I found a guide:
· Author: Jay Kresge AKA Synbios on Fenrir
· Last Updated: 07/23/04
· Introduction
· Using the Registry
· Anti-Aliasing
· Mip-Mapping
· Anisotropic Filtering
· Sound
· Skip the explanation, just tell me how to make FFXI look and run better!
Introduction
Final Fantasy XI is a port of the same game for the Playstation 2. Like most console to PC ports, it does not take advantage of many higher end graphic features. Unlike most console to PC ports, however, FFXI still looks damn good. The purpose of this guide is to help you maximize your image quality while at the same time, keeping your performance up to speed.
If you want to avoid all the nerd talk, just skip to the last section. It's a detailed guide on how to get the most out of FFXI in terms of performance and image quality. If you do not know what you are doing, don't touch anything in the registry other than what is listed.
Note: All images in this guide are uncompressed, original sized bitmaps. They may be cut out of the image, but they have not been resized or compressed in any way, so their original quality is held intact. Due to this, images may load slowly.
Using the Registry
A couple of the graphic tweaks that we're going to use here require use of the registry. Even if you've never edited your registry before, you should have no problem doing so by following these instructions.
First, go to Start, Run, type regedit, and select OK. This will bring up the registry. Now, expand the following menus; HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SOFTWARE, PlayOnlineUS, SquareEnix, FinalFantasyXI. If you can't follow what I'm saying, for some reason, use the images below. This brings you to the FFXI registry entries. Refer to this section whenever a registry edit is recommended.
Anti-Aliasing
SquareEnix decided that when they were going to port FFXI to the PC, that it would continue to use the same exact graphic features as the PS2 version. Due to this, there is currently no way to force FSAA, even via your display control panel. There is, however, still a way to use a form of anti-aliasing in FFXI. FFXI uses super-sampling. Super-sampling is when an image is rendered internally by the grpahics processor at a specific resolution, and output at a lower resolution. Due to the higher resolution rendering, it will seem as if AA is enabled. In this case, your foreground resolution is your output, and your background resolution is the internally rendered resolution.
Of course, Square sort of dropped the ball on this one by not allowing users to set the background to a higher resolution than the foreground. Play the game at 1024x768, but set the background to 512x512, and the game looks like a pixelated mess. That's because the game is being up-sampled. With the max background resolution option in the config menu being 1024x1024, those who are playing in higher resolution modes aren't going to get the clearest image.
That's why you need to edit the registry for this one. Here, we're going to edit values 0003 and 0004. In the images below, the screenshots were taken in 1280x1024 resolution. The image on the top has a backround resolution set at 1024x1024. The image in the bottom is 2048x2048. You can clearly see the effects of anti-aliasing in this still shot. In motion, it looks far better.
This can also be used to improve your framerate, as opposed to improving your image quality. Using super-sampling increases the demand on your video card's memory and fill-rate. So, if you're playing at 1024x768, and the background is set at 1024x1024, you're using more memory and fill-rate than you need to. By editing 0004 down to 300 (768), you can drop your background to 1024x768. You'll lose very little in image quality, and gain a few frames per second.
Mip-Mapping
Mip-mapping is a technique used to alleviate the problem of textures becoming pixelated at a distance. The best example of this would be a floor texture. As it gets farther from you, it seems to become more pixelated. Why is this? Well, use MS paint shrink an image, and see how the quality decreases. With Mip-mapping, it allows the developer to substitute smaller but more detailed textures, and have them replace the larger texture as you get farther from it. Another option is to have the hardware smartsize it as it gets farther away. Here's an example using text.
The image on the left is the original picture. The image in the center is resized in a standard fashion, similar to the way textures are resized without mip-mapping. The image on the far right is the original, but resized in a smarter way. This is the way mip-mapping works.
Anisotropic Filtering
Anisotropic Filtering is the successor to bi-linear and tri-linear filtering. When mip-mapping first came about, it looked ugly. Sure, the resized textures look nice, but you could clearly see where one mip-map ended and another began. Linear, and then bi- and tri-linear filtering were created to help fix this. They help to ease the transition between mip-maps. They still look fairly ugly, but not as bad as without filtering.
Most newer video cards today default to bi- or tri-linear filtering, unless anisotropic filtering is used. Anisotropic filtering is used for the same purpose, but is far higher quality. Here are some screenshots form FFXI showing the use of mip-mapping with and without AF enabled. NOTE: GeForce 4 and FX series cards are limited to 8xAF. Radeon series and GeForce 6800 series cards can go up to 16xAF. There isn't a huge difference in terms of quality going from 8x to 16x, so it's up to you if it justifies the performance hit. Also, turning on mip-mapping in the FFXI config panel doesn't bring the mip-map distance in enough to be noticable. It's best to do a registry edit here. Edit value 0000 to any number from 3 to 5. I use 4 for my preferred results.
