Intel HD Graphics Help

[NeoTanner]

Does anyone know of a way to at least get 20-25 FPS while not having the game look like horse poop? Unfortunately, I have a crappy Intel HD graphics card (on board with core i3 processor). In Stormwind, I have about 15-20 FPS, sometimes dipping down to 5-8 FPS. Within a raid, it's about average 15-20 FPS, though I'd rather not have the dips in frame rate.

[Sunius]

Well, you can always buy a discrete graphics card if it's not a laptop.

[NeoTanner]

Unfortunately, it is a laptop.

[Cynadra]

Ctr+Shift+Esc

Click 'Processes' tab

Right click on Wow32.exe

Click 'Set Affinity..'

Check the 'All Processors' box.

===anyone running windows 7 should be doing this, it defaults your programs to run on ALL your cores instead of using 1 until it's underload and then switching to the next core... overall, better performance.===

[Saithes]

Ctr+Shift+Esc

Click 'Processes' tab

Right click on Wow32.exe

Click 'Set Affinity..'

Check the 'All Processors' box.

===anyone running windows 7 should be doing this, it defaults your programs to run on ALL your cores instead of using 1 until it's underload and then switching to the next core... overall, better performance.===

WoW defaults to all threads now.

[NeoTanner]

And that was checked already, Cynadra

[Nellah]

doh.jpg

Unfortunately, no, Intel HD graphics are the lowest of low end GPUs. What you have is what you are stuck with. As it is a laptop, you'll be unable to upgrade it... pretty much just start saving for a new PC.

[Desh]

You aren't going to get very good performance out of an integrated graphics chip. You'll need to get a dedicated but unfortunately that is not possible with a laptop.

[vesseblah]

Unfortunately, it is a laptop.

Sadly you're fucked then. Just need to turn video settings lower until it's playable.

===anyone running windows 7 should be doing this, it defaults your programs to run on ALL your cores instead of using 1 until it's underload and then switching to the next core... overall, better performance.===

Anyone running any kind of Windows should not be doing this as you risk messing up stuff with zero gain.

WoW has been running on two cores since TBC beta (2.0) and ALL your cores instead of using 1 since WLK beta (version 3.0) automatically.

[Isendar]

Don't feel bad, I ran wow on a black friday $500 budget Toshiba laptop almost 4 years ago before TBC. In old areas I was getting 5-15 fps on all low/off settings and would crash every 5 minutes to BSOD. I upgraded the meager 512 megs of ram (On Vista basic mind you...) do 2 gigs and enjoyed a solid hour of gameplay until BSOD. Figured out later that the BSOD was caused by the ATI video card superheating and shutting down to prevent a gpu core melt-down. Poor integrated low end ATI gpu is now subjected to the torture my father and mother put it through as they utilize it for email, attending to legal matters, and enjoying a silly video or two until it decides to crash and BSOD.

I bought an Ibuypower laptop with an Nvidia 8600GT MXM card. It performed amazing and gave me 30-45fps in medium/high settings in WoLK. Raids would drop it to 5-15fps. Luckily I bought a new desktop near the end of WoLK and had no quarrels. That laptops' GPU finally gave a little less than a year ago due to heat related issues.

I went all out and bought myself an Alienware M18x with AMD 6990 c-fire. Needless to say, I run WoW in stormwind at about 45-60/62 fps at Ultra settings (yes even shadows, although I learned that turning v-sync off helps alot!). I recently upgraded my desktop to a single 560 Ti and enjoy about the same settings. I will be buying another 560 in the next day or so!

[NeoTanner]

Well, I've managed to figure out the stop in Frame Rate dips - I turned on Triplebuffering and it lets me stay above 19 FPS usually (unless the zone's loading at first). I prefer having the "Good" setting for the View Distance for some reason and I like Projected Textures (like for my druid's Swiftmend), so I keep them on, while putting every other detail to Low. I get a steady frame rate now and I don't get as many "hiccups" as I did when doing the Molten Front dailies or during a raid boss fight.