Bloodlines

[alanschu]

Did it make a good difference?

 

EDIT: 2.5 GB of RAM??

 

Once you pass 2 GB, don't you start to see diminishing returns given how kernels (in my exceptionally limited experience) tend to reserve the upper block of memory exclusively for the kernel (given the 4GB maximum....assuming you're living in the world of 32-bits).

Edited February 8, 2006 by alanschu

[Bokishi]

Well I can't use sound recorder anymore cuz it claims I don't have enough memory (glitch).

[alanschu]

What happens if you cut back to 2 GB?

[Bokishi]

Hmm.. dunno. Still, 1024 * 2 = 2048 or still over 2 GB. I can't have exactly 2 GB. Hmmm...

[Darque]

I have 512MB memory and it plays fine. Wonder if I should buy another 512 memory chip? Memory is cheap these days.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Whew, I was just about to ask about this after seeing 2 gig thrown around

[Atreides]

Oooh found this @ planet vampire

 

Performance Increase

-add: -heapsize xxxxxx after the targetline in the shortcut for bloodlines.Where xxxxxx stands for half of your RAM in kb.So if you have 512 RAM the shortcut target line should look like this:"C:\Program Files\Activision .... blah blah blah\vampire.exe" -heapsize 250000

To enable the console too just make it look like this:

"C:\Program Files\Activision .... blah blah blah\vampire.exe" -console -heapsize 250000

And if you were wondering,yes you have to add those spaces in between.

-When you run the game,before you select a new game or load a saved game, hit the "~" key to bring up console, and type:autosave_on 0

That will disable the autosave and increase the loading speed.

-After that type:particles_enable_precipitaion 0

to disable the rain.

-Open the cfg folder and file in the Vampire folder and:

1.change: rate to "25000"

2.change: dsp_dist_max to "440" (you don't have to do this one,but try it and see if you need the change)

-Disable antivirus software

-Change the paging file size so that the number you typed in + your Ram size equal 2048mb.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Please let me know if that works.

[Bokishi]

Well disabling rain works, if rain is your source for lag.

[CoM_Solaufein]

I have 512MB and have not cut off any of the effects in the game. You're having problems with 2G's?

[alanschu]

Hmm.. dunno. Still, 1024 * 2 = 2048 or still over 2 GB. I can't have exactly 2 GB. Hmmm...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Err, that's just because of the messed up binary system.

 

A kilobyte is 2^10 bytes, or 1024 bytes.

A megabyte is 2^20 bytes, or 1024 kilobytes.

When people refer to 1 GB, they are referring to the 1024 megabytes, not 1000 megabytes.

[Surreptishus]

Err, that's just because of the messed up binary system.

 

A kilobyte is 2^10 bytes, or 1024 bytes.

A megabyte is 2^20 bytes, or 1024 kilobytes.

When people refer to 1 GB, they are referring to the 1024 megabytes, not 1000 megabytes.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

But manufacturers often twist the terminology so that a drive that is listed as 1GB is literally 1000000000 bytes or approx 950 Mb

[Tha Cunnysmythe]

True. As my laptop died, I was mad vexed to find that I had not 80Gb, but 74.5.

 

Flithy beasts.

[alanschu]

That may be true, but it's not how the memory architecture works. I doubt that that is how memory modules are sold as well, especially seeing as they typically follow binary patterns (you can buy 128MB, 256MB, but you can't just go to the store and buy a 200 MB module).

 

Also, given the context of my statement, with respect to memory, 2 GB is indeed 2048 MB using binary notation. The interpretation I was under the impression of (and I could very well be wrong), is that it's not uncommon for upper addresses to be reserved for the kernel. The reason for this is because extensive memory managers that I've seen typically place the kernel near 0x8--------- for it's intial start. (This has always been wierd for me, because if you didn't have 2 GB of memory, technically you'd never hit 0x8------- because 0x80000000 is the start of the 2048GB......if someone else is more in the know, then please correct me).

