Question about Optifine?

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Nuclear_Creeper0

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Mar 30, 2017
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Why isn't it standard included in FTB Packs, anyone that comes on here and asks, "How do I improve my FPS?" And the first thing everyone says is, "Add Optifine."
So why isn't it just like in there by default like FTB Utils is.
 

lenscas

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Jul 31, 2013
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Because optifine and mods often don't play well and mod dev's as a result often don't want their mods to be included with packs that contain optifine.

I also believe that the dev(s) of optifine don't want their mod to be included by default in mod packs, possibly because of the same reasons.
 

Cptqrk

Popular Member
Aug 24, 2013
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Why isn't it standard included in FTB Packs, anyone that comes on here and asks, "How do I improve my FPS?" And the first thing everyone says is, "Add Optifine."
So why isn't it just like in there by default like FTB Utils is.

Actually "add Optifine" is almost always the last thing suggested here, as for the knows issues Optifine has with soo many mods, breaking textures and random crashes.

First suggestion is always get MC to run using your video card instead of onboard. Second is to remove texture packs. Third is to make sure you don't have some massive redstone contraption pulsing causing lag.

Also, Creeper, this didn't need it's own thread. It could have gone into ask a simple question.
 
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Nuclear_Creeper0

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Mar 30, 2017
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Because optifine and mods often don't play well and mod dev's as a result often don't want their mods to be included with packs that contain optifine.

I also believe that the dev(s) of optifine don't want their mod to be included by default in mod packs, possibly because of the same reasons.

Actually "add Optifine" is almost always the last thing suggested here, as for the knows issues Optifine has with soo many mods, breaking textures and random crashes.

First suggestion is always get MC to run using your video card instead of onboard. Second is to remove texture packs. Third is to make sure you don't have some massive redstone contraption pulsing causing lag.

Also, Creeper, this didn't need it's own thread. It could have gone into ask a simple question.
I didn't know Optifine caused issues. I've always added it to every pack and have never experienced any issues. I play with it on Hypixel, I play with it on modded servers, I use it in singleplayer. Never any issues.
 
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Ieldra

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Apr 25, 2014
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Actually "add Optifine" is almost always the last thing suggested here, as for the knows issues Optifine has with soo many mods, breaking textures and random crashes.

First suggestion is always get MC to run using your video card instead of onboard. Second is to remove texture packs. Third is to make sure you don't have some massive redstone contraption pulsing causing lag.

Also, Creeper, this didn't need it's own thread. It could have gone into ask a simple question.
Get MC to run using your video card? Is there something special about that? I don't even know if I have on-board video on my mainboard, how would I go about finding out if MC is using my video card, and if not, how do I change it?

@Nuclear_Creeper0 :
As for Optifine, it's debatable if there is a net benefit from using it. The game usually runs more smoothly with the right settings, but often at the cost of rendering speed (which is different from FPS), and I've had quite a few odd crashes at random times I attribute to Optifine. I tend to use it if FPS are getting too low, and accept the occasional crash, but the results can be unpredictable.
 

lenscas

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Jul 31, 2013
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Get MC to run using your video card? Is there something special about that? I don't even know if I have on-board video on my mainboard, how would I go about finding out if MC is using my video card, and if not, how do I change it?
Look in the snooper settings for the openGL vendor. I believe the GPU used is now also displayed with f3 but not sure about that.
Sometimes Minecraft doesn't get given the right GPU to work with, this happens especially on laptops. You can manually override this in the settings of your GPU driver.

I'm not sure if this is still an issue, but it used to be one
 

ShneekeyTheLost

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Dec 8, 2012
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Lost as always
Why isn't it standard included in FTB Packs, anyone that comes on here and asks, "How do I improve my FPS?" And the first thing everyone says is, "Add Optifine."
So why isn't it just like in there by default like FTB Utils is.
Okay... this topic again. Right, let's do this.

First off, the developers of Optifine have an 'all rights reserved, do NOT redistribute without permission, and that includes modpacks, which you do NOT have permission to include'. They aren't on Curseforge either, they have their own website, so unlike most mods, they haven't accepted Curseforge's ToC which includes right to redistribute. So there is an actual legal issue involved with including it in modpacks, because they have asked people not to. FTB Utils, on the other hand, is 'you are free to include in mod packs so long as credit is given and you aren't making money off of it', like most mods on Curseforge these days.

