Graphics lag issue

[bakaohki]

I downloaded AI War 3.0 - and while I really really really wanted to love this game, the speed is just terrible. I tried it in HD and in lower, 1280x1024 resolution, but even in the tutorial *everything* stutters. Even the interface elements are drawn slowly (I can see the windows drawn!) - zooming on the battlefield is like a joke Spaceships' movement is jerky and laggy: what's going on? Did I miss something? I mean it's possible, but I think I do meet the system requirements:

Amd Athlon 64 5600+ dual core cpu,
4gb ram,
nvidia geforce 8500gt 1gb
and Windows 7 64bit.

The installer only needed the simpledx, also I don't have directx 9 - can I do something? I tried turning off everything in the graphics menu, but that did not help at all (apart from doing a time travel to the nineties' games and Hercules monitors) - also I couldn't find an option to run the game in a window or in a resolution that's different from the desktop's: can I try some config files somewhere? Thank you!

[RCIX]

I downloaded AI War 3.0 - and while I really really really wanted to love this game, the speed is just terrible. I tried it in HD and in lower, 1280x1024 resolution, but even in the tutorial *everything* stutters. Even the interface elements are drawn slowly (I can see the windows drawn!) - zooming on the battlefield is like a joke Spaceships' movement is jerky and laggy: what's going on? Did I miss something? I mean it's possible, but I think I do meet the system requirements:

Amd Athlon 64 5600+ dual core cpu,
4gb ram,
nvidia geforce 8500gt 1gb
and Windows 7 64bit.

The installer only needed the simpledx, also I don't have directx 9 - can I do something? I tried turning off everything in the graphics menu, but that did not help at all (apart from doing a time travel to the nineties' games and Hercules monitors) - also I couldn't find an option to run the game in a window or in a resolution that's different from the desktop's: can I try some config files somewhere? Thank you!

AFAIK, you can't get W7 without DX9...

[x4000]

Your speed should be more than fine, that is a crazy amount of lag and not expected. There was one issue in 3.0 that caused lag in the first 3 tutorials, and if you get the latest official version in-game (3.016), that will be fixed. Still, your issue sounds a lot more severe than that, so I wonder about a bum driver or something. My suggestion would be to upgrade to 3.016 of the game, which is quick and easy to so from in the game itself. Hopefully that will solve most or all of the issue. If there is still a problem after that, please let us know and if you can check in your game data directory (see the bottom of the settings menu for the location), then that would also be helpful if any error files were logged there.  Hope that helps!

[bakaohki]

I have installed 3.0.1.6 and I "think" it's a little bit better, but it's far from acceptable for me. Probably it's not a very good comparison, but the zooming/scrolling/movement operations compared to Total Annihilation (I hade a 300mhz celeron back then) are still very bad, but now that I checked some youtube vids it seems to be "normal". Thanks for the help and hope the newer versions can do better rendering somehow

[x4000]

I have installed 3.0.1.6 and I "think" it's a little bit better, but it's far from acceptable for me. Probably it's not a very good comparison, but the zooming/scrolling/movement operations compared to Total Annihilation (I hade a 300mhz celeron back then) are still very bad, but now that I checked some youtube vids it seems to be "normal". Thanks for the help and hope the newer versions can do better rendering somehow

There isn't any jerkiness in the youtube videos, not what I consider jerkiness, so I'm not sure what you're picking up on there.  The game runs at 20fps, so that may be what you are disliking, I'm not sure.  It's not going to get any higher than that anytime soon, because that's already pushing the limit of things.  I'm not sure what exactly to say with this one, it's a low-framerate game compared to some, but that's part of because of the intense throughput compared to TA or other games; it renders vastly more than comparable games, 10x or more in many cases.  Wish I could be more help, but it sounds like you may just be abnormally sensitive to lower framerates or something.

[bakaohki]

Oh, I see - I didn't know about the 20fps limit and all I did was the first two tutorial levels which did not seem to be all that complex, but I do understand that it will not get any better then. I still find the visible UI redraw a bit annoying, but I can live with that - thank you for the support!

[x4000]

You know, I forgot about your mention of being able to see the interface elements drawn. That is very strange indeed. That is actually using a different graphics rendering subsytem fRom the main game, and is refreshed by windows at a higher framerate. If you are seeing redraws there, then something is very wrong and it is not directx-related (those menus are gdi).

In that case, my primary suspect would be graphics drivers. I imagine you keep your gfd drivers up to date with a system like that already. However, you might check if there is anything late-breaking. Also, some of the 19x nvidia drivers cause problems for some cards (not just with ai war), so you may be one of those unlucky few who will see a return to normalcy if you switch to the 18x driver version range while nvidia fixes whatever their other issue is.

Hope that helps!