to the Dev: what's the future for AI and gameplay in Lockon?

[Starlight]

Hi,

I recently upgraded to LockOn 1.02 (I've always played with 1.01 until a few weeks ago). There are some serious issues that I thought were fixed in 1.02 and instead I found out that they haven't been addressed. At the end of the post there is my config, which is quite good, tested and stable (with other games)

I only "fly" offline single player missions. Here are just some examples of the issues noticed.

 

- The AI is VERY BAD. And I really mean VERY BAD. Friendly AI planes most of the times are of no help at all. Enemy AI pilots no matter what's their skill level, sometimes they're good fighters, sometimes they're sitting ducks, waiting to be killed.

Both friendly and enemy AI pilots make little use of tactics and formations, even some ACM basics (eyeball/shooter, shooter/cover and so on...).

A lot of times attack aircraft miss their primary targets: but not due to bombing errors or weapon malfunction, they just seem to go for their own personal flight plan. Attack runs are quite ludicrous, with A/C slowing down on the final leg or making strange paths and exposing to AA defenses (extremely not real if you read any real pilot account - and also to the rookie simmer that doesn't make sense!).

I also had many times AI-controlled aircraft crash on landing or even at takeoff!!!! I have one mission where a flight regularly have two a/c crash one into the other at takeoff (#4 against #2). I played the mission Crimean Flight Tour (made by one your beta testers I think, I just added an AI wingman) and after 5-10 minutes of low flying the AI a/c *regularly* crashes into the ground. Each and every time!!!! Want more? Sometimes I had an AI-controlled a/c unable to exit stalled/departed flight.... he just went straight at stall speed, unable to recover.

 

- I experience quite a lot of game crashes, don't know if even more than with 1.01, even though I have a very stable config with many other games. In particular with "complex" missions (about 20+ aircraft and some ground vehicles) the game suddenly freezes and I just have to kill Lockon through the task manager. I have some missions which regularly freeze at some random point (even when switching to the debriefing screen!). In lighter missions (less than a dozen aircraft) the game is quite stable though.

 

- The FPS are quite a problem. With my config (which isn't the top but is very good anyway) I have generally good FPS, but in some hot spots they drop below 20. And after some minutes of play especially with heavy cloud overcast and on external views their drop is very high. (they go below 10 FPS, which makes the game unplayble or the external views impossible). Explosions and crowded places (an airfield with parked aircraft for example) are also FPS nightmares!

 

- There are lot of details lacking about things like landing and takeoff procedures, for example. Carrier operations (at least for USN aircraft) are quite chaotic. For example there is no inbound pattern (I think it's called Marshall pattern over the carrier). I had an a/c land while others were being cat-launched from a carrier: there was no collision because in some way the collision detection didn't work very good either.

 

- The player when acting as a flight lead has not much control over AI-controlled aircraft since radio orders sometimes are ignored, even when there isn't a battle raging. An example, AI wingmen who already hit bingo fuel will ignore radio call to rejoin formation, even if lead is on their same way just a few miles far.

 

- There's still no dynamic campaign and not even an-event based mission builder. Missions are VERY static and boring after a while.

 

- The a/c switch doesn't work very good yet. Sometimes it happens that once I switch to another A/C enemy AI pilots or AA defenses don't care about me anymore.

 

 

I've bought Lock On because I thought it was a great simulation. After playing a little more in depth I think now it CAN BE a great sim IF (and only if) these and other issues are fixed.

The graphics (both 3D and artwork) are excellent, the best I've ever seen, the game dynamics are overall very good. The FMs are very good, the sound is good. The work done by the dev team seems to be great. The page that gives a bit of insight on how it was done is absolutely impressive!!!

 

But I think such a sim can't be left with such limted AI and gameplay.

 

Lock On is ok for a very limited tactical scenario. A few aircraft attacking with a simple path and a few defenders doing their job. Anything more complex, such as trying to simulate a real (complex) battlefield, seem to sort out bad effects on this sim.

