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everybody dies - CPU memory too

Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2006 7:28 am
by thx1138
Could someone please provide some useful hints on how to speed up Defcon ? Everytime I start Defcon the CPU memory usage reaches up to 99 - 1000% and the mouse pointer is incredibly slowed down, which makes the game useless to me, yet.
I tried to follow the hints on the introversion support page, but they made no major difference.
Given the minimal system requirements for Defcon on the introversion site I thought it should run fine on my pc, but now I am really frustrated.
WinXP Pro SP2, 1.5 GHz Intel P4 CPU, 768 MB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 2, SoundBlaster Audigy Platinum, Logitech Cordless Mouse.
Grateful for any useful comments !

Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2006 3:43 pm
by xander
Honestly? Get a new computer. The machine that I have at work is a 1.7 Ghz Pentium 4, 16MB ATI Rage 128 Ultra (according to the device manager), and, with everything turned down to minimum, it is just barely playable -- the mouse is a little slow, and it sometimes takes a little for it to respond to mouse clicks.

xander

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 2:26 am
by hansmuff
By today's standards, the GeForce 2 is really very old for gaming.
If your machine can run a GeForce4 Ti 4600, or maybe a 4200, that might help a lot.
I haven't run DEFCON on such a card so I can't say for sure, but they go for $30 or so on ebay, it may be your best bet.

Make sure your AGP slot can drive a Geforce 4.

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 6:03 am
by unseen
It`s true thx1138, It may look a simple game, but it isn`t really. While your machine will run office apps, and some games really well, Defcon does require a fair amount of power to run. On my girlfriend`s machine - Athlon 2400+XP (about 1.8Ghz), 1.5G mem, GeForce 5200 Ultra OC (256M mem), it runs under the default options fairly well, but still slows down, becomes unresponsive, and drops out of games occasionally. Turning down the options to minimum means it stays in-game longer, but it does eventually grind to a halt or just become fairly unplayable.

Your soundcard and mouse aren`t the problem. It`s the lack of cpu, memory and gfx power. :?

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 7:08 am
by thx1138
Thanks for the comments, but then I am wondering why introversion gives such outdated system requirements recommendations ?
What makes Defcon so memory intensive, while, as unseen mentioned, other games run quite well on my computer ?
Would a "newer" graphics card improve performance ?

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 7:36 am
by Zarkow
The Geforce2 is severly outdated and not a very fast card. I know, I have one in this job-computer (play on the other one).

I'm not sure what you are refering too when you say that 'CPU Memory usage reaches 1000%' [sic] - is it the CPU reaching 100%?

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 7:59 am
by thx1138
Zarkow wrote:The Geforce2 is severly outdated and not a very fast card. I know, I have one in this job-computer (play on the other one).

I'm not sure what you are refering too when you say that 'CPU Memory usage reaches 1000%' [sic] - is it the CPU reaching 100%?


Well, I know that the GeForce2 (actually an ELSA Gladiac 511) is indeed very old. But given the minimum recommendations, I thought Defcon should run ok. It is not even running with most of the options set to the lowest levels.
The CPU system performance shown via the task manager levels around 100%, when Defcon is initialized and the computer slows down markably. It's a pitty.

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:19 pm
by Mighty Santa
Its not really the hardware, come on people.
In most cases, even the most mediocre cards will run the game FINE.

I am running defcon on a 1ghz p3, 512mb sdram, on a tnt2 riva vanta pci card - bought in 1999. Thats right, the game runs FINE on a card that is 7 years old.


The real problem is that the game program sucks up ever higher amounts of memory - which frankly, is insane for a game of this small size.

How can the programmers justify these wire diagrams taking up a 2 gig swap file. If the memory leaks can be patched up, then I'm sure a lot of the main issues will be resolved.

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Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:58 pm
by Zarkow
Are you trying to pretend that since the game doesn't take up a DVD it cannot be taking up a lot of CPU or memory when it is running?

I can put together an app that uses 100% CPU and will hogg 99% of your memory-resources, in a little exe of 200KB...

"It's not the size that matters, it's how you use it."


As a sidenote, there is a confirmed memoryleak, especially in the main lobby, but this will be adressed in a patch so there is no need for any panic. Luckely the game is quick to restart, so if you play a full day, restart between the games and the memory-usage will stay low.

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 6:00 pm
by MrBunsy
hansmuff wrote:If your machine can run a GeForce4 Ti 4600, or maybe a 4200, that might help a lot.
I haven't run DEFCON on such a card so I can't say for sure, but they go for $30 or so on ebay, it may be your best bet.
For referance, Defcon runs fantastically on a Geforce 4200 Ti, I get about 60 fps. I'll give it a whorl on an old pc with a GF2 sometime too, considering I can get defcon to run (albeit 4fps) in virtual PC so it ought to cope with a GF2.

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 6:47 pm
by xander
MrBunsy wrote:
hansmuff wrote:If your machine can run a GeForce4 Ti 4600, or maybe a 4200, that might help a lot.
I haven't run DEFCON on such a card so I can't say for sure, but they go for $30 or so on ebay, it may be your best bet.
For referance, Defcon runs fantastically on a Geforce 4200 Ti, I get about 60 fps. I'll give it a whorl on an old pc with a GF2 sometime too, considering I can get defcon to run (albeit 4fps) in virtual PC so it ought to cope with a GF2.

Hrm... I should try getting it to run in Virtual PC on my Mac. It was dog slow during the alphas, but it may be a bit better no :)

xander

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 7:46 pm
by MrBunsy
I'm hoping sometime MS will add a 3D graphics card to Virtal PC, since Vista will need one for all it's fancy ...stuff. If they do it'd open up a whole lot of new options.

Let us know how it gets on though, will you?

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 8:35 pm
by xander
MrBunsy wrote:I'm hoping sometime MS will add a 3D graphics card to Virtal PC, since Vista will need one for all it's fancy ...stuff. If they do it'd open up a whole lot of new options.

Let us know how it gets on though, will you?

Are you familier with molasses? Have you ever seen it try to flow up hill? In January? That would be about right. I think it comes down to video cards -- the proc should be fast enough for Defcon (it claims to be a 1.67 GHz Pentium something or another), and I have 512 MB of RAM allocated to Virtual PC, so the video is probably not being used properly.

xander

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2006 8:53 pm
by MrBunsy
Pity. Worth attempting though.

Posted: Wed Oct 18, 2006 9:02 am
by thx1138
Mighty Santa wrote:Its not really the hardware, come on people.
In most cases, even the most mediocre cards will run the game FINE.

I am running defcon on a 1ghz p3, 512mb sdram, on a tnt2 riva vanta pci card - bought in 1999. Thats right, the game runs FINE on a card that is 7 years old.
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Could you please let me know what OS you use and if you needed to adjust some further options to get Defcon running. Do I have to set the swap file to 2 GB ? When will a patch be available ?

Thanks