First time poster here, but love the resource. I started playing PE about a month ago and got the PC version two weeks ago. Ever since downloading I was having quite a lot of lag and came to learn that my integrated graphics card, Intel HD 3000, left something to be desired and apparently is especially bad with Minecraft.
That said, several things have boosted my performance to playability, and last night I finally forced an update of the driver and now it screams (relatively speaking).
First, While running vanilla I was getting about 5 FPS and it was agonizing. I turned off fancy graphics, set rendering to normal and that got me up to about 12, but it still lagged to 4-5 pretty often. Then, I downloaded Magic Launcher and Optifine - I set render to near, used Multi-Core, turned off fancy, and reduced several other settings (smooth lighting, etc.), this got me to about 20-30 FPS which was a huge improvement. I then read that several people with the Intel HD cards had a good boost in performance after getting the newest drivers. I first tried to let Windows update the driver, it said it was up to date (it was not), then I tried Intel's driver install "wizard" and it wasn't compatible with my laptop. Then I went to Toshiba's site and found I already had the "most recent" update from them. Finally, last night I manually downloaded and installed the latest driver direct from Intel's site (I think it was released 10/24/12) and I played for about 15 minutes and not once did my frame rate drop below 50! I was regularly running at 80-100 FPS. This is a huge improvement in gameplay. Tonight I am going to try the new drivers with vanilla MC, and with turning up some of the graphics setting in Optifine - I am hoping to be able to get away with around 50 FPS on fancy and normal render.
I wanted to post this so that those with the Intel HD GPUs know NOT TO TRUST windows driver update, and if using a Toshiba, don't trust them either! Go straight to intel's site and do the download and install manually. You can use an Intel HD GPU and play Minecraft with decent performance...I was about to start rebuilding an old desktop so I could play...glad I can avoid that route.
Happy mining...computer specs below if interested.
Interesting I must try with my hd 3000 laptop. Also 4-5 without any mods doesnt seem right. I had played on hd 3000 for months with an average framerate of 25-35 with no mods or anything but I will definently try updating my drivers.
In the interest of full disclosure, I also removed Java 6 from my system last night (I had both 6 and 7 installed, apparently).
I did not test the removal of Java 6 and the addition of the new driver discreetly...so I don't know how much of the boost in performance was due to one, the other, or both.
That said, I know for a fact that the game was running with Java 7 - 64bit even when 6 was still installed.
ETA: I also used the magic launcher to allocate 2 GB of ram to MC - but this was done before the changes described in this post (removing java 6 and installing the new driver) - so I was still getting 20-30 fps with the additional RAM...it did seem to help prevent big lags but wasn't responsible for any big jumps in performance.
In the interest of full disclosure, I also removed Java 6 from my system last night (I had both 6 and 7 installed, apparently).
I did not test the removal of Java 6 and the addition of the new driver discreetly...so I don't know how much of the boost in performance was due to one, the other, or both.
That said, I know for a fact that the game was running with Java 7 - 64bit even when 6 was still installed.
ETA: I also used the magic launcher to allocate 2 GB of ram to MC - but this was done before the changes described in this post (removing java 6 and installing the new driver) - so I was still getting 20-30 fps with the additional RAM...it did seem to help prevent big lags but wasn't responsible for any big jumps in performance.
Funny, have you tried allocating less, i might be wrong on htis, but i heard that if you allocate 256 MB it gets better frames, but i dont know with a HD 3000 system
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~i dont run away from you....i walk slowly and it kills me that you dont care enough to stop me......You think this is truly the end hero NAH it has only just begun!
Funny, have you tried allocating less, i might be wrong on htis, but i heard that if you allocate 256 MB it gets better frames, but i dont know with a HD 3000 system
No I have not - I know that it is using around 450 - 500 MB while it's running (per the debug screen). I will try allocating less and see what happens. I was unable to to make any additional gains in framerate, but I've been playing with all the shading on and with fancy graphics and running between 30-50 fps in general. I have render set to normal +16 (or maybe +32?). Very, very acceptable and enjoyable.
DISCLAIMER for Toshiba owners: The Toshiba stock DVD video player stopped working after updating the drivers, I got a message saying "modules are missing" - I assume installing the new driver deleted some registry keys needed for the player to work. Nonetheless, windows media still plays DVDs just fine.
That said, several things have boosted my performance to playability, and last night I finally forced an update of the driver and now it screams (relatively speaking).
First, While running vanilla I was getting about 5 FPS and it was agonizing. I turned off fancy graphics, set rendering to normal and that got me up to about 12, but it still lagged to 4-5 pretty often. Then, I downloaded Magic Launcher and Optifine - I set render to near, used Multi-Core, turned off fancy, and reduced several other settings (smooth lighting, etc.), this got me to about 20-30 FPS which was a huge improvement. I then read that several people with the Intel HD cards had a good boost in performance after getting the newest drivers. I first tried to let Windows update the driver, it said it was up to date (it was not), then I tried Intel's driver install "wizard" and it wasn't compatible with my laptop. Then I went to Toshiba's site and found I already had the "most recent" update from them. Finally, last night I manually downloaded and installed the latest driver direct from Intel's site (I think it was released 10/24/12) and I played for about 15 minutes and not once did my frame rate drop below 50! I was regularly running at 80-100 FPS. This is a huge improvement in gameplay. Tonight I am going to try the new drivers with vanilla MC, and with turning up some of the graphics setting in Optifine - I am hoping to be able to get away with around 50 FPS on fancy and normal render.
I wanted to post this so that those with the Intel HD GPUs know NOT TO TRUST windows driver update, and if using a Toshiba, don't trust them either! Go straight to intel's site and do the download and install manually. You can use an Intel HD GPU and play Minecraft with decent performance...I was about to start rebuilding an old desktop so I could play...glad I can avoid that route.
Happy mining...computer specs below if interested.
I did not test the removal of Java 6 and the addition of the new driver discreetly...so I don't know how much of the boost in performance was due to one, the other, or both.
That said, I know for a fact that the game was running with Java 7 - 64bit even when 6 was still installed.
ETA: I also used the magic launcher to allocate 2 GB of ram to MC - but this was done before the changes described in this post (removing java 6 and installing the new driver) - so I was still getting 20-30 fps with the additional RAM...it did seem to help prevent big lags but wasn't responsible for any big jumps in performance.
Funny, have you tried allocating less, i might be wrong on htis, but i heard that if you allocate 256 MB it gets better frames, but i dont know with a HD 3000 system
No I have not - I know that it is using around 450 - 500 MB while it's running (per the debug screen). I will try allocating less and see what happens. I was unable to to make any additional gains in framerate, but I've been playing with all the shading on and with fancy graphics and running between 30-50 fps in general. I have render set to normal +16 (or maybe +32?). Very, very acceptable and enjoyable.
DISCLAIMER for Toshiba owners: The Toshiba stock DVD video player stopped working after updating the drivers, I got a message saying "modules are missing" - I assume installing the new driver deleted some registry keys needed for the player to work. Nonetheless, windows media still plays DVDs just fine.