Windows XP - Game runs at 1-2 FPS at times, unplayable.

[turbo2]

My system is old, yep. But I meet the minimum requirements, so it is really not acceptable for this game to be running at 1-2 FPS so often. Specs:

32-bit Windows XP SP3 w/ DirectX 9.0c
Athlon 64 X2 4400+
2GB RAM
Radeon HD 6670

I've tried both normal and opengl. OpenGL seems slightly better but still unplayable. I've noticed something that might be of importance - when I first started in the ship, it was really bad, like 5 fps. But once I fixed the computer thing which turned the lights on, it went up to a playable 25 fps. It seems like maybe graphical & lighting effects are killing the performance for me. BUT THERE IS NO WAY TO TURN EFFECTS OFF. I see no graphics options to tweak whatsoever.

I looked in the pinned thread and that stuff is useless. I was hoping someone else with Win XP + older machine found out some trick they could share with me?

P.S.: People who are going to troll "LOL OLD MACHINE UPGRADE" - I meet the listed minimum requirements. Because of this, 1-2 fps is not acceptable. The game should be playable at the minimum requirements. If it isn't, that's false advertising.

[lightningdragon10065]

Unfortunately, the game is, as far as I understand, still quite lacking in optimization.
There might be a mod (or mods) on the official forum that reduce/eliminate particle effects, so you might try that if you're okay running mods.
Other than that, I think the only thing you can do is wait for the devs to optimize the game more.

[Aro]

Waiting for a 1.0 release would be your best bet. The only thing I'd worry about is if they raised the minimum requirements at that point.

Actually it may be worth a try to run a flavour of unix to see if performance increases. Something like xubuntu.org would be really worth a try.

[Gravestone Andy]

yeah man, i gonna be "those people". but for heaven sake, you dont have to do a full upgrade, atleast go out buy a 4gb ddr2 ram. i bet you can get one for less than 15 USD at your local shop or newegg. im not asking you to get a 8gb ddr3/4 ram since windows xp cant really use those extra memory to the fullest, but even those are dirt cheap, you can get them around 40 USD

[turbo2]

This is an older mobo. It uses more expensive and very outdated DDR400. It would be a waste of money buying 4GB of outdated RAM and may not even help whatever my bottleneck issue is, given that I am in XP (much less memory hungry than later Windows versions.) Even if I had the money to waste on that, which I currently don't. BTW, 32-bit XP won't even give you access to 4GB of RAM.

You aren't paying attention. I meet their minimum requirements, therefore the game should be playable for me. Frequent drops to 1-2fps is not playable. I came here looking for some kind of fix. If there is no fix, that is false advertising and you're wrong to defend it. They listed the min requirements, the game should be eventually optimized to work for those requirements. If it doesn't then it's a case of fraudulent specs which are below the true minimum spec just to get more people to purchase the game.

How about - let me set a lower graphical setting ??? Can't believe it isn't even an option here. This game is basically space Terraria. There isn't anything insane going on here that needs a modern $1000 PC. I run Terraria and Minecraft perfectly fine. From what I've seen from its behavior, I think if I was given the option to simply turn off the lighting effects or switch to simple / basic lighting effects, I could run this game just fine as well.

Edit: Previously I have seen prices of something like $116 to upgrade this bucket to 4GB (well ~3.25 GB under 32-bit XP.) But I am seeing listings indicating maybe I can do it for $14. If that is legit and would actually work, it would definitely be worth THAT price, whether or not it fixes this problem.

Edit 2: Looked into it again. I have two "blue" ram slots and two black ones. Currently using 1GB of CAS 2.5 each in the blue ones I am running at the full 200 MHz (200x2 = 400 under DDR.) If I increase my RAM beyond this it will force me down to 166 / 333. Add in the ~3GB limitations of 32-bit XP and the fact that the cheap RAM I saw was CAS 3 and basically, NO. I'm pretty optimal for this old board right now. I'd have to buy a whole-new EVERYTHING to effectively upgrade, and that is not feasible and unjustifiable for what is Space Terraria.

[Kinja]

Origineel geplaatst door turboc2:

You aren't paying attention. I meet their minimum requirements, therefore the game should be playable for me. Frequent drops to 1-2fps is not playable. I came here looking for some kind of fix. If there is no fix, that is false advertising and you're wrong to defend it. They listed the min requirements, the game should be eventually optimized to work for those requirements. If it doesn't then it's a case of fraudulent specs which are below the true minimum spec just to get more people to purchase the game.

