Perhaps the most obvious way to take advantage of multiple cores is to distribute in-game systems, such as physics, artificial intelligence, sound, and rendering, among available processors. Multithreading is needed to take advantage of extra processor cores, and Valve explored several approaches before settling on a strategy for the Source engine. That’s easy enough with a single processor core, but more challenging when the number of cores is multiplied by two, and especially by four. Unlike some types of applications, games strive for 100% CPU utilization to give players the best experience their hardware can provide. Read on to see how Valve has implemented multithreading in its Source engine and developer tools, and how they perform on the latest dual- and quad-core processors from AMD and Intel. Multi-core optimizations for Source will be included in the next engine update, which is due to become available via Steam before Half-Life 2: Episode 2 is released. You won’t have to wait for Half-Life 3 to enjoy the benefits of Valve’s multi-core efforts, though. Valve has invested significant resources into optimizing its Source engine for multi-core systems, and doing so has opened up a whole new world of possibilities for its game designers.
With the megahertz era effectively over and processor makers adding cores rather than cranking up clock speeds, game developers looking to exploit the capabilities of current hardware are faced with a daunting challenge-”one of the most important issues to be solving as a game developer right now,” according to Valve software’s Gabe Newell. A handful can take advantage of additional processor cores, but not in a manner that improves performance substantially. Unfortunately, most of today’s game engines are among those applications that aren’t effectively multithreaded. Those that are not enjoy no such performance benefits, and may even run slower than on the fastest dual-core chips due to the slightly slower clock speeds of Intel’s first quad-core offering. Those that are can look forward to a healthy performance boost jumping to four cores, including near-linear scaling in some cases. The -novid option makes it so that the Valve video and the game intro video don’t play every time you load the game.I F THE LAUNCH OF Intel’s new quad-core Core 2 Extreme QX6700 processor has made one thing clear, it’s that some applications are multithreaded, and others are not. Now I need to see if World of Warcraft has some of the same options.
This should work on any game any game with the Valve Source Engine based on Half-Life 2 such as Half-Life 2 and its episodes, Team-Fortress 2, Left 4 Dead 1 and 2, Day of Defeat : Source, Counter-Strike : Source and Half-Life 2 Death Match. Add the “ -window -noborder -novid” to the box and select OK.In steam open your Library of games, select the game you want and right click it to open the menu and select Properties.So I set up Team-Fortress 2 and it is so much better to have it this way.
#HOW TO PLAY HALF LIFE 2 OLD ENGINE SOURCE UNPACK FULL#
While playing Left 4 Dead 2 the game was crashing so someone said they used borderless full screen.
If you are like me and have two screens you end up with other things going on, on one screen while you are playing games.