Computer Performance Advice

[Perrigrin]

Guys,

I've been 5-boxing for a good while now, and my computer has done ok - But, Dalaran, PVP and even running around the Tournament area slows it to a craw and even causing frequent freezes on one or many wow clients.
The freezes become more frequent until I restart wow or even reboot - Typically, if I visit Dalaran, I benefit from a reboot of at least wow after that.
Most of the freezes are of the kind that I get them entering a new area, then as it has "stabilized" around that it moves better - But areas like running around the tournament in IC or dalaran are always extermely jerky and laggy.

So, I am firstly looking for advice how to invest in the current machine to get a bit more bang for the buck out of it, but I've come to terms that I will need a new one most likely.

So, I'm running:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 @ 2,50 GHz
4 GB of Memory (which is max this motherboard can take)
2x 500 GB 7200 RPM discs, both quite full. WoW is ran from one disc, OS from the other (same as swap file), I run 2 folders of wow, one for main, one for the 4 slaves - All but UI and config data is linked.
A 8800GTS 640MB something no name graphics card - powerin 2x 22 inch Samsung monitors at 1680x1050, 32 bit color.

Maximizer in keyclone is set to 1-1 in game resolution,
Main wow is set to maxfpsbk 15 and maxfps 60
Slave wows are set to maxfpsbk 15 and maxfps 20

My main wow is set to the graphics settings I like playing with single boxing - which is fairly high spell effects etc to be able to see stuff on ground in raids etc and a resolution of 1600x900 24 bit color (60hz).
The slaves run the effects slider all the way on minimum, and 720x576, 24 bit color (60hz).

So, any advice that could improve my current setup? Mostly I would like to be able to pass through the IC torunament area without freezing and lagging.

I do realize I will eventually be getting a new box, but I'll start a new thread on advice about that.

Thanks guys!

[Kalros]

Yeah, the RAM is really your Achilles heel. Ideally for Northrend you want 8GB. I couldnt even quest in Howling Fjord until I upgraded to 8GB myself. Would you be able to just get a new motherboard and put all your old parts into it?

[Kalros]

Oh, and since 3.2, even with my 8GB of RAM, I lag like crazy in the Tournament area too.

[Perrigrin]

Oh, and since 3.2, even with my 8GB of RAM, I lag like crazy in the Tournament area too.

That's kinda disheartening, any idea why?

[Owltoid]

For smooth multiboxing many suggest 2 clients per core max, 1GB RAM per client min, and an SSD.

Obviously you can multibox with less than that, but for smooth multiboxing it seems to work. I only ever lag at the end of a WG battle and I feel it's probably due to server lag, not my computer:
i7 920, 12GB RAM, SSD, GTX275 1.8GB VRAM

[Svpernova09]

I just upgraded to a Q8400. So I'm running quad 2.6, 8gigs ram, 1tb 32mb cache SATA drive. and a PCi-E 8400 GT Nvidia card. my ownly downfall atm is my video card, and I lag here and there, but it's usually not bad, and I'm normally 30 FPS on the main, 15 on the slaves.

So RAM is definetely you're point of upgrade here, sucks that you're at max the board can take.

[jeffz0rz]

Operating system makes more of a difference than most people realize, specially with ram. Windows XP 32bit edition, will only make use of 3GB's of ram, and thats only after you change some compicated settings.. I think in the registry.. I don't remember exactly how I did it, I'll find a link and post it. So right there, thats 1gb, maybe even 2gb's of your 4 that aren't even being utilized.

I also don't remember the limits for each version of windows XP and vista..

Maybe someone else can confirm?

Edit, found and copied this from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb613473(VS.85).aspx



4-Gigabyte Tuning

On 32-bit editions of Windows, applications have 4 gigabyte (GB) of virtual address space available. The virtual address space is divided so that 2 GB is available to the application and the other 2 GB is available only to the system.
The 4-gigabyte tuning (4GT) feature, formerly called 4GT RAM Tuning, increases the virtual address space that is available to the application up to 3 GB, and reduces the amount available to the system to between 1 and 2 GB.
For applications that are memory-intensive, such as database management systems (DBMS), the use of a larger virtual address space can provide considerable performance and scalability benefits. However, the file cache, paged pool, and nonpaged pool are smaller, which can adversely affect applications with heavy networking or I/O. Therefore, you might want to test your application under load, and examine the performance counters to determine whether your application benefits from the larger address space.
To enable 4GT, use the BCDEdit /set (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=93291) command to set the increaseuserva boot entry option to a value between 2048 (2 GB) and 3072 (3 GB).


