Windows XP Slowwwwness

Post by **Rusty075** » Tue Apr 06, 2004 6:08 pm

Vegita,

If you've got 115Gigs full, I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of it is file storage. (mp3's and mpeg's, right?)

Go through your directories, and anything that you haven't accessed in a month, burn to CD.

Vegita · Post by **Vegita** » Tue Apr 06, 2004 6:28 pm

hofffam wrote:Vegita, I have a hard time believing you can't free up enough space on your drive to get back enough space to run a defrag. The standard things like emptying your recycle bin, deleting temporary internet files, etc. can do quite a bit. One other thing - if the file system by chance is FAT instead of FAT32 or NTFS your cluster size may be large enought (e.g. 32K) to waste space with small files. If you have to - uninstall some software to get some free space. Zip some very large directories temporarily. You probably don't have enough free space to install a clean up program.

For the price of more memory you can add hard disk capacity - which you will need soon anyway! You simply can't run at 96% full for long. By the way - adding memory will reduce paging, but does not improve the speed of access to fragmented files nor will it help with creating new files.

Yeah, I empty my recycle bin frequently. And don't worry about the temporary internet files, I've set the limit to 1 MB for that... I know I run a tight ship.

I know I could probably buy another 120 GB for the amount of another 512 MB's of RAM, but I don't have a problem with games that don't page(thrash?) excessively right now - they run perfectly fine. If I got another 120GB, those programs will still page excessively, except they would be doing it with defragmented disk space, and I don't think the performance improvement would be significant. However, if I got more RAM then the paging to disk would be reduced, and as well all know, RAM is several orders of magnitude faster than disk.

Vegita · Post by **Vegita** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 3:26 am

A small update, I freed up several gigs after deleting stuff (pr0n), and did a full defrag using Diskeeper.

My page file is now completely contiguous on disk, whereas before it was fragmented into 11,800 pieces.

Still extreme slowness in some resource-intensive games.

Conclusion: 512MB RAM isn't sufficient for modern gaming.

WarpedPlatter · Post by **WarpedPlatter** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 5:31 am

Vegita wrote: My page file is not completely contiguous on disk, whereas before it was fragmented into 11,800 pieces.

That will really kill performance. Swapping is bad enough, but when you add in extreme fragmentation, forget it. To prevent this from happening in the future without having to defrag all the time, don't let Windows manage the swapfile size. The best procedure usually is to disable the swapfile, reboot and do a defrag, set the minimum and maximum swapfile sizes to the same value and reboot again.

You'll end up with a contiguous swapfile that will not become fragmented. This can cause you to get an occasional out of memory error if your total RAM and chosen swapfile size is too small, but you can always delete and recreate it once or twice to find the right size.

One problem you might run into with a drive so full is that the location of the swapfile on the drive might end up far away from the system files, requiring longer seek times. If you get another hard drive in the near future, I'd recommend keeping dedicated partitions for system files and data. You also could create a partition for the swap file, ala *nix, although this really isn't needed if you follow the above suggestion.

WP

BillyBuerger · Post by **BillyBuerger** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 7:31 am

There are two ways to handle a system that is bogged down. The first is to throw more and more hardware at it. More memory, more disk space faster processors, etc... The second is to find out what's bogging down the system and stream line things so that you only have what you need using the resources you have.

The first method is the easier, but more expensive route. Adding more memory will keep your program from having to use the swap which sounds like what you're most interested in. But your full hard drive is probably also causing some performance problems even if it's not as noticeable as the swapping. So following this method you would also need more disk space.

The second method requires more work but is the better way in my book. You can have a $3,000 system with the fast processor and tons of ram and disk space, but still bring it to a stand still if you have too much unnecessary junk on it. As already recommended, check that you don't have anything running that isn't necessary. How many icons do you have in your system tray? Do you really need an icon for your multimedia player there? (RealOne is very bad with this) I'm amazed at what I find running on people's computers. Things they never use or don't even know what they're there for. Little things add up.

So my point is, given the games you're playing and what not, you probably could use some more memory and disk space. But take into account what else may be contributing to your slowness problems. Otherwise, you'll soon find that 1GB of memory isn't enough either.

Vegita · Post by **Vegita** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 1:37 pm

Sorry I meant to say "My page file is now completely contiguous on disk", not "My page file is not completely contiguous on disk".

Yeah, I've got it at a fixed size so it should stay contiguous indefinitely.

Beyonder · Post by **Beyonder** » Mon Apr 19, 2004 1:35 pm

Vegita wrote:A small update, I freed up several gigs after deleting stuff (pr0n), and did a full defrag using Diskeeper.

My page file is now completely contiguous on disk, whereas before it was fragmented into 11,800 pieces.

Still extreme slowness in some resource-intensive games.

Conclusion: 512MB RAM isn't sufficient for modern gaming.

What is the page file usage in the task manager when you reboot your computer and it comes up fresh? Are you running other programs in the background while trying to play Far Cry? I do realize that you're using 648 megs at peak, but that's much more than Far Cry alone would ever ask for--so there must be a plethora of other "stuff" running in the background. Simple ways to free up memory:

1. Uninstall programs that run in the background (ie: antivirus software, folding@home, whatever--if you see it in the icon tray and you don't use it then consider removing it. On my system, folding alone usually eats up fifty to seventy five megs). The memory load on my computer when I first boot into windows is 85 megs, for reference--most people seem to be somewhere around 120-150.

