5 accounts, 1 comp/monitor

[stompershock]

so i was playing around with this last night and it didn't seem to bad, i have 1750 ram, 2.8 amd processor. In about 1 hour i got to lvl 4 on all the toons, so i had a couple quesitons.

1 priest 4 mages
i made a macro for the mages, /assist main /cast fireball(rank 1)
I just click on the different clients and hit the macro, master loot to give quest items to all the different toons.

My question: I don't fully understand the necessity to multiple computers if this setup works. Once I integrate a auto-it script it will be a lot smoother.

So if my system can handle 5 accounts/clients at the same time is there a real necessity to 5 computers, or if it is just a ram issue, i have 4 ram slots, upgrading to 4 gig ram is still cheaper than 5 comps and monitors.

Or is it about the ultimate experience of 5 comps/monitors? I do think it would be hard to pvp with 5 clients on one comp, but leveling istn't that bad.

or am i off my rocker?

thx, i am new to all this just trying to figure it out

[Boss]

To me its harder to play diffrent classes all on ther same pc. I have ran up to 3 on mine 3 of the same range class or 2 and a healer is fairly easy. When you want to 5man a instance or do hard stuff like that to me you need more PCs. This is what I think anyways not sure how much easier it is since I only use one pc. Also I was doing like you at first just clicking the window to cast and stuff and you will like something like http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums2/viewtopic.php?t=17 alot! Im still trying to figure it all out but just for the simple 1-0 key strokes going to all windows is nice.

[sabot7726]

Can someone who is doing it please explain how? Do you just install wow to another directory or ?

My wife and I have 2 machines and 2 accounts. I wanted to play dual when she's not around but I havent decided if I should use synergy and control both machines or if I should just have 2 wow windows up instead.

[Nocturne]

It's about the EULA and programs accessing wow instances that are in the background. It's your time and money -shrug- , but I considered it until I thought about how much time and effort would be wasted if Bliz decided what you are doing (and i was considering) is legit or not.

5 Boxing with 5 PCs is legit because it does not flag as scripting/bott'ing in any sense of the form, and if their watch dog program has any reasonable doubt, you're guilty before you're innocent. I cringe using multibox versus a true keyboard mux, but after dropping the cash on the new PCs it'll just have to wait a few more months. Then at that point I'll know I'm at a truely legitimate solution to 5 boxing.

I also believe that as this "scene" becomes more popular Blizzard will start scrutinizing it more and more. It's up to you, I for one am not willing to risk it.

[Xzin]

I do think it would be hard to pvp with 5 clients on one comp, but leveling istn't that bad.

You will be hard pressed to PVP (successfully) at all with less than 5 computers and 5 monitors. You need to send output to 5 "screens", monitor what is going on in real time and react instantly. Granted, you could get a massive 30" 2560 x 1600 monitor and decent 10k RPM or RAM based hard drive and some custom software to broadcast to every client but I have to ask what is the benefit? Even though it is more work and a greater cost (and may require you to run new power lines and cooling) the upsides for PvP are such that I never seriously considered running WoW on a single machine. Too many things can go wrong with a single point of failure and for PvP (at least for me) the reaction time just isn't there.

Plus, there are some practical limitations on a 32 bit operating system - WoW needs 1 gig per client to run smoothly - and no 32 bit OS is able to support more than 3.X gigs (close to 4 but not quite).... so until 64 bit OSes are mainstream.....you would have to make do with latency switching from screen to screen and less than ideal ram per client.... plus the video card would have to be able to handle all 5 clients.... at the same time....

It's just not as elegant or as clean. Possible to be done but 5 separate machines is a far better way to go for the time being. Perhaps when we get quad core CPUs, better SLI drivers and handle the IO bottlenecks better then you could just run WoW (and the entire OS) virtualized. Right now none of that is possible and 3d gaming in a virtualized OS is unworkable to boot.

[sabot7726]

Hi Xzin nice to have you on these forums, it was an article about you that got me excited about the possibilities :)

For my purposes I have a computer that can most likely handle 2 wow windows at the same time. I'm sure I'd take a performance hit but I might be able to live with it.

I was just curious how to pull that off, even if it turns out to be a bad idea :p

I might try installing another copy of wow into a new folder and trying that, someone here had posted that they do this with a program to keep one window always on top, and just aligned the windows so you could easily click the actionbars of the hidden wow window if you needed to. Hmm

[Xzin]

Glad to see I inspired a few people :) You can multibox 2 accounts on the same account without any major difficulty. The problem is simultaneous input. It isn't easy to do without 3rd party software to send commands to both WoWs. Plus you still have some latency to deal with as you switch from window to window (higher end hardware should eliminate that though).

I would poke around for one and run both WoWs in a window. I can't make any promises Bliz will not get upset at you - they tend to frown on those things but in general I don't think they will care too much if all it does is send keystrokes. Just watch out for keyloggers and the like.

[Qcybershop]

welcome back Xzin. i thought u quit. i was checking Armory and your char still at 60 >< but gradz to see the legend back :twisted:

[Xzin]

welcome back Xzin. i thought u quit. i was checking Armory and your char still at 60 >< but gradz to see the legend back :twisted:

No - I did not quit but I am still level 60. I own the expansions but I have been too busy with real life to get into TBC and WoW as much as I would like right now.

Soon hopefully :) The 5v5s were great fun in beta. Lets just hope they fixed all of the bugs. Feared through the walls whereru?

[ocaTwins]

Let me know, how 5on5 Arena is working out for you with the <Army of Zin>.

Right now, with around 200 matches played with my draenei shaman and a resto druid, rogue, survival hunter and ms warrior on our team, I find that constant crowd control throughout the match and paladins as healers are the real match winners.