All images were taken at different parts of the day, but thankfully, show what I'm trying to display. In the left image, no mip-mapping or AF is used. As you can see in the distance, the floor textures begin to become pixelated. This is more noticable in modern PC games, but since FFXI is a direct port, it uses lower quality textures. Image 2 shows mip-mapping in action. As you can see about 2/3 of the way up, there is a clear cut-off point between where mip-mapping is used and where it is not used. In the third image, you can see the difference that AF makes.
No Mip-Mapping, No AF Mip-Mapping on 4, No AF Mip-Mapping on 4, 16xAF
So, what does this mean? It means that I do not recommend using mip-mapping unless you're going to use Anisotropic Filtering. Using mip-mapping won't decrease performance in it's own, but turning AF on will deliver a fill-rate hit. This will be more noticable on weaker cards, whereas high-end cards can do this in FFXI without a noticable hit (framerate limit of 30).
Sound
In the FF Config, you can adjust how many sounds can be heard simultaneously from 12-20. This is a small range, so you can further adjust it by changing value 0029 in the registry.
Before adjusting this setting, find out what kind of sound card you're using. If you're using on-board audio (audio is handled by your motherboard and CPU), then you'll take a noticable hit to performance as you raise this number. The exception to this is NForce audio (available for AMD mobos only). NForce audio delivers a smaller performance hit than even the best PCI sound cards.
If you're using a PCI sound card, find out how many streams it does in hardware, then work your way down from there. Don't fall for the HW/SW mix modes that are available on SB Live! and Audigy 1 cards. These cards max out at 32 hardware streams. Selecting a number over 32 with these cards will start to kill your performance. Audigy 2 series cards go up to 64. A Typical SB16 or SB PCI can handle up to 16 streams.
Skip the explanation, just tell me how to make FFXI look and run better!
So, you want to know how to run FFXI to it's full potential, but don't want to read all the above nerd speak? Well then, just follow this guide. We'll start by opening the FFXI config. Set the following settings in the following tabs.
General:
· Mip-Mapping - off
Screen Size:
· Overlay Graphics Resolution - Whatever you prefer, or run other games at.
· Background Resolution - Doesn't matter, we'll be adjusting this in the registry.
Textures:
· Texture Compression - Find out how much video memory your video card has. If 32MB, set to high. If 64MB, set to low. If 128MB or higher, set to uncompressed.
· On-Screen Maps - Similar as above. If 64MB or below, set to compressed. If 128MB or higher, use uncompressed.
Effects:
· Bump-Mapping - Turn it off for now. If everything runs smooth when we're done, then try having it on.
· Environmental Animation - Leave it on smooth. The game seesm to run jerkier with low settings.
Sound:
· Enable Sound - On
· SoundEffectNum - You can select 12-20. See the sound guide above, or select 16 to be safe.
MISC:
· Show Opening Movie - Your preference.
· Enable Hardware Mouse Cursor - I prefer to have this on. If you have it on and the game fails to work, try turning it off.
· Simplified Character creation visuals - If you get a black screen at the character creation screen, turn this on. Seems cards that don't fully support DX8 have issues with this (GF4MX, for instance).
Now, follow the registry guide above to open the correct section of the registry. Once there, edit these values.
· 0000 - If you use Anisotropic filtering, set this number to 4. If you don't use AF, set this number to 0. This is your mip-mapping setting. Setting to 0 with no AF will give maximum performance, while setting to 4 and using AF will give maximum IQ. Setting to 4 and using no AF is just plain ugly.
· 0003 - This is your background resolution width. For maximum performance, set it to the same value as 0001. For balanced performance and image quality (IQ), set it one number above 0001 (IE, if 0001 is 1024, set 0003 to 1200). For maximum IQ, use 1600 or 2048.
· 0004 - This is the background resolution height. Follow the same instructions as listed for 0003. Instead of comparing to 0001, compare to 0002.
· 00029 - This is the number of sounds you can hear at one time. Refer to the sound guide above before changing this number.
Now, run the game. If it runs smoothly, try turning on bump-mapping, and/or raising the background resolution in the registry. If it runs too slowly, turn down your environmental animation, and/or lower the background resolution to match your foreground resolution.
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