2. Disable services you don't use (be careful doing this).

3. Remove excessive backgrounds from desktop, and get rid of icons.

There are a few other tweaks you can do to speed up disk access in XP, but with a system like yours, it should do just fine with Far Cry--512 megs IS enough to play all games I've seen thus far, and Far Cry is no exception. My brother plays it fine with 512 and a slower athlon, so I don't think the problem is the game.

As for the hard drive--your problem is two-fold: your hard drive is very full, and the only space left on it is on the slow part of the drive (ie: inner tracks). When you start using virtual memory (which occurs because you probably have too much stuff running in the background), you're probably reading and writing to the slowest part of the drive, resulting in enourmous lags. If you are going to "solve" this problem (in quotes, because the fundamental problem here is sloppy administration) by purchasing RAM, I would first consider just buying another hard drive for the OS and programs, and then move all of your DATA to the existing drive. Additionally, the RAM may not hurt if you don't mind spending the money--although if it was me, I'd save the cash and just clean up my system.

apocalypse80 · Post by **apocalypse80** » Mon Apr 19, 2004 1:53 pm

Farcry definitely needs more than 512MB of ram to play 100% perfectly.
I have a VERY powerfull system (Barton@2530 , 9800pro@410/390).
I run the game @ 1024x768 , everything@very high , max quality in drivers settings , no AA , 4x AF.
I consistently get 45-60fps , but every now and then (mostly in external areas) , the hdd light turns on..... and fps drop to below 10.....

I tried EVERYTHING , including running the game after a diagnostic boot , still no go.
Setting all game settings to medium , made things much better , but not perfect (and graphics sucked).
The only thing that made it run perfectly@max settings , was "stealing" a 256mb dimm from the second PC to get a total of 768MB.

If you want to run farcry (or any newer game) with max settings , you definitely need more ram.

Post by **Ralf Hutter** » Tue Apr 20, 2004 1:18 pm

apocalypse80 wrote:Farcry definitely needs more than 512MB of ram to play 100% perfectly.

All of Vegita's other hardware/software issues aside, this seems to be a very true statement based on the feedback that I've been hearing about this game. Apparently, Far Cry is setting new records for the amount of RAM a game uses.

frosty · Post by **frosty** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 9:41 am

I have done the right things and clean et cetera and come to the conclusion XP sucks. It is slow and cumbersome and I hate it. I will stick with sleek out of date W98SE.

nutball · Post by **nutball** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 11:41 pm

frosty wrote:I have done the right things and clean et cetera and come to the conclusion XP sucks. It is slow and cumbersome and I hate it. I will stick with sleek out of date W98SE.

ROFL. W98 sucks donkeys. XP Pro with all the Janet-and-John UI stuff turned off (so it looks like W2K) is a fine operating system ("fine" relative to other Microsoft operating systems that is).

System checkpoint-restore is worth the hassle of XP all on its own.

shathal · Post by **shathal** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 9:41 am

Having run 98 SE and XP Pro for several years in a dual-boot setup, I'm comfortable to say that XP is by far the better.

I use 98 SE purely for some of my older games (nostalgia) which won't run under XP. But as such, XP all the way.

Also, 98 can't really deal well with more than 512 MB of memory. You need to change some registry stuff if you want to have more than 1/2 a GB (I'd need to read up, refresh my memory), but it's a right pain in the end.

XP is definately preferable

.

sthayashi · Post by **sthayashi** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 10:16 am

shathal wrote:Also, 98 can't really deal well with more than 512 MB of memory. You need to change some registry stuff if you want to have more than 1/2 a GB (I'd need to read up, refresh my memory), but it's a right pain in the end.

I don't think Win98SE can properly handle memory above 128MB. This came from the time when I had Win2k/Win98 in a dual boot setup and I had memory errors somewhere above the 128MB line (it may even have been above the 256MB line). Win2k kept crashing, and Win98 was more stable of the two.

To Win98's credit, I think that it may have been a lot easier to write drivers for it. I had some hardware that became virtually useless once I upgraded to Win98.

shathal · Post by **shathal** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 10:42 am

Oh yeah, sure it can.

I'm running it with 256 MB of memory, no problems.

(ye gawds, I'm looking forward to my 1 GB rig....)

Incidentally, I found the Microsoft article about more than 512 MB for those concerned/interested:
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=253912

Voila

.

Beyonder · Post by **Beyonder** » Mon Apr 26, 2004 5:16 pm

Farcry is going to bring any rig to its knees if set higher than 1024*768:

http://www.nvnews.net/reviews/galaxy_ze ... ge_4.shtml

...but you can most definetly run it fine with 512 megs of ram--this benchmark has an athlon 1800+, 512 megs of ram, and a gf5700 running farcry at playable framerates. The settings are turned way down, but you're going to have to turn settings down for any system--even a 3000+, ATI 9800 pro, 1 gb/ram screamer. Like I said, he can get another 512 megs, but it sounds like the underlying issue has nothing to do with hardware limitations given that everything is limited by farcry.

Adrian · Post by **Adrian** » Sun May 02, 2004 6:43 am

I am surpised that no one has mentioned the best reason to ditch Win9x - the lack of use of the CPU HLT command to greatly reduce energy use of the CPU (in turn reducing heat of CPU/PSU). Unless all of those using Win98 are also using one of the utilities that make use of the CPU HLT command (see http://www.benchtest.com/cooler.html for examples).

I'm don't want to start any sort of debate on it because I am a fan of using what works for you; but I real feel that anyone using the Win9x line should seriously examine the newer Win2K or WinXP - it is worth it for NTFS alone, not to mention better driver support, a considerably newer kernel, support for hyperthreading, and I'm sure a long list of other stuff I am forgetting.
(edited for proper closing of tags.)