Choppy Performance

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"Choppy Performance"

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nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-06-01, 08:18 PM (EST) "Choppy Performance" Hey there all.
I am running MSTS on a P4 1.4 ghz 64 MB Radeon VE video card, Windows ME, and 128 MB ram. All and all the performance is great, except for every 3 seconds or so there is a 1/2 second (I am guessing) pause. I have the same thing on FS2k Pro and CFS2. Anyone else having this problem? Any solutions that anyone can help we with? Thanks.Brian A. Neuman Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
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Subject Author Message Date ID RE: Choppy Performance thegetter Jun-08-01 1 RE: Choppy Performance nwabri Jun-08-01 2 RE: Choppy Performance KaBoNG Jun-08-01 3 RE: Choppy Performance DKlemm Jun-08-01 4 RE: Choppy Performance royboy Jun-08-01 5 RE: Choppy Performance buzzbenz Jun-08-01 6 RE: Choppy Performance nwabri Jun-09-01 7 RE: Choppy Performance RainMan Jun-09-01 8 RE: Choppy Performance nwabri Jun-09-01 9 RE: Choppy Performance RainMan Jun-09-01 10 RE: Choppy Performance nwabri Jun-09-01 11 RE: Choppy Performance rrevved Jun-09-01 12 RE: Choppy Performance nwabri Jun-09-01 13 RE: Choppy Performance Rails Jun-11-01 15 RE: Choppy Performance nwabri Jun-11-01 14 RE: Choppy Performance SouthShore Jun-11-01 16 RE: Choppy Performance drobson Jun-11-01 17 RE: Choppy Performance BillKunert Jun-11-01 18 RE: Choppy Performance nwabri Jun-12-01 21 RE: Choppy Performance Rails Jun-12-01 19 RE: Choppy Performance nwabri Jun-12-01 20 RE: Choppy Performance Dogdaysdude Jun-12-01 22

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thegetter (19 posts)
Jun-08-01, 11:09 AM (EST) 1. "RE: Choppy Performance" Brian,I had this same problem when I first got FS2000.
Then I saw a article on AVSIM.com regarding a program Cacheman.
Worked just great!
I had put a post on this forum regarding this program.If you want to check it out,the program is FREEWARE and available
at www.outertech.com It's just been upgraded to 4.1
I've been using it for well over a year with no problems what so ever...I highly recommend it.
Hope this helps!
Happy Simming!
John/thegetter Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-08-01, 02:25 PM (EST) 2. "RE: Choppy Performance" Well, I downloaded the program, and it did not solve the problem. It didnt make it worse, just left it the same. I guess I will just have to deal with it. It seems to almost be some form of compatability problem. I will look into it. Thanks.-B. A. Neuman Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
KaBoNG (5 posts)
Jun-08-01, 02:36 PM (EST) 3. "RE: Choppy Performance" Brian,I get something similar on my PIII 800, 256mb, Voodoo5 rig, however it seems less frequent than every 3.5 secs. I think it is related to hard drive activity because it seems that my hard drive activity light flashes in unison with the pausing. One would think that Cacheman (or some other disk cache utility) should improve this though.This appears to be a performance bug that ought to have been squashed by the developer during the beta. I know that MS is quite senstive to these sorts of performance issues on some of their other game titles in development. Hopefully the Train Sim developer will follow that lead. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
DKlemm (49 posts)
Jun-08-01, 03:31 PM (EST) 4. "RE: Choppy Performance" Are all applications closed done and this is happening? If not try closing your antivirus program and others. Then see if you still have this delay.David Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
royboy (6 posts)
Jun-08-01, 06:08 PM (EST) 5. "RE: Choppy Performance" I just bought MSTS yesterday. I have a P III 550 running at 733 with 256 Meg Ram and lots of disk space.
The first attempt at install was a nightmare. The software simply crashed because of some confusion about the Direct X version.
I chose to install DirectX8 but had no way of knowing what happenbed after that.
Once I got restarted, uninstalled MSTS and determined through a system utility that Direct X 8 actually was installed I reinstalled MSTS.Well this time it worked but was REAL choppy as your message indicates.I tried a few experiments with setting display preferences with limited success.During the course of a day I end up shutting down and restarting a few times as I leave for the office, return etc.Lo and behold after about 3 or 4 system restarts MSTS seems to work OK.It is not choppy anymore. The only problem now is that after a short run my mouse becomes almost useless but the keyboard commands work ok so I guess I will stick to themNo solution for you here just a comment. Hope you get things working.Ray Hallock Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
buzzbenz (34 posts)
Jun-08-01, 06:23 PM (EST) 6. "RE: Choppy Performance" Had that problem in FS2K as well at one time. I noticed you did not mention 2 things - DirectX version and Sound Card. I had the choppy thing in FS2K where once wvery 5-7 seconds it would freeze for a half second. Turned out to be an issue with DirectX 8 and my motherboards built-on sound chip. I reinstalled my system at first as there is no other way to remove DirectX. I used DirectX 7.0a until i got an actual sound card. I disabled my motherboards on board sound chip, used the sound card instead, and just a couple of weeks ago put DirectX 8 back on there. Works great now.--------- BUZZ Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-09-01, 01:02 AM (EST) 7. "RE: Choppy Performance" Well, I examined a few things. And the choppiness that I thought I was expirencing may be a little different then what I first thought. It is going along smooth at about 19-35 FPS (I have the setting up pretty high, I have a high end system, and it should be able to handle it). And every other second or so, it seems to skip a frame. So it is jumping ahead of its self, or so it seems. I havent tried anything new yet, I may shut down all the background applications, then try to turn down the graphic options. I guess we will see if that works or not. B.A. Neuman Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
RainMan (19 posts)
Jun-09-01, 01:22 AM (EST) 8. "RE: Choppy Performance" I got the same problem... I run an Athlon 1.2G @ 1.4G w/ 256 MB RAM and GeForce2MX Vid card.