Not to defend the current, ♥♥♥♥♥♥, state of the optimization(the game has issues even on powerful PCs(there's plenty of threads around on the subject), but minimum requirements should never be taken as "the game is playable for me" if i just meet them, for many years now they've been more like "you can run the game if you meet these" for most games. So technically no one has lied to you about anything. Plus it's an unfinished, early access game, minimum specs can change along the way and the game can become better optimised, just wait for 1.0. If you played less than 2h you can refund it, if not just wait for 1.0 like everyone else, there's nothing else you can do about it.

[Dante]

I'm sorry, but windows XP isn't supported anymore. That means dev's really shouldn't be spending time making compatability fixes for outdated operating systems that people shouldn't be using anyway.

[Gravestone Andy]

Origineel geplaatst door turboc2:

This is an older mobo. It uses more expensive and very outdated DDR400. It would be a waste of money buying 4GB of outdated RAM and may not even help whatever my bottleneck issue is, given that I am in XP (much less memory hungry than later Windows versions.) Even if I had the money to waste on that, which I currently don't. BTW, 32-bit XP won't even give you access to 4GB of RAM.

You aren't paying attention. I meet their minimum requirements, therefore the game should be playable for me. Frequent drops to 1-2fps is not playable. I came here looking for some kind of fix. If there is no fix, that is false advertising and you're wrong to defend it. They listed the min requirements, the game should be eventually optimized to work for those requirements. If it doesn't then it's a case of fraudulent specs which are below the true minimum spec just to get more people to purchase the game.

How about - let me set a lower graphical setting ??? Can't believe it isn't even an option here. This game is basically space Terraria. There isn't anything insane going on here that needs a modern $1000 PC. I run Terraria and Minecraft perfectly fine. From what I've seen from its behavior, I think if I was given the option to simply turn off the lighting effects or switch to simple / basic lighting effects, I could run this game just fine as well.

Edit: Previously I have seen prices of something like $116 to upgrade this bucket to 4GB (well ~3.25 GB under 32-bit XP.) But I am seeing listings indicating maybe I can do it for $14. If that is legit and would actually work, it would definitely be worth THAT price, whether or not it fixes this problem.

Edit 2: Looked into it again. I have two "blue" ram slots and two black ones. Currently using 1GB of CAS 2.5 each in the blue ones I am running at the full 200 MHz (200x2 = 400 under DDR.) If I increase my RAM beyond this it will force me down to 166 / 333. Add in the ~3GB limitations of 32-bit XP and the fact that the cheap RAM I saw was CAS 3 and basically, NO. I'm pretty optimal for this old board right now. I'd have to buy a whole-new EVERYTHING to effectively upgrade, and that is not feasible and unjustifiable for what is Space Terraria.

you know, being a early access game, this is what you gonna get, bad optimization. i cant even run the game smoothly on my "better-than-ps4" laptop(though i havent try it on my gtx 970 deskktop), not to mention to runing the game smoothly as you expected on your windows xp desktop. and this is the reason why some people hated early access game in passion. but that graphics card of yours are pretty nice though. thats more than enough to handle this game.

[WhiskeyJim68]

You don't need to spend a thousand dollars to build a machine that can play this and many other modern games. I know this game does not look like it should require much but you at least need RAM and a cpu from this decade. Is this the only game you play? I can't imagine that the machine your using is much good for anything. I also wish the world had never moved on from windows XP (98 SE is my favorite of all time) because it was a good OS, but time marches on. You need to build a new machine. You can do a budget build by ordering parts from new egg or similar sites for less than 500 bucks that can at least get you started with options for future upgrades. I get you frustration since the game looks like it belongs on a super nintendo but you should take it as a sign that you really really need to upgrade. I built my rig 5 years ago for 700 bucks and have thrown a couple hundred more in in upgrades over those 5 years and it plays every game in my library very well. (except ARK, but it still does pretty good there.)

[turbo2]

Sad that so many people will defend a game running at (often) 1-2 fps at minimum spec. That's not defensible. "I can't imagine your machine is much good for anything" actually I can run Minecraft and Terraria just fine, which is relevant because 1.) a lot of people have issues with Minecraft fps, I don't 2.) Starbound is effectively Space Terraria. There's no justification for the extra workload here, it's just lazy programming and especially lazy that they don't even include ANY graphics settings?? This machine could still run most retail games off the shelf as of mid-2014, it runs Diablo 3 "OK" which is to say at about 20 fps, which is playable. Yet 1-2 fps in space terraria? Please.