Windows Server 2003 and earlier: To enable 4GT, add the /3GB switch to the Boot.ini file. The /3GB switch is supported on the following systems:


Windows Server 2003
Windows XP Professional
Windows 2000 Datacenter Server
Windows 2000 Advanced Server

The /3GB switch makes a full 3 GB of virtual address space available to applications and reduces the amount available to the system to 1 GB. On Windows Server 2003, the amount of address space available to applications can be adjusted by setting the /USERVA switch in Boot.ini to a value between 2048 and 3072, which increases the amount of address space available to the system. This can help maintain overall system performance when the application requires more than 2 GB but less than 3 GB of address space.
To enable an application to use the larger address space, set the IMAGE_FILE_LARGE_ADDRESS_AWARE (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms680349%28VS.85%29.aspx) flag in the image header. The linker included with Microsoft Visual C++ supports the /LARGEADDRESSAWARE switch to set this flag. Setting this flag and then running the application on a system that does not have 4GT support should not affect the application.

[daviddoran]

Guys,

(snip)
2x 500 GB 7200 RPM discs, both quite full. WoW is ran from one disc, OS from the other (same as swap file), I run 2 folders of wow, one for main, one for the 4 slaves - All but UI and config data is linked.
(snip)


So, any advice that could improve my current setup? Mostly I would like to be able to pass through the IC torunament area without freezing and lagging.

I do realize I will eventually be getting a new box, but I'll start a new thread on advice about that.

Thanks guys!

I think the drive space is your problem. Standard hard drives perform much worse when at or near capacity. I have 2 computers and 3 separate wow folders. one copy of wow is on a velociraptor, another (that runs 2 clients) is on an older raptor, and the other is on a regular 7200 RPM drive. I always see the raptor loading faster than the 7200 rpm one, and the velociraptor (that also holds my OS and swap file, etc) is always first to load.

My suggestion: Buy a dedicated SSD for wow, and run all clients from it. Just a 32gb one will be fine for you, and wont run you much more than $150 for a decent one.

[BoxingGeeks]

I have almost the same exact specs as you. Same processor / video card but i have 8GB of ram instead of 4GB. I run vista 64bit and was having the same issues as you. I run 2 monitors a 30inch and a 20 inch for the clones. The weird thing is a reboot or starting all of my wow sessions would bump be back to normal.

Being a computer nerd i started to monitor everything (CPU Usage, Disk usage, bandwitch ect....) all of which seemed to be fine. I then when to my addon's and kicked everything out but Jamba and MikScrolling battletext..... Everything went back to 60FPS on the primary and the clones were smooth.

Only thing i have noticed is if i Cntl+Esc to open another program like IE or Crome.. my FPS starts to suck even after i close them.. Something pisses Wow off and it wont run good FPS until a reboot or completely closing wow's + keyclone.

My resources dont change after i have opened the other apps it just runs poorly afterwards.

Another thing that i noticed it that after the PC falls asleep and comes back out of sleep mode my FPS sucks.

Anyone have good luck on Windows 7??? Now that its released I was thinking of testing it.

PS i run smooth in dalaran and all city's when its working good...

[Perrigrin]

Hmm, well the SSD was going to be my next try - As that is something I can easily move to a new machine.

I'm also curious about the 4GB limit - The original add of the machine: http://www.webhallen.com/prod.php?id=86349 (it's in Swedish, but you can read the specs) says it's 4GB max - But googling the motherboard - I've found hints at it supporting more.

Anyone know anything about the ATX NV C2Q 775 PCIe nVIDIA nForce 650i Ultra mobo used in FS computers?

[BoxingGeeks]

Maybe i missed this... but what OS are you running on?

32bit or 64bit?
Looking at your board.. you should be able to upgrade it to 8GB but you will need the 64bit OS to use it.


Physical Memory Limits: Windows Vista
Source Link (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa366778(VS.85).aspx#physical_memory_limits_window s_vista)

The following table specifies the limits on physical memory for Windows Vista.


