I was able to host last night, crosses fingers for tonight...

 

i was lagging a little bit last nite

 

New router is in. Want to test it out.

In the time being, found some tips to speed up your game:

Halo will automatically configure the video setup based upon your computer's hardware configuration, however, this is a very basic configuration. Therefore, you will want to go to the Options menu (see above) to configure your Audio/Visual preferences. Halo is very demanding on all areas of your system, particularly: Video, Memory, and CPU. In my opinion, a 128MB video card is recommended, at least 512MB of DDR RAM (1GB or more preferred), and 2.0Ghz CPU.

It is recommend you use the latest official drivers for your video card. At the time of publishing this article, the latest official driver release from ATI Technologies is Catalyst 4.9 and from nVidia is Forceware 61.77.

Resolution

The resolution you choose will dramatically affect how the game runs on your system. This setting will vary depending on what speed your CPU and video card are. Generally speaking, if you have a video card with 128MB of video RAM, choosing 1024x768 is recommended for best visual pleasure and good speed. Of course, in greater detail, the amount of shader pipelines your video card supports will also dramatically affect performance. For Halo, which is a shader intensive game, 8 shader pipelines is ideal for greater detail options and faster speed.

Refresh Rate

Halo allows for the refresh rate to be changed in game. Generally, if you have VSYNC enabled, choosing a higher refresh rate will improve performance.

Framerate

This option is extremely important to achieve max performance. Halo, by default, sets this to 30 FPS, which means the game will never go over 30 FPS in-game. For the XBOX version, this works perfectly, but for the PC version it should be ignored. The other options are VSYNC and OFF, throughout my tests with a X800 XT Platinum Edition, OFF has been the best choice. With 30 FPS, the game would lag noticeably. With this set to OFF, performance is improved but slight tearing tearing is evident. Increasing your refresh rate can reduced evident tearing.

Specular

This option has to do with lighting and how it is placed around texture models. Depending on which choice you pick, it can account for either 5 percent gained in performance. On higher end video cards (ATI Radeon 9800+) you can safely set this ON without little loss in performance. Lower end video cards (ATI Radeon 9500) may opt to turn this OFF.

Shadows

Shadows can dramatically increase or decrease the performance of Halo on any system. Roughly 10 percent can be gained with shadows turned OFF. The shadows in Halo are not normal shadows, they are soft shadows, so using video card drivers with better support for soft shadows is recommended.

Decals

Decals account for the lowest amount of processing power required by your computer's system (blood effects, shell effects, etc), about 2 percent gained in performance if set OFF.

Particles

The particles option has three settings: High, Medium, Low. Particles have to do with all of the explosions and muzzle flashes you see in the game. Roughly 8 percent of performance can be gained depending on which setting you use. Please note, out of all of the options (not including Shadows), the setting for Particles will be the second most noticed visual change in the game.

Texture Quality

The texture quality option accounts for how detailed and sharp the textures in Halo are. Depending on the setting, roughly 12 percent of performance can be gained depending on which setting you choose (High, Medium, Low). The texture quality setting will be the biggest visual difference in Halo (aside from Shadows).

Master Volume

This does not affect performance, therefore, it will be ignored.

Effects Volume

This does not affect performance, therefore, it will be ignored.

Master Volume

This does not affect performance, therefore, it will be ignored.

Sound Quality

This option has to do with the overall clarity of the sound quality within the game. The option has three settings: High, Medium, Low. The higher the setting, the more CPU processing power will be required. In our tests, setting this to High and having Hardware Acceleration set ON provided the best audio/performance ratio. With Hardware Acceleration support, you can safely set this to a higher setting, as you will have more CPU processing power available for this option.

Hardware Acceleration

Newer sound cards should support this feature. This option allows for much of the processing of sound to be laid onto the sound card, instead of the CPU, thus improving performance. If your sound card supports this, set it ON for best performance and audio presentation.

Environmental Sound

This can be compared to something like EAX support from Creative. It can improve your audio experience, but will decrease performance, depending on your sound card.

Sound Variety

This option accounts for the amount of sounds that are different in the game. It has three settings: High, Medium, Low. The higher the setting, the more CPU processing power will be required.

 

Halo is perfectly fine on my desktop h: And with my lower end vcard, i dont get that annoying haze when I zoom

XP1600
512MB pc2100
GeForce 2 Ti 64MB

:hugglez:

 

my runs okay even without a videocard. i only lag when the host lags h:

or so i think :thinking:

 

no halo tonight? :happysad: I left work 1hr early too :sad:

 

I still can't host.

Wickardo?

 

Someone say Haro? :rick:

 

Demo, join now!

 

:eek4: