Maximizing performance

[Mubox]

So, what your saying is:
If i upgrade my CPU (be it a new CPU, or new pc) i can run more?

Btw, does it matter if i seriously tune my windows so that it's a gamers edition?
Cuz i tried making my own windows version, and i cut the RAM-usage back to about 30MB.

I don't know a lot about registry tuning, but maybe that will increase performance even more.
I hope so, cuz i don't have the money for a new computer.

It's true that WoW is a CPU-intensive game (e.g. uses more CPU than GPU), so usually upgrading a CPU can have a more positive impact than upgrading anything else (GPU, RAM).

However, WoW is also RAM-intensive, since WoW doesn't immediately flush unnecessary data out of memory as you change zones (since it's cheaper to swap the data back into memory than to re-load it from a a compressed MPQ + in-memory re-init.)

To know if a CPU Upgrade would benefit you, simply crack open Task Manager (taskmgr.exe, or CTRL+SHIFT+ESC Hotkey) and switch to the Performance Tab. It should show CPU Utilization. If CPU Use appears at 100% you are "CPU-bound", that is, performance in WoW is negatively impacted due to a lack of CPU. If CPU Use doesn't ever hit 100% then you are not CPU-bound.

On my machine, I can run 4 instances at an average of 90-95% CPU, depending on what is going on. I get 30-40 fps. With 5 clients I become CPU-bound, CPU is constantly at 100% and my fans go into overdrive. I've actually had my box shutdown due to heat 3 times over the last 6 months.

Even if you are CPU bound, it may still take a heavy CPU upgrade to get any real benefit. Such as my case. If 4 clients are at 90% CPU I can extrapolate that each instance is using roughly 23% CPU, thus, I would need an upgrade that reduced the CPU cost of running wow by roughly 5% per instance, or put another way, I would need a CPU upgrade that improved my CPU performance by (5%*5)=25% to provide my 5th instance with the extra CPU it needed to not be CPU-bound. Unfortunately, there is no CPU swap I can perform to become unbound from the CPU in my machine. So, I'm stuck waiting until I can upgrade to a significantly faster system (Probably a quad-core i7, which would probably increase the number of instances I can run significantly.)

I "local-box" 5 instances, and in AV's my FPS can dive down to 6fps. I blame this on a combination of CPU, BUS Clock (MB and Gfx) and GPU performance. With 30+ geared toons surrounding me I simply lack the power overall to handle the load. My point? Even if you can increase CPU, you may find you are still bound to bus clock rates (you can only move data around so fast) and available GPU performance (I have a "lowly" 8700m, 512MB.)

So, it would help to know what you have in terms of hardware, and what your upgrade options are. This is why I was curious if there was any tool out there that would indicate being IO-bound or GPU-bound, because a CPU upgrade may not always solve the problem (it may only be part of the solution.)

My current rig is a single Core2 Duo 2.0Ghz Laptop with a 512MB 8700m and 4GB of Ram, running on Windows7 X64. For the most part, I get decent-enough framerates running 5 instances of WoW to not claw my eyes out. FPS is usually above 20-25fps.

On the subject of Memory usage, I use a multibox app that lets me "trim" memory per-instance of WoW, I trim at 612MB. This trim occurs every 30-60 seconds or so, which allows WoW to "grow" momentarily when it really needs to. This trim ensures that each instance of WoW only ever uses 612MB of physical memory. 612 * 5 = 3060MB, or 2.9GB. This is nearly all my physical memory (as out of 4GB, 1GB is reserved by the host hardware for shadowing video, audio and other hardware-writible portions of memory.) Thus, runnign 5 instances I've consumed almost all my physical memory. I've tried trimming wow down to 256MB of memory, but I wind up seeing "gray texture" glitches in-game. 512 seemed sufficient, but I simply pdid the math and ensured that each instance of WoW got an equal share of ALL my physical RAM.

With memory trimming, I can ensure no one instance of WoW overtakes all of my physical. Without this, I lack the memory to run WoW and experience occasional swap-hell when zoning, running through Orgrimmar, etc. If left unchecked, during my casual play WoW will eat as much as 800MB of memory. On average, with everything tuned down, WoW consumes 400MB of physical and 200MB swap. IMO per instance of WoW you will want 512MB of memory, and also assuming that the total memory of all AddOns is under 32MB, it's possible for a full AddOn suite to each more than 100MB of RAM easy.)

Lastly. Heat management.

Modern CPUs will degrade their own performance internally as they reach a critical tempurature, I believe this is around 77 degrees celcius (I could be wrong.) Once a critical tempurature is hit the Cores will clock at 0, halting the system until the heat dissipates. If heat does not dissipate, a modern system will reboot. Some systems may opt to reboot instead of clocking down to 0. I haven't researched this behavior since the P4 began "stepping" its clock rate due to overheating.

