[How-to] - Windows XP Gamer's Edition

[gdogg]

will steam install, you dont need to buy anything to install steam , not even hl2

if it does, then a steam hl2 will work also

Edited March 11, 2006 by gdogg

[Aegis]

Let's quit bothering Ripken with game requests. Most games will work...and if we keep requesting him to try out every game out there, then this topic will be flooded with useless info. A better alternative is to ask what doesn't work and why.

[ripken204]

will steam install, you dont need to buy anything to install steam , not even hl2

if it does, then a steam hl2 will work also

what do u want me to test, just if it installs fine?

edit: well i just installed it and it went fine

[gdogg]

yah, if steam installs, then all those games I mentioned above, will work

[ripken204]

i am currently trying to get a ram drive set up. the windows driver just doesnt want to work so i may have to use a third party driver which does work.

[Aegis]

Ripken you're not suppose to be discussing the features of GE just yet...

[Kramy]

Wow, this sounds really cool! I'm a little dubious about the supposed "performance gains" on my system, but it sounds rocking for 64bit!

I have an original Barton XP 2800+ (hardlocked multi) OC'd to 180mhz(2.25ghz), and Win2k really flies. When I heard you mention having IE installed and stuff, I started not taking you seriously for gaming, but reading all 15 pages ( ) has put that to rest. I can't really picture XP being good for gaming....ever really. Perhaps XPE is different?

In personal tests with multiple RTS games (WC3: TFT, WBC3, Kohan II: KOW), I've found that WinXP even nLited has severe performance problems. My Win2k has been HFSLIP+nLited, and I too broke some stuff like DirectX in the process. I can't actually install or update anything DirectX related, so I just have to move required DLL files to game folders until they run.

Anyway...With Warcraft III and KKOW being the biggest, I found between 20 and 40% performance gains between Win2k and XP. For Wc3 TFT I often enjoy 40% higher framerates, and my map loading times have bested several X2 4400+ w/XP systems, so it may be engine issues. Warcraft III is heavily CPU-based though, which makes be wonder just how efficient the multi-tasking XP kernel can me.

KKOW has a small community, but I found I load maps the fastest, despite having lower framerates than other people. Despite my choppy 10-15fps, I apparently bested some P4 3.6ghz computers and an Athlon 64 3200+ in load times. KKOW came out later though, which suggests it's more 64bit ready/optimized.

Oddly though(and I have no idea why), when I installed my lexmark printer driver on Win2k the huge fps boost vanished, and programs like Firefox/Trillian began starting slower. I've since re-done everything and removed printer support entirely.

So anyway...now that I've strayed away from my original point of posting - I read you may know about OS/kernel tweaks. Don't suppose you know any nice and real ones for gold ol' 32bit Win2k? Hex editting is my friend, though internal DLL knowledge is not.

Thanks, and I look forward to the public beta...you say 32bit processors will be supported?

Edit: Ah ha, just remembered my second reason for posting! You may want to look into GeoShell as a possible shell. It would require some tweaking, but GeoShell is heavily designed for low memory usage. Adding a taskbar or some other GUI component can only add between a few kb or a few hundred kb in memory.

Jaykul(creator) is quite busy with life right now, but he expressed some concern over where GeoShell is going, since Vista will change the landscape a lot and support many of GeoShell's features natively. You might want to talk with him to see about building a lite 2mb shell with a run box(ok, maybe a bit more memory usage, but no CPU interference, and gamers would at least be able to run it).

Fake "hover" start menus are also possible, though it'd be a bit time consuming to design one.

Edited March 13, 2006 by Kramy

[gdogg]

dont expect miricles from xpe is will just let you down.

oh and I believe war3 FT is locked in at 65 FPS.

Edited March 13, 2006 by gdogg

[Sofer]

I believe the Blizzard Graphic Engine used renders up to exactly 64 fps, however it can show more than that, it just begins to start duplicating frames.