I don't want to use this sim just for sightseeing tours over Crimea, nor to take screens and clips.

 

I took a look to the new features introduced by Flaming Cliffs and I've hardly seen any reference to any of these issues been fixed (even though some I think are well known).

 

I'd like to know what this addon/patch will correct exactly and which are the plans for the future. I don't need a Su-25 which is the pleasure of modellers (I used to be a modeller too some time ago), now I just need a sim which does its job - simulate military aircraft in a wartime situation.

 

I've written all of this because I absolutely love Lock On, it's amazing, but it's also quite frustrating when I try to play it (not because I'm a newbie, I've already managed to fly and fight with Falcon4's F-16). It's also frustrating because I also did some skins and I was planning some other mods but it makes little sense to do further work when actual gameplay is not much exciting.

 

PS: All that I've written here can be proved by screens that I took and mission files saved. If you want any feedback on this I'd be more than glad to share it. I just wanna do a constructive criticism.

 

cheers,

Matteo

 

 

My config:

 

Athlon XP 3200+

ASUS A7N8X-E Deluxe

1 GB Twinmos DDR400 PC-3200 Cl 2.5

Radeon 9800 Pro 128 MB DDR - 256 bit with Cat 4.10

Maxtor SATA 160 GB HD

Creative SB Live 5.1

[britgliderpilot]

Re: to the Dev: what's the future for AI and gameplay in Loc

 

- AI is apparently "significantly" improved in v1.1.

 

- Try patching directly to v1.02 from v1.0 - reportedly more stable and better for FPS.

 

- Regarding FPS . . . . Lomac IS a demanding game. There isn't really any way you can get around that. At the moment, I find that it both looks better and runs smoother than Pacific Fighters . . . . so I'm happy.

 

- AC switching . . . mmn. I wouldn't recommend that anyway. Shrug.

 

- Procedures . . . . are not Lomac's strong point. Look for them to be upgraded a little in v1.1 . . . . perhaps a lot in future. If all you *really* want is procedures, though . . . may I suggest Falcon 4 SP4, or the forthcoming Fighter Ops?

 

- The ME looks to be improved in v1.1, too . . . complete with some mission randomisation built in. A true Dynamic Campaign is a long way off . . . . for now the best way to approximate something similar is to alternate building missions with a few online buddies. Can make them MP as well, and only every couple of missions do YOU know what's going to happen in them.

 

 

 

Things are going to get better (or even better, depending on your point of view :wink: ) . . . but not instantly. Be patient, hang around here and see what happens.

[Skywall23]

- Regarding FPS . . . . Lomac IS a demanding game. There isn't really any way you can get around that. At the moment, I find that it both looks better and runs smoother than Pacific Fighters . . . . so I'm happy

 

Sorry BGP but you gotta be joking. Pacific Fighters has better FPS than LOMAC and its obvious why. In lomac even the FPS displayer consumes FPS, theres no way to switch flares and explosions pixel shaders off (unless you use the mods for that), the labels are also high FPS consuming, and the fact that has LOMAC ground has water under it, makes the game a very heavy game even for high end pcs.

 

And even if LOMAC had better FPS than PF, patches are already under way for it. (Pacific Fighters of course)

[Skywall23]

And I almost forgot to say that some planes in LOMAC dont have LODs. :?

[britgliderpilot]

Sorry BGP but you gotta be joking. Pacific Fighters has better FPS than LOMAC and its obvious why. In lomac even the FPS displayer consumes FPS, theres no way to switch flares and explosions pixel shaders off (unless you use the mods for that), the labels are also high FPS consuming, and the fact that has LOMAC ground has water under it, makes the game a very heavy game even for high end pcs.

 

And even if LOMAC had better FPS than PF, patches are already under way for it. (Pacific Fighters of course)

 

Really, I'm not kidding.

 

Flares are a bugger, I admit . . . . explosions don't seem to cause that much of a problem for me, I don't use labels, and to get PF's water looking anything other than flat blue is causing my system some problems right now.

 

Lomac right now is running very smoothly on my system . . . . I agree that PF generally is very good for FPS, but the only way to get decent water is right now killing them.

 

 

Last time I heard the Lomac "OMG t3g water is t3h everywhere !11!!!one!!" argument, I was told that it would actually be worse for performance to try and split up the areas of water . . . . .

 

(forgive the poetic license :wink:)

[Drakkhen]

Noticed some strange emerging behaviour (v1.02):

quickly edit a face to face with only one enemy plane in CAP with some hill between so that it just has a moment to "see" you, no attack point, thus no target set and: it works.

 

Now... just add a wingman to the AI... they both fly steady by the hill and let you take their six.

[Skywall23]

Sorry BGP but you gotta be joking. Pacific Fighters has better FPS than LOMAC and its obvious why. In lomac even the FPS displayer consumes FPS, theres no way to switch flares and explosions pixel shaders off (unless you use the mods for that), the labels are also high FPS consuming, and the fact that has LOMAC ground has water under it, makes the game a very heavy game even for high end pcs.

 

And even if LOMAC had better FPS than PF, patches are already under way for it. (Pacific Fighters of course)

 

 

Last time I heard the Lomac "OMG t3g water is t3h everywhere !11!!!one!!" argument, I was told that it would actually be worse for performance to try and split up the areas of water . . . . .

 

(forgive the poetic license :wink:)

 

About the water, well Ill give it a maybe.

 

And about the poetic license, no problem. :P

[ALDEGA]

and the fact that has LOMAC ground has water under it, makes the game a very heavy game even for high end pcs

The fact that the water is rendered always (even if there is land above it) is not hurting your FPS. In order to do what you suggest, the water would be applied to a high-detail mesh in order to fit nicely along the coast line.

Currently the water in lomac is rendered on a small number of large triangles.

 

OT: in OFP the mesh of the water is relatively very high. It even rises when you increase "land" detail. Ironic, considering what the water looks like in OFP.

 

The new (non-flat) water in PF (which requires a videocard capable of ShaderModel3.0, only Geforce 6xxx right now, no ATI card yet) is apparently very demanding on current hardware. If you have capable hardware, try it and see for yourself. water = 3 in the config file. When I play on the Finland map with "perfect landscape" my FPS are quite low compared to non-"perfect mode"... And that's without the new water.

[Skywall23]

But ALDEGA PF is demanding with high water quality, but Lock On is even more, to teh point that I cant get all the graphics at medium high at least. I have to stick with medium water, that isnt too impressive, and with no trees on the scenario, just near the villages. I also cant get heat Blur, since it consumes too much.

 

And pixel shader3 is avaible for ATI cards with the new drivers i think, but they call it pixel shader 2b, not sure though.

 

And why the hell do you want a pixel shader 3 water? :shock:

[ALDEGA]

Compared to my medium-high settings in Lomac, IL2-PF on the Finland map with "perfect mode" (and the old perfect water) my FPS are signficantly lower with IL2.

 

The only thing "very high" water adds is reflection of ship and mountains. Both are barely seen unless you're watching the Kuznetsov float past a mountainous coastline. You already have cloud reflection with "high". I find that up to "high" it runs quite fast, even on a Ti4200. Check the extended FPS statistics to see how much processing goes to the water rendering, then compare with other things like "objects". So to conclude, "very high" water is slow because of the processing that is done, not because the water is rendered "under the land". Let's make this clear.

 

btw, where did I say I < want > SM3 used in Lomac? It was merely a technical detail.

[Guest ruggbutt]

IMHO "high" water in LOMAC is approximate to "water=3" in PF. And I get about the same frames. LOMAC's smoke is much better but I do like the damage models in PF. But, we're getting some new ones in 1.1.

[Caretaker]

I can assure you that the AI in Lock On has been fixed in various areas, although it still has some issues remaining. But it's certainly more effective, especially for ground attacks (no more suicide attacks on SAM sites for example ;)). I'm also confident that this area will be worked on further for future releases.

 

Randomization options haven't been included in the mission editor; what is present is that the AI now has some basic randomizations in its behaviour (which target to attack at which range, how to react to threats etc.), where it always reacted exactly the same in previous versions. Implementing this wasn't trivial as it had to be included in the track system for example, but now that it's in we might get more randomization options in the future, this isn't clear yet. But things like probability of appearance of units are not featured yet in 1.1.

 

The claim that water rendering is unoptimized is indeed a myth and I'm wondering why it's still repeated frequently.

 

Overall I find 1.1 quite an improvement. Just don't expect it to now fix every issue you have with Lock On. But it's clearly moving in the right direction, which is more than what could be said for many sims.

[Starlight]

Hi,

First thing, let's keep the discussion a little more general. I'm not talking about water quality and FPS, I'm talking about general features of this game. What I mean is that this game is a FPS-eater. There seem to be little optimization on the overall graphic engine. I know such a game is demanding, but sometimes adding a few aircraft to make a scenery look real makes the game a lot less playable.

 

Second thing, I'd like to hear someone who's really involved in LockOn development, to hear if he agrees (at least in some part) to what I've written here or not. And what are the steps made in 1.1 and which one may be in future developments.

 

Last thing, when I'm talkin about AI, I'm not only saying that it acts in a stupid way during combat, I'm saying that it's so dumb that sometimes I have less forces in the air because AI controlled a/c crash into each other on takeoff or while on the taxiway! I've never seen such an AI in any sim, not even in those for MS-DOS! And this just adds to the fact the AI doesn't use tactics at all! Have you ever seen a flight of F-14 face a Soviet bomber force in a tight echelon formation? Or even the Mig-31... they have a data link to make a kind of BARCAP even more than a hundred miles long... what are they doing stacked up in 1/3 of mile!!!

 

I mean the game is pretty unbalanced... graphics are stunning, the devs strive to make the Kopyo radars work as real ones and the AI is so poor?

 

And, last thing which covers FPS and overall stability, I think the game should be able to handle a realistic scenario with some degree of complexity without freezing or having FPS dropping extremely low. I've conducted many test missions and today it isn't so, even with patch 1.02.

 

PS: yeah, I patched 1.00 ---> 1.02, that's why I waited so long to do it, I waited to have a fresh OS/Lockon install! ;)

[Caretaker]

Hi,

Last thing, when I'm talkin about AI, I'm not only saying that it acts in a stupid way during combat, I'm saying that it's so dumb that sometimes I have less forces in the air because AI controlled a/c crash into each other on takeoff or while on the taxiway! I've never seen such an AI in any sim, not even in those for MS-DOS! And this just adds to the fact the AI doesn't use tactics at all! Have you ever seen a flight of F-14 face a Soviet bomber force in a tight echelon formation? Or even the Mig-31... they have a data link to make a kind of BARCAP even more than a hundred miles long... what are they doing stacked up in 1/3 of mile!!!

 

You are exaggerating. AI problems, unfortunately, are very common with flight sims. Always have been. Lock On is by no means special in that regard - even games which seem more popular than Lock On and have had more development still have problems with crashes of taxiing aircraft or non-existant tactics (look at Il2/FB/PF, or Falcon4) or of couse planes flying into the ground for no good reason. AI programming simply is a complex area that is sometimes subject to chaotic, unpredictable results. AI units have to be handled with care when designing a mission, that way a lot of those problems can already be worked around.

 

I do agree that some of Lock On's AI flaws have quite an impact on the overall gameplay experience, and I was lobbying heavily for that area to be considered for further development. And guess what, it is. Whether it will be enough for your standard I don't know.

 

I cannot comment much on stability or performance as I did not really have problems with these in any Lock On versions I played.

