[simon726]

Hey there,

I'm planning to reinstall my once enjoyed Freespace 2 computer and I have a computer system that is running Windows XP with these specifications:

- Intel P4 at 1.4Ghz
- 256 MB RDRAM
- Nvidia Riva TNT2 AGP Video card at 32MB
- 120GB Hard Drive
- Windows XP Pro with SP2
- 16X DVD-ROM drive (equiv. to 48x CD-ROM)

I've tried doing a search on this on this message board, but it wouldn't let me for no reason.....Anyway, I'm trying to install the program either from the original discs that is laying in my shelf for a couple of years or the ones downloaded from the Freespace zone website.

If one of you people downloaded from the Freespace zone website or have the original copy of the program, did you experience any problems?

Also, I know this is quite early to tell, but if one of you people were running on the Windows Vista (not yet released) operating system, did you also experience any problems?

I haven't tested the CDs that I downloaded from the Freespace zone website and installed it on my system, however.
Anyway, I hope this helps.

[Nuclear1]

Freespace 2 works fine on XP Home for me, though I've heard of XP Pro not particularly liking some games. Your specs are just fine as well, though the graphics card may be a little outdated, especially if you would to run Freespace Open (i.e. Source Code Project).

As for the search problems, the administrators have shut down the Search function simply because one search can often lock up the boards.

You can use either the CDs on your shelf or the copy from FSZ. I personally haven't had any problems with the CDs (though I primarily now use Open and no longer need them), but I haven't had the experience of downloading from FSZ. Nobody seems to have any real problems with this, though; the only problem is getting all the right files.

Oh, and welcome to HLP, mate.

[yubyub]

I can report that FS-Open also runs fine of Windows XP 2005 Media Edition. 

[S-99]

Yeah, you're video card will be a limiting factor.
If you plan on playing just vanilla fs2, that card should be fine.
Hell, the tnt2 was the mainstream video card when fs2 first got released, i'm sure you probably remember the competing ati rage 128 pro (which is what my moms computer got)
But if playing the SCP, then i'd say you should at least get a 64mb video card with the ram being at least 128bit.
Also when you get a new card make sure it's at least 256bit, video card memory data chunk ratings are bottlenecks in video cards.
That means doing the math also when it's a card with like 64bit ddr, ddr is dual channel, which means 64bit ddr = 128bit sdram, oh and just wait till you get a video card with ddr2, you get to multiply the data chunk size by 4 (I'm all too familiar with trying to purchase the correctly manufactured radeon 9800).
Anyway get a new card if you plan on the scp because polycounts will be high and so will the textures.

[Wanderer]

FreeSpace 2 runs very well on XP Pro /w SP2. Or atleast it does that for me

[pecenipicek]

works well on XP Home with SP2 and an arseload of other crap too...

[simon726]

Although this reply that I'm about to make is not related to Freespace 2 being able to run Windows XP, If I remember back then, I used to run Descent: Freespace (aka Freespace 1) on my Windows XP machine and it works perfectly. Has anyone used to play that game on their XP computer before?

Also, this is just came in to me:
I currently have a wireless keyboard and mouse on my computer system. Will I be able to use these hardware on these two computer games? Have anyone used their wireless keyboard/mouse combo to control the ships, etc.? My primary concern is that my hardware's batteries (the ones that power my wireless keyboard and mouse) will run out pretty quickly. I think I better use a Y-cable for my wireless keyboard and my corded keyboard in my humble opinion! Anyone confirm?

[CP5670]

FS1 works fine for me on XP without any tweaking needed. Some people have had some weird glitches with it (something related to the afterburner) but it's usually fixed by using 95 or 98 compatibility mode.

Also, if you have a decent processor, you might want to play it in software mode. I think it actually looks way better than the D3D mode and still runs very smoothly. You get free glowmaps on everything and as far as I can tell, the large textures can only be used in software mode, even with the registry hack.