Should be fine.. Under "normal" circumstances it is all well, but when driving FAST, ie: single 380, full throttle, the pause kicks in for about a split second... but very frequently. The faster I go, the more textures MSTS has to load into memory, so I wonder if it has to do with us only having 32MB video cards?
Maybe we have to play with the apature size for the AGP slot in the BIOS?
Maybe increase the swap file size? (Mine is a static 1024MB file) I downloaded the latest Detonator drivers and reinstalled WinME instead of WIn98 and it got a tad better... So, any other ideas?? Cheers,
Rainwww.raingaming.com Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-09-01, 01:30 AM (EST) 9. "RE: Choppy Performance" Well, I have a 64 MB card. I shut down all the other background apps, and even turned down the sliders to see if that made a difference. Alas, no matter what the settings are, it is the same problem. It is a livable problem, but the stuttering can be annoying.B.A. Neuman Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
RainMan (19 posts)
Jun-09-01, 01:41 AM (EST) 10. "RE: Choppy Performance" LAST EDITED ON Jun-09-01 AT 01:47 AM (EST)I messed with the BIOS and set the Aperture size to 256MB and some other tweaks - like setting the wait states from 3 to 2, or 2 to 1 depending what options.. also I enabled bursting and other stuff that "sounds" fast I also upped my static swap file from 1024 to 2048MB .. Again, static swap of that size made B-17 II really smooth and CTD free. Sounds promissing I then made 2 more changes to winME: a) SYSTEM.INI add ConservativeSwapfileUsage=1 under {i386}
b) SYSTEM.INI add under {vCache} MinFileCache=4096 & MaxFileCache=8192 That should help.. Lemme get back with you all after I did some testing Rainwww.raingaming.com Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-09-01, 02:05 AM (EST) 11. "RE: Choppy Performance" If that worked, you will have to tell me how to do it. I have never messed with BIOS before, and I would hate to completly mess up my computer. Thanks.B.A. Neuman Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
rrevved (19 posts)
Jun-09-01, 04:00 AM (EST) 12. "RE: Choppy Performance" >Hey there all.
>
>
>I am running MSTS on a
>P4 1.4 ghz 64 MB
>Radeon VE video card, Windows
>ME, and 128 MB ram.
>All and all the performance
>is great, except for every
>3 seconds or so there
>is a 1/2 second (I
>am guessing) pause. I have
>the same thing on FS2k
>Pro and CFS2. Brian, 128mb is a -tiny- amount of RAM on your
otherwise powerful system. RAM is cheap, so
buy some more. .. An increase to 256 would make
everything you run much smoother.
You'll be (very) glad you did.
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nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-09-01, 02:07 PM (EST) 13. "RE: Choppy Performance" Well, I realize that 128 is a small amount of RAM. I did go out and purchase another 256 of RAM. And it wasnt cheap. My CPU takes RDRAM PC800, and thats pretty pricy. It should arrive sometime this week. But reguardless, even with 128, it SHOULD run smoothly, considering the programs only requiring 32 mb of RAM. We will see what happens.B.A. Neuman Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Rails (3 posts)
Jun-11-01, 02:12 PM (EST) 15. "RE: Choppy Performance" Hi All,
Been reading your posts with much interest since I am having similar problems. At first I just thought it was my slower processor but when I see that the 1 giga's are having similar problems it must not be related to the processor speed.First my vitals are:
PIII-733
256mb
Geforece 200mx-64mb with 4XAGP slot
19" CTX monitor
WD HD @7200
at present using the sound card off the DFI MB.
Windows98SE--allow windows to manage memory.
One other note, I get very little if any stuttering in FS2000.
I get stuttering or 1 sec quick pauses similar to the way B.A. described. Been trying over the weekend to fix the problem but am running out of ideas. Overall I enjoy the sim and get respectable fps (15-35)at 1024x768x16 and display effects either full or near full.
What I have tried todate:
Use End-it-all
defragged drive
scandisk
changed to different resolution settings i.e. 800x640x16 or 32.
reduced settings, shodows etc.
switched engines to see if textures might cause the problem.
replaced 12.41 nivda drivers with 12.10 and 10.8 drivers and no change.
