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Doom_user

How well would Doom run on a netbook?

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I'm considering buying a netbook, but only if I'd be able to run GLBoom on it and get a playable framerate at the native resolution of 1024x600.

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It would be certainly capable of running ZDoom in software mode even at that resolution (if my Athlon 1400+ notebook with 512 MB can do it, then a netbook surely can).

However stay away from any kind of OpenGL or DirectX acceleration: it will just make things run a lot slower.

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It really depends to a great extent on the specs of the netbook. Ive run Doom in OpenGL with a very, very old laptop, but it did have a dedicated graphics chipset. You'll definitely be able to run Doom with software rendering, but OpenGL is up in the air.

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Very well indeed in my experience. I've got the latest version of Doomsday currently running on my eee901 and although I've had to tweak some of the settings to maintain a steady 30fps it worked out of the box* (by box I mean source package which I compiled myself). Note though that I had to manually change the fullscreen resolution to 1024x600 as it didn't default to that (will address at some point).

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I run and develop Chocolate Doom on my EEEPC-901, and run it at full screen resolution (software mode) with smooth frame rate. I've never tried glboom, though I doubt it can be slower. I've certainly run Cube full screen and that uses GL and has smooth frame rate.

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I mentioned that it would be slower in OpenGL mode because on laptops of that class and netbooks, they usually throw in some el cheapo Intel or S3 Savage integrated graphics, which have absolutely no 3D hardware on them.

They may have run-time compatibility with OpenGL and Direct3D, which however will be totally software emulated. And usually the dedicated software renderer is way faster than the generic OpenGL/Direct3D emulator bundled into the drivers (when it is bundled, that is).

My laptop has an ATI Radeon IGP320 (roughly equivalent to a desktop Radeon 7000) and while it can run Direct3D and OpenGL stuff, it can only do so acceptably with no effects such as antialiasing and at resolutions <1024*768, after which it just barfs (damn shared memory...). Using GZDoom in OpenGL instead of with the software renderer barely looks good better enough to justify its use, and is much more prone to slowdown with large levels, lots of monsters etc.

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Netbooks typically come with an Intel graphics accelerator (well, with the exception of ones with AMD CPUs... would come with Geode), and they run Quake 3 just fine even.

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MikeRS said:

....Quake 3...


Which is an OpenGL game with "requirements" that are amply overtaken by any GHz-class CPU with an architecture designed after the Pentium I. For that matter, even Unreal and Unreal Tournament and Half Life 1 would run as fine on a netbook.

However GZDoom can be quite heavy, especially with GL lights on (a Pentium 4 with an Nvidia TNT2 barfed with more than a dozen of light sources on the screen visible at once).

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kristus said:

I've played Half Life deathmatch on a notebook.

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MikeRS said:

Netbooks typically come with an Intel graphics accelerator (well, with the exception of ones with AMD CPUs... would come with Geode), and they run Quake 3 just fine even.

that's because the technology isn't from intel, it's powervr. they're better for embedded solutions, just don't try bloom on them. That's why the recent intel graphics chipsets don't suck.

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To make a long story short:

You should be fine with software rendered ports. With most modern OpenGL stuff however, including the latest OpenGL Doom source ports, it's even money whether it will totally suck or play acceptably.

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I was intrigued and decided to run a test. I took PrBoom-plus in OpenGL mode, tweaked all the options to things I thought might make it run faster, then ran it in 1024x600 fullscreen. I get 54.3 frames per second when doing a timedemo on Doom I DEMO2.

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fraggle said:

I was intrigued and decided to run a test. I took PrBoom-plus in OpenGL mode, tweaked all the options to things I thought might make it run faster, then ran it in 1024x600 fullscreen. I get 54.3 frames per second when doing a timedemo on Doom I DEMO2.

