Multiboxing Hardware Science!

Ok that might be a good test. Make 10 clients on one gpu.

Set all to 60fps forground and background (all 10 at 60fps all the time) and full ultra including max multisampling (make sure you only using one gpu, if you have a 2nd card in disable its driver in device manager). Have 9 tiles in background (3X3) and one tile full screen forground. Have all look at something in the distance not at ground, a crowed place is better but not necessary. Do not send the background to a second monitor (of course if you send outputs to a 2nd monitor it will be rendered). Have only one active gpu and one active monitor.

Bring the one tile to the full screen forground hiding all others in the background. Make sure fraps is off completly (check process in the task manager). Do a SS and see what gpu load is. Swap the windows and bring the 9 tiles to the forground (is that possible?) and the one client to the background take SS and see what the gpu load is (memory means nothing).

Then do the exact same test except with fraps recording the background only (not the forground). SS with the one client in the forground and fraps recording in background, then 2nd SS (showing gpu load) with 9 clients in forground and 1 client in background with fraps again only recording the background.

Those 4 gpu load figues should give us the answer.

If they are the same in both sets compared to the other in the same set and the first set is a bit lower then the 2nd set (cause fraps gonna take up a bit) then you are right. I.E.

GPU load:

1 (no fraps 1 client forground) 38percent
2 (no fraps 9 client in forground) 38percnet
3 (fraps 1 client forground) 42percent
4 (fraps 9 client forground) 42percnet

If we see something like that you are correct.

Of course wow will render both the forground and the background if the forground goes to one display and the background goes to another display.

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Originally Posted by Sam DeathWalker

Ok that might be a good test. Make 10 clients on one gpu.

Set all to 60fps forground and background and full ultra including max multisampling (make sure you only using one gpu,

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I think you're completely mistaken as to how powerful you believe a single GTX 580 is or how much CPU &
GPU Ultra w/ MSAA requires. I can't even run 5 clients @ 60/30 FPS using the Ultra preset and no MSAA
(x1). Why your test requires super maximum video settings is beyond me. I mean... why don't I just go into
the nVidia control panel and increase all those settings to max as well so I can have Ultra++++ settings
across 10 clients? What more is that going to prove rather than keeping the clients at Fair or Low settings?

I'm done with all of this and I will not be running anymore of your tests in an attempt to help you believe
what I say is true. It's unfortunate that you can't see where I'm coming from in all of these different tests
and that isn't my problem. Why don't you run some tests of your own?

The last test that I FRAPS'd which was the Tedrassil/Orgrimmar test with two characters in two completely
different zones. The character in Orgrimmar had 60 FPS at all times and the character in Teldrassil had 10
FPS at all times. FPS affects the GPU load as anyone can see by using GPU-Z and changing their FPS in real
time.

You Believe: If a window cannot be seen because it is hidden behind another window then it is not being
rendered and that only the top window (out of how many ever are stacked on top of each other) affects the
total FPS that is being rendered/used by the GPU.

I logged in the same characters from that same test but only one at a time and both characters' single
window GPU-Z readings were... wait for it ...much, much lower than the 234MB VRAM / 13% GPU load
readings from the video. Why? Because the GPU renders all game windows that aren't minimized.

Why can I successfully FRAPS a game window that sits behind another game window? Because the GPU
renders all the game windows that aren't minimized.

I keep saying "that aren't minimized" because here's a little test you can run on your own. Try to FRAPS a
single game window and minimize it, give it a few seconds, and then unminimize it. Play that video back and
you can see that the video freezes in place during the time it was minimized. Why? Because the GPU isn't
rendering that window anymore because it's minimized. You can even watch the GPU load drop when you
minimize a window because it isn't being rendered anymore in its minimized state.

When on the flip side, in my last video, jumping between game windows did not affect the GPU load. The
2% that the GPU load did fluctuate was most likely because of people passing through the Orgrimmar tunnel
and the GPU had to... wait for it again ...render those people even though they were in the background
window!

To all of the readers of this thread: I hope these last few page have been fun and exciting for all of you who
do read and keep up with this thread. Hopefully, your tubs of popcorn are not near the bottom because I'm
sure this thread will continue to experience more excitement in the future.

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I think you're completely mistaken as to how powerful you believe a single GTX 580 is or how much CPU &
GPU Ultra w/ MSAA requires. I can't even run 5 clients @ 60/30 FPS using the Ultra preset and no MSAA
(x1). Why your test requires super maximum video settings is beyond me. I mean... why don't I just go into
the nVidia control panel and increase all those settings to max as well so I can have Ultra++++ settings
across 10 clients? What more is that going to prove rather than keeping the clients at Fair or Low settings?

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Prior test were usless because the gpu was not being stressed at all. I just picked some high stuff at random as it seems like the 580 was just to strong, any setting that use like 80 or so percent of the gpu load is fine.

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Why can I successfully FRAPS a game window that sits behind another game window? Because the GPU
renders all the game windows that aren't minimized

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FRAPS itself might require the window to be rendered thats why my test is run with fraps on and with fraps off.