Second off, Optifine is not the end-all-be-all you seem to think it is, and in some cases it can actually make things worse. It depends on what sort of system you are running, really. I'd rather use something like Fastcraft than Optifine unless I was going for HQ texture packs or shaderpacks.

Third off, historically, there have been many issues with Optifine and how some mods render things, especially back in the 1.5 and 1.6 eras. Even in 1.7 era, there were some mods that had issues. I haven't been using Optifine lately, so I can't speak to its compatibility lately. However, if a mod does custom rendering, there's at least a solid chance that it can cause... issues. Ranging from simply rendering improperly to outright crashing because of conflicting resource grabbing.

Optifine is only really useful to people with already high-end systems who are wanting to make things look nicer using HQ texture packs or shader packs. If you are just trying to get it to chug along at 30 FPS, Optifine is almost certainly NOT going to help this happen.
 

Quetzi

Jack of All Trades
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Aug 20, 2012
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I'll restate what others have already responded with by way of an official answer if you like. Optifine is widely regarded as a great way to break your instance, it does not play well with a large number of mods - as such, we can't provide any support for instances where this has been added. Legal issues surrounding the authors desire to be the only source of downloads, we aren't able to distribute it even if we wanted to. The main 'demand' for using optifine actually comes from players migrating over from vanilla, where it is fairly frequently used, or players wanting to experiment with shaders (which frequently have glaring bugs and broken rendering when used with mods).

Simply put, the mod isn't intended for modpackt and will often break things in unpredictable ways when used as part of a large pack, that combined with license restrictions mean it won't ever be included in our packs.
 

Hambeau

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Jul 24, 2013
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As far as the Graphics question about GPU usage, you can go into your system's BIOS and select the GPR to use... Many "inexpensive" motherboards use Intel's Integrated Graphics, which are just about the worst for gaming... Fine for colorful spreadsheets and Powerpoint presentations, and barely able to stream video, but that's about it.

The BIOS usually has a selection which to use if both are present. The BIOS I'm most familiar with has a soft-switch to disable Integrated Graphics.

Many newer laptops have both Integrated Graphics and a dedicated GPU, theoretically switching between the two as needed to conserve battery life, but apparently Java has to be told which to use. In addition, Integrated Graphics also "steals" memory from the system to operate, not having dedicated ram. This is usually 256 or 512 MB. Because of this, if your laptop says it has 4GB installed and you look at the memory available you only see 3.5GB.
 

lenscas

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Jul 31, 2013
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As far as the Graphics question about GPU usage, you can go into your system's BIOS and select the GPR to use... Many "inexpensive" motherboards use Intel's Integrated Graphics, which are just about the worst for gaming... Fine for colorful spreadsheets and Powerpoint presentations, and barely able to stream video, but that's about it.

The BIOS usually has a selection which to use if both are present. The BIOS I'm most familiar with has a soft-switch to disable Integrated Graphics.

Many newer laptops have both Integrated Graphics and a dedicated GPU, theoretically switching between the two as needed to conserve battery life, but apparently Java has to be told which to use. In addition, Integrated Graphics also "steals" memory from the system to operate, not having dedicated ram. This is usually 256 or 512 MB. Because of this, if your laptop says it has 4GB installed and you look at the memory available you only see 3.5GB.
I wouldn't recommend to alter that BIOS setting just for the sake of 1 program though, at least not on laptops. You can manually overwrite which programs use which GPU in the settings of your GPU driver (or at least, you should be able to) and unless you are still using just 4 GB of RAM that 512 MB isn't exactly much in comparison to what is in the system.
 

Hambeau

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Jul 24, 2013
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I wouldn't recommend to alter that BIOS setting just for the sake of 1 program though, at least not on laptops. You can manually overwrite which programs use which GPU in the settings of your GPU driver (or at least, you should be able to) and unless you are still using just 4 GB of RAM that 512 MB isn't exactly much in comparison to what is in the system.

True... 512MB may not be much but it'll allow a 1.7.10 pack to run comfortably and let the OS do it's thing. I wouldn't attempt to run any 1.10 or newer packs with less than 8GB ram installed, though.