Artifacting with 2+ WoWs

[Savage]

When more than 2 WoWs are open at the same time, I get random artifacting and other graphical anomalies. I know this isnt video card damage because it doesnt happen on a single instance of WoW

I have updated Drivers, etc. Each instance gets perfect FPS, just the artifacting problem that I can't figure out. This happens with SLI on and off.

[Siaea]

I used to get the same thing right before I lost a video card. What technical support at ATI told me is that it's getting hot. Make sure your case is clean and the fan runs (mine had stopped), and you may also put another fan directly on the card. Possibly, if you already have artifacts, it's damaged.

[turbonapkin]

Are you running seperate copies or symlinked clients? When I changed from running all client off one copy to main of copy A and slaves off copy B, this artifcating issue no longer occured.

[Korruptor]

I used to get the same thing right before I lost a video card. What technical support at ATI told me is that it's getting hot. Make sure your case is clean and the fan runs (mine had stopped), and you may also put another fan directly on the card. Possibly, if you already have artifacts, it's damaged.Like Siaea mentioned, I had the same issue with artifacting when the card was over-heating. When its happening take the side of your computer case off and carefully check the heatsink(s). If you have temp monitors use those. For me, one of my video cards' fans was slowing down.

[Savage]

The card isnt overheating: when running everything it's topping out at about 55C. The fan is always at 100%. As for the WoW folders, I have two folders: one on each of my hard drives. I believe the same problem happened to me when they were running off of one folder, but I dont know. I tried symlinking but I got a few errors.

[turbonapkin]

What happens if you run the main with full draw distance and the slave(s) at minimum draw distance? Do you still experience artifacting?

[Savage]

Yup, I do. I've tried so many different configurations, I dont know what is actually causing the problem. It seems like rendering 2+ clients at the same time is causing it because 1 WoW runs flawlessly. Also, when this happens on all of the instances, If I run fraps and record, it stops on that screen. When Fraps records, right now, its capped at 30FPS. I dont know WHY this happens, but /shrug

Edit: Just tested a second time: The artifacting STOPS when im frapsing on that screen. The others still do it. Anyone have any idea why this happens?

[Hachoo]

I get artifacts playing 5x WoWs only if my computer hasn't been rebooted in a little while after I've already 5 boxed. (ie: I 5 box yesterday, don't reboot, then this morning play 5 WoWs, I will almost 100% get a ton of artifacts to the point where I have to hard exit and reboot). I personally feel it is a memory related issue, but I can't really put my finger on exactly what causes it.

[Frappuccino]

Delete config.wtf under your WTF folder :)

I had the same problem, while I was doubtful it fixed the issue completely!

[Heenan]

Yup. Frappuccino and I had this same problem (as well as many other people on the official forums). Doesn't hurt to try it, especially if you haven't cleared it out in awhile. Delete config.wtf and let the game rebuild it.

[Savage]

:thumbup: Yeah, Ill try that when I get home and see if it helps.

[Savage]

Another update here: I just took a little video to show what I'm talking about. Youtube apparently takes a little while to add it to your list once you upload it, so I'll edit when it comes up. Hopefully someone can help after this. I actually got a Blue Screen while configuring my mods from a fresh WoW install and Symlink, so I dont know. I researched the BSOD and I found absolutely nothing.

Edit: Sorry, Double post - And also Frap deleting the WTF folder didnt work - I think it has something to do with my hardware / drivers /software.

Edit2: Video : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXNIN_Bo_Nc The quality was taken WAY down because of youtube, but you can basically see whats going on. The frames are all flashing in and out - that isnt because of the camera.

[Dgc2002]

are you running a multi core processor?

I had this problem awhile back. When i started 2 wows...even at the login screen i had artifacting. What i ended up having to do was going to task manager and right clicking on the wow.exe and go to set affinity. And change each wow to work on the same core.

[Savage]

Ive recently switched back to Vista - something must have been confliting with XP. So far I havent encountered the same problems as in the OP, so this fixed it. Thanks for all the help, as always.