FPS Issues with modern hardware

[Phoenix7000]

So I've been trying to get Morrowind to play again on my laptop, and I've been running into all sorts of FPS problems. Specs are below:

 

Windows 7 Professional 64

 

CPU: i7 Q740

Graphics: ATI 5650 1GB Ram

Memory: 8GB

 

So as you can see, there really shouldn't be any problems here, and yet when outside I consistently get 9-15FPS. Sometimes briefly higher or lower, but usually in that range. Any thoughts as to what's causing this? I've tried running Morrowind vanilla (ie, no mods), as well as with MGE, and it makes no difference. In fact, the number of options I enable in MGE also appears to make no difference. Very strange

[bben46]

My guess is that Morrowind was made for older single core processors and cannot take advantage of the multi core i7 - and It can only use 2 Gig of RAM also -

 

Try shutting down all but one processor when running Morrowind.

[Povuholo]

Another thing to consider: If you turned your music slider all the way left, give it a small tick to the right. Having music volume off completely in the options menu is known to cause stuttering.

[Themisive]

I use Windows 7 Professional 64 bit, and with a dual core CPU. I've had no problems running Morrowind. However, it may be something to do with the CPU speed, RAM seems to OK, can you update you laptop CPU wit a faster one?

[Phoenix7000]

Tried it with only a single core enabled, that brought it down to 5 FPS, so that didn't work.

 

I don't have any other processors to try it with, but each core of the 740 runs at 1.73GHz, with incremental boosts to 2.93GHz possible. Given when this game was made, 1.73 should be more than fast enough, even on a single core.

 

Morrowind is only using about 15% of the CPU when it's running.

[JimboUK]

Have you tried disabling shadows? they're rubbish anyway and wouldn't be missed. I have an i7 and it runs fine, so it may not be anything to do with the CPU. It might also be worth trying the exe optimizer http://timeslip.users.sourceforge.net/exeopt.html

[Phoenix7000]

I gave the optimizer a try with no effect, and here's something odd I've noticed about the game (this happened before that patch, as well)

 

When I first start the game and load up my save file, I'll at first be unable to move but the frame rate will be in the 60-120 FPS range. Once I'm able to move again, after a few seconds, the frame rate starts to drop and within another few seconds it is down within the 5-15FPS range. This is getting to be very bizarre.

[JimboUK]

That's very strange, might be worth looking through this thread to see if there is anything you could try. http://forums.bethsoft.com/index.php?/topic/781497-vistawindows-7-problems/ If not it may be worth asking on that forum anyway, I dare say it gets more traffic than this one and someone there may have an idea.

[Phoenix7000]

Thanks, I followed a tip on there to improve performance in vista and 7, and it worked perfectly. Consistently over 100 fps now, thanks everyone. Here's the tip reposted here in case anyone else finds my thread while searching.

 

How to generally increase Morrowind's performance

 

If you are having problems with frame rates when running Morrowind try doing this, Right click your Morrowind shortcut> Click the compatibility tab> And tick the boxes that say disable desktop compositon, disable visual themes and disable display scaling on high DPI settings> Click apply and enjoy increased performance! :P

 

Credits to ViperArrow from here

[JimboUK]

I'll try that, I get around 40 which is OK but would prefer more obviously.