Computer experts, please help!
 

Hey guys,

I recently tried playing HL2 on my laptop and it basically doesn't run. I have to play on the lowest settings and it still lags often. Now, I am not looking for "get a better computer". Heres my problem, when I did the PC test for this game my computer blew it out of the water... and when I try and play its doesn't play properly. Does anyone know why? I mean regardless of how bad my laptop may be, it should still run HL2! The damn game is like 7 years old.

All help is appreciated!

All the requirements are met right? Any error messages? Does it play at all? Bit more information might help people

Yeah like I said my computer even passes the "reccomened" specs but I can't even play on low. Yes it does play but it's very laggy even on low. I don't understand.

I'm not a real geek but, I play one for old people and kids.

The first thing I might look at would be to open task manager and see if anything else is running. if it is, stop it and go to your start up folder and see what's in there. (it all starts whenever you start your computer.)

If that's not it go to device manager and see if any ? marks show up for device drivers.



If that aint it call a real geek

Do you play equally demanding games without these issues?

This could be as simple as a software configuration, such as a driver issue or the game not installing properly.

If you play games of equal graphics/strain and they play well, then it's not a problem with your laptop, it's a problem with software.

Do games of the same graphics/strain cause these same issues? If that's the case, either:

1. Your laptop isn't powerful enough to play (even though it says recommended)

2. A part(s) of your hardware are malfunctioning. Which part can be determined by doing a few tests, but I won't touch on those until I know if this is the case.

If I were you, I'd just start making sure my graphics drivers were updated, reinstall the game to make sure it wasn't an installation issue, etc.

Yeah, I should check my drivers. Thanks! :)

Thanks M.C, I will do some driver checks and see if thats it.

Is it laggy as in latency? Or as in frames per second? Latency is usually a network issue. (For example if multiple people in my house are using the internet, world of warcraft starts lagging). Could be that the internet you use simply isn't designed for gaming. But I don't think that's the case since you play xbox live unless you have similar issues. (The internet plan as in high speed, or whatever) Some things can help like using an ethernet cable versus wireless.

If it is framerates, everything will be extremely choppy. That is usually when the computer can't keep up with the demand of the game. Or when there are other things running in the background and it is bogging the computer down.

One thing that really kills my online gaming on my PC is when I am using xbox live. My internet now just can't handle it well and it makes one or the other really crappy.

It is laggy as in FPS. However, I found a program called "Game Booster 3" which when switched to "Gaming mode" basically shuts down all the useless things on your computer to focus the computer on the game. This helped a bit but when I record my gameplay it strains my PC a bit. I suppose I can deal with it.

specs please.

you using FRAPS? now i havent worked with it in a long time, but back in the day (when i was rocking Dial-up and an Athlon XP) FRAPS used to just kill my frame rates (I used to try and capture my epic battles in PlanetSide or Asheron's Call).

one of the first things i do too, is open the MSCONFIG, and under start up, turn off everything but the bare essentials. some say to go into services as well and turn stuff off, but unless you know for sure what it is, i wouldnt mess with services too much... wrong thing and you get headaches and need to go to a restore point if thats turned on.

give us specs, or make n model atleast and ill see if theres more that i can help ya with.

I have tried Cam Studio, Camtasia Studio, FRAPS, WeGame, and many other stupid capture programs and the one that causes teh LEAST crash is WeGame, so I use that but even without WeGame HL2 lags (FPS lags not internet lags) on LOW settings. Now I KNOW something isn't right... Here is the picture below to the RECCOMENDED specs and my specs.




EDIT: I just did a test out of curiosity and according to the specs, my laptop can run Batman: Arkham Asylum on low. So why is it that it says I can run a next gen game on low but I can run a game from 2006 on low?!?!?! I'm furious, this is why I hate computers lol