Windows 7 Screen Flickering/Refreshing? Fix here!

Posted by Michichael on Tuesday August 18, 2009 3:01 pm

So! I decided to install Windows 7 on my work laptop and see how it would perform in a work environment. I'm impressed. It's natively compatible with everything we run except for the VMWare ESXi control panel. Woo! But then I noticed a problem. Often, and even more when doing Firefox or resizing windows, the screen would appear to flicker - applications would disappear from the task bar (but still be open and visible) etc. It was bizarre, but not really a game-ending problem. It got worse and worse so I opted to install the latest drivers from Intel, WMDI 1.1 compatible! You'd think it'd fix it buuuuuuuut no. It doesn't. However, after much dicking around, and finding NO help whatsoever on the internet (Google, you failed me you bastards!) I figured it out. The tips pointing me the right way did come from references to OpenGL, and it took me a while to find the settings in Windows 7, since the "Driver disallows editing of advanced 3d properties". Or some shit like that. Anyway, this doesn't resolve it 100%, there is still some refresh flicker, but it's a huge improvement. Others may find settings that work better.

• Open the Intel Graphics Media for Mobile tray. You should have this installed and running, if it's not, reinstall your graphics drivers from Intel and be sure to enable it (Yeah, it's a hassle and I hate having more than bare minimums installed but it's necessary in this case). Right click and select "Graphics Properties."
• Now, in the Window that popped up, you should see a 3d Settings Button:

•  In the new window that pops up, use the following settings:
  
  • Asynchronous Flip: On
  • Triple Buffering: On
  • Flipping Policy: Flip
  • Depth Buffer Bit Depth: 24 Bit Depth Buffer
  • Force S3TC Texture Compression: On
  • Force FXT1 Texture Compression: Off
  • Driver Memory Footprint: Low
  • Texture Color Depth: 32 bits per Texel
  • Anisotropic Filtering: Off

That's what did it for me. Experiment, comment below if you find better settings!

Windows Vista RDP Slowness

Posted by Michichael on Thursday May 21, 2009 5:18 pm

Well, is Vista being a little slow for you over remote desktop? You're not alone. It's slow for a lot of folks. the big revelation was when I got myself upgraded to an 18MBPS down, 1.5 MBPS up connection through AT&T, and my remote connection from work to home was STILL slow! I ran a speed test... Keep in mind this is on an 18MBPS connection at home, I'm remoted in over a 6 MBPS down, 1.5 Up pipe from work:

 

 

So jeeze! What's up with that! I did a bit of digging and actually found help on yet another blog.  To save you some time, here's how you fix the problem.

Open a command prompt: (Start, Run, "cmd", Enter]. In this prompt, copy and paste the following: netsh interface tcp set global autotuninglevel=disabled

Make sure you do this as an Administrator! And viola!

 

  So there ya have it folks! Easy, quick way to fix the slow RDP problem on your Vista machine. Keep in mind, this only works on Vista, and you have to run it as administrator! [Man, did it really take me two years to catch on to this? I need to stop being lazy and fix the problems before they get to me!]

Happy Easter?

Posted by Michichael on Tuesday May 05, 2009 2:26 pm

Normally I don't put gaming stuff here... well WoW stuff, but the front page is where this belongs. A few guildies and I put together a fun little video based on the Monty Python and the Holy Grail video/skits. Enjoy!