[Bokishi]

Grr, I get no stuttering otherwise. The only time it happens is when I am in dialog and I pick a response. It pauses for a second like it's loading the NPC's response and stutters. It also stutters everytime I innitiate a conversation with an NPC. But no one else has this problem. What should I do first? Go down to 2 gigs? put old video drivers on? Reinstall?

[alanschu]

To be honest, going down to 2 Gigs shouldn't really make a difference. I'm just sort of under the impression you get limited gains from going beyond it.

 

Though you did mention that going to 2.5 GB did make other things act wierd, so I don't know.

 

Try a HD defrag

 

What's your swap file usage while running the game?

[Bokishi]

Where can I find swap file usage?

[alanschu]

Hit CTRL-ALT-DEL to bring up Task Manager, and click on performance. Once your Page File usage at?

 

 

Also, while you're here, there's something else that may work. When you are running the game, open up task manager and find the vampire process under the Processes tab. Right-Click on it, and select Set Priority and set it to one level above normal (appropriately called "Above Normal" if it truly is a CPU load issue, this *should* fix it, as it will give extra CPU cycles to the Vampire thread if it needs it (which I'm sure it could use, since running games can be pretty strenuous). Note, whatever you do, don't accidentally click on Realtime, because it means that ALL of your resources will go towards Vampire. As a result, I'm not even sure if you'd be able to get back into the game as there'd be no resources to handle Alt-Tabbing back into the game....I don't even think your mouse will move. The only way your other processes will get more CPU usage is if the game doesn't require ALL of the resources....and I wouldn't count on that

 

Though to be honest, I'm not too optimistic that that will work either. You mention that it's limited to speech only. Perhaps exploring new audio drivers, or changing the hardware acceleration level of your audio chip would net some additional improvements as well. I'm kind of stumped as your problem is pretty isolated.

[Bokishi]

I started a new game and the stuttering is gone. Yay

[alanschu]

That's it? Just started a new game???

 

 

Oh well, sometimes it's the easy things that work the best

[metadigital]

"Have you tried turning it off and on again."

[alanschu]

Hehehe, I _hate_ that tech support response.

[metadigital]

It's a quote from the new comedy series "The IT Crowd". :D

 

PS More than 1GB of RAM can slow down the CPU because the level 2 cache is not big enough to address all the RAM in one pass (I think this is what you were alluding too, Jimmy.)

[alanschu]

No that's not exactly what I was talking about. I was curious about the default placement of the kernel into main memory.

 

Though it could be I was confusing it with the 2 GB max for a single process.

http://www.support.microsoft.com/default.a...kb;en-us;555223

 

Though I'm not familiar with the situation you describe either. I've only had one class that covered cache, and it was rather brief. Though I would think that given a 32-bit interface, it shouldn't really have a hard time addressing a 1GB of RAM (as 32-bits allows for addressing of 4 GB of data). And even then, the caching would only be necessary when memory is actually used. No sense caching something that isn't used. Though I suppose I could see potential problems with once you start getting into set associative cache....though even then I wouldn't think you would

Edited February 10, 2006 by alanschu

[metadigital]

If I could be arsed I would go and get last issue of Custom PC to check exactly what I mean ... ... but I do remember that the gains above 1GB RAM are not commensurate with those from, say 512MB up, because of some phenomena (thought it was L2 cache, might be wrong, I'll check it sometime) ... so much so that 2GB might actually be slower than 1GB. (Might have something to do with traversing the page file? Dunno, it's approaching 8am and my brain is not willing to entertain my demands for information. Something to do with the architecture of the CPU, though.)

 

The conclusion was that 1GB was the optimum quantity of RAM, just tweak the timings and voltage (and ditto for the CPU clock multiplier).

[Bokishi]

Maybe Windows itself gets slow? I dunno, 2 gigs makes BF2 and FEAR smoother + load faster, and I can jack up Doom 3 on ultra and get no hitching. It really is worth it. Actually XP 32-bit has a total capicity for 4 gigs of RAM and will refuse anymore. Now, difference between 2 and 4 gigs is undectable and not worth upgrading to.

[alanschu]

It makes sense that it can't exceed 4 GB of memory, as that's the most you can address on a 32-bit processor.