I've been tinkering with an old iMac G3 when I decided to see how the old JJ2 Mac demo (ver. 1.22 s) runs on the machine. (Thanks to Haze for hosting it, still).

Once I got it up and running, I noticed that the controls felt much tighter on the old iMac than they do on my quad-core. Jazz was able to make much quicker turns and stops. Butt-stomps seemed faster as well. The controls felt finely tuned. On my quad-core machine, movement feels more loose and slidey.

Is this in my imagination, or does JJ2 perform better on older hardware?

Maybe because JJ2Mac was made for the PowerPC-based Macs, and you were running it on an Intel-based Mac before?

Oh. My quad-core is a PC, though.

I'm fixing up the old iMac for a friend of mine. I might have to see about installing the JJ2 demo here for comparison. (Intel/Dual-Core/Windows 7)

*** EDIT ***

I think I know what it was.

I'm staying at my friend's for a few days and just scored a gaming keyboard over at a nearby thrift store. I haven't had a chance to try the new keyboard on my PC back at home yet, but I was using it to work on the iMac.

When I loaded up JJ2 on my friend's PC, I noticed the loose controls like I'm used to. So I figure I might try the same keyboard that I was using on the iMac... And I think that was it. There's probably some difference in performance, but that'd take more testing than I'm interested in doing.

I didn't really think choice of keyboard mattered that much.

This topic didn't turn out half as interesting as I hoped it would.

In 2012, I played JJ2+ on a Dell computer running windowsXP that was ~10 years old and noticed no difference at all compared to Windows 7 or 8 on a new computer.

Thanks, KRSplat.

Yeah. It is all in my head, then.

Back when I started playing JJ2 on my first PC, the game wouldn't go over 15 FPS when I set all the audiovisual settings to maximum

I really enjoy the steady 70 FPS and second-long loading times I got now

I used to play it on a Windows 98 computer that -- if I was lucky -- would bluescreen at least once a week.
Needless to say, all that I currently have of that old thing is its Hard Drive.

But, despite all this, it ran JJ2 pretty well. XD

For me, I notice a huge difference depending on what Keyboard I use.

Like, I feel that the best response time is from a notebook keyboard, i.e. the keyboard integrated into the computer case. (Similar to ancient Macintosh computers, if I recall correctly.)

Second fastest response time comes from a wireless USB keyboard. Then wired USB keyboards and traditional wired keyboards seem to have the slowest response time.

Originally Posted by KRSplatinum

For me, I notice a huge difference depending on what Keyboard I use.

Like, I feel that the best response time is from a notebook keyboard, i.e. the keyboard integrated into the computer case. (Similar to ancient Macintosh computers, if I recall correctly.)

Second fastest response time comes from a wireless USB keyboard. Then wired USB keyboards and traditional wired keyboards seem to have the slowest response time.

I'm surprised. I would have placed them in the opposite order - fastest being PS/2, then wired USB, then wireless. A laptop keyboard is really a tiny PS/2 or USB keyboard and so would be somewhere around those two.

I get the fastest response time using a PS/2 keyboard with native PS/2 on the motherboard. Problem is that my newest PC doesn't have PS/2 anymore.

The differences between all my keyboards are mere milliseconds. Though most of us gamers would know even those teeny input delays are noticable.

PS/2 is based on interrupts and thus doesn't require any further calculation to make out the input. Traditionally, it's wired directly to the south bridge which containts the keyboard matrix. With USB it needs to go through the separate USB controller and the CPU and then calculate what kind of input was made. For this comparison I'm of course talking about native PS/2 and not a PS/2 keyboard through an USB converter (which basically makes it an USB keyboard).

Good thing is that all newer motherboards can initiate USB input devices and hubs right from the BIOS/EFI, which is faster than through a driver from the OS. This should make the delay almost unnoticeable under good circumstances.

Wow, Slaz. I had no idea. I always assumed USB was superior.

Mechanical keyboards seem to be the on the high end of quality gaming keyboards. How would you say those rate in all of this?

Oh, and I think the slidey conrols I mentioned earlier might also be due to latency when playing online.

Originally Posted by Hare

Mechanical keyboards seem to be the on the high end of quality gaming keyboards. How would you say those rate in all of this?

Oh, and I think the slidey conrols I mentioned earlier might also be due to latency when playing online.

As far as I know, mechanical keyboards only make a difference in the type of keys they use and aren't anywhere different in speed. Regular keyboards use rubber plungers that when pressed to a circuit on a piece of plastic, cause an interrupt in the signal. With mechanical keyboards, all keys are individually microswitched (usually silent Cherry switches) and wired to a board.

Basically, typing on a mechanical keyboard feels like silk due to all keys being spring-loaded. While a regular keyboard feels like pressing... rubber?

And control speed in online games shouldn't differ from single player. During online play, your game and your character are being played live as in SP, just sending all movement & more to the server through packets. The quality of other players movement visible to you depend on latency.

Is there actually any benefit at all in using a mechanical keyboard vs. a regular keyboard(Not just in JJ2, but still a little bit)?

Mechanical is perceived as more comfortable by some, and is usually more durable than membrane-based keyboards.

Oh. Hmm. So mechanical is mostly about the feel? I suppose I will stick to my current keyboard then.

I think my Apple ][e had mechanical switches. Or something did. My fingers recall typing on one at some point. Very satisfying "click" when pressing them. Don't a lot of laptops use switches like that?

By the way, my post above is based purely on speculation. I did absolutely no calculations or actual testing before I made that statement, so it could reasonably be assumed to be false.