Performance issues :(

karandras

I know i'm not the only person with performance issues. But for quite a while now whenever i play ns2 i only average around 30 - 35FPS. I have all the graphical settings set to low or off apart from multi core option and i have my resolution set to 1440x900.

Now the other weird problem i have is no matter what resolution i set the game to or what i change the graphic settings to i still seem to get the same FPS. This i find highly confusing. I have also tried the tips on the bad performance thread to no avail :(.

My system specs are as follows.

Windows 7 home 64bit.
Intel Q6600 2.4ghz quad core.
Nvidia Zotac 275AMP edition 896mb.
4GB DDR2 1066mhz.
640GB HDD 7200RPM 64MB cache.

My PC is around about 4 years old but it's no slouch when it comes to running even the newest of games.I realise that on steam it says it doesnt meet the required core speed or the required graphical memory. But the minimum settings say a geforce 8600 :/ and id of thought a quad core would compensate for the lower core speeds. Also i'm not sure how accurate the required specs are as my laptop runs the game at around 20fps and this thing barely comes close to the minimum specs. A couple of friends of mine have more or less the same setup as me and they also get similar problems.

I'd appreciate any help anyone can shed on this as i do enjoy NS2 as i am starting to grow tired of NS1 :p.

On a side note please dont post things like "get a new computer" as they aren't exactly the most helpful of comments. (and i am aware that i do need a new PC in about a years time)

Dghelneshi

Short answer: CPU bottleneck.

Long answer: Your computer does not only do graphics calculations. NS2 is currently very heavy on everything else, hence you will run into a CPU bottleneck and altering graphics settings won't gain you much performance since the GPU has to wait for the CPU to finish its calculations anyways.

The performance is in a pretty bad state right now and we all hope that UWE can improve it by a lot for release.

karandras

Ok, is there anyway to stop my CPU bottlenecking the GPU? Or is it a case of upgrade the CPU?

Dghelneshi

You obviously can't disable things like animations or movement calculations, so there is no other way than overclocking or upgrading your CPU and waiting for more patches.

Btw, if you type r_stats in the console you can see "x ms waiting for GPU". If this is 0ms for most of the time, you are CPU bottlenecked, otherwise your bottleneck is the GPU.

karandras

Thanks for the info. I'll have a butchers at what R_stats has to say when im next on my desktop and see what it has to say. I found an intel QX6850 for relatively cheap earlier so it might be a feasible quick solution until i upgrade fully.

Dghelneshi

I would advise you not to waste money on an old system. Either upgrade it properly or don't do it at all. Even if it's not much, it's still wasted money.

Gorgenapper

I would further advise you to overclock your old system, don't buy a new one just yet. I also have a Q6600 on my Gigabyte EP45-DS3L motherboard and there is a big difference in performance going from 2.4ghz to just 3ghz (I'm currently at 3.2ghz).

What you need to do is to figure out how to overclock your system, and to get a decent CPU cooler like a Zalman or something. It is actually really quite simple to get your 2.4ghz up to 3ghz or 3.2ghz. For me, after installing the CPU cooler, I just changed the stock CPU speed setting from 266 to 333 to get 3ghz (since the Q6600 has a 9x multiplier, thus 9 x 333 = 2997, or roughly 3ghz), then I changed my RAM multiplier to a number that, when multiplied with 333, gets me 1066mhz. I also upped the voltage (VCore) on the CPU from stock to 1.325V, and turned off some power management built-ins from the BIOS.

tl;dr Overclock your stuff, it really is quite easy and CPU coolers are around $40 - $50.

karandras

I'll be honest i'm not too interested in overclocking. Never done it before and it has always been something that has always had me wary becuase i would hate to ###### my system up lol. I'd try it on an old PC first if i had one but i dont :(

As for my CPU cooler i use the CoolerMaster Sphere.

Gorgenapper

Well, there is risk everytime you try something new, but in this case the risk isn't very high with this particular intel chip (said to be very overxlock friendly). All you're really doing is telling the CPU to go faster, and giving it the juice (Vcore) needed to do so. Then you deal with the added heat from the CPU working harder by getting rid of it with a good cooler.

I used to be wary of over clocks too, but once I understood the basics it turned out to be quite simple and painless. Where I had been about to spend $1000 for a new system, I spent $45 and a few hours instead. The best part is, I can reuse my cooler for my next system when I finally upgrade to it.

karandras

I may give it ago, but i never bought my CPU cooler to overclock. I bought this as when i did get it, it was half price and i read reviews saying that while not ideal for overclocking it was a good cooler to replace the stock coolers of the intel series of CPU i have.

Really not sure if the cooler woul like me clocking it up 600MHz. And i kinda agree with Dghelneshi that paying out on new things for this sytem is probably a waste of my tcash at the moment. However if i do get a new system it leaves me this PC to do with as i see fit :D.

Thanks for the suggestion though.

Turbine

Overclocking my pc, even just a little bit had a noticeable impact. I really should have turned more fans on as I overheated a few hrs later. :P

TxtMsg

Not sure if this thread is dead, but I didn't want to create a whole new thread just for the question. I'm looking to buy a new laptop and was wondering what sorts of specs I would want to look at to be able to run NS2. I'm not looking to spend more than $1200. What sort of CPU and graphics card should I be looking at?