Below are tests that have been done with the following system specs and or equivalent. Each test showed a result of the max FPS given with certain settings enabled or modified in the DAoC performance options menu. You may use the following information as a guideline as to where your system may stack up. Please be sure to try variations of performance options to see which options work best for your PC.
System Specs: Pentium4 2.4GHz, ATi Radeon 9700 Pro running at 1280*1024 resolution, 8X performance Anisotropic filtering, no Anti Aliasing.
SHADOWS
Clip plane/lod near, player only casts low detail shadow: 97 FPS (-23 from baseline) Clip plane/lod near, player only casts high detail shadow: 77 FPS (-43 fom baseline) Clip plane/lod nar, all figures cast low detail shadows: 97 FPS Clip plane/lod near, player only casts high detail shadows: 77 FPS Clip plane/lod near, all figures cast high detail shadows: 77 FPS clip far/lod near, all cast low detail shadows: 77 FPS clip far/lod near, all cast high detail shadows: 67 FPS
WATER
clip/lod near, classic shadows, low qual reflective water seldom updates: 78 FPS clip/lod near, classic shadows, high qual reflective water seldom updates: 66 FPS clip/lod far, classic shadows, high qual reflective water seldom updates: 57 FPS clip/lod far, classic shadows, high qual reflective water often updates: 43 FPS
MAX QUALITY
Clip far, LOD off, all cast high quality shadows, high quality water updates often: ~32 FPS
If you feel you need to change the performance options, you may do so by following the below information:
Under options on the character selection screen, click on the "configure Performance" option.
The first option presented to you will be Clip Plane. Try lowering this to the "medium" setting and proceed down to the "near" setting if the performance still is not suitable.
The next option presented to you will be Figure LOD. Try lowering this to the "medium" setting and proceed down to the "near" setting if the performance still is not suitable. You may also turn this setting off.
The next option presented to you will be Config Shadows. Try lowering this to the "Low detail shadows" setting and proceed down to the "classic" setting if the performance still is not suitable. In this sub-menu you may also select how many figures will display shadows at a given time. If none of the settings are suitable, you may select the "No Figures Cast Shadows" option.
The last option presented to you will be "Config Water". Try lowering this setting from "Reflective Water" to "Classic Water". In this sub-menu you may also select the quality of the water reflection. Try lowering this to the "Medium Quality Reflection" setting and proceed down to the "Low Quality Reflection" setting if the performance still is not suitable.