Question concerning Intel graphics driver i915 and OpenGL rendering

[Janne Jokitalo]

Hello list,

I've joined here to ask some questions regarding OpenGL rendering with i915
driver, since I've got a problem when it comes to playing UFO:AI on a laptop
with a graphics card that wants aforementioned driver.

This problem has been reported by some others as well, and the problem is of
the kind where some parts of the game you get very few FPS, enough so to
make playing impossibly unpleasant. With an ATi card on a desktop, the game
is tolerable, at the same parts of the game you get thrice the amount of
FPS, and the machine is utilizing a 7500 Radeon card and a 1GHz P3 CPU, with
  some 900MB of RAM. To my understanding, each of the elements on the 
desktop
are smaller or fewer than on the laptop, and combining this information with
the reports from others I take it the game has some problems in the GL code.

I have discussed this with the game developers, and as they're developing
other parts of the game currently gave me a heads up if I wanted to help in
solving the problem. There's just some trouble, I'm not an experienced game
developer, I do know some of C code though and am thus interested to
troubleshoot the issue.

Drivers, though, are very much in the unknown territory, and this is why
I've come to ask for guidance on looking into this on the driver side. So,
does anyone have any pointers on how this issue should be tried? Thanks very
much in advance.

Some additional information:

Laptop:

Compaq Presario V6103EA
Ubuntu Feisty 7.04
Celeron M 1.60 GHz
1GB RAM
Intel graphics 945GM
direct rendering: Yes
OpenGL renderer string: Mesa DRI Radeon 20061018 AGP 1x x86/MMX/SSE TCL

Desktop:

Some no-name brand
Ubuntu Feisty 7.04
P3 1 GHz
920 MB RAM
ATi Radeon 7500 (RV200)
direct rendering: Yes
OpenGL renderer string: Mesa DRI Intel(R) 945GM 20061017 x86/MMX/SSE2


Best regards,

-- 
Jaska