Can anybody with slow computer (p3/p4 or something) test the latest beta of glboom-plus 2.5.0.2 with and without gl_sortbytexture? (it will appear in cfg after first start)

I have these results on Core2Duo at 640x480, but I am not sure about slow systems and probably it can be slower (gl_sortbytexture 0 -> gl_sortbytexture 1)

map12 2662 fps -> 2662 fps;
dv    590 fps  -> 636 fps;
epic  218 fps  -> 234 fps;
nuts  64 fps   -> 83 fps;
Win32 EXE: http://prboom-plus.sourceforge.net/prboom-plus-2.5.0.2.test-win32.zip
SVN sources: https://www.crowproductions.de/repos/prboom/branches/prboom-plus-24/prboom2/
Demos: http://prboom-plus.sourceforge.net/test_demos.zip
Command line:
glboom-plus -geom 640x480w -nosound -timedemo sky.lmp
glboom-plus -geom 640x480w -nosound -file dv.wad -timedemo DV04-UVMAX3.lmp
glboom-plus -geom 640x480w -nosound -file epic.wad -timedemo epic.lmp
glboom-plus -geom 640x480w -nosound -file nuts.wad -timedemo nuts.lmp

Do not forget about gl_vsync 0 in cfg

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50+ fps in OpenGL mode was better than I expected, honestly, used as I am to horrible S3 Savage and pre-GMA 900 Intel integrated shit.

It seems that at least some of the Intel 900 series integrated graphics have some support for OpenGL, but the memory being shared and all, I honestly don't think any integrated solution can achieve a greater frame rate than a software solution, even if it "looks" better with lighting effects, plus many effects are still not hardware accelerated.

Basically it's a tradeoff between accepting the looks of the software renderer, or accepting some extra CPU and memory bandwidth burden in order to get a more "3D accelerated" look, which usually won't exceed the software renderer in absolute framerates.

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entryway said:
Can anybody with slow computer (p3/p4 or something) test


PIII-550 512MB SDRAM, GeForce2 MX400 64MB SDRAM
Windows 98SE
glboom-plus.cfg from prboom-plus-2.5.0.2.test-win32.zip
640x480 fullscreen

                 -0-             -1-
sky               83              84
dv                39              40
epic              23.9            24.4
nuts              7.5             8.8
nuts rlytics     (10902)         (9272)

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Without implying that the MX400 is "t3h sh1t" in terms of performance, these tests stress mostly the CPU due to vertex/monsters calculations. If you really want to see how good just the graphics card is, try something with GZDoom and lights.zip loaded, especially a map with many luminous projectiles, light sources etc.

For example, Mock's 2 all-cacodemon map with flying clusters of cacodemons shooting 1000s of fireballs at you, slows to a crawl as soon as the fireballs come anywhere near you shining in all of their OpenGL super-duper effects, and that's on an Athlon 64 3200+ with an AGP 8x Ati Radeon 9600XT (mine). Now, that should be even more of a crawl on a lesser graphics card, let alone on an integrated one.

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Maes said:

Without implying that the MX400 is "t3h sh1t" in terms of performance, these tests stress mostly the CPU due to vertex/monsters calculations. If you really want to see how good just the graphics card is, try something with GZDoom and lights.zip loaded, especially a map with many luminous projectiles, light sources etc.

Hitherto did not want to see how his graphics card is good or bad. It was just a test of some changes in prboom+ on old hardware. There is no difference for me how much fps he has. I wanted to see only difference between gl_sortbytexture 0 and 1 (1 should no be slower than 0). Now I have the answer.

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I think any modern Doom port would run great on a netbook, even better with OpenGL turned on. Hear me out.

You only have 1024x600 pixels to drive, which is not an awful lot. If you turned the detail settings down so you're not doing anything too fancy like anti-aliasing, high-res textures, or advanced lighting stuff, you should be fine. Basically make it look like Vanilla Doom but in higher res. This would be preferable to running in pure software mode, as it would offload a fair amount of the graphics processing to the GPU, leaving the CPU free to do other tasks, improving overall efficiency.

Those Intel GMA chipsets are not to be sneezed at, they're roughly equivalent to a nVidia 5000 series, they just have a bad rep with gamers due to compatibility issues with newer DX7 or later games, as some models of Intel can't do some features (like T&L or vertex shaders) in hardware.

(This is most notable in the previous Macbook's GMA950, so all the Macfags had a big whinge that they couldn't run Crysis on their $1300 plastic computer, even though Steve Jobs promised them "it just works". Bit of a troll and flame there, but anyway :P)

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Super Jamie said:

(This is most notable in the previous Macbook's GMA950, so all the Macfags had a big whinge that they couldn't run Crysis on their $1300 plastic computer, even though Steve Jobs promised them "it just works". Bit of a troll and flame there, but anyway :P)


Filling some random Mac fanboys' ass with concrete is always welcome in these forums, don't worry about that ;-)

I still don't see how OpenGL can work better than pure software on a shared memory system though: I mean, you have all the memory bandwidth requirement of the game and windows themselves, PLUS the added burden of the shared RAM being used for textures, not just for frame buffering. Even assuming that the "GPU" has some processing capabilities of its own and is not actually offloading everything to the CPU, there's still too much shuffling data around.

