Just a few warnings

[BigDaddyRoth]

I'm new here. Well duh, this is my first post

 

I've been reading alot of the threads posted about performance with great interest, only to find people slagging the game off due to their own stupidity.

 

Recently I purchased 2 pcs. I got one as a make do (due to a bad financial situ at the time) and then replaced it (well I still have both like) with something better.

 

System 1 is a C2D with a radeon x1650 and doesn't run games.

 

System 2 is a AMD Phenom quad 2.4ghz with 4gb ram and a 9800GTX.

 

Any way, the point to this is that people seem to be missing the biggest problem running GTA4 - THEIR SYSTEM SETUP.

 

The first thing I want to point out is the use of Vista. Vista is an awful, slow, bug ridden OS. I have fact to back this up. When I purchased my Phenom machine it came with Vista on. Vista premium with bells and whistles. Games appeared to run very well on it (compared to my older c2d machine) and I was happy. About a week later I got a virus and Vista died (so much for taking a 80gb image of itself huh?) and I installed XPMCE instead.

 

And my lord, what a total difference.

 

Grid, which ran at 27FPS on my Vista setup then ran at 52FPS with identical settings.

Crysis gained 8 FPS over the 22 it was offering before, and GOW was also much better.

 

I had heard all kinds of bad about Vista before I got the new machine, but I admit I was lazy and didn't want to have to unpack a new computer and then spend a good day setting up windows (I have about 300 plugins for photoshop that all need manually installing).

 

So that's one thing out of the way. If you're using Vista you deserve everything you get (or from what I have been reading, are not getting).

 

The second port of call is 64 bit operating systems. They have awful drivers (gosh, a 64 bit Vista is the worst OS pretty much in the universe right now) which is bad enough, but seeing as any version of Vista is known to have poor driver support it doesn't come as a suprise that the 64 bit version is even worse.

 

So if you want to play this game and have it running properly do yourselves a favor and take off Vista and install XP with SP3.

 

I thought my new pc was fast, and really would never have known any different. Now? Crikey, it's uber fast.

[X2-Eliah]

Some folks are stuck with Vista..

 

Consider the OEM on laptops (and don't start giving that bull that games don't run on laptops etc.) and any other hardware.

Almost all pre-built PCs also come with Vista.

Same goes for most shop-builds (which are, ofc, of varying quality).

 

Then, think of the effort and money it takes to re-grade to an XP - you basically need to buy a seperate OS (is XP even for sale anymore?), and bother with all kind of data backup, drivers etc.

 

Then, and lastly, did you install the SP1 and all of updates to your Vista? Because the difference is right there.

[BigDaddyRoth]

Yup, everything was all up to date.

 

Sadly the fact is Vista is a poor operating system, in the same way that ME (aka multiple errors) was. It's just riddled with problems and sadly M$ are not going to support it for long enough to make it the best choice.

 

Back in January M$ put out a statement that they were no longer going to support post June 2008. They were then reminded of the laws of supporting software, and reminded that they couldn't just walk away and leave everyone in the lurch like they did with Millenium Edition. Voila ! SP1.

 

I would be utterly amazed if they ever released a SP2. XP wasn't really all that good until SP2 was released (for example before SP1 you couldnt even remove the pre installed msn messenger).

 

And already M$ are developing Windows 7 or whatever the hell they're calling it. Madness TBH.

 

The only thing that made me keep it in the first place was DX10 support. But it simply didn't warrant having a crap OS for everything else just to see a few games look a little better (and most of the time you wouldnt notice the difference).

 

My presumption on installing XP is that any serious gamer will have it sitting about from a system past, or, will want to fork out the $80 or so for it, being that it's like totally worth it. I just ran a test in Crysis Warhead and I peak at 70 FPS on high with 2xFSAA and average 42. In XP with SP3 of course.

 

The problem with most PC owners is that they think they know everything (being mostly intelligent beings) and thus will defend their software choices to the death and be stubborn. But the fact remains, XP is a much more solid GUI with a solid backend Kernel and *IS* faster and better than Vista in pretty much every aspect.

[CharmingCharlie]

We have a dedicated PC section for you to discuss the PC version here :-

 

http://www.gtaforums.com/index.php?showforum=240

 

I am sure you can find a topic in there that better suits your needs.