Support NeoGAF

[Hooker]

The beta version of the Catalyst 4.9 which improves OpenGL performance. In case you're wondering, Cat4.8 improves FarCry performance by enabling PS2.0b. 4.9 is the one that increases Doom3 performances by 5-30% on x800 cards, less on the r3** cards. Still an improvement though.


http://www2.ati.com/drivers/wxp-w2k-DOOM-HOTFIX-8-05-040727a-017086E.exe

Use at your own risk, these drivers are still BETA!!

Also how to make the game play and load faster:

There is a boost, but don't expect miracles. With that said, give this a read:


As all of you who allready have this game recognized the game is very slow even on new Computers.

I found out the reason for this and the solution to fix this problem.

As you already know after installation the game consits only of the doom3.exe and some .PK4 files. Those PK4 files includes the entire game (sounds, videos, textures etc.) in high compressed form.

Normally those files were decompresse during the game.

But this exactly is the problem. Even new CPUs are not able to decompress those files while running the game with good peformance and therfore the game runs very **** also on new computers. I don't know if the develpers of ID-Soft was just too stupid to think about this or if they have an agreement with some hardware manufacturing firms.

How to get around this problem:

It is very simple. Go to your Doom 3 installation directoy and get inside the folder "Base". There are some .PK4 files you have to open each of them with WinRAR 3.3 and extract their entire contents to the Base dir in you Doom 3 installation folder (replace all files if they are any duplicates). Now you have to delete all .PK4 files in the Base folder to prevent the game to use those compressed files agian.

Now the game starts and runs mutch faster!!!

Have fun playing Doom 3!!!

 

[MaddenNFL64]

You should post this in the Doom 3 sticky thread also.

 

[Hooker]

I was just skimming through the thread, and I saw someone else already posted it. I didn't want to do it as it says "(ALL POSTS ON THE GAME HERE)" and this isn't solely about the game so :/

I also just came back from a vacation so I need to read the forum some more to check up on news and already posted subjects

 

[dark10x]

Err, id wasn't stupid about those files...they NEEDED to be compressed. I just started to give that idea shot, and after just TWO of the five LARGE pak files...I had already crossed 1.8gb (compressed, those files were ~550mb).

 

[MaddenNFL64]

Well if you have the space, i'm sure it's worth it.

 

[dark10x]

Well if you have the space, i'm sure it's worth it.

The thing is, what does it improve? If it is just related to loading, I'm not going to even bother as the game loads VERY quickly on my machine as it is. If the framerate is taking a hit due to these files, however, I'd consider it...but I don't see how as it doesn't seem to be de-compressing anything as you play.

The thing is, though...that guy suggested that id was STUPID for compressing those files and I disagree. It is very obvious why they were compressed and, quite frankly, that compression makes much more sense to me than just leaving all of the assets out there in the full form.

 

[Hooker]

I just started decompressing so no impressions from me yet. Couple of buddies of mine did say that the game is immensly smoother. Especially when you open a door and find a monster behind it, it usually stutters for a brief moment, these moments are gone.

 

[Raxel]

I'm getting a huge boost on my 9800 pro, almost 30%. I dont think I enabled vsync or changed the 3D settings in the control panel either.

 

[Hooker]

Oh yeah, with the decompressing of the PAK files you won't be able to play PURE multi servers anymore.

Here's another bit someone wrote about it

his is a guarenteed way to get a MASSIVE performance increase to your game, at the expense of taking up a little more hard drive space (2 gigs approx). I went from running low quality at 800x600 to running High Quality on 1024x768. This improves load times AND framerate/details.

There is a catch! By doing this, you temporarily can't connect to pure multiplayer servers. You have been warned (I'll tell you how to revert it at the end)

After installation, the Doom III Folder consists only of the doom3.exe and some .PK4 files. Those PK4 files includes the entire game (sounds, videos, textures etc.) compressed. They are normally uncompressed in mid game, which is very hard on your CPU. Lets fix this!

1. Make a copy of ALL the files in C:\Program Files\Doom 3\base. This is some big filage, but if you want to revert to MP without reinstalling you need to do it.

2. Unrar the following .pk4 files (just pretend they are .rar's and open them with winrar) into the C:\Program Files\Doom 3\base folder (each one should unrar a single folder such as textures or models):

pak000.pk4
pak001.pk4
pak002.pk4
pak003.pk4
pak004.pk4 (This one has many files, put them all in \Base and over right any that apply.

3. Now delete the files above (pak000-004) or move them to another folder for storage so you can revert to multiplayer.

When you want to revert to multiplayer, restore everything you had before and get rid of the new stuff. I'm not sure if the folder "maps" is the same or not, so make sure you back that up.