 

Otherwise, sure it would be great to have more detailed carrier operations, AI behaviour tailored to each plane's specific capabilities, a dynamic campaign and whatever. No question here. But without a bigger development budget this simply will not happen anytime soon.

[Starlight]

You are exaggerating.

 

I can send my last "attack at maykop" mission. Just try that and you'll see all the things I'm talkin about. Maybe I was just out of luck that I discovered so many bugs in just one mission... maybe not.

 

AI problems, unfortunately, are very common with flight sims. .... have problems with crashes of taxiing aircraft or non-existant tactics (look at Il2/FB/PF, or Falcon4) or of couse planes flying into the ground for no good reason.

 

Absolutely NOT in Falcon 4, at least until SP3 which was my last config for that game. In F4 there was a fully dynamic campaign goin on, and not a single crash while taxiing or taking off. And, both friendly and enemy a/c did what they were supposed to do. LockOn is many steps ahead compared to Falcon 4, but in terms of AI, it's quite behind to F4.

 

AI programming simply is a complex area that is sometimes subject to chaotic, unpredictable results. AI units have to be handled with care when designing a mission, that way a lot of those problems can already be worked around.

 

I do know something about AI, it was my last exam at University this Summer and I got 30/30 (30 is the maximum in one exam here in Italy) :D

Not that I'm an AI guru, BTW, I'm not saying that!!!!!

 

I do agree that some of Lock On's AI flaws have quite an impact on the overall gameplay experience,

 

I agree. And I will also add that in such a game, AI is very important, as much as graphics and modelling, because it's a way to achieve realism.

I have the feeling that the LockOn community feels that realism is achieved more by having all radar submodes in the Fulcrum or having the Su-25 bouncing when landing. I don't think so. I consider those mere details. I consider AI should be given absolute priority if I was to patch this sim. But I don't know if it is possible. Quoting my OS teacher he said that security is not the thing you're gonna put into an OS after you design it; it must be a built-in feature. I'm worried that the same thing can hold true for AI in Lockon

 

I cannot comment much on stability or performance as I did not really have problems with these in any Lock On versions I played.

 

I admit I didn't have much problems until I played small missions. But when I designed my own missions with strike packages, defenses, escort, sead and support, well, after a while the game is pretty unstable. And with all that missions goin on, well there are quite a lot of bugs in the air! :(

[Caretaker]

I can send my last "attack at maykop" mission. Just try that and you'll see all the things I'm talkin about. Maybe I was just out of luck that I discovered so many bugs in just one mission... maybe not.

 

I'm not saying these issues aren't there, I'm only saying they are just as common in many other sims, and Lock On is certainly not the worst in this regard - that's what I was calling "exaggerated" ;)

 

Absolutely NOT in Falcon 4, at least until SP3 which was my last config for that game. In F4 there was a fully dynamic campaign goin on, and not a single crash while taxiing or taking off. And, both friendly and enemy a/c did what they were supposed to do. LockOn is many steps ahead compared to Falcon 4, but in terms of AI, it's quite behind to F4.

 

Yes Falcon4's AI currently is better than in Lock On, but it took quite some years to get there (was just as problematic back when it was released), and it's still far from perfect. There are still various issues, not too critical overall but they do exist. Just scanning the respective forums reveals this.

 

I do know something about AI, it was my last exam at University this Summer and I got 30/30 (30 is the maximum in one exam here in Italy) :D

Not that I'm an AI guru, BTW, I'm not saying that!!!!!

 

Congratulations! Then you certainly know that it's not a trivial area, especially in a 6DOF environment with real-life capabilities to consider ;)

 

I agree. And I will also add that in such a game, AI is very important, as much as graphics and modelling, because it's a way to achieve realism.