Windows Vista
Limit in 32-bit Windows 4 GB
Limit in 64-bit Windows 128 GB

[jak3676]

I'd suspect the retailer said 4GB max because that's all the any of the 32-bit OS's will run with. I see similar stuff from Dell and HP all the time. The retailer may well have put parts in the system that didn't have 64-bit drivers (at least they may not have been available when it was originally released). But that doesn't mean that you can't get 64-bit support and run with 8GB of RAM.

You can probably upgrade to Win7 (64-bit) and then move to 8GB of RAM pretty easily. If you still have any drivers that you got from the retailer - those could be a problem. You may need to make sure that you can determine the original manufacturer for all your parts and make sure you can get drivers from them. I never like drivers from the retailers anyway. But figuring out who made your components may take a few minutes of work.

For example - "ATX NV C2Q 775 PCIe nVIDIA nForce 650i Ultra" doesn't tell you the brand name. ATX is the form factor, NV may be something, but probably just stands for NVidia. C2Q 775 just tell you the CPU specs and pin out. PCIe nVIDIA 650i Ultra tell you the specs on the motherboard. Wost case you can just go to Nvidia's web site and download nForce 650i drivers from there - but if you knew the original manufacturer they may recommend something a little different.

[Bovidae]

Looking at a few old listings on Newegg of deactivated items ( http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&as_q=nForce+650i+Ultra&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&num=10&lr=&as_filetype=&ft=i&as_sitesearch=www.newegg.com&as_qdr=all&as_rights=&as_occt=any&cr=&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&safe=images (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&as_q=nForce+650i+Ultra&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&num=10&lr=&as_filetype=&ft=i&as_sitesearch=www.newegg.com&as_qdr=all&as_rights=&as_occt=any&cr=&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&safe=images) )

it looks like the hardware should support 8gb of ram, and as previously mentioned, the manufacturer propably put the 4gb limit due to OS constraints. Also, looking at the tech specs for that chipset ( http://www.nvidia.com/page/nforce_600i_tech_specs.html ) be sure to use DDR2-800, don't buy anything fancy here.

That said, DDR@-800 is cheap, Windows 7 is even cheaper.

Also, to emphasize previous points, full HDDs don't play nice, I'd consider another HDD for my WoW, a small SSD would be nice and would return some space back to your porn errr family phote storage.

Moving down the list, your 8800GTS 640mb DOES NOT have the G92 processor, it just missed that boat. An upgrade to even a 260 would be monumental.

Even further down that list are your mobo and processor; while great 2 years ago, they are hardly cutting edge anymore. You should be able to squeeze more frequency out of your overclock, or possibly drop in a Q9550 :D But if you are nodding your head down this entire list, and you can justify the cost thus far, might want to start thinking i7...

[jak3676]

This is pretty much the exact boat I was in upgrade wise. 8GB of DDR2 800MHz ram will run you just under $100 on newegg. A cheap 32GB SSD is about $125, but you can find cheap 64GB drives for close to $175. A C2Q 9550 on newegg is about $200 and a GTX 260 or 4870 (1GB) version will run you about $150-175.

As mentioned above, you should never let hard drives get more than 75% full. They start taking some big performance hits past that point. I'd start by freeing up some hard drive space whereever you can. If that means you have to get an additional hard drive - may as well get an SSD. The SSD may not be the cheapest upgrade, but it can follow you to a new PC at some point in the future. In terms of "bang for your buck" it's probably as big an upgrade as more RAM.

If you haven't already - I'd strongly recommend checking out Win7 (64-bit). You can get the realase condidate for free and that will last you until March until you actually have to buy a real copy. If you need to stick to "free" upgrades for now, then I'd start by cleaning up hard drives and picking up Win7 (64-bit).

I'd put 8GB of RAM (4x 2GB sticks) next on your to do list, but really it's right up there with a SSD. It's fairly cheap and will probably provide the biggest bang for your buck with what you have right now. If you just do the SSD and more RAM, you'll probably be good to go. At least that should cut out the bad lag spikes.

You probably don't really need a new GPU. But more video memory can always help. Still you can compensate for video issues by just turning down the video effects a little bit. If you do spend some money on a new GPU at least you'll be able to transplant in a new PC down the road. I'd say this is a personal preference really.

I'm not sure I'd mess with a 9550, unless you can find a cheap on one craigslist/ebay. It's a clear upgrade from your Q6600, but it's not that much of one. If/When you eventually upgrade to a new machine it won't be able to follow you either.