When in normal mode, you should have "maps" "savegames" "config.spec" "doomConfig.cfg" "doomkey" "game00.pk4" and "gamex86.dll", nothing else.
ALSO! If you open DoomConfig.cfg (C:\programfiles\doom3\base) in notepad and change

seta image_cacheMegs "32"

to a higher number, such as 96 or 128 you will see a big increase too. Go for it bad boys!

The PAK files are 1.44 gigs when compressed, 3.68 when decompressed, if someone wanted to know

 

[dark10x]

Especially when you open a door and find a monster behind it, it usually stutters for a brief moment, these moments are gone.

I have yet to experience ANY of that, so I'm not concerned with fixing that aspect...but I am shocked to hear that it has a nice framerate boost.

I may just give this a shot...

 

[Gattsu25]

i think the 30% boost comment was talking about the beta cat. drivers

 

[MaddenNFL64]

Dark was referring to the little walkthrough. It mentions framerate increase.

 

[dark10x]

i think the 30% boost comment was talking about the beta cat. drivers

This is a guarenteed way to get a MASSIVE performance increase to your game, at the expense of taking up a little more hard drive space (2 gigs approx). I went from running low quality at 800x600 to running High Quality on 1024x768. This improves load times AND framerate/details.

We'll see...

 

[Andy787]

Why did they not just release this game, uncompressed, on a single DVD in the first place, or at least offer that option? By just doing that, the entire reception of the game as far as from a hardware/technology perspective, would be vastly improved, and people would be even more impressed and confident that the game would run well on their machines..

Anyway, awesome, awesome news either way. I'm really happy Ati is apparently increasing the performance of their cards so much in the past two updates.

 

[DaCocoBrova]

ALSO! If you open DoomConfig.cfg (C:\programfiles\doom3\base) in notepad and change

seta image_cacheMegs "32"

to a higher number, such as 96 or 128 you will see a big increase too.

This was the only tweak I've done, and I noticed quite a difference.

Anyone else find it impossible to toggle back to the desktop while the game is running?

 

[DopeyFish]

all their games since quake have been using PK Zip files iirc.

it's because installing would be a pain in the ass doing files seperately, and it's cleaner to look at. On FAT hard drives, it's not taking up any extra space because it's all in one big file.

oh yeah, great improvement if you ask me (the extraction one at least)

 

[dark10x]

This was the only tweak I've done, and I noticed quite a difference.

Anyone else find it impossible to toggle back to the desktop while the game is running?

YES!

It won't let me back to the desktop no matter what I do!

 

[Oni Jazar]

This was the only tweak I've done, and I noticed quite a difference.

Anyone else find it impossible to toggle back to the desktop while the game is running?

I just use alt-enter which makes the game play in a window. It happens pretty quick. Then you can alt-tab out. You might need another window already open though. The windows key seems disabled.

 

[DopeyFish]

wannabe doom 3 owners:

DOOM3 and Windows 98SE

For those die hard Windows 98SE users like me, if you want to run DOOM3 on this operating system, follow the instructions below.

1-Download and install FS Hex Editor. http://www.searchandreplace.com/fshexedit.htm

2-Back up the original DOOM3.EXE file (safety measure)
-Go in your DOOM3 folder; default is :\Program Files\Doom 3
-Create a folder called: BACKUP
-Copy your DOOM3.EXE file in your newly created BACKUP folder.

3-Modify the original DOOM3.EXE file
-Right-click on the original DOOM3.EXE file and remove the read-only attribute.
-Start FS Hex Editor and open your original DOOM3.EXE file.
-Use the search fonction and find: GlobalMemoryStatusEx
-The string should now be highlighted.
-Your screen is divided in 2 sections; left and right.
-The left side is in Hexadecimal format and right side is in Text format.
-Go on the left side and change the last 2 hex number from: 45 78 to 00 00
*Above are zero's NOT the letter O.
-Save the file.
-Start the game.

I've played for about 20 minutes, loading previous games, running the included benchmark (timedemo demo1.demo) etc...and everything seems fine.

Countach69
Bonjour à tous les Québecois qui fréquentent ce site.

 

[Kon Tiki]

Heh, whats the difference between a pure and non pure server?

I know the majority of servers will be pure, since it is default.

 

[DopeyFish]

i think pure = legal

 

[Hooker]

Pure is non-modified. So no tournament mutators or extra stuff.

 

[deadhorse32]

By extracting all those file you have access to the game's scripts/models/textures/maps/... and by modifying some files you can probably change a lot of game parameters ( propably flashlight radius, jumping higher, .... )

 

[crawlingpeter]

i tried upping my cache to 96 as well as decompressing all the files.. and my timedemo remainded the same.

anyone else have the same effect?