I have the feeling that the LockOn community feels that realism is achieved more by having all radar submodes in the Fulcrum or having the Su-25 bouncing when landing. I don't think so. I consider those mere details. I consider AI should be given absolute priority if I was to patch this sim. But I don't know if it is possible. Quoting my OS teacher he said that security is not the thing you're gonna put into an OS after you design it; it must be a built-in feature. I'm worried that the same thing can hold true for AI in Lockon

 

That was always my position on flight sims in general and Lock On in particular. Il2/Forgotten Battles for example I stopped playing simply because I could not cope with the AI behaviour anymore, no matter how excellent the sim was otherwise. Single player needs good AI to be a challenge and for immersion, and it wasn't Lock On's strongest point so far - but as I said, it's unfortunately a common problem with sims, and the online crowd which doesn't care much for AI seems to be a bit more vocal overall.

 

You have to keep in mind though that new AI alone doesn't sell a product. Rather it is often expected as a free "fix" even though it may just be as hard to develop as a new flyable with all its avionics. Just the way it is ;)

 

As I said, there is progress in the AI area with 1.1, but also various things to work out still. In my view, ED is aware of those issues and the impact they have, and I'm looking forward to further progress in the future.

[emenance]

i have been dabbeling with lock since day 1 and am trying to get serious with it now. I do appreciate this game and its cutting edge not to mention the great gamble and work that went into it for a bunch of well my self included newbies to this caliber of a flight sim.

 

 

One tip i can give and maybe the devs will confirm this but i think a big thing people dont do is that they load an operateing system but do not increase the size of thier page file. No patch from MS does this for you you have to do it your self. Now MS even recommends more than 2 gigs for your page file. A stock 2000 pro or xp install is only 500 mb correct me if im wrong :) page file is the green part of defrag in win 2000. i suspect the xp owners with thier memory hogging operateing system would really benifit.

 

and thats not enough do a OFFLINE defrag too not just defrag in windows.

 

My only problem with the game so far is flashing textures at the end of a runway sometimes.

 

xp2400 11x210

corsair 1gb ram 833 2.5 dual c

albatron kx18d pro 2

9600 xt 591/343 ati tray tools

 

maybe that would help?

 

Im sure the demand for this game will grow.

[Starlight]

One tip i can give and maybe the devs will confirm this but i think a big thing people dont do is that they load an operateing system but do not increase the size of thier page file. No patch from MS does this for you you have to do it your self. Now MS even recommends more than 2 gigs for your page file. A stock 2000 pro or xp install is only 500 mb correct me if im wrong :) page file is the green part of defrag in win 2000. i suspect the xp owners with thier memory hogging operateing system would really benifit.

 

Quite wrong, for XP Professional at least. XP will make a page file according to the amount of ram installed. When I had 512 MB I think it made a 800-1500 variable size file. Now that I have 1 GB I think I have (by default) a 1.5 - 3.0 GB large file. Now I set it to be 1.5 - 4.0 GB. Nevertheless at some time, especially when there is a cloud overcast, when I have lots of vehicles and aircraft and when I make intensive use of external views the FPS drop from the 15-30 "minimum zone" to the 5-10 "minimum zone".

 

"Minimum zone" is my own definition for the minimum FPS rates that I have when the sim is rendering "graphically heavy" scenes (A/C formations, city overflights, explosions and external views)

[Kula66]

You only need a page file if you 'Over-commit' memory ... if you have enough RAM you don't even need one. Assume XP takes 128Mb RAM and LO takes 256Mb RAM and you have 512Mb RAM ... the difference (512 - 256 - 128) will automatically get used as disk cache ... hence reducing the load on your HD subsystem. If you don't ever over-commit memory, and these days given the availablity of RAM, save yourself the disk space ... don't even bother with a page file!

 

James

[Starlight]

You only need a page file if you 'Over-commit' memory ... if you have enough RAM you don't even need one. Assume XP takes 128Mb RAM and LO takes 256Mb RAM and you have 512Mb RAM ... the difference (512 - 256 - 128) will automatically get used as disk cache ... hence reducing the load on your HD subsystem. If you don't ever over-commit memory, and these days given the availablity of RAM, save yourself the disk space ... don't even bother with a page file!

