Yeah. The solution was to manually edit the video7.cfg file to force AH to load textures. For whatever reason, the game wouldn't allow him to select that option with the GUI.
However, that sort of problem resulted in a stutter whenever a new texture had to load (that is, when a plane transformed from a dot into a textured element.) This seems more like a regular stutter, that happens regardless of textures.
Or am I missing some element of the description?
-Llama
No, you've got it right.
Offline, with all graphics options set to maximum, including the use of soundpacks and skins, it's fine.
Online, with everything set to minimum, default skins and sounds, and at a deserted field, the variance is all over the place. Also, the variance drops down to -1 whenever I look up, both when I use the joystick or just keypad 5.