Minecraft Forums

I'm sure there's a big number of people having this issue. Some of them started to have this since 13w37a but in my case it was since 13w41a.

The game is completely unplayable, chunks load very slow, max FPS I can get are 10... I've tried updating my drivers, changing every setting in video settings, reinstalling Minecraft, but nothing seems to help at all. And the fact that Minecraft is consuming more processor than in 1.6 makes me think that it's using only the processor to render graphics, and my graphics card isn't doing anything.

My specs are:

AMD V120 Processor 2.20 GHz
ATI Mobility Raedon HD 4200 Series
2 GB of RAM.

I know it's not a high-end PC but it can run Minecraft 1.6 at 40 FPS!

Please, PLEASE help me!

EDIT: It seems like when I pause the game, the chunks start loading as fast as before.

Quote from Swimmer1929

Step 1) Grab your old computer
Step 2) Throw it out the window
Step 3) Buy a better computer
Step 4) Play Minecraft 1.7 at 40 FPS

Some people with beefy computers (Intel Core i7, 8 GB RAM, etc.) have this issue too, though, their issue isn't as bad as mine because an Intel i7 still gives decent FPS without the graphics card.

There's a bug where Minecraft uses integrated graphics over a dedicated card, which is most evident when other games run well, and also why even people with high-end computers can have problems. You have to force Minecraft to use the dedicated card; this link may help you if that is the case.

Quote from TheMasterCaver

There's a bug where Minecraft uses integrated graphics over a dedicated card, which is most evident when other games run well, and also why even people with high-end computers can have problems. You have to force Minecraft to use the dedicated card; this link may help you if that is the case.

I'm not able to find the "Switchable Graphics" part. May be because I have an integrated graphics card (chipset)?

Quote from SweElite

Yeah... My advice would be to buy a new computer.

Just because 1.7 messed up something?... you gotta be kidding me!

If the problem were a slow hardware I would do it, but I can run 1.6 just fine.

i dont know what the problem is, i have your average joe PC: intel i5 dual core, radeon 7670m 2 GB vram, and 6 GB ram... and i run MC 1.7 at like 70-80 fps, 50 in my heavily-tampered-with survival world. I think if you want to do some serious gaming, you should save up and get a decent comp like mine.

Quote from ElectroArc

Those who are saying he should buy a new PC. Not everyone is as rich as you that they could buy a new PC just because mojang messed something up with their game.
On topic: I'm having this problem too and my PC isn't even 2 years old so it's definitely mojang's fault that I ran ~150 fps in 1.6 and run ~30 fps on 1.7. I guess all that's left is try to allocate more ram(probably wont help but there's no reason NOT to try. it literally takes 5 seconds to change used ram with the new launcher), wait for a fix which might come out after minecon or so and wait for optifine to come out.

I allocated more RAM 5 times already, and nothing.

When 13w41a came out I was waiting Mojang to realize about the issue, but 1.7.2 came out and nothing happened even though the issue affected a good number of users... I just don't wanna wait even more.

Quote from MC_Potato

I allocated more RAM 5 times already, and nothing.

When 13w41a came out I was waiting Mojang to realize about the issue, but 1.7.2 came out and nothing happened even though the issue affected a good number of users... I just don't wanna wait even more.

Allocating more RAM to make Minecraft run faster has to be the most overused suggestion to improve performance, and if you think about it, one of the most useless; Minecraft won't make any use of memory that it doesn't actually need; press F3 and see just how much of that 1, 2, 4, etc, GB of memory is actually needed. The Optifine thread even recommends reducing the memory allocated to 350 MB, assuming you don't use HD textures or memory intensive mods (I myself allocate 512 MB, with default textures, Forge and 7 mods/10 total including Forge, and memory usage stays around 200-300 MB; this is for 1.6.2, but even 1.7.2 on Amplified doesn't run into memory limits). Note also that the Java process uses a LOT of memory for itself; I get around 1 GB of usage in Task manager, twice what I allocated.

Another thing to note, regarding CPUs, is that Minecraft still hasn't caught up with CPU technology; that is, it isn't multithreaded for the most part, except for a separate server and client, the latter of which requires most of the CPU horsepower (from the dedicated server requirements here; even sub-GHz Pentium III CPUs can run a server for a few players). In other words, a CPU with better single-core performance (but more than one core) is better than one with many cores running at lower speed.

Quote from TheMasterCaver

Allocating more RAM to make Minecraft run faster has to be the most overused suggestion to improve performance, and if you think about it, one of the most useless; Minecraft won't make any use of memory that it doesn't actually need; press F3 and see just how much of that 1, 2, 4, etc, GB of memory is actually needed. The Optifine thread even recommends reducing the memory allocated to 350 MB, assuming you don't use HD textures or memory intensive mods (I myself allocate 512 MB, with default textures, Forge and 7 mods/10 total including Forge, and memory usage stays around 200-300 MB; this is for 1.6.2, but even 1.7.2 on Amplified doesn't run into memory limits). Note also that the Java process uses a LOT of memory for itself; I get around 1 GB of usage in Task manager, twice what I allocated.

I knew that, I was just too exhausted of trying everything else...