[Gravestone Andy]

Origineel geplaatst door turboc2:

Sad that so many people will defend a game running at (often) 1-2 fps at minimum spec. That's not defensible. "I can't imagine your machine is much good for anything" actually I can run Minecraft and Terraria just fine, which is relevant because 1.) a lot of people have issues with Minecraft fps, I don't 2.) Starbound is effectively Space Terraria. There's no justification for the extra workload here, it's just lazy programming and especially lazy that they don't even include ANY graphics settings?? This machine could still run most retail games off the shelf as of mid-2014, it runs Diablo 3 "OK" which is to say at about 20 fps, which is playable. Yet 1-2 fps in space terraria? Please.

so in theory an intel core 2 with a 8800gt can run gta 5 right? wrong. you're hardware is aged. even though it says can run the game on paper, but it just cant in practice. this game is fairly cpu and ram heavy for the randomized universe. and cpu and ram is what you're lacking. nobodys defending this game, the bad optimization is one of the biggest fail of this game, even fanboys hated it. theres no excuse to using such old and barebone hardware expecting to run... a badly optimized 2d game. seriously, you already have a decent gpu, just go upgrade your ram and cpu, then update your windows, it will be a much better gaming experience for you. or just go out buy a 400 dollar-ish laptop will do too(dont do that, that will be stupid) my $400 old mid-2012 laptop with an i5 3210 with intel hd 4000 integrated graphics can run this game at 30fps 1080. "but... my hardware are past the minimum req." you might say, fine just think that way.

[Stupendous Man]

Origineel geplaatst door turboc2:

Sad that so many people will defend a game running at (often) 1-2 fps at minimum spec. That's not defensible. "I can't imagine your machine is much good for anything" actually I can run Minecraft and Terraria just fine, which is relevant because 1.) a lot of people have issues with Minecraft fps, I don't 2.) Starbound is effectively Space Terraria. There's no justification for the extra workload here, it's just lazy programming and especially lazy that they don't even include ANY graphics settings?? This machine could still run most retail games off the shelf as of mid-2014, it runs Diablo 3 "OK" which is to say at about 20 fps, which is playable. Yet 1-2 fps in space terraria? Please.

Most people are not defending it but putting up a valid argument, that it is an early access beta game meaning some people will have performance issues.

However, you are not quite at minimum spec. Minimum spec is a Core 2 Duo, per their site:

http://playstarbound.com/system-requirements/

A Athlon X2 4400+ is not equal to a Core 2 Duo:

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/37?vs=65

That is the closest to your CPU and lowest end Core 2 Duo I could find, which it still beats the Athlon X2. In fact that is a better version of your CPU, it has a bit higher clock speed and is running on AM2 using DDR2.

The CPU could easily be the bottleneck since the game itself is not insanely graphically demanding and your CPU is just a bit under minimum spec for the game.

Truth be told you can probably buy a Core 2 Duo with board and 4GB of system RAM for pretty cheap now. Sure you can argue that you wont get the full 4GB but 3.25GB is better than 2GB and if we consider that they put Core 2 Duo as the minimum CPU they probably mean 2GB od DDR2 800 is the minimum memory, 2x as fast as your DDR 400.

[_]

It may have nothing to do with your system, I have a GTX 970, 8GB RAM, and a 3.8 GHz CPU, but I was getting like, a max of 5 fps when I first started chopping down trees. As it would turn out, this issue for me had a work around. When I went into the files and launched the game via the .exe instead of through Steam, I got my FPS back. Now I get 50+ on unpopulated worlds. Try launching the game through the .exe in the files and see if that helps. I have had others thank me for telling them this.

I don't know why launching it through Steam would cause a loss in FPS, but it does.

[turbo2]

I will try that method, thanks. I guess I didn't try because my FPS goes so low, I didn't think such a simple thing as not launching through Steam would affect it enough.

As for the CPU comparison - on the benchmark site I looked at, my CPU was listed as slightly BETTER than the lowest Core 2 Duo rankings, which should put me still at just above the bare minimum. So yes, CPU could be my bottleneck but my general point is, the FPS is so bad that the fact that I am on the very low end of the minimum really isn't enough to explain it away. And as you say, my graphics card is much newer than the rest of my stuff (still amazed it works in this thing.) Good to hear people with much better systems are having issues. I'd really be fine with low fps like ~15 as long as it's playable. I know my machine is old. Hopefully the non-steam launch thing will work out.

[Power Button]

I agreed about that false advertising part. But, this is an early access and that theory will be valid if it's a full game release.

But to fix low fps, try to edit config files. It's starbound.config and it should be located in <YOUR GAME PATH>/Starbound/giraffee_storage.

look for lines that says "vsync : true" , set it to "vsync : false" , that might increase your fps little bit.