom3 with decent drivers???

Please heeelllpp!!!

 

Doesn't always seem to work properly, though. Might be dependent upon the amount of cache you have set.

 

Re: mobility 9700?

You could try extracting only the opengl driver (atioglxx.dll) from a newer Cat release and place it in the Doom3 directory. That way it should use the file in the Doom3 directory without updating the drivers.

 

Nightfire, I have a Dell Inspiron 9100 with the same card. You can use the Omega Drivers.

General question to anyone:

Are the white dots on the stock speed cards caused by overheating or a glitch in the actual game? So far, I'm running only on 1024xsomething or other resolution on medium details and I do not have any artifacts, dots, and or snow. Those are the only two things I have changed in the game. I was wondering if this is a problem with all ATI cards or is it user specific?

I'm enjoying the game, but I don't want my system melting over one game.

 

Hi, all. This is my first post here. Had to register just for this thread. A few things have come up for me in following some of the suggestions.

1) I get banding in the lighting using the lastest code (the one with the .w's). If I go back to the one without the w's the lighting is fine again. I didn't have time to take screenshots but I will if people want to see what I'm talking about.

2) So now, is there a fix for using ingame AF without the quality loss? Is it just a matter of putting "seta image_filter GL_LINEAR" and then "seta image_filter GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_LINEAR" in the autoexec.cfg?

3) For those suggesting "image_roundDown 0", I get a weird overlay problem when using that and looking at a security video screen ingame like the one in Alpha Labs, which doesn't show up on screenshots. The security video is overlapped onto the entire ingame view.

 

Re: mobility 9700?

I have the exact same notebook with R9700 128Mb.

These Omega drivers http://www.omegadrivers.net are modified Cat4.7 and they install on mobility GPUs.

Doom3 runs on Dell 9100 very good.

 

You didn't? What about:

I added the bold so you wouldn't miss it.

I guess you're too busy picking on ATI to use your brain. If you're not even going to read your own stuff, how can you expect to have a reasonable conversation at all?

Of course, I don't expect you to be reasonable.

-FUDie

 

Thank you, Humus!

Your tweak has worked wonders for my Saphire 9700 Pro with a small OC @ 336/672mhz. I play Doom 3 at 1024x768, High settings, everything on, no AA, and CP AAx16(Quality), CP HQ/HQ(TEX/MIP). Rest of the system is a 3,2ghz P4C, 1gb DC PC3200 RAM, ASUS P4C800 Del mobo, WIN XP SP1a, Realtime Virus scan in background(I/O AR). Small tweaks to a custom .cfg file.

I used timedemo runs of "demo1" for benchmark.

without Humus tweak:
1st run 30.1 fps
2nd run 32.1 fps

with Humes tweak:
1st run 39.4 fps!
2nd run 42.1 fps

About %30 increase in performance. The fps avarage, usually never sways more than 0.1 in the many timedemo runs I have made. Very good.

The game looks really good and performance is very good for my "old" system(it can get +19200/6000 3DMark01/03 with a good OC, but it isn't OCed rightnow, except the small OC on the VPU). Never expected to run the demo1 with my 9700 Pro with these settings at +40fps

I am going to wait to winter/spring with getting a new VPU. This system can still kick some.

Thank you very much, Humus!

I'll report if I see artifacts or to say if it runs perfectly. For now, I am very happy

 

Try this: image_lodbias 0.4

 

Is it possible to get 32fps 1024x768(same settings as in my first post), forced Ultra Setting with a R9700 Pro and Humus' tweak, when benchmarking the demo1?

I forced it by setting my machinespecs to 3(Doom 3 sets it to 2 by default with my specs) and the videoram to 512 in my custom config. Then after I have executed the custom config, I typed execmachincespec when the main menu screen comes up, and then ran the timedemo. There is an obvious improved iq and lod compared to my high setting, when I am in the sp game. There is also a frame rate drop by 10-? fps and there are heavy slow downs when moving from area to area(and loadscreen takes forever now). The textures has changed, but not all of them have big changes. The flash from the flashlight has also changed. Everything just looks way more sharp and detailed. Could be me and the shrooms.

Is this really Ultra setting I am looking at, or is it a semi Ultra setting? Please help, as I am kinda lost over the (still high at +30 fps on a freaking 9700 Pro, imo) results. Looks damn fine and runs fine, but the frequent slowdowns are really annoying(I had almost none, at high settings, 128mb vidram)..

If it really isn't a true Ultra setting(or even a semi one), then please give a step-by-step guide, to how I can activate and see it, on a 9700 Pro. Thank you.

 

I did the patch, and i didnt get ANY increase that was noticeable, But i did get one weird thing, NO SHADER, nothing was shaded after i applied it for some reason.

 

This is driving me crazy! I dled the file, looked for the "/glprogs" folder in my doom3/base dir to unzip it to but the folder is not there! Anyhelp would be greatly appreciated.

nevermind my bro just explained it to me

 

You have to open the .pk4 files with a decompression utility to find the files/directories, they're compressed.

Mephis? What type of hardware you running?

 

I have found some visual differences with Humus' tweak. The problem is that some see-through glass surfaces, doesn't get darker when ... they're in the dark. They become brighter if I light 'em up, but not completely dark, when there is no source of light. Also, I think some of the effects is done in a lower precision than usual, as(only) some of the effects looks 16bit or lower. Both of the issues are really not that annoying, as most of the glass surfaces has light within or near(which makes it look "kinda" natural), and the lowered effects could just be me, and I have only noticed it when I am not moving, and just staring at screen. First 6 levels tested, and I am more than satisfied with the results, considering my aging HW.

 

IMO 3,2GHz can hardly be considered old even though they've been around for a while. Both your CPU and RAM is still top notch for any non-high-end-workstation system. So except for a "merely" above average graphics card there is nothing in your system that could be considered aging - I just don't think we're there yet. Come play Doom 3 with this 1600+ of mine for a change, then complain about an aging system again...

BTW, thanks for your tweak Humus! Definitely helped me by a few fps and I notice only negligible visual differences, rock on!

 

Point well made, Gollum. No arguments there.

It is just, I had expected Doom 3 to show a small message with the words "your system sucks donkey .... *image of demon pointing and laughing*", considering all the reviews and articles claiming you'll need to upgrade big time. All of my HW was bought, as soon as it came to the stores, and the R9700P is over two yo. I just hadn't expected the fine results I got. Only my dissillusioned mind

Also, I had expected sp low quality vs performance, so I could have persuaded my girlfriend, to allow for a new $500(what I payed for the 9700P) card. That didn't really happen without Humus' tweak, and certainly not with it. So I am going to wait until winter for the next gen card to buy

Nice work ID software and Humus for delivering this amazing experience, on a old VPU

 

Not at all 40% faster.
My system:
AMD 2400+
1GB SDRAM PC133
MSI K7T Turbo 2
Sapphire 9800 Pro 128 MB @ 420/370

Settings: 1024x768, detail High, NoAA, AF8x
Timedemo demo1, 2nd run

Before Humus patch: 31,5 fps

After Humus patch: 31,9 fps

I need a real boost for Doom3!!!

 

In most cases you only get a significant boost if you were running at forced AF. If you weren't then don't expect miracles from the tweak. You could also just wait for ATI's magical Doom3 drivers.

 

Sorry but Doom 3 isn't gonna shine on this system. Try switching to 640*480 low detail and see if you get any FPS increase in timedemo or ingame - if not then your CPU is the bottlenack, plus the PC133 ram.

If you really need D3 to run better, time to spend some money