What this means, though, is that poor heat dissipation will negatively impact CPU performance. For example, I smoke, and I ash right next to my laptop. Call it what you will. The problem I had was severe overheating. My fans would run full-blast non-stop and my framerates would decline to <20FPS. Why? Because the ash from my smoking was building up on all of the cooling components (fan, heat-sink fins, etc.)

I went out, bought a can of air (Eckard's Can-of-Air or Duster, 3-5$ depending) and sprayed everything clean. The result? My framerates have improved from <20fps to >30fps, and my fans, well, I don't hear them at all Moral? Check your cooling components, you'd be surprised what a can of air can do, or at least how excessive heat can ultimately degrade performance.

Hope that helps.

[Mubox]

The processor may be an issue, but you'll find that 4 boxing with 4gb is fine, 5 boxing with 4gb can create exactly the issue you are describing - particularly in crowded areas.

I was able to get away with 5 boxing a single system into TBC but anywhere crowded like Org or Shattrah would play hell on it. Once Lich King released it's not feasible to even 5 box remote areas on 4gb of ram... especially if you are on a 32 bit OS.

I haven't yet hit Northrend with my team, I'm just now breaking L55. However, on my setup I get decent enough framerates in Badlands (I'm hearthed to shatt for the portals).

Though, I use a memory-limiting feature.

I do suffer horribly when I 4-box AV. To compensate I shut off all AddOns, perform an "End Process Tree" on explorer, etc. Ultimately I find I'm CPU-bound. With 4GB of memory, 3GB are available.

With WoW "tuned-down" (lowest effects, 1024x768 windowed) I'm not swapping unnecessarily. The tools I use display the physical memory commit for each instance I'm running, on average they report at less-than 400MB physical. If I pull up perf-counters for page activity, once loaded into a zone, I don't really swap at all. Most of the Disk IO I suffer is related to texture loads (filemon, sysinternals.)

5-boxing with 4GB is doable, but I agree it gets dangerously close to entering swap-hell. Before adding a memory-limiter and trimming back all of my AddOns I would occasionally enter swap-hell and it would last for 20 seconds, which is simply unacceptable. Memory limiting at least distributes the swap-out cost over-time, ensuring that the only data in memory is data that WoW has been needing for normal operation. When I first began multiboxing I ran two instances, and each one ate 1.2GB of RAM, I learned over time that WoW with medium or high effects and/or a "bad" collection of AddOns can result in horrible memory utilization.

[wowphreak]

If yeh drop the resolution you play at it will reduce the lag considerably.
After that kill shadows, reduce yer view distance, those are the big ones.

On all the other wows take the graphics affects bar, the big one, and drag it all the way to the left.

The problem yer running into is not enough memory the higher the res yeh play at the more memory yeh need.
Alll those affect require a considerable amount of cpu cycles. WoW does most of the graphics on the cpu.

[Mubox]

If yeh drop the resolution you play at it will reduce the lag considerably.
After that kill shadows, reduce yer view distance, those are the big ones.

On all the other wows take the graphics affects bar, the big one, and drag it all the way to the left.

The problem yer running into is not enough memory the higher the res yeh play at the more memory yeh need.
Alll those affect require a considerable amount of cpu cycles. WoW does most of the graphics on the cpu.

Just an update, I recently purchased a new laptop (Sager NP9280, i7-975, 6GB, NV 280M 1GB, WoW is on a Intel SSD) and I can now run all 5 instances locally, windowed, maximized. I get 60fps in the foreground, 30 background, no hiccups. I set all settings to max for one client (my primary driving toon) and set the rest to lowest. On my "secondary driving toon" I set the display distance to full.

The primary FPS killers on this hardware?

1) Shadows
2) Specular Lighting
3) View Distance

I knock shadows down, ensure that Specular lighting is disabled on all but one client, and knock the view distance down to half on all but one client. I get excellent FPS.

On my old Alienware (core2 2ghz, 4gb ram, NV 8900m), to achieve 30fps+ in the foreground: Windowed mode, 1024x768, all effects set to lowest, desktop BPP set to 16 bits. Going 'maximized' with just one client would tank FPS, increasing effects would also tank FPS. CPU for 5 clients was around 90-95%, on the i7 cpu is less than 15%. Same multibox configuration, and higher settings.

Thus, if you're CPU bound an i7 (desktop, not mobile) appears to be WAY more than you would need, whereas a T7200 core2 is sub-par for 5 toons. Likewise, the gfx performance of the 280m surpasses that of the NV 8900m with reckless abandon.

The only downside? My new rig cost me around 4200$ shipped. Most people don't have that kind of dough on hand for a laptop, but I would imagine a similarly configured Desktop would cost significantly less. If I had to 'guess', I can probably run 10+ clients in terms of available CPU/GPU on the Sager/i7, and 5 was pushing the CPU limit on the Alienware/Core2.

[boxblizzard]

i would recommend in your graphics card advanced option choose "performance" option for overall graphics. makes a shed load of difference.

[DrChaos]

If i spent 4200.00, i would have certainly got the extra 800.00 and ordered the WoW laptop.......