 

[Chopin Trusty Balls]

^^Yeah
A64-3000/1024 ram/9800 Pro

 

[crawlingpeter]

i assume that in order for this to work, youd actually have to change "seta image_useCache "0"" to "1"

 

[Bregor]

These tweaks shouldn't have an effect on the time demo. They both effect how the program loads up new material. They therefore will smooth out performance in any situation where Doom has to load a new map (etc.), but not the time demo which already has all of it's material loaded.

 

[Kon Tiki]

By extracting all those file you have access to the game's scripts/models/textures/maps/... and by modifying some files you can probably change a lot of game parameters ( propably flashlight radius, jumping higher, .... )

Or the amount of players online.

I want to know how people have 8,10,16 player servers!

 

[crawlingpeter]

Or the amount of players online.

I want to know how people have 8,10,16 player servers!

Clients Playing Multiplayer:

1) make a shortcut to the exe with these target commands : C:\ROOT\DOOM3\DOOM3.EXE +set si_maxPlayers 16 +developer 1 +com_allowconsole 1 +com_showfps 1
2) immediatly go turn your graphics quality on very low for all multiplayer games with more than 4 players, this is required since the engine is new (regardless of your videocard)
3) immediatly go change your name from "player" to "personal prefrence", this is to avoid name collison on servers, which will eventually kill servers
4) finally go to console and use the command "connect ip#" without the quotes, to join a multiplayer game in session

Hosts Serving Multiplayer:

1) make a shortcut to the exe with these target commands : C:\ROOT\DOOM3\DOOM3.EXE +set si_maxPlayers 16 +developer 1 +com_allowconsole 1 +com_showfps 1
2) use the in game server hosting menu, and choose dedicated, this seems to be the only way to currently host a game, this will allow you to host a game with 16 players

 

[drohne]

stupid noob question, but how do you open the console?

 

[emerge]

CRTL + ALT + ~

 

[Rockman]

After doing that tweak the game takes a bit longer to load but performance is better in game which is what matters most.

Catalyst 4.9 Beta
Medium setting using 1024 x 768
Athlon XP 2100+@2.0ghz
512 MB PC2700 DDR
ATI Radeon 9600 Pro

 

[dark10x]

Rockman, if I were you, I would consider dropping down to 800x600. It still looks very sharp, but the performance increase is well worth it! 1024x768 is very playable, but 800x600 removes any of the dips you might experience.

640x480 is even faster, obviously, but that is just a bit too low for a PC monitor these days...

 

[Rockman]

Rockman, if I were you, I would consider dropping down to 800x600. It still looks very sharp, but the performance increase is well worth it! 1024x768 is very playable, but 800x600 removes any of the dips you might experience.

640x480 is even faster, obviously, but that is just a bit too low for a PC monitor these days...

Good thinking.

 

[SaitoH]

I always play my games at 1024x768 or higher because I can't stand the way they look in a lower rez. For some reason games look fuzzy to me.

Why is this? Am I on crack?!

My thumbs have gone weird.

 

[dark10x]

I always play my games at 1024x768 or higher because I can't stand the way they look in a lower rez. For some reason games look fuzzy to me.

Why is this? Am I on crack?!

My thumbs have gone weird.

No, that's not strange. Some people love good IQ...but performance is MUCH more important to me.

 

[Slo]

I usually can't stand the way games look at 800x600 either. I'm going to try to limp along at 1024.

 

[Kon Tiki]

I updated to 4.9 and now doom 3 wont load. Error with atioglxx.dll. :/

It loaded the first few times. Now, nothing.

 

[ced]

I usually can't stand the way games look at 800x600 either. I'm going to try to limp along at 1024.

I almost always stick to 1024 as well, but I tried 800 last night and I can hardly notice, and the performance boost is pretty big.

 

[marsomega]

I almost always stick to 1024 as well, but I tried 800 last night and I can hardly notice, and the performance boost is pretty big.

Exactly the same thing. I barely notice at all at first. But I'm so into the game I forgot completely, its that good. Only thing is going from high to medium kills some of the textures.

 

[ravingloon]

For all of you guys who've done these tweaks, did you defrag your hard drive before installing? I know ID made a point of how you should do this, and considering the decompressing that's taking place, it would make sense that a messy hard drive would slow the process.

 

[Kon Tiki]

I defraged after. Very impressive results.

 

[Discharger]

i assume that in order for this to work, youd actually have to change "seta image_useCache "0"" to "1"

When I've got it set to 1, my game crashes during loading but if I take it off, it works fine. Even with lower numbers for the cache size, it still crashes before the id logo.

Oh well, the game is more than playable

 

[Gattsu25]

edit: Meh

 

[bogg]

Anyone installed the beta drivers? See any improvments? Unpacking the pk4's does show some improvments on my pc, especialy when entering a new room.
Great game btw