Just as if you have two monitors and send background to one and forground to the other even if one is turned off your gpu will still render whats being sent to it..

Ill have to run some tests myself. Obvisouly if what I say is true then gpu load with one client should be the same as gpu load with 10 clients (if nine are all in the background). Should not be that difficult to test properly.



Ok I did a test. And anyone can do this with their computer its easy enough.

Two Clients. Set the FPS back and forground to 100 on both. Set DX9 or 11 the same on both.

1st Client. Full Ultra with 8 X multisampling stand in the center of the area and look far.

2nd Client. Low with 1 X multisampling stand against the wall looking into it.

When I show the 1st client I am at like 80ish gpu load, when I show the 2nd client I am at 50ish gpu load.

BUT THIS ONLY WORKS IF BOTH HAVE "FULLSCREEN" checked.

If you check "windowed" or "windowed fullscreen" it will probably render the background.

Keep in mind your computer will change the fps to try and compensate and of course as fps goes down so does gpu load. Probably it might be best to set both at 20 or 30 whatever causes the 1st client to get like 90 percent or so.


Thats not to say that Fenril was in any way wrong, probably he never runs with "fullscreen" checked in all clients (in fact IsBoxer might not allow that when tiled).

Why would you run your game in fullscreen?

Seriously, WHY?

And not just for one of your stupid tests Sam. To boost performance? Sorry, but if I'm multiboxing I want to have a quick glance at my other clients to make sure they're where they should be, not humping a tree or some nonsense, so I'll have them run in non-fullscreen mode (again, WHY?! I switch between other applications all the time!) and tile them as I see fit.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sam DeathWalker

Ok I did a test. And anyone can do this with their computer its easy enough.

Two Clients. Set the FPS back and forground to 100 on both. Set DX9 or 11 the same on both.

1st Client. Full Ultra with 8 X multisampling stand in the center of the area and look far.

2nd Client. Low with 1 X multisampling stand against the wall looking into it.

When I show the 1st client I am at like 80ish gpu load, when I show the 2nd client I am at 50ish gpu load.

BUT THIS ONLY WORKS IF BOTH HAVE "FULLSCREEN" checked.

If you check "windowed" or "windowed fullscreen" it will probably render the background.

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Why are you testing in Fullscreen mode? Is that is how me multibox? Is that how anyone around here plays
multiple clients on one machine? In Fullscreen mode? No, they don't. When one fullscreen window is in
focus... everything else can be considered to be in a minimized state hence the reason why that one game
window hijacks the entire computer.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sam DeathWalker

Thats not to say that Fenril was in any way wrong, probably he never runs with "fullscreen" checked in all clients (in fact IsBoxer might not allow that when tiled).

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No, Sam I don't. No one plays in Fullscreen because you can't tile windows in Fullscreen. It's been like that
since the beginning of multiboxing time. I have no idea why you don't know this since you do, in fact, tile game
windows yourself.

No I don't tile (check my SS on my web site) I play fullscreen and alt/tab between clients (cause I have 6 monitors I see enough of the world anyways).

Lax should look into that. If you could have all your tiled character in the background (say 4) and the main in the forground full screen that would save some gpu power for sure. But you will lose a LOT of switching time. And coodenated mouse movement might not work (although you dont need to render the world to know where your mouse is). But you might not lose to much switching time if you have a really powerfull gpu like the 580 cause it can render the screen in less the 1/60th of a secound.

Does everyone use coodenated mouse movement (mostly for ground click attacks if you run mellee you don't need it)?

Well, actually the reason to tile is to get common mouse movement on all screens at the same time, and to see more of the world I guess.

If you have a 2 monitor set up, it might not be that bad to put 2 guys on your main screen and 3 guys on the alt screen and do full screen on all, (or 1 and 4) you wont get coodenated mouse movement (although lax might be able to fix it so that you can on background sceens also I am not sure, if that dons't occurs as it is). That would save some gpu power for sure. And switching times are very very fast. And you never have to squint looking at a tiny screen.

Also I am not sure that the rendering thing dosn't work with "windowed (fullscreen)" checked or not Ill do more tests on that later.

Now that I think about it I can set my background fps to 60 like my forground (or at least 30) given taht there is no rendering .... make my auto follow tight.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sam DeathWalker

No I don't tile (check my SS on my web site) I play fullscreen and alt/tab between clients (cause I have 6 monitors I see enough of the world anyways).

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I stand corrected on how your Window Layout works, however, you are the first and only person I know of that
alt-tabs between fullscreen game windows.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sam DeathWalker

Also I am not sure that the rendering thing dosn't work with "windowed (fullscreen)" checked or not Ill do more tests on that later.

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Windowed (Fullscreen) and Windowed are both "windowed" in these tests. One has a border and the other
doesn't. All of my tests that I've shown here in this thread are in Windowed (Fullscreen) mode. I've conducted
other, smaller tests on my own that were just Windowed and the results are all the same. As to what the
technical differences are between the two modes, I don't know (or if there are any differences besides one
window being 'maximized').

what here talk about ? not hardware tools ??