[Herra Tohtori]

Yeah, the graphics card is a little inefficient with 32 MB memory only... you could also use some additional RAM. Vanilla FS2 will probably run quite well, but SCP demands a bit more of a machine.

Example: At my home, I used original FS2 with following computer:

Windows XP SP2
AMD Athlon 2800+
512 MB DDR-SDRAM
ATI Radeon (don't remember the type number any more, might've been 9200 or something like that...) @ 128 MB

FS2 itself worked very well on that machine.

Now I use SCP with fs_open_367.exe with MediaVP release 3.6.7 (all mv_*.vp files available) on following machine:

Windows XP SP2
AMD 64 Athlon 3200+
1024 MB DDR-SDRAM
NVidia GeForce 6600 @ 256 MB

And it works really smoothly both in D3D and OpenGL modes. Actually it works smoother in OpenGL, if there are really many ships with high polies, or if there are a lot of explosions that use mv_adveffects.vp, which otherwise work very smoothly. Actually, for some reason the game sometimes slows down notably when that cool blue/orange/flak shockwave effect is used. But even that issue goes away in OpenGL mode. I just like D3D mode better, because of Environmental mapping available in D3D, which is very cool. I'm getting decent framerates with both modes (excluding the D3D shockwave slowdown), very much playable in all conditions.

But, when I went home for christmas and tried to play SCP with that older computer, it did run quite all right but the mv_adveffects almost melted it, so I had to content to mere mv_effects, which were quite much better than retail effects too. Also, there was some issue with Radeon cards... If I remember right, D3D mode didn't show any shinemaps and OpenGL mode showed white squares instead of red lights (ie. the one in Leviathan's side and the one at the end of Hercules' lower fin...), but I could actually help this proble quite much by enabling env mapping and use alpha for env mapping, so that these reflections quite much replaced the shinemaps (I hope shinemap is the correct term here; I'm referring to that pure white reflection in windows and some surfaces, that makes them look shiny...)

[S-99]

Ah, herrah, i believe the lighting you are talking about is the specular lighting.
As for the radeon, i used a 9600se 128mb, and now using a 9800pro 256mb.
The only time i had problems with rendering was when i had that white squares fs2 build, and that d3d related in that build.
Ogl does run faster, seems d3d has everything working and missing one thing, and ogl has everything working and is missing that one trait that d3d has, i guess one of those ironic trade off things.
d3d is sort of being scrapped in favor of ogl right now.
Which is fine because ogl has come a long way.
But, ogl works 100% how it's supposed to on my machine, on both my crap 9600se, and my awesome rocking 9800pro.
But definitely recommended that you have a gig of memory for adveffects.
Otherwise you're machine will turn into a slideshow accessing virtual memory too much for the adveffects.
Dab's beams are so much better than the usual beams, and the animated shinemaps for shivan ships are really something awesome.
win2k
512mb DDR (hint taken i need more memory badly)
sapphire radeon 9800pro 256mb
P4 2.6ghz

[no idea]

Some people have had some weird glitches with it (something related to the afterburner) but it's usually fixed by using 95 or 98 compatibility mode.

Yes im on of these people:
Im using XP pro. Freespace II needs the compatibility mode otherwise i cant use the afterburner.

[phreak]

That TNT card isn't even supported for FSO.  You're going to need at least a GF or Radeon.  Standard FSO will work, but thats about it.

[S-99]

Why would compatibility mode need to be so important for fs2 to run on newer versions of windows properly?
It's a little funny and a little dumb i don't need it.
I mean, xp home, and xp pro are also nt5.0 like win2k is
Why should it be all borky on xp?
Why should it need compatibility mode on win98 which was the main OS of the day that fs2 was run on besides me and win2k back in the day.
Why should it need compatibility mode on newer versions of windows which are based off of and improve upon good old win2k?
Like the other people who haven't had problems with xp in this thread, i guess it's apparent some people should do windows update and get the latest service pack, or reinstall xp and do windows update and get the latest service pack if you're a fanatic about this game...
It's the same thing with win2k if you don't have any of the new service packs game compatibility is going to be limiting.
Back in 1999 when i got fs2, i also had win2k which was brand new, and i think half life and fs2 were the only games of mine that would work on win2k before service pack 2 came out for it, then after service pack 2 came out for it, i could play need for speed 3 too

