Can I use the MGE?

Post » Thu Sep 01, 2011 8:44 am

This is what I know about my laptop:

HP Pavilion g6
Processor: Intel Core i3 M370 @2.40GHz [I'm told this is a quad core. I guess that's good?]
RAM: 4.00 GB (3.80 useable)
Win 7- 64bit

Graphics Card: Intel HD Graphics
Approx. Total Memory: 1696 MB

Will I be able to install and use the MGE?
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Damian Parsons
 
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Post » Thu Sep 01, 2011 8:37 am

Well, I don't see why you wouldn't be able to use MGE, my laptop was/is older and fairly basic and it had no problems running MGE. Now I do have to admit, I did just set it to 'Best Quality' and didn't use any MGE mods. :shrug:


:dead:
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Ana
 
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Post » Wed Aug 31, 2011 8:24 pm

This is what I know about my laptop:

HP Pavilion g6
Processor: Intel Core i3 M370 @2.40GHz [I'm told this is a quad core. I guess that's good?]
RAM: 4.00 GB (3.80 useable)
Win 7- 64bit

Graphics Card: Intel HD Graphics
Approx. Total Memory: 1696 MB


My system maps very closely to yours. I have a dual core i3-2310 system, which is the next chipset after your core i3. I'm using integrated graphics as well, but I think the hardware revision mine is at had a graphics boost. I also have 4 GB of memory and am running Windows 7 64-bit.

Will I be able to install and use the MGE?


I had no problem with MGE, but trying to run any of the shaders (as outlined in the MGE section http://http://knotstheinane.blogspot.com/p/morrowind-modding-guide.html, which I recommend) pretty much immediately made the performance drop to unusable levels. This was after all the environment texture packs though.

Running MGE XE yields okay results (again without extra shaders), but frame rates can drop below 10/second in some areas (Balmora, heavily wooded areas). It does look nice though, the shadows are a nice touch. Even so, I'm considering going back to vanilla MGE sans shaders (or playing with the shaders some more to see if I can find a nice middle ground) for the performance.

You may in fact have better performance with MGE XE than me, regardless of video chipset, as I see little to no difference in MGE XE when running fullscreen 1600x900 compared to 1024x768, so it may be CPU limited, in which case your extra cores MAY be useful (although morrowind apparently can't take advantage of extra cores).

To save you trouble now, here's a tip that's stated everywhere but I can't overstate the importance of: right click and go into the properties, compatibility and set to run as administrator morrowind, morrowind launcher, MGEgui, MGEXEgui, morrowind code patch and anything else related you might run as an application/executable. For a while I through MGE XE (and the latest MGE subversion build) wouldn't work on my system, but I had forgotten that step...

Edit: I just tried MGE 3.8.2 r0178 again, and disabling all AA and other filtering, no shaders, I'm getting ~18-20 FPS in a scene I get 14-15 with MGE XE. I'm thinking MGE XE is worth it.
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neen
 
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Joined: Sun Nov 26, 2006 1:19 pm

Post » Thu Sep 01, 2011 8:43 am

You can never be sure with those integrated graphics cards, but it's worth a try. You can always uninstall it again if it doesn't work well.
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Noely Ulloa
 
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Post » Wed Aug 31, 2011 9:49 pm

Processor: Intel Core i3 M370 @2.40GHz [I'm told this is a quad core. I guess that's good?]

Physically it's a dual core processor. That doesn't matter much though, since Morrowind can only utilize one core anyway (with one small exception). Meaning: If you actually HAD four physical cores, the game wouldn't run any faster; your system would just have two additional CPU cores twiddling thumbs. Unfortunately, the CPU you mentioned lacks the one feature that could improve performance: TurboBoost, which makes one core run faster if the others aren't under full load. But it's probably not a significant difference in your machine either.

Will I be able to install and use the MGE?

I think so. Integrated graphics chips had been a compatibility horror for years, but lately this seems to have been fixed. However, as povuholo said, you never know .... I agree that it's worth a try. If it doesn't work, you can easily remove or deactivate MGE.
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Calum Campbell
 
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