A netbook, by definition, is not as powerful as a notebook: slower RAM and no hint of dedicated video RAM or even of a slightly advanced GPU.

Dunno, I could run some tests with my notebook (Athlon XP 1400+, 512 MB of RAM, shared video memory 16, 32 or 64 MB, Radeon IGP320 with partial hardware T&L) but insofar, anything using OpenGL/DirectX runs in the 30-40 frame range, which doesn't feel smooth by any standard.

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Maes said:
Dunno, I could run some tests with my notebook (Athlon XP 1400+, 512 MB of RAM, shared video memory 16, 32 or 64 MB, Radeon IGP320 with partial hardware T&L) but insofar, anything using OpenGL/DirectX runs in the 30-40 frame range, which doesn't feel smooth by any standard.

Run 3DMark03 (+ latest patch), it does both hardware-assisted and software-only benchmarks in its' normal run, which should produce noticeable differences. It certainly does on my 2Ghz C2D laptop with Intel X3100 GPU.

(Out of interest, that system scores 1773. My P4 3Ghz desktop with ATI 3850 scores a bit over 25000, though I barely managed 1008 with my old FX5200)

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Heh, most of the 3DMark03 tests won't even run because of the lack of advanced shaders etc. However 3DMark01 produced about 2000-2200 3DMarks, depending on the resolution (with no AA).

That's about the score achieved on a Celeron 2.66 GHz with 1 GB of RAM and an nVidia MX400 with 64 MB of RAM.

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I think people are underestimating the netbooks too much in terms of power. My P2 233 rig can play GZDoom smoothly even with the worst 3d card in the world, and every machine nowadays is many times faster than that

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leileilol said:

I think people are underestimating the netbooks too much in terms of power. My P2 233 rig can play GZDoom smoothly even with the worst 3d card in the world, and every machine nowadays is many times faster than that


Depends. I reported several times what happened with a P166 and the ZDoom software renderer at 640 x 480: it worked fine for IWAD levels, but as soon as you loaded even the simplest PWAD speed plummeted. I have no doubt a netbook will run software mode just fine, but since OpenGL mode is unlikely to have hardware T&L, it will run with less FPS, no matter if it looks better or not.

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Maes said:

it worked fine for IWAD levels, but as soon as you loaded even the simplest PWAD speed plummeted.

That's a silly myth, that never happened when I zdoomed on my old machines (much slower) with pwads and even played online with them.

Maes said:

but since OpenGL mode is unlikely to have hardware T&L,

In Doom, there's hardly anything to put through hw tnl unless a model pack would be used. A 486 can even handle GZDoom smoothly (it can't handle fmod though)

Remember, netbooks are capable of running Max Payne with a good framerate, and no Doom port demands more than Max Payne ever. (except for Vavoom but heh)

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leileilol said:

That's a silly myth, that never happened when I zdoomed on my old machines (much slower) with pwads and even played online with them.


Well, it happened on mine but it was with a specific version of ZDoom (for Windows, 2.1.7 I believe). Didn't try older/newer versions or DOS ones for that matter.

PrBoom (for Windows) ran everything slower than that particular version of ZDoom (in windows 98, eh!) but didn't suffer as much from PWAD loading. Seeing how these "features" and glitches come and go, it's not surprising you had no problems with older versions, especially if you used DOS. I also had 48 MB of RAM when I did those tests, so maybe that played a part. However it was mathematically assured: even by loading cybie.wad instead of MAP01, ZDoom 2.1.7 slowed to a crawl.

There. Version numbers and everything pinned down. Anyway, the hardware was really marginal and I'm surprised it ran at all. No wonder the slightest coding inefficiency could break it down.

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Maes said:

it's not surprising you had no problems with older versions,

i never stated I was using old Zdoom versions. It was the 2.2.X SVN builds range, which is pretty well more recent than the DOS versions you mention

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DuckReconMajor said:

Netbook or notebook?

Uhmm. I had to look that up. A netbook as it turned out. (my brother's)

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