One thing I did notice was in the different demos I did not get the stuttering except on the NECorridor with the amtrak. The other demos were smooth as silk. Some had trees and some didn't.
However I do believe that the pauses are more pronounced with a lot of thick trees..so as someone mentioned the displaying of graphics could be the problem..but then so many folks out there with similar or less power video cards and even slower processors have not noticed any stuttering..
Still hoping there will be a cure..it is very annoying to see those sudden jerks every second or two..
Certainly appreciate reading your posts todate..
Thanks,Carl Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-11-01, 01:14 AM (EST) 14. "RE: Choppy Performance" I will be adding another 128 MB of ram on Wednesday. I am hoping this will solve the problem. I will let anyone who is interested know. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
SouthShore (4 posts)
Jun-11-01, 06:26 PM (EST) 16. "RE: Choppy Performance" I have a quick question---->Will I get better performance with Windows 2000 Proffessional than with Win 98 first edition? I have all the driver upgrades for 2000, waiting for some answers. By the way, running with PIII 550 w/258 RAM, Nvidia 32 Meg video card. I'am also running Cacheman, Rambooster and end-it-all utilities and have most tabs maxed out. Only stutter I get is when on the outside view moving the camera's around. (Running at 1024 X 768 X32 bit color). Latest drivers are the key! Just want to know before I screw up a good thing and try to upgrade. Thanx in advance. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
drobson (1 posts)
Jun-11-01, 10:03 PM (EST) 17. "RE: Choppy Performance" I wouldn't bet on the additional ram making it better. I get stuttering (worse than on fs2000, in fact, fs2000 hardly ever stutters) with my system:
AMD 1.1 ghz T-bird--512 megs of ram--Matrox G400 32meg video card--WD 40gig hard drive. I close everything down that is not needed, but still get the stutters. Not bad, but still there.
Darrell Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
BillKunert (1 posts)
Jun-11-01, 10:48 PM (EST) 18. "RE: Choppy Performance" I'm wondering if creating a ram drive, and somehow forcing the program to use it, would have any effect. My pauses are when the hard drive is accessed. If the whole program could be loaded into memory the problem would, I think, go away. Hard drive access, even with a fast drive, is an order of magnitude slower than memory access. I have very few pauses in FS2K or CFSII unless I'm flying close to the ground in a dense scenery area. I can fly through Chicago with all scenery settings maxed with probably 90% less pausing than in MSTS. I really like the sim but the pauses are annoying.
PIII 933MHz 133MHZ bus
512meg PC133
Maxtor 15 gig 7200 rpm
Matrox G400Max dual head 32 meg
Soundblaster PCI 128Not the world's fastest system but not a slouch either.
Bill Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-12-01, 02:47 PM (EST) 21. "RE: Choppy Performance" Well, the extra ram was installed in my computer. And alas, the choppiness was not resolved. Therefore, maybe it is a software problem, and a patch may solve the problem. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Rails (3 posts)
Jun-12-01, 10:22 AM (EST) 19. "RE: Choppy Performance" Did you check a recent post by not leaving the switch driving aid on ..Have been leaving it on and when used the F8 key to delete off the screen..no more pauses..Couldn't beleive something as simple as that fixed the problem..
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nwabri (16 posts)
Jun-12-01, 12:13 PM (EST) 20. "RE: Choppy Performance" LAST EDITED ON Jun-12-01 AT 01:03 PM (EST)Havent tried it, but will look into it. Thanks.B.A. Neuman(30 Minutes Later)Well, I didnt notice much of a difference. There was some minor I mean VERY minor changes with the F8 key. But still large stutters. I tell you, the Hiaitsu line so far caused the worst pauses and stutters yet. Pretty disapointing. Remove | Alert Edit | Reply | Reply With Quote | Top
Dogdaysdude (1 posts)
Jun-12-01, 05:58 PM (EST) 22. "RE: Choppy Performance" nwabri,
You may also want to try the following from the Hercules web site;
Go into the Control Panel, double click on the System icon, then click on the Device Manager tab. Look under the CDROM heading, and go into each of your CD-Rom drive's properties. Click on the Settings tab and enable DMA if it is listed in the options section. Look under Disk Drives in the Device Manager, then go into each of your hard drive's properties. Click on the Settings tab and enable DMA if it is listed in the options section. This may also be caused by the swap file on your hard drive. You should make a permanent sized swap file. Click on Start, Find, and choose Files or Folders. Make a search for "win386.swp" on your primary hard drive. Check the file size of the file when it is found. Go into the Control Panel, double click on the System icon, then click on the Performance tab. Click on the Virtual Memory button, then select "Let me specify my own virtual memory settings". In the Minimum text box, type in roughly the the file size that was found when you searched for the "win386.swp" file. Leave the Maximum text box as is. 150 is recommended for the Minimum swap file size and 200 for the Maximum swap file size.
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