Actually, I have the same problem when I'm on a server. If in case of a superflat world, and I switched off Anisotropic Filtering and Mipmapping, my FPS is fast. Same with looking up in the sky (What the?)

However, I can see the problem you're having is with MC not using the graphics card.
Also, in response to not finding Switchable Graphics, since your AMT/AMD is kinda outdated, you can try updating your graphics drivers, and check if Switchable Graphics is here. Otherwise, there's kinda no luck.

If it was working fine in 1.6 and it isn't working fine in 1.7 then logically it is a problem with 1.7.

Having 20+ years experience servicing and building both PCs and Macs whenever I hear someone say "you need to upgrade" for petty reasons it makes me want to scream.

If you have never played a certain game and it runs horribly - yes, that might warrant a faster CPU, video card, RAM, and/or faster hard drive.

But if one version of MC was working fine and an newer one does not - that's not a reason to buy or upgrade hardware. Doubtfult that even a graphic driver update would matter (and sometimes it actually can make it worse).

I have a Core2 desktop with a GTX 260/2GB RAM/Win7 - MC works great for me. 1.7 seems a bit slower but I have noticed the lighting engine seems different - perhaps something was rewritten in terms of how graphics are displayed and it takes a bit more CPU/GPU cycles than 1.6.

If you have a laptop games are never going to run well - it is inherenly impossible to get desktop performance in laptop because it has to run on batteries at some point. Thus, vendors such as AMD cut corners in the processors/onboard graphics to cut power consumption. When you encounter a buggy release or update to a game it makes it much worse than it would be on a desktop.

My advice would be to not to worry about it and see if the next update to 1.7.x changes it.

I didn't see anyone mention this and it may or may not fix your issue but with 1.7.2 they added some new graphic options. If you are playing in windowed mode you actually have to scroll down in the video settings to see the new options.
Mipmap Levels and Anisotropic Filtering.

Setting these both to off can help improve performance on older hardware.

Also, setting the Render Distance can make a big difference too. Try in the 8-10 range on that if you are higher and see if that helps improve your performance.

Quote from TheEBlocker

i dont know what the problem is, i have your average joe PC: intel i5 dual core, radeon 7670m 2 GB vram, and 6 GB ram... and i run MC 1.7 at like 70-80 fps, 50 in my heavily-tampered-with survival world. I think if you want to do some serious gaming, you should save up and get a decent comp like mine.

if you want to brag about a
decent comp like mine...

maybe first get a decent comp

I am having the same problems with low fps. I should not really be complaining as i maintain a solid 60 FPS. But in 1.6 i was getting 150+ FPS so something definitely changed. I have a Dell XPS i7 3.2GHz, 12GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GT 640M with 2GB of dedicated graphics. I know I have a Semi beefy computer and can play anything else just fine. All setting were lowered, tried re installing the game, minimizing screen size and anything else.

Quote from The_Hax0r

I'm sure there's a big number of people having this issue. Some of them started to have this since 13w37a but in my case it was since 13w41a.

The game is completely unplayable, chunks load very slow, max FPS I can get are 10... I've tried updating my drivers, changing every setting in video settings, reinstalling Minecraft, but nothing seems to help at all. And the fact that Minecraft is consuming more processor than in 1.6 makes me think that it's using only the processor to render graphics, and my graphics card isn't doing anything.

My specs are:

AMD V120 Processor 2.20 GHz
ATI Mobility Raedon HD 4200 Series
2 GB of RAM.

I know it's not a high-end PC but it can run Minecraft 1.6 at 40 FPS!

Please, PLEASE help me!

EDIT: It seems like when I pause the game, the chunks start loading as fast as before.

i think the issue might be ram. You should have at least 4 gigs to run minecraft well............

Quote from JonathanGaming

i think the issue might be ram. You should have at least 4 gigs to run minecraft well............

No you don't... here is what Optifine says, and given what Optifine was made for, they know better:

Lauch Minecraft with less memory (yes, really). Usually it does not need more than 350 MB and runs fine on all settings with the default texture pack. By default java allocates way too much memory (1GB) which may get swapped to disk and the overall performance may suffer a lot.

I allocate only 512 MB myself and have never had any problems*, the game doesn't even use all of that, usually only around 50%; if there isn't enough memory, you simply crash with out of memory** (now, of course, if you don't have enough free system RAM things are different but even with only 3 GB I only use about half my system RAM while playing; even when I run Firefox at the same time total system RAM usage is only around 2 GB; 2 GB of system RAM should be enough as long as you reduce the memory allocated to Minecraft and don't run other programs or have unnecessary background processes).

*In fact, guess what happens if I try using Far render distance (16 chunks) with 1 GB allocated. Out of memory (it runs fine for a few minutes, no lag, before suddenly displaying an out of memory screen). How the...? That's because on a 32 bit system like mine a program can only use up to 2 GB of RAM and the Java heap (what you can set) is only part of the memory used by Java, which also needs memory for the graphics driver and stuff.

**Note also that there are two kinds of "out of memory" crashes; the first is the out of memory error screen and the second is a hard crash (game closes) with "java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: Java heap space" in the console; the former occurs (I believe; in-game reported memory usage when it crashes) when the process space is exceeded (as I described above) and the latter when you allocate too little memory.