Edit:

Just noticed that this was post #444

Freaky :X

Edited March 13, 2006 by Sofer

[ripken204]

stupid blizzard... i love warcraft III, i used to be a cheiftain of a clan until none of the members showed up anymore so i said screw it...

[Kramy]

I believe the Blizzard Graphic Engine used renders up to exactly 64 fps, however it can show more than that, it just begins to start duplicating frames.

I decided to check out and measure the different framerates on Win2k(HFSLIP+nLited) vs WinXP(nLited), aswell as checking out wc3 in OpenGL (use -opengl )

1280x1024x32 8xAA 16xAS

GeForce 6600 256mb OC

FRAPS used to display/measure FPS.

Win2k DirectX 9.0c

----------------------

Average FPS: 30

Max FPS: 30

Win2k OpenGL

----------------------

Average FPS(Game): 20

Max FPS (Game): 30

Average FPS(Bnet): Max

Max FPS (Bnet): 60

WinXP DirectX 9.0c

----------------------

Average FPS: 30

Max FPS: 30

Ok...it may be something driver related since DX won't go over 30fps. DirectX actually performs better, and XP seems smoother. The various setups had different issues though, and that was when I noticed the abysmal loading speeds of XP for Wc3.

Win2k DirectX 9.0c:

Alt+tab takes between 5 and 12s to complete, during which the system does nothing. Screenshots take about 3s to save before the next frame.

Win2k OpenGL:

Text looks horrible on anything less than 1280x1024. Image Quality fine, but rendered text looks worse than with DirectX.

WinXP DirectX 9.0c:

Morter team explosions cause game to not show frames. The framerate is uneffected, but there is a very visible 0.2 - 0.25 second jolt before the next frame is displayed. Multiple explosions cause massive lag, though Alt+tabbing and screenshots are fine.

Drivers used were TweaksRus Extreme-XG 76.50 HD drivers, which I've been using for a long time.

Sorry for hijacking your thread. B) I've recently became fascinated by how many games lack default-toggled performance enhancing options. Don't even get me started on KotOR - one line in an ini and you get triple the framerate, and no 10s freezes on Dantooine.

[3-R4Z0R]

By now it looks gorgeous!

My favourite Games are working as well

Can't wait for the public beta.

How long will aegis torture me ?

GreetZZ 3-R4Z0R

[ripken204]

a public beta will not be happening for a little while

first we are going to invite some more private beta testers so that we can try to get GE compatible with all systems

[Jeremy]

I'm not making this post to diss anyone. I'm asking you to make me be more optimistic about it, that's all.

You started from scratch (not using XPLite, nLite, other 3rd party tools). You're just removing DLLs and then once you find out some are needed for this game, and others are needed for that game, you put them back in. People say it might increase performance by 5%, but is all this really worth that. Some performance counters running in the background, but they are just DLL files and nLite removes a lot! If people know which DLLs they are, they can add them to the Remove Box.

My main question is: What is so much more beneficial with this, than just closing down everything in Task Manager before you load a game... on a system with AMD Athlon 64 3700+, 2 GBs of Dual Channel RAM and dozens of optimizations already in effect?

Just in: Drivers and threads running in the background that go beyond what Task Manager tells you generically? But nLite handles all that. Something new is added to each new version and with the final coming up on next release or one after that, more removals, and finally XP will be finished. With that said, it does seem to me, as if you're re-inventing the wheel...

Oh, and, this stuff shouldn't be so secretive, either.

Cheers guys,

Jeremy

PS: Once again, not trying to sour any moods here, just really curious about your answers to my questions.

@Ripken, haven't seen you online in a while, did Punto and me finally scare you away from Hl2 Deathmatch? Sorry I pwned you so hard.

[ripken204]

well what we are doing allows us to optimize much more than nlite does. the dll problems are pretty much fixed now. the speed increase in windows alone is pretty fast, i havnt had much time to mess around with games yet..

and what do u mean by secretive? what would you like to know.