System Requirement question

Indianasmith · Post by **Indianasmith** » Sun Mar 26, 2006 11:24 pm

I just bought Oblivion last week. I bought my computer in January. It is a Compaq Presario with a 3400+ AMD Sempron Processor and integrated ATI Radeon Xpress 200 Graphics. (Note - I am copying those things off the labes on my computer and have little idea what any of them mean!)

When I purchased it I asked the salesgeek if it would be able to run "Oblivion". He seemed familiar with the game and said that it should run on my PC, no problem, so we bought the computer.

Now I've bought the game and loaded it and started playing. The action is unbearably slow, especially in combat, and when I climbed up out of the dungeon after the emperor gave me his amulet and started to emerge into the daylight, the computer flashed a "Virtual Memory Minimum Too Low" warning and froze up. I haven't bone back into it yet.

I realize what I really need is probably a new video card and some better memory, but I can't afford either of those things right now. Is there anything I can do on the "Options" menu that might enable me to limp through the game until I can upgrade my system?

This is more a tech question than anything else, but I would appreciate any help anyone could offer. Then I can come back and pester you with regular game questions.

Rookierookie · Post by **Rookierookie** » Sun Mar 26, 2006 11:46 pm

Set resolution to 640x480 and all graphics settings to the minimum.

Oh, and take everything the salesman tells you with two grains of salt. Three, if possible.

Indianasmith · Post by **Indianasmith** » Mon Mar 27, 2006 10:39 pm

OK, tried that . . . .

This time as I exited the sewers, the world outside finished loading, but when it actually went to open, I got an error report . . . .

What is "anti-aliasing", and where do I access the control to turn it off? is it on the settings for the game, or on the PC itself?

Thanks again! maybe I'll get far enough to have some actual game-related questions soon!

Rookierookie · Post by **Rookierookie** » Mon Mar 27, 2006 10:42 pm

Somewhere in Options. It might be called AA or something.

Threads like this are the only reason I keep visiting this forum, because I don't want to get spoiled by screenshots/spoilers.

Dyre Straits · Post by **Dyre Straits** » Tue Mar 28, 2006 12:26 am

Indianasmith,

(If you're actually from Indiana, I am, too.

)

As for your problem:

You should also share with us the amount of System RAM that is in your new computer. I'm almost certain that it's likely about 512 MB. If so, due to having Integrated Video, you're going to be greatly limited as to what games you can play with any real enjoyment. (What was said about the salesman is true....he's only out to sell you something and make his commission.) The reason being that, any activity that goes on on that computer has to be accomplished with the video card sharing the same memory as the system.

I just built a new system yesterday for my daughter-in-law with an AMD Sempron 3100+ and a separate ATI X500 PCI Express video card that has its own 128 MB of Memory and 756 MB of DDR 3200 System Memory. She's able to play Oblivion at 800x600 with a lot of features turned off. We tried setting it up at 1024 x 768 and it just lags too much to enjoy.

Essentially, due to the demands of the graphics in a game like Oblivion, your system is 'choking' on the demands. What might be a little help would be to try as soon as you can to add more system memory. But, in order for an integrated video card to work very well without struggling, you'd likely have to go to about 2 GB of system memory. Then, when you can afford to do so, upgrade to a separate video adapter with about 256 MB of its own memory.

To compare: I'm able to run Oblivion with all settings at High (but without any AA) at 1024x768 and I'm seeing 30 - 60 average Frames Per Second (FPS).

Good luck to you. I hope you can enjoy the game as it's really spectacular.

Rookierookie · Post by **Rookierookie** » Tue Mar 28, 2006 12:52 am

you'd likely have to go to about 2 GB of system memory.

Seems kind of a waste on integrated graphics.

To compare: I'm able to run Oblivion with all settings at High (but without any AA) at 1024x768 and I'm seeing 30 - 60 average Frames Per Second (FPS).

...which means that he will probably see about 3-6 frames per second on average with similiar settings...

Denethorn · Post by **Denethorn** » Tue Mar 28, 2006 12:57 am

Indiana Smith: I've actually got the game to play on my 3 1/2 year old GeForce 4 Ti4200, 15-40 fps. Which is actually an unsupported card and technically shouldn't be able to even run it. A similar method may work on your system.

I'll be posting the details tonight

Dyre Straits · Post by **Dyre Straits** » Tue Mar 28, 2006 1:09 am

[QUOTE=Rookierookie]Seems kind of a waste on integrated graphics.
...[/QUOTE]

Not really since that same RAM will be very helpful when upgrading to a good video card.

Dyre Straits · Post by **Dyre Straits** » Tue Mar 28, 2006 1:14 am

[QUOTE=Denethorn]Indiana Smith: I've actually got the game to play on my 3 1/2 year old GeForce 4 Ti4200, 15-40 fps. Which is actually an unsupported card and technically shouldn't be able to even run it. A similar method may work on your system.

I'll be posting the details tonight

[/QUOTE]

Keep in mind, though, that your card is a separate video card with its own memory....not an integrated video card.

Personally, I'll never own a system with integrated video.

fable · Post by **fable** » Tue Mar 28, 2006 7:26 am

[QUOTE=Dyre Straits]Not really since that same RAM will be very helpful when upgrading to a good video card.[/QUOTE]

Exactly. Plus, he'll be able to run all sorts of mods, which in turn require extra memory.