try disabling the "vignette" option in advanced settings

One thing I've noticed that if you're using custom settings, the maximum texture size always depends on which preset you're modifying. You can edit the User.ini too, but it's easier to just pick a preset and work from there. This way you can turn other settings off but still have great looking textures.

Also, the texture downscaling option seems to very useful on a not so good system (C2D E8400 3ghz, 9800 GTX+ 512mb, 3gb RAM). If this is set to low and using the ultra textures, the game not only looks much better than with both on low, but there's almost no performance hit at all. As far as I can tell, it doesn't touch the ground textures at all, only small objects for which having very high-res textures isn't as important.

My settings are attached.

I basically switched shadows to Low, turned off bloom/SSAO/Ubersampling and left everythign else at Ultra.

On my rig of an overclocked Intel i7 920 (@ 3.5Ghz per core) w/ 6GB of DDR3 RAM + GTX 260's in SLI (1.8GB RAM on eachcard ) on Win7 x64, I'm getting around 40fps average in outdoor fighting scenes.

I've just installed latest beta drivers so I'll see how they go.

Links to screenies of how these settings look:

http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z184/shirike/Gaming/witcher22011-05-1819-45-02-35.png
http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z184/shirike/Gaming/witcher22011-05-1819-40-08-04.png
http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z184/shirike/Gaming/witcher22011-05-1819-35-46-38.png
http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z184/shirike/Gaming/witcher22011-05-1818-41-41-61.png

I did some testing and this game is fuckin weird in the optimizations.

AMD Phenom II X3 720 @ 3.2GHz
8GB DDR2 @ 400MHz in Dual Channel
XFX ATI RadeonHD4890 1GB
Win 7 64bit
11.5 drivers
Steam
1920x1200

All settings are default unless noted.

Ultra: http://www.abload.de/img/witcher2max5pjo.jpg
(Default other than maxing EVERYTHING including ubersampling.)
I get 9-15fps walking around. Not playable.
High: http://www.abload.de/img/witcher2highnp7v.jpg
I get 20-30fps walking around in this area. 60fps in menus.
Medium: http://www.abload.de/img/witcher2mediumjr9h.jpg
I get 28-35fps walking around in this area. 60fps in menus.
Low: http://www.abload.de/img/witcher2lowuqg2.jpg
I get 30-40fps walking around in this area. 260+ fps in menus!

I have to play on medium with some things increased and DOF off but it's playable.

However the difference from low to high is almost negligible. This needs SERIOUS optimization. A difference of 10 fps? Thats pretty poor.

Disable ubersampling and you can max everything and play without problems.
Disabling it works?

I don't want to play on high because it's too slow. I want 60fps.

I tried it earlier because thats what i originally thought it was but it did nothing. Now i'm hearing things that some of the settings don't change properly in the .ini. So i'll have a look later on tonight when i've got time to check it.

Will post my results when i do that.

Thank you very much. : )

I can only really run this with nearly everything disabled only the textures are high, Here are my specs

Graphics Card: Nvidia 9500GT 1GB
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz (4 CPUs), ~2.4GHz
Memory: 3072MB RAM

going to be upgrading to a GeForce GTX 460 1GB in a few weeks.

You wont see a huge boost unless you upgrade that CPU as well.

I'll suggest a GTX 560 Ti. The CPU is good. Only if you overclock it at 3+ GHz of course. And 4 GB of RAM at least.

What is your definition of buttery smooth? You sure Ubersampling is on? That setting is designed for the most top end cards and SLI. I'm talking dual GTX590s here.

Phenom II x4 3.2Ghz
6GB RAM
ATI Radeon 5850 1GB

With everything maxed out (Ubersampling included) result is about 13-14 FPS Average
Everything on MAX and Ubersampling Off, result is 30-50FPS, which is completely OK with me at least.

Most of the PC games in the last few years are developed primarily for consoles, which are already behind the PC in terms of processing power, so they run easy with very high graphic settings on mid-high machines. The Witcher 2 however is an exclusive PC title, and we can expect that some more cutting edge graphic techniques are implemented, therefore putting a lot more load on the CPUs/GPUs.

Ubsersampling as far as I know in general is a technique that renders every frame, or a part of it several times and then blends them together for the best result possible. Said with a few words, this is an option for high-end SLI/Crossfire cards, so anyone with a single-GPU card should put it on Disabled.

Well it doesn't gitter at all, and seems to flow very nicely. Tomorrow I will monitor the FPS and give an update of how it is playing.