Frames Drop in Vista x64

[theox]

Ok, something odd has occurred. I was getting great frames in XP32 at near top settings with the same hardware. Now in Vist64 I get 9-12 even using the affinity trick. I have latest drivers installed (altough Vista says it has an update for mt vid card, weird, but will install). Any idea why this would happen?

 

AMD Phenom 9600 64 Quad Core

Vista HP 64

Audigy 4 SC

GeForce 8800 GTS 768MB

4 GB G SKILL 1066 RAM

[Feuerfalke]

Ok, something odd has occurred. I was getting great frames in XP32 at near top settings with the same hardware. Now in Vist64 I get 9-12 even using the affinity trick. I have latest drivers installed (altough Vista says it has an update for mt vid card, weird, but will install). Any idea why this would happen?

 

AMD Phenom 9600 64 Quad Core

Vista HP 64

Audigy 4 SC

GeForce 8800 GTS 768MB

4 GB G SKILL 1066 RAM

 

A little more data would be useful. What mainboard do you use and did you install the latest drivers for it, too? What Audigy drivers do you use? The Alchemy-Drivers? And which nVidia-Drivers do you use for your GeForce?

 

Besides that, you should be aware, that Vista needs some room for swapfiles. Be sure to have enough diskspace reserved.

[theox]

ASUS M3A78-EM motherboard w/ latest drivers

 

Nvidia driver ver: 7.15.11.6906

 

Audigy 4 Drivers 6.0.1.1361

 

Swap File is Page File, right? If so I've got roughly 8 GB reserved with 1.5 in use

 

Help, the game is unplayable now. ;)

[Prophet]

Far too large of a page file with 4GB of RAM. But I doubt that would cause a problem.

 

Not enough data. There is really no way to tell why it doesnt play well.

[theox]

Nvidia Ver 181.20, for clarification.

[Airway]

64bit?

 

I recommend installing the chipset drivers anyway.

[GunSlingerAUS]

If it's a new install, it sounds like you haven't installed new drivers for all your hardware. After a clean OS install, make sure you reinstall drivers for the following, where appropriate:

 

Motherboard chipset

Graphics card

Sound card

Network card

 

If you skip any of these, get ready for bad frames... especially motherboard and Graphics drivers.

[theox]

Done

Done

Done

Done

 

Sound is a little wonky in the pit, but I hear others having that issue as well. I'll try sound again, just in case.

 

Im not even on the highest settings, Water is normal, gauges at 512 (All-Time), no mirrors, and medium view distance. ARRRGH!:mad:

 

Will try again after dinner.

[RCN_Moose]

What screen resolution are running at?

[theox]

My native rez @ 1600x1200

[GunSlingerAUS]

Have you also installed the Vista Service Pack? I'm running 64-bit Vista Ultimate with no problems, and as evidenced all over these forums, the OS works fine with Black Shark.

 

One more thing - did you ensure you used the 64-bit drivers for your hardware, and not the 32-bit version? They're very different.

[theox]

Yes, my version came with SP1. I was also careful to get the x64 bit drivers for everything that I could.

 

I notice when I run dcdiag, I have an error with DirectShow. Dxdiag crashes if I don't disable it on the next run. A hint perhaps?

[theox]

Ok, I've tried new drivers for sound, graphics, motherboard, and even DirectX10 and to no avail. Still 10-15 fps. Setting affinity to all 4 cores does not seem to affect it. Under the Task Manager "Virtualization" is checked, is that supposed to be there?

 

Also, Black Shark is installed in my x32 program folder, is that correct as well?

 

Edit: Should I try reinstalling Black Shark?

 

Edit2: When doing the affinity trick I assign CPUs 0-3? Correct? (I have 4 cores)

Edited January 11, 2009 by theox
New Question

[theox]

Ok, heres something else. I lowered the settings to "embarrassing" 1024x768 etx. and ran it. Still no higher fps than 17. Weird. Will try some other games now.

 

Ok. COD:WaW runs like a damn champ on this machine. 30-40 on highest settings, no stuttering what-so-ever. Must be a DCS:BS issue, may have to reinstall. I'm open to other theories and courses of action.

Edited January 11, 2009 by theox
New Info

[verana_ss]

Done

Done

Done

Done

 

Sound is a little wonky in the pit, but I hear others having that issue as well. I'll try sound again, just in case.

 

Im not even on the highest settings, Water is normal, gauges at 512 (All-Time), no mirrors, and medium view distance. ARRRGH!:mad:

 

Will try again after dinner.

 

Hi theox.

 

setting cockpit resolution to "512 always" has been reported to drop FPS significantly.

[DarkWanderer]

Far too large of a page file with 4GB of RAM. But I doubt that would cause a problem.

The presence of swap itself may really be a problem, as both LO/DCS have problems with memory management. Theox, try to fully disable it - 4G will be enough for both of themn running simultaneously.

[Cibit]

Don't underestimate what a big part sound drivers play in modern games, and lack of FPS in ARMA for instance is huge with some real random quirks in performance without the correct sound setup.