If you're getting to the point up upgrading your CPU and motherboard, then it really is time to look at a whole new i7 system. You can get a good one for about $750 - but that's a fair bit more than just doing a few cheap and simple upgrades and living with your current system for another year or two.

[cybernerv]

could be a number of things for bad performance, but I did not see(just skimmed) anyone say anything about your power supply. what power supply are you using(again I just skimmed the posts) and is it enough to power that system with the monitors? Just something you can look into, a simple solution could of been replacing the power supply with a better build quality and more stable psu. unless you are dead-set on building a new computer we can help with that as well :)

[Perrigrin]

Thanks a bunch so far guys.

I think I'll go the route of - getting a SSD (when the new Intel becomes avail) - Upgrading to Win7 (got a free volume license) - Taking my chances on the spec and slapping in 8 GB of cheap memory.

I might go for a new graphics card, depending on the $$ to spend on it, I might just rather get a new box entirely.

Anything with the mobo or processor I would just upgrade the whole thing I think - Unless I find a cheap processor that fit the mobo - That would be the 9550?

[Owltoid]

BTW, these threads should be in the hardware section of the forum.

[jak3676]

Yes a 9550 would be the "cheap" CPU upgrade you want. If someone gave you a 9400, that may work too, but it's and even smaller upgrade than the 9550. If by chance you stumble into a 9650 for a good price, that's better than the 9550, but it's generally like 2x as expensive. If you're going to pay retail for a 9650, then you should really look at a new i7.

Before you do any upgrades to the CPU you will need to make sure you motherboard supports them. I bought my current PC when the core 2 duo's just came out. It still has the 1066MHz front side bus. So it will take the Q6600 just fine, but for all the newer C2Q's it underclocks them quite a bit. The newer ones are built to have a 1333MHz FSB. I can run them, they just don't run at full speed. I can overclock my motherboard to help out, but I'm barely stable at what should be stock speeds for the CPU. (Maybe if I played with it a bit more it should help - I don't think my memory can handle being OC'd).

[Barelan]

I would try to investigate the problem first.

1) Is the CPU maxed
2) Is the swapfile used a lot
3) Is the disk queue high
etc.

That way, you can make a better decision.

If all off these seem OK then its probably the graphics card (which is more difficult to measure)

[outdrsyguy1]

I've got a similar setup and have freezes and painful stuttering lag in Dal and Tournament (5 clients 1 pc).
280 gtx graphics, quad 2.8ghz cpu, 4 gig ram, xp 32 bit., 750 gig HD (standard type, not sure model)

I'm guessing it's a RAM issue so i ordered VISTA 64 w/ free upgrade to Win 7 and 4 more gigs of ram to bring me to 8 gigs total. I held off on the SSD for now and I'll let you know how it runs with a standard hard drive and this setup by the end of the weekend.

Wintergrasp always freezes one of my clients atleast once per battle.

If it's better but not good enough i'll try the SSD i think. I'm not sure I want to spend $$ on those 4 gig ram sticks at this point (i only have 4 ram slots on mobo).

[wowphreak]

Operating system makes more of a difference than most people realize, specially with ram. Windows XP 32bit edition, will only make use of 3GB's of ram, and thats only after you change some compicated settings.. I think in the registry.. I don't remember exactly how I did it, I'll find a link and post it. So right there, thats 1gb, maybe even 2gb's of your 4 that aren't even being utilized.

I also don't remember the limits for each version of windows XP and vista..

Maybe someone else can confirm?

Edit, found and copied this from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb613473(VS.85).aspx (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb613473%28VS.85%29.aspx)


Xp will use all 4 gigs of memory unfortuanetly the way windows reports its goofy some of the memory get used for the hardware Xp requires some memory...

The /3GB is specifically used for if a single application requires more then 2 gigs of memory when you 5 box your useing 5 applications, not one, the /3gb switch aint gonna help in this case.


Perrigrin (http://www.dual-boxing.com/member.php?u=1466): check the motherboard manufacturers website they may have a bios upgrade yeh might be able to stick more memory in there.

