in need of assistance in Iraq

R@nger

i have an HP laptop with the ATI IGP 345M video card. I am currently serving in Iraq and use this machine for laying games. I have had nothing but problems from the video card. I wen to HP's web site and updated my BIOS and the video card river but I still suffer from crappy performance. Is there an after market driver that I can download somewhere that will resolve the issue? I have buddies that have the same size (64MB) video card that are playing "FaCry" and it wont let me play it.


Thanks in advance,

Sean

BMG_Cya=-

Someone...NEON....help this guy. BTW, if you are truly serving in Iraq, just know there are a ton of people here that support each and everyone of you guys!!!

Salute...stay safe...

BACK ON TOPIC...someone wil be along shortly.

R@nger

Thanks... I am with C Co 1/153rd IN/ TF 1/9 CAV in Baghdad. watch and you may see some articles about us, there was on recently in TIME. thanks for the support.

BMG_Cya=-

I've PM'd a coupla' guys who should be able to help you shortly.
I'm not real familiar with ATI laptop cards, or I would.

One thing while we are momentarily waiting...you say you updated your drivers...

Did you use Drivercleaner to clean out the old ones first?
Drivercleaner can be found here:
http://www.driverheaven.net/cleaner/

Always want to do that before installing new drivers, as sometimes
different drivers can cause a conflict, even if you "uninstalled" the
old ones.

And yeah, I'll keep an eye out for you guys.
I read and watch as much as possible about what is going
on over there. Usually watch FOX news, CNN, and MSNBC
news. Also read all the papers in the area. I'm from Texas...Dallas...so most of the time the papers
here are fairly accurate. Not too many liberal slants.
Well, better than some areas.

Another thing...what graphics settings do you have the game(s)
and your card at? AA...Aniso...graphics detail settings etc.?

BMG_Cya=-

Reason I ask that last question is because even though some of your
buddies have the same size cards, (64MB) not all of the cards are
created equal.

You might have to lower the detail settings in your game
and/or graphics card control panel, as FarCry is one of
the most graphically demanding games out right now.

It runs at an average of 28-30 fps on my 9800XT (256MB)
with the settings in-game maxed, and with the card's CP
settings at 16x Aniso and 4xAA. It's a memory and graphics capabilities hog.
Beautiful game, but not the most efficient engine around.

Hang tight...I'm gonna PM someone again....

eggs420

Stay safe -- And if you know a Verback out there slug him once for me.

The_Neon_Cowboy

There are several routes:

#1.
Use a modified set such as the omega drivers
http://www.omegadrivers.net/


#2
you try to can use the official cat 4.9's from ati
http://www2.ati.com/drivers/wxp-w2k-...5a-017633c.exe

But they have to be modfied to install on laptops
http://www.driverheaven.net/patje/


#3 you can do a custom hack job (i can help) or try other moded sets


laptops aren't aren't nearly as powerfull as thier desktop counter parts. I'd suggest you try not to use AA/AF I would just use trilenear filtertering in games. go in the control panel and move the sliders all the way to performance. Also, try not to use high resolutions and that should help your fps as well.

R@nger

i am working on downloading the 2.4.55 driver from Omega. it says it is the latest one that supports mobile card (that what i understood, but i may be wrong). it will take me all night to download it since i am on worse than dial-up connection.

i will let you know how it goes.

just for reference... dont buy an HP with this video chipset...to much hassle

The_Neon_Cowboy

Cool, for referance the best card for laptops right now is a the 9800 mobile thier actually X800 "cut downs" . You should check and see if the laptop is upgradeable many are but i doubt you be able to find an upgrade atm . least in that part of the world.

good luck and best wishes!

BMG_Cya=-

Thanks for getting back on this Neon. Always want to help out anyone, but especially our service guys.

Son_of_Thunder

just out of curiosity, do you know what kind of an ATI graphics card you have in that thing? ie radeon mobility 9000, 9600, 9700 etc

Geminiwave

im pretty sure that IGP is the 9000. If it is a 7500 your friends may just have 9000's with the same memory size.

Now to better help you I need to know what exactly is bothering you.

Is it also possible that this has nothing to do with the graphics card but instead the ram? Or maybe the harddrive. Maybe its overheating(iraq is kindof hot isnt it?). Also HPs arent very reliable(ive had a few) they tend to be kinda badly made and require lots of bios updates(as i see you've done). I would suggest running some benchmarks and seeing about what scores you're getting. Lets get this thing fixed man. You cant be all those thousands of miles away from home and NOT have videogames...thats like ...like...getting oxygen taken away!

mbeeston

the IGP 345M is a IGP 7000 (i have a compaq labtop with it)
just use omega's, nothing better for it..

hitman05

I have a Compaq 905US laptop which uses the ATI IGP320M. This is the *exact same chipset as the 345M*. The 320m is for Athlon notebooks, the 345 is for the Pentium notebooks.

Anyway these chipsets are based off the Radeon 7500, which doesn't include Pixel or Vertex shaders OR hardware transform and lighting. Unfortunately, these chips are just not powerful enough to run newer 3D games. To be honest, the newest 3D shooter games that run well on these cards are games that came out in early 2002.

To get the best performance, you can try the Omega drivers, or you can run the drivermod on the official ATI drivers. Even then, I don't expect you'll get Far Cry to run well, even on low detail. It's just asking too much of a 3 year old 3D card design.

Stay safe, we're pulling for you boys in Canada.

R@nger

i have 512MBof ram and a 60GB HD. i know that HP is a poorly built machine, and i know that the graphics will never touch those of my machine at home. I have an ATI 9700 Pro, AMD Athlon 2500+ Barton core, A7N8X MoBo, 1GB DDR 3200 ram by OCZ, etc.
i bought this machine out of haste, i didnt have much time until i was to leave, and like was said earlier i cant live with out some form of gaming.
i am still working on downloading the driver ( they have constant power outages here and you have to pay for the internet by the hour)
Thanks again, and i will keep you posted


Sean

digitalwanderer

FarCry really likes 1Gb of RAM a lot more than 512MB, I noticed a big speed improvement in it when I upgraded my rig.

G'luck on your tour, stay safe.