Unreal Tournament 2003 & ATI Settings

I'm experimenting with my ATI Radeon 9500 Pro AA and AF settings to see what
the best graphics quality and performance settings are for me. Can someone
help me with suggested settings (without overclocking) in the ATI control
panel to improve performance without sacrificing quality. I'm playing UT2003
at 1024x768x16.

I read all the test articles about what brand graphics card is faster than
the other using AA and AF settings. I know that UT2003 is a DirectX 8 game
and UT2004 uses DirectX 9.

What I want to know is with UT2003 how can I tell if AA/AF settings is
faster than non-AA/AF settings? Until UT2004 comes out and my ATI card can
use DirectX 9 with the game I don't know if using AA/AF now with UT2003 will
lower my framerate or not compare to using standard non-AA/AF settings.

I mean is using standard Direct3D graphic card settings (in a non-DirectX 9
game) always going to be faster than using the same resolution under AA/AF
settings?

Can someone explain the benchmark log file results and how to interpret
them? I tried normal vs. different AA/AF settings and the benchmark results
are always the same? I must be running the tests wrong...

On Mon, 29 Sep 2003 20:56:36 -0400, "Ikaros" wrote:

I'm experimenting with my ATI Radeon 9500 Pro AA and AF settings to see what
the best graphics quality and performance settings are for me. Can someone
help me with suggested settings (without overclocking) in the ATI control
panel to improve performance without sacrificing quality. I'm playing UT2003
at 1024x768x16.

I read all the test articles about what brand graphics card is faster than
the other using AA and AF settings. I know that UT2003 is a DirectX 8 game
and UT2004 uses DirectX 9.

What I want to know is with UT2003 how can I tell if AA/AF settings is
faster than non-AA/AF settings? Until UT2004 comes out and my ATI card can
use DirectX 9 with the game I don't know if using AA/AF now with UT2003 will
lower my framerate or not compare to using standard non-AA/AF settings.

I mean is using standard Direct3D graphic card settings (in a non-DirectX 9
game) always going to be faster than using the same resolution under AA/AF
settings?

Can someone explain the benchmark log file results and how to interpret
them? I tried normal vs. different AA/AF settings and the benchmark results
are always the same? I must be running the tests wrong...


(Ive found that 32 bit textures are faster then 16 actually)

With UT2003 it is VERY important to put the AF setting in properities to
Application Preference instead of forcing it ON in the display properities.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

If you play Ut2k with Ultra high and AA / Anisotropic x4 on then you might want
to try this:

( I have a ATI 9700 PRO with Omega 3.7 dets btw )

Open up the file called "UT2003.ini" with notepad. The file is located in folder
/UT2003/System.

In the :

[D3DDrv.D3DRenderDevice]

you'll see these three lines:

LevelOfAnisotropy=4
DetailTexMipBias=0.500000
DefaultTexMipBias=-0.500000

Make yours match those values.

Close that file and select YES to safe. (Save it in other words)

Then right click on the desktop and select properties at the bottom.
Click on Settings tab.
Click on Advanced button on near bottom.
Click to Direct3D tab.
Make Anisotropic Fliltering checked so that the slider is grayed out.
(Application Preference!)
Apply.
Okay , okay.

Fire up UT and marvel at map Curse3 for example. The textures will be much more
clearer and cleaner looking. I think if you try to force Anio to always 4 or 6
it doesn't work right with UT together. This should fix it.

Pluvious

ps.. here's what my whole section looks like:

[D3DDrv.D3DRenderDevice]
DetailTextures=True
HighDetailActors=True
SuperHighDetailActors=True
UsePrecaching=True
UseTrilinear=True
AdapterNumber=-1
ReduceMouseLag=False
UseTripleBuffering=True
UseHardwareTL=True
UseHardwareVS=True
UseCubemaps=True
DesiredRefreshRate=85
UseCompressedLightmaps=True
UseStencil=False
Use16bit=False
Use16bitTextures=False
MaxPixelShaderVersion=255
UseVSync=False
LevelOfAnisotropy=4
DetailTexMipBias=0.500000
DefaultTexMipBias=-0.500000
UseNPatches=False
TesselationFactor=1.000000
CheckForOverflow=False
AvoidHitches=False
DecompressTextures=False
UseXBoxFSAA=False
DescFlags=0
Description=
OverrideDesktopRefreshRate=False
TerrainLOD=0
SkyboxHack=False
LowQualityTerrain=False