[Perrigrin]

Just a short update:

- added a Intel 80GB SSD
- upgraded to 8 GB
- installed Windows 7

= Massive upgrade, can now reliably run massive pvp battles and dalaran as well as new tournament area - It's not perfect, but for the age and spec of the machine it runs amazing

some side notes :

- The display driver for Win7 for my old card crashes now and then, causing me to have to restart wow if it happens (about once every 3-5 hours play, so not bad).
- The power save on the disc needs to be turned off, or it causes a complete system lockup, not what is causing it, but turning power save on the SSD disc off fixed it (setting in Windows power management)
- Sound drivers seem to suck for me in Win7, all kinds of problems with Vent, but fixable

All in all, SSD+8 GB = an amazing bang for the buck!

Thanks for the advice all.

[outdrsyguy1]

Just a short update:

- added a Intel 80GB SSD
- upgraded to 8 GB
- installed Windows 7

= Massive upgrade, can now reliably run massive pvp battles and dalaran as well as new tournament area - It's not perfect, but for the age and spec of the machine it runs amazing

some side notes :

- The display driver for Win7 for my old card crashes now and then, causing me to have to restart wow if it happens (about once every 3-5 hours play, so not bad).
- The power save on the disc needs to be turned off, or it causes a complete system lockup, not what is causing it, but turning power save on the SSD disc off fixed it (setting in Windows power management)
- Sound drivers seem to suck for me in Win7, all kinds of problems with Vent, but fixable

All in all, SSD+8 GB = an amazing bang for the buck!

Thanks for the advice all.

where did you pick up Win7? I've been trying to get the RC from the windows site for a couple days and it just gives me an error when i try to download it.

thx

[Perrigrin]

I have a MSDN subscription volume license, all versions of Win 7 is available there.

[outdrsyguy1]

Okay, so I went from 32 bit xp w/ 4 gig installed ram to 64 bit Vista with 8 gig installed ram. No SSD yet but the results were amazing. I had a blast in Wintergrasp and also got to cruise around Dal for the first time with all 5 accounts and didn't freeze or really stutter at all. My keyclone also works better as keystrokes don't seem to cause undue lagging when i hold down movement keys. (before, if i held forward, all toons would get stuck running forward for an extra few seconds and other key inputs wouldn't really be recognized). In case you didn't see above, i have a geforce 280, Q9550 (2.8ghz quad core)cpu, and regular disk hard drive.

Here's the stats.
Old specs with 4 gig installed ram
Normal Xp 32 idle: ~450 meg RAM usage
5 boxing xp ~2 meg RAM usage (caps at 2.2 usage in DAL, tournament, and WG, and also freezes up a lot there)
CPU usage~ 30% on all 4 cores (i think i was bottlenecked by ram and cpu wasn't having to work hard)

New specs with 8gig installed ram and Vista 64
Vista 64 idle ~1.4 gig RAM usage
5 boxing ~5.7 gig RAM usage (peaks at about 6.2 gig usage in Dal, wg, tournament)
CPU usage ~50% most places, 90-95% on all 4 cores idle in DAL

lesson learned: get 64 bit windows and minimum 8 gigs ram.

I'd love to see it on highspeed 12 gigs ram, but it was too much money to buy the extra 2 4 gig sticks.

[jak3676]

I think some of your problem in 32-bit was your video card. Remember that XP-32 bit can only address a total of 4GB of memory. With 1GB on your video card, that only left 3GB for everything else. So it's not just that you went from 4GB to 8GB, but more like 3GB to 8GB. Even just the upgrade to 64-bit would have bumped you up a GB.

This is just something to keep in mind when you're trying to figure out where your system bottleneck is. If someone were just looking at your old spec's they may have assumed that you were not bottlenecked. It looked like you had plenty of RAM to spare (athough you didn't), and your CPU usage was pretty low too. But in truth you were actually bottlenecked by your OS.

As a side note - if you have a 9550, I don't think you can hold 12GB of RAM. All the 775 motherboards I've seen, cap out at 8GB - 4x 2GB.

[outdrsyguy1]

wow, i never realized that the 4g included the video card, that's good to know.

oh, and my asus p5q motherboard userguide says it will take up to 16 gig (4X4gig sticks/slots). Course that 4 gig stuff's expensive. I think next biggest bang for my buck would be SSD before I move to 12 or 16 gig. I'm definitely loving the new settings though.

Although, sometthing weird is going on with wow. I can't get it to remember my video settings when i login. They seem to reset everytime to the old settings and I think it has something to do with the fact i'm still running the same wow from winxp (vista didn't erase my files at all so i acutally just clicked on keyclone and everything worked great still).