[MakoShark]

Hi,

 

I'm sure you've already done this but perhaps 'full screen' is not ticked in black shark's graphics options?

[Haukka81]

Have you installed the DX9 for Vista??

 

 

 

-haukka

[SuDepp]

Strange thing....

My system runs better on 1920x1200 than with 1680x1050 - dunno why. It also gives some fps extra when 4xAA is enabled in comparison to none AA or Quinuxx :dunno:

Anyways.....

NEW 181.20 WHQL driver is great! :thumbup:

 

1920x1200, 16xMSAA, AF 8x, everthing "high" except textures "middle" + water "normal", mirrors ON, shadows "planar", Wombats/Jesses affinity "trick" .......

@my specs 30-80fps! AMAZING! :beer:

 

Dunno why U shouldnґt got similar fps with similar settings..... Try it!

 

Greets

S@uDepp

Edited January 11, 2009 by S@uDepp

[Feuerfalke]

The presence of swap itself may really be a problem, as both LO/DCS have problems with memory management. Theox, try to fully disable it - 4G will be enough for both of themn running simultaneously.

 

I cannot recommend this. The swapfile is not only used for excess memory when the phyiscal RAM is full. It is rather primarily used to organize data uncompressed before saving or handling otherwise, etc.

 

Actually some programs don't even run without a swapfile allocated (like most professional programs in the graphics- and rendering-business.)

 

Besides that, the recommended swapfile-size for XP32 is 1.5 to 3 times the ammount of physical RAM installed, AFAIK for Vista64 it's twice the ammount of RAM installed and that is also recommended in documentations from Photoshop and other utilities.

Please also be aware, that if you have 4 or 8 GB allocated as maximum swapfile-size, this is barely if ever reached! Unless you force windows to use such a huge swapfile, the size of the swapfile is dynamically adopted to the needs of programs and OS and with 4GB+ it barely reaches 3 GB on my machine when doing large graphics-stuff, while I have 8 GB set as maximum.

 

So if you disable swapfile completely, be aware of 2 things:

1. Windows will still save stuff on your HDD (in this case via slower temp-files)

2. programs may no longer run, or be forced to use much less physical memory than actually present and with an increased rate of data-loss.

[greenhut]

If find one of the most interesting data points provided that CoD is performing well but BS is not. CoD/BS are more dependent on GPU/CPU respectively. Pehaps there is an issue with your CPU like it is always entering low power mode. I suggest you install something like CPUz to check actual cpu/bus speed in windows.

[DarkWanderer]

I cannot recommend this. The swapfile is not only used for excess memory when the phyiscal RAM is full. It is rather primarily used to organize data uncompressed before saving or handling otherwise, etc.

 

Actually some programs don't even run without a swapfile allocated (like most professional programs in the graphics- and rendering-business.)

 

Besides that, the recommended swapfile-size for XP32 is 1.5 to 3 times the ammount of physical RAM installed, AFAIK for Vista64 it's twice the ammount of RAM installed and that is also recommended in documentations from Photoshop and other utilities.

Please also be aware, that if you have 4 or 8 GB allocated as maximum swapfile-size, this is barely if ever reached! Unless you force windows to use such a huge swapfile, the size of the swapfile is dynamically adopted to the needs of programs and OS and with 4GB+ it barely reaches 3 GB on my machine when doing large graphics-stuff, while I have 8 GB set as maximum.

 

So if you disable swapfile completely, be aware of 2 things:

1. Windows will still save stuff on your HDD (in this case via slower temp-files)

2. programs may no longer run, or be forced to use much less physical memory than actually present and with an increased rate of data-loss.

 

I haven't heard of any alternative Windows mechanisms, and the whole statement seems like a common myth.

 

It may be Photoshop itself that uses its own memory management and grabs two megabytes for each meg free; windows does nothing via the swap except memory paging. Period.

 

On my system (Vista 64, 4G RAM) this adds 50-100% to loading speed and 100%+ FPS in BS without any loss in heavy processes like running multiple VMWare servers. Try first, then argue ;)

Edited January 11, 2009 by DarkWanderer

[theox]

Tried setting page file to 0, number never updated in the window, do I need to reboot after setting that? I loaded BS after setting page file to 0 with no difference, but didn't reboot first.

 

I also reinstalled this morning with no difference. Get stuttering from the terrain mostly, setting cockpit res to highest makes no difference.

 

Also, for the guy who asked about CPU, my monitor shows all four cores running at fairly high capacity after I set affinity. Is there something in particular I could see or test?

 

Edit: Going to install FSX now and see what happens. Will update.

Edited January 11, 2009 by theox
New info.

[DarkWanderer]

Tried setting page file to 0, number never updated in the window, do I need to reboot after setting that? I loaded BS after setting page file to 0 with no difference, but didn't reboot first.

No, there's an option "No swap" (don't remember how it is in english) to the left of the numbers. The input fields should become grey. And yes, you need a reboot.