Frame skip issues

[ED209]

Hi.

I've just bought the PC version and it's painfully slow on my laptop. The only thing that fixes it is to turn on the frame skip, but this just causes a new issue where the whole game is juddering.

My friends have all told me that they have fairly basic laptops but they don't have any issues.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

 

[r4v1n6]

It's hard to say without knowing more about your laptop. Hardware specs and windows version and such. The easiest way to gather that information is to press Windows-R and then type "dxdiag" (without the quotes). The window that pops up will have several tabs with information, but you can conveniently save all that information to a text file with one of the buttons in that window. Then you can attach that text file to your post.

Do note though that the text file may have some sensititive information such as your user name that you may not want to make publically known. I recommend looking through it and redact any sensitive information before posting.

Your laptop may have 2 different graphics chipsets. One for low power mode, and another one for high performance mode. Make sure that it's set to using the high performance mode before starting Terraria. It's usually possible to set it to switch automatically as needed, but I know Terraria before 1.4 didn't like that. I don't know if 1.4 changes that.

Also make sure the monitor refresh rate is set to 60 Hz. Terraria doesn't like it if it set to a higher rate (especially if it can't be divided by 60).

If your laptop is very old you may have to lower the graphics settings in Terraria. 1.4 adds several new effects that can be turned off if necessary. Lighting mode also effects performance greatly, at lower settings that will also effect how water renders though.

 

[ED209]

Thanks, here it is:

 

[r4v1n6]

I'm sorry but that laptop doesn't seem to meet even the minimum requirements for Terraria. Your model seems to use the Intel i3-2365 CPU which simply aren't fast enough (only 1,4 GHz). You also don't have much RAM (only 4GB). While Terraria should be fine with that, it will cause the system to use the harddrive frequently to supplement memory. That will slow things down further.

 

[ED209]

I'm sorry but that laptop doesn't seem to meet even the minimum requirements for Terraria. Your model seems to use the Intel i3-2365 CPU which simply aren't fast enough (only 1,4 GHz). You also don't have much RAM (only 4GB). While Terraria should be fine with that, it will cause the system to use the harddrive frequently to supplement memory. That will slow things down further.

But I've got friends who have similar laptops and have no issues. It seems stupid to need so much kit for a £6 game. It's unplayable, I'm either too slow (like walking on honeyblocks) or it's too juddery.

 

[r4v1n6]

The game's price doesn't really have any bearing on it's requirements. 1.4 adds a lot of bells and whistles that increase the performance requirements. You can try disabling those as much as possible. For Quality set it to Low, and for Lighting set it to Retro. You may be able to disable Frameskip then.

 

[ED209]

The game's price doesn't really have any bearing on it's requirements. 1.4 adds a lot of bells and whistles that increase the performance requirements. You can try disabling those as much as possible. For Quality set it to Low, and for Lighting set it to Retro. You may be able to disable Frameskip then.

Nope, still awful. How much RAM does it need?

 

[r4v1n6]

The requirements that's listed in the Steam Store (I don't know how accurate those are, they are probably rather subjective):
RAM: 2,5GB (minimum) 4GB (recommended) Do note these are for the game itself, the system also requires some RAM (typically around 1GB for Windows 10)
CPU: 2GHz (minimum) 3GHz (recomended)

In your case, it's the CPU that's the problem. It simply isn't powerful enough. Adding more RAM to your current laptop (if that's even possible) may help a little but isn't enough.

If you have a web browser open while playing, try shut it down. They are pretty greedy with regards to resources, especially if you are on a page with ads.

 

[ED209]

I tried that

The requirements that's listed in the Steam Store (I don't know how accurate those are, they are probably rather subjective):
RAM: 2,5GB (minimum) 4GB (recommended) Do note these are for the game itself, the system also requires some RAM (typically around 1GB for Windows 10)
CPU: 2GHz (minimum) 3GHz (recomended)

In your case, it's the CPU that's the problem. It simply isn't powerful enough. Adding more RAM to your current laptop (if that's even possible) may help a little but isn't enough.

If you have a web browser open while playing, try shut it down. They are pretty greedy with regards to resources, especially if you are on a page with ads.

I tried that, still nothing. I only bought it to build a adventure map I've had in my head, but I'll probably just keep playing on PS4 instead. The controller support on PC is a joke anyway.

 

[r4v1n6]

Well you have it now. At some point in the future you might get a better pc. You could try again then.

The controller support could be improved, though it works decent enough. Console is better though. For the most part it's the unintuitive UI that causes issues when using a controller. I use an Xbox controller and have mapped the buttons to resemble classic console as much as possible (perhaps Redigits mapping is better but I can't get used to it). But for some reason I can't drop the damn Voodoo Doll when initiating a fight against WoF with the controller. I have to briefly use the keyboard and mouse to do that. That's a bit of a bother as I often sit in the living room when using the controller (my tv is connected to the pc in another room).

 

[ED209]

Well you have it now. At some point in the future you might get a better pc. You could try again then.

The controller support could be improved, though it works decent enough. Console is better though. For the most part it's the unintuitive UI that causes issues when using a controller. I use an Xbox controller and have mapped the buttons to resemble classic console as much as possible (perhaps Redigits mapping is better but I can't get used to it). But for some reason I can't drop the damn Voodoo Doll when initiating a fight against WoF with the controller. I have to briefly use the keyboard and mouse to do that. That's a bit of a bother as I often sit in the living room when using the controller (my tv is connected to the pc in another room).

True. I have a better PC now, but it's in my home office where I am all day. In the evening I want to sit and play on my laptop hooked up to the telly, and tweak what I'e done in TEdit the following day for about 10 minutes on the desktop. As I said, I've only bought the PC version for this one adventure map I want to make, so it's not a huge deal.