[StratComm]

It's necessary but only for some people, and we've been around long enough to know what we're talking about.  There's a glitch with the timer that only crops up with XP (and apparently once in a blue moon under 2k as well) with the retail executables that causes the afterburners to always think that they were just used and thus cannot be refired yet.  This was fixed with FSO fairly early on, but to run retail you still may need to set compatibility mode.  It's got absolutely nothing to do with Windows updates, so if you don't see it then you don't see it and don't need to do anything about it.  But if you do then you still should know how to fix it.

[S-99]

ummm calm down dude.

It's necessary but only for some people, and we've been around long enough to know what we're talking about. There's a glitch with the timer that only crops up with XP (and apparently once in a blue moon under 2k as well) with the retail executables that causes the afterburners to always think that they were just used and thus cannot be refired yet. This was fixed with FSO fairly early on, but to run retail you still may need to set compatibility mode. It's got absolutely nothing to do with Windows updates, so if you don't see it then you don't see it and don't need to do anything about it. But if you do then you still should know how to fix it.

we don't need people posting the weight and size of there seniority.
i was just thinking about how dumb some things can get.
Generally persuing the logic that something new should work better, xp and so on.
Yes i understand that fs2 is a community contribution and it's not going to be perfect with each new release comes new features, and usually comes a few bugs, and then those eventually get worked out.
And yes you will have a problem with game compatibility if you're trying to play an old dos game.
win2k and up uses a dos emulator because dos is not the core of the os anymore.
I'm using dos here as an example of compatibility on nt systems (not saying fs2 is a candidate of dos).
Because obviously there are other problems with compatibility.
And yes upgrading service packs does help a lot, a service pack is like another release of the os.
Service packs include patches, new software, new features, better compatibility, etc, essentially to make windows work better and the programs that run in it.
There's nothing wrong with suggesting something that may or may not work.
And now i know that compatibility mode is fs2 vanilla related with out fso (if i got that right from what you posted)
So if this problem was fixed with fso.
Why not use fso without the vp's to slow down his video card?
Probably the reason the tnt2 and so on isn't supported anymore is because it didn't work too well with the enhancements or something, or perhaps because of the gpu's age.
That doesn't mean fso will not be able to run at all without the mvp's.
Because with all the features off in the launcher it should just be vanilla fs2 anyway, but running a current build instead.

[StratComm]

In theory yes, in practice no.  There are a lot of changes from the way graphics, in particular, are handled from retail FS2 to the SCP.  An old engine build would indeed run just fine, but you have to be careful when talking about an unsupported card as it still may not work or work noticibly incorrectly.  Again, there's no need to speculate on why support for the TNT2 line was dropped, as there were reasons originating from this very community.  We know that it does not play particularly nicely with HTL.  It will work, sort of, but there will almost certainly be places where it looks noticably worse than if running retail.  Even with all features off.  And that's with just the features that were broken before TNT2s were taken off the supported list; there's no telling what else may be broken now.

And Service Pack 2 has absolutely no impact on FS2/FSO's performance or qwirks, in any way, shape or form.  Updating to it - or not - won't change anything in the slightest unless it just makes the OS snappier for you.

[CP5670]

Can't you just turn off HTL when using one of those old cards? They don't really support it anyway.

[StratComm]

Last I checked, non-HTL wasn't working for anyone.  Don't know if that's been fixed in the last two weeks, but I don't think it's that simple.

[Charismatic]

FS2 on XP works fine for me.

[simon726]

I was also wondering, folks:

Has one of you tried the game running Dual-core and/or 64-bit computer processors? If you people are running on dual-core processors, what was your experience? Do I fiddle around with your configuration to make Freespace and Freespace2 work with Dual-core processors?