[Lt_Core]

Just got my new 17" (yeah!) and I'm having problems with Quake for some reason. It seems really jumpy and the movement is choppy. The graphics look great but the gameplay is choppy.

What resolution is everyone using in Quake? The 17" screen is 1440 x 900. I've tried 1024 x 768 and 800 x 600 in Quake but it feels choppy. When I try to use a higher screen resolution that 1024 x 768 it defaults back to 640 x 480. Any ideas?

I had the Quake video settings set for medium quality and was getting a consistent 90 fps, with heavy fighting dropping to around 65-70 fps.

My gaming PC runs Quake like a champ and is very fluid. I have a Nvidia GeForce 3 Ti200 64MB card in my PC. The gameplay was smoother on my old 500 MHz Titanium with only 8 MB video RAM!

Is anybody changing the actual display settings before launching Quake?

[Abel]

I had the same problem playing Heroes of Might and Magic IV,
and It did play pretty good in my old pentium III 700Mhz.

I know that the 17" is capable of playing very demanding games, I played Warcraft III flawlessly. So I think that is because those games are not designed to play in the 17".

abel

[CheesePuff]

Quake III runs great on 17" PowerBooks. Make sure that you have the newest 1.3.1 (I believe) update installed.

[Vash]

Lt_Core -
Quake 3 can do any resolution that you want it to do. Also the chopiness may be because you do not have the latest version for OS X. Go to id's site and make sure. To do a custom resolution in Quake 3 just bring down the console(press ~). And type in the following commands:
"/r_customwidth 1440" (return)
"/r_customheight 900" (return)
"/r_mode -1" (return)
"/vid_restart" (return)
now Quake3 should restart and be in widescreen mode for your Tibook. You can change the width and height settings to whatever your want, but make sure your monitor supports it. Quake should run perfectly on your 17" model. I play Quake 3 all the time with settings as high as they'll go on my 15" 1ghz model.

[AssassyN]

Quake III runs more than beautifully on my 23" HD Display at 1920x1200 resolution when pushed by my 17" PB, so there's no reason in the world it shouldn't perform amazingly at any resolution lower than that. There's a trick to installing Quake III for OS X. Before actually putting the Quake III CD in your drive, head to www.versiontracker.com and make sure you get the Quake III 1.3.2 Patch, run that, and then in the baseq3 folder you see, insert your Quake III CD into your drive and drag the pak0 file in that baseq3 folder into the baseq3 folder that was placed on your hard drive by the patch, and THEN you're ready to play the game. Good luck!

EDIT: Did the searching for you, the Quake III 1.3.2 patch that you need to optimize Q3 for OS X can be d/loaded here: Click HERE

[Wet Jimmy]

Originally posted by Vash:
And type in the following commands:
"/r_customwidth 1440" (return)
"/r_customheight 900" (return)
"/r_mode -1" (return)
"/vid_restart" (return)

Do you have to type this every time you start the game or are these settings remembered? If not, is there a .ini file or similar which you can edit to make these changes the default?

[AssassyN]

In my game it has remembered, and so I'm assuming it just may save them if you start & exit the game having last used them...if it doesn't, there's a hidden config. file (it's blatanly obvious for Win users) that I'm trying to find in which you can edit.

[AssassyN]

Ah, found it!

Quake config file is here...

~/Library/Application Support/Quake3/baseq3/

Add the lines to the q3config.cfg there and you are set.

Good luck!

[Wet Jimmy]

Many thanks! Provided the 17" ever makes it to Sydney, I'll be a happy Quake 3 player

[AssassyN]

Originally posted by Wet Jimmy:
Many thanks! Provided the 17" ever makes it to Sydney, I'll be a happy Quake 3 player

Sure thing man! Glad I could help, and I hope your PB arrives soon!

[Mr Creosote]

I'm relieved to hear that Q3 plays well on the 17inch as I am avid player.
There are a zillion in game and config commands one can use to fine-tune Q3 both to tweak its speed and also to refine it for your own personal tastes.
A good way is to create a file called autoexec.cfg and put it in your Baseq3 folder and there you can put in any personal console commands that you like. As an example here is mine here

[Lt_Core]

Thanks AssassyN and Yash for the tips. I'm up and running smooth on my new PB 17. Thanks a ton! What a difference from my old 500 MHz Titanium!

Mr Creosote
,
I've tweaked my q3config.cfg file in the past. I've heard about autoexec.cfg files but which file takes precedence - autoexec or q3config? There are similar commands in each config.

[AssassyN]

Originally posted by Lt_Core:
Thanks AssassyN and Yash for the tips. I'm up and running smooth on my new PB 17. Thanks a ton! What a difference from my old 500 MHz Titanium!

Mr Creosote
,
I've tweaked my q3config.cfg file in the past. I've heard about autoexec.cfg files but which file takes precedence - autoexec or q3config? There are similar commands in each config.

Great to hear man!!! Enjoy your 17" PB!!!

And I would only alter the q3config, not the autoexec, as I believe the autoexec is primarily controlled & setup by the machine, while the q3config is made for more user implied changes. I think tampering w/ autoexec *could* cause you more issues, so I'd alter the q3config first.

[Mr Creosote]

Originally posted by AssassyN:
Great to hear man!!! Enjoy your 17" PB!!!

And I would only alter the q3config, not the autoexec, as I believe the autoexec is primarily controlled & setup by the machine, while the q3config is made for more user implied changes. I think tampering w/ autoexec *could* cause you more issues, so I'd alter the q3config first.

I am afraid that is incorrect. Its the other way round. The q3config.cfg is the quake control file with all the console commands in it, it needs this as there are hundreds of commands it has to have. You can alter it though if you wish. But far safer is to create a file in notepad (sorry dunno the equiv text editor in Mac) and call it autoexec.cfg - this is an optional file. When q3 starts it reads the q3confif file first and then looks to see if there is an autoexec, if there is it executes t and as its been executed after the q3config the commands in it over-ride the q3config ones.
So, its best to put all you personal or test or tweak commands in the autoexec, that way you can control them better and if you screw the pooch you can just delete it or whatever and let quake use the commands in the q3config.
Also to note is that any changes you make in game to the options get written out to the q3config file so that q3 will know them next time.
I recommend to take a backup copy of the q3config.cfg file before you do anything, then you can always restore it and q3 to its default settings if anything goes wrong.

q3 is a very customisable game. The defaults work fine in general but I have learnt that how you have your config makes a heck of a difference as to how skilled you get at the game. For example altering you field of view (point of view or POV in q3 terms) helps enormously. It defaults to 90 degress but if you up it to say 100 or even as high as 120 the game becomes easier as you have a wider field of vision. The trade off is that everything in the distance appears smaller but on balance its a great thing to adjust.
The other great thing to put in an autoexec is a rocket jump. They arent easy to do and you can set up a simple set of instructions to execute a rocket jump and assign a key to it (see my config referenced in previous post). Its better to do rocket jumps yourself rather than this technique but I like to have a key assigned to it for certain eventualities, and while the q3 purists will say its not the done thing, it works great and is perfectly permissable.