I have a 1.7 GHz P4 myself. Which, IIRC, is about 2x the CPU speed of the original "recommended system" for AH2. And this CPU's still good enough to run EVERY OTHER THING full tilt, especially since I got a Radeon 9600 Pro. But in AH2, my FPS blows chunks, especially with the Radeon. I got this Radeon to replace a ancient GeForce3 with 1/2 as much on-board memory, and doubled my RAM at the same time, all of which resulted in a 20% REDUCTION of my FPS in AH2, although every other game in the world works better. And since then (that was back around Beta 4 or 5), my FPS has gone steadily down with every new beta. In Beta 14, I'm down to 17 FPS on the runway.
That's the problem. My CPU may be several years old, but I've got enough RAM and a good enough vidcard to have no need at all to buy a new system for any other game. AH2 is the only problem, and it keeps getting worse instead of better. Something is BADLY wrong with AH2, especially for Radeon users. If other new 3D games with gorgeous graphics work fine, why can't AH2?
I'd REALLY like to see this framerate problem fixed first, instead of seeing new betas with the rather trivial fixes seen in Beta 14. I really could care less if shadows show through the plane when the FPS is so bad that I can't play the game anyway.
OTOH, if HTC has no intention of fixing the FPS problem, I hope they at least have the decency to tell me up front, right now, so I can weigh my alternatives.