 

James

 

Quite wrong too. You're likely to need a page file anyway. In Linux systems for example you should always have a swap partition, that's a small partition which is only used for the page file. And also in Windows you'll need one. A page file is extremely useful for an OS to manage data.

I can also ensure that 512 MB of RAM are not more than enough for LockOn and if you have the page file enabled it will swap sometimes!!!

The more RAM and page file you have the better performance you'll have. If you have a small page file and the RAM is not enough to keep all things in memory, your OS will swap a lot and this really slows down a lot the pc.

 

I have 1 Gb of RAM and LockOn still uses some page file. just to give an idea.

[Kula66]

XP isn't Linux. I use XP and 768Mb RAM and don't have a swap file ... XP doesn't even page use the page file for paging application code (they get retreived from the DLLs/EXEs), only data pages. Back when 128Mb of RAM was big, page file management/placement/optimisation was very important to running of systems, it is just less important now - I used to manage an environment of 2,500 Win2000 servers, some needed page files, some didn't. The only reason MS say have a pagefile of greater than physical memory is for crash dumps ... the page file gets used to write the crash dump file ... and hence has to be big enough. If you don't do a dump (nn laughing please) ... then you can get away with a smaller/nonexistant page file.

 

James

[Starlight]

XP isn't Linux.

but they did borrowed some things ;)

 

I use XP and 768Mb RAM and don't have a swap file ... XP doesn't even page use the page file for paging application code (they get retreived from the DLLs/EXEs), only data pages. Back when 128Mb of RAM was big, page file management/placement/optimisation was very important to running of systems, it is just less important now - I used to manage an environment of 2,500 Win2000 servers, some needed page files, some didn't. The only reason MS say have a pagefile of greater than physical memory is for crash dumps ... the page file gets used to write the crash dump file ... and hence has to be big enough. If you don't do a dump (nn laughing please) ... then you can get away with a smaller/nonexistant page file.

 

James

 

so can you please tell me why the page file dynamically increases and decreases when the pc is working (if he just needed to dump the ram you would set it as large as the ram itself, not larger!) and why many game/app manufacturers advise to have a page file available just for running the app (not to see the dump)?

 

2,500 clients or 2,500 servers? I don't think even my ISP has 2,500 servers :)

[GGTharos]

They didn't borrow a thing. LInux is based on unix, windows XP/NT is based on VMS.

 

As for the pagefile, it's used in the manner that the OS determines is most optimal, whatever that may be.

[emenance]

XP isn't Linux. I use XP and 768Mb RAM and don't have a swap file ... XP doesn't even page use the page file for paging application code (they get retreived from the DLLs/EXEs), only data pages. Back when 128Mb of RAM was big, page file management/placement/optimisation was very important to running of systems, it is just less important now - I used to manage an environment of 2,500 Win2000 servers, some needed page files, some didn't. The only reason MS say have a pagefile of greater than physical memory is for crash dumps ... the page file gets used to write the crash dump file ... and hence has to be big enough. If you don't do a dump (nn laughing please) ... then you can get away with a smaller/nonexistant page file.

 

James[/quote

 

i can hardley believe your server environment has anything to do with a machine like mine that is loaded up with about 6 gigs of top of the line pc games.

 

Thanks for pointed out the swap file rules i will upping mine to 3 gigs asap

 

yes lockon with only 512 mb of memory is unplayable :roll:

 

you all should check out the thred i started in this forum about my error i get when i close out of lock on I get a memory related error and maybe its because its because i just upgraded to 1gb of memory and now when it dumps i dont have enough room for the dump!!?1?!! will try and solve saterday or sun.

[Dmut]

You're likely to need a page file anyway. In Linux systems for example you should always have a swap partition, that's a small partition which is only used for the page file.

not quite correct. It's depends on memory amount you have in your box. I run my linux development plaform on 256mb without swapfile, based on Slackware setup. Also my linux project platform (quite resource-intensive, BTW) run on 512mb with no swap partition.