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Solved Fix for Intel Graphics Card problems (Laptop NVidia users)

M

MMSchaffels

Landlubber
Hi guys, although I'm new to the forums I have been playing stock POTC and the Build Mods since the day they were released and I have enjoyed them greatly. Since I bought a new laptop (yes, Windows 7 and Intel Graphics Card combined with a NVidia Graphics Card) I was unfortunately unable to play this game (it honestly hurt the child within me for a moment).

Now I am not one to give up easily and that is why I have been searching all around the forums for about two days and I had not been able to find a solution to the dreaded problem (I believe mainly new laptop users) have experienced: the integrated Intel Graphics Card.

Now I am not that good with hardware, so I spent some more time chasing the clue that people offered on this forum about 'activating' your NVidia Graphics Card instead of using the Intel Graphics Card and I stumbled upon this very helpful thread about someone who experienced the same problems using Steam to play games.

This was the solution given, I tested it on my laptop and it works like a charm! It is not that difficult and only costs a minute. :)
  1. Go to the NVIDIA Control Panel by right clicking on your desk top and clicking on "NVIDIA Control Panel".
  2. In the default screen that pops up (it should be "manage 3D settings", and the "Program Settings" tab should be automatically selected), under "1. Select a program to customize:" hit the "Add" button.
  3. From here, navigate to the folder where your POTC is located.
  4. Select the folder for the game you want to use your NVIDIA card for, and find the .exe for that game (it's usually right in the main game folder). Select it and hit open.
  5. Then, under "2. Select the preferred graphics processor for this program:" open the drop-down menu and select "High-performance NVIDIA processor".
  6. Finally, hit apply in the far bottom right corner, and you should be good to go!
I hope some moderator will move this to the FAQ because last time I checked it was not there. Also, I have only tested this on my own laptop with the two integrated graphic cards. I suspect people with only the Intel Graphics Card will still have to do with Swiftshader.
 
:ahoy matey!

This is a known solution for those with an Nvidia card such as yours. It is buried in these forums somewhere. :read This solution does not work for those with an ATI card though. I also agree that this should be in the FAQ, or this thread should be stickied as there is a steady stream of laptop users with problems coming through looking for answers.
 
Stickied the thread and made a note in the FAQ. Thanks for posting this! :cheers
 
Thanks indeed!

But if there's a note in the FAQ, we don't also need to sticky this thread, do we? Too many stickies becomes confusing. :facepalm
 
The note is just a link to this thread, not a copy & paste of the details. One advantage of this is that it should be easier to find in the form of a separate thread, even for those that don't bother reading the FAQ.
 
That's fair enough in my book; but still doesn't require it to also be stickied, right?
 
Being stickied will make it easier for me to find when needed. Also, this section only has 2 stickied threads right now.
 
Exactly. If we had a page full of stickies, it would be a different story, but for now it's nice to keep this one easily visible. ;)
 
This fix actually doesn't work for me. I have Intel i7 4710hq with integrated graphics, nVidia gtx850m, 6gb of ram. I also tried running this game with swift shader but it ran on very low fps. So I have to find new fix for this
EDIT: I'm now reinstalling build 14, and I now checked that intel fix, it will probably work now. I thought that fix is just for integrated graphics, and I have nVidia... Well, now I have to play with ugly sea ;)
 
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If you have an NVIDEA graphics card too, you should somehow be able to convince the game to run from that one instead.
That would save you the trouble of using the Intel fix.
 
I tried forcing game to run on nvidia, but it still doesn't work. Maybe I should disable intel HD graphics somehow. Anyway, game works fine with that patch :)
 
I'm now able to run the game after installing with the Intex Fix. I'm trying to avoid doing a complete reinstall just to test my graphics settings further. Is there a way I can undo the patch to test my nvidia card settings?

Also I don't understand why my changes to water color at the correct time of day with the intel patch has no effect on the game. Any help would be appreciated. PROGRAM\Weather\WhrInitValues.c
 
There is an uninstaller for it in your main game folder.

The Intel Fix uses different water colours to make it look more reasonable.
So if you are tweaking that, make sure you're editing on the right side of the if statement.
 
Having a Laptop with NVidia it bothers me that I'm having to use the IntelFix to get the game running. Exploring this further I now know that the game insist on running with the integrated Intel GPU. Yes I, like others, have set it to run the high performance Nvida card in the NVida control panel. So why does it run the intel GPU?

Monitoring the GPU with MSI Afterburner I can see which card is running. I notice on other games that they too are sharing GPUs. Yes both cards are showing percentages for each GPU usage with the high performance NVida card holding the higher percentages. Why the sharing? Yes I turn off auto-select and set to HP NVida.

With POTC 0% is run on the HP NVida GPU even though it set to do so. Interesting enough it is the same with COAS. Now COAS does run fine even though it has reflective water.

I may be kedging but I'm trying to work my way clear. Any insight on this could benefit all.

Thanks
 
For NVida users with onboard Intel GPU there is a chance, like mine, that simply selecting HP Nvida will not run the card with POTC like it should. But I understand some are having no issue. Why are both GPU running? The onboard is running windows while the game should be running the HP card. Not the case for my laptop.

Oh, and right clicking the ENGINE.exe and picking to run the HP Nvida also fails.
 
When opening Config.exe

Display options has the ;
Device
The device selection can be used if there is one or more video cards present in your computer.

However the device setting is grayed out leaving no choice but the primary display driver. Is this changeable in some ini file?
 
Wish I could play the game the way it's supposed to look. Why does POTC hate Intel so? :thumbsdown2
 
Nobody knows. It is basically all the Storm Engine games that are affected by that.
 
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