More Awesome Than You!

I don't remember exactly how I came across this, but I was wondering why my Core Duo 2 laptop was lagging so much when playing TS2. Since doing this I've noticed a significant increase in performance in the game (and booting up my computer actually). Here's why performance is so low:

1) On Dual Core/HT systems Windows XP needs a hotfix that Windows Update does not give you (KB896256 (http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=896256))
2) OEMs do no install this hotfix (except a few rare ones)
3) The Sims 2 has sync issues with multiprocessor systems causing its performance to suck (choppy graphics, slow response time etc.)

Affected systems:
Intel - Pentium 4 w/ HT, Pentium D, Core Duo, Core 2 Duo, Dual Core Xeon
AMD - Athlon 64 X2, Turion X2, Dual Core Opteron

Resolution:

• Install KB896256 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=C2AB5A48-8240-4934-BBD8-34FB8A0FCE3B) (for both Intel and AMD)
• (AMD only!) Install KB924441 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=B0FF829D-C427-4F40-BC56-F481837EFFBE) and AMD CPU Driver (http://www.amd.com/us-en/assets/content_type/utilities/amdcpusetup.exe)
• Open boot.ini in notepad and add the /usepmtimer switch

(DO NOT COPY AND PASTE FROM BELOW!!)

• Download ForceCore (http://www.kalme.de/files/tools/forcecore.zip) and copy ForceCore.exe to C:\Windows\System32 OR the TSBin folder for whatever expansion pack you have (it's easier to use it from the System32 folder)
• Create a shortcut to Sims2EPx.exe (for whatever EP or SP you have) and modify the Target to read: (modify as needed)

This tells Windows to open the game using the second core/cpu, you can add any of the normal game switches after the quotes (like -1024x768 or -w etc.). For HT systems I'd recommend using 1 instead of 2 since it's only one processor anyway, -1 tells it to use any random processor that you have. Details and picture guide for easier understanding here (http://www.kalme.de/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=44&Itemid=35).

Info yoinked from: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=60416

Thank you this is great. ;D

Looking at where you originally got the information from, I noticed that there was an extra step, which involved editing the Registry. Is it alright to do that, or should we just ignore it?

That's interesting info, Argon.  I have a Pentium 4 w/HT (desktop) which had been giving me write delay failure error messages since February.  Thought we had a fix by replacing a cable and doing a registry modification as the rig has been running flawlessly since March 8, but after downloading and installing the latest XP patch yesterday, error message popped up again. 

Back to the drawing board.

Thanks for the info Argon! :-*

A couple of questions:


What if we are using a securerom hider thingamabobby?  The target in my Sims 2 Seasons icon currently points to


How will this affect me?  Can I just add the ForceCore thing to the beginning or middle?  Or I won't be able to use it?




What's an HT system?  I could probably look it up, but meh...  I figure it probably doesn't concern me, but I was just curious.  A cursory google brought up home theater system, but that doesn't seem to make sense.  :-\

Ste

HT = hyperthreading.  It was a way Intel designed fast chips (higher than 2.8Ghz) to act like they were two separate processors, before the Dual Core technology came out.

Ahhh, thanks joe. :D  My sister has an "older" compy with a P4 chip... how do I tell if it has HT or not?  So I can figure out whether or not I need to update her machine too.

ETA: When I run dxdiag, it reports that her machine processor is a Intel Pentium 4 CPU 3.00 Ghz (2 CPUs).

Ste

That is not a dual core, but it is a HT cpu.

@Diala
Just ignore it, the KB article only lists that reg entry for disabling the hotfix. Windows has a lot of options that are active even if the reg entry is not there, it's safe to ignore that step.

@Ste
The Sims 2 uses SafeDisc not SecuROM, that's weird that SecuROM Loader v1.2 would work for it; I'll have to try that out. Anyway since that program allows switches I assume it'd work just fine but to be safe I'd write out the whole path like this:

and yes, your sister's computer has HyperThreading. On Dual Core and Pentium 4 w/ HT processors Windows XP loads the multiprocessor kernel so that's why dxdiag shows the "(2 CPUs)".


FYI: I always just change the permissions on the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DEVICEMAP\Scsi (deny read and query value for the Users group) when I use DAEMON Tools to run my game, that way I know it will never be blacklisted when a new expansion comes out. The only bad thing about it is that it only works for that Windows session.

Old SecuROM and Safedisc were susceptible to the same hiding techniques. SecuROM has been upgraded so that newer versions are no longer affected by old SecuROM hiders (I think YASU is the current hider of choice), but Safedisc never received those upgrades, probably because they're equally useless, and remains susceptible to the same old tricks.

I attempted to try this, but doesn't seem to work.  I copied and pasted what you had in code exactly as above and I got one of those crash errors where it asks if you would like to report the issue to microsoft and what not.

This happened when I tried it on my Duo 2 Core.  When I tried it on my sister's P4, it asked me to put in the sims disk... ???

Without the ForceCore in the target path, both computers can run the game without the cd.


I guess I won't be able to get this to work?  Unless I use some alternative method instead of ASR?  I only just recently started using the ASR thing.  What alternative methods can I use that doesn't involve having to constantly regedit keys.  The thing is, I would have to do the same for my sister's puter, and I would like to make it as simple and idiot proof as possible.  With ASR, effectively nothing changes for her.  All she has to do is click on the icon and play as normal.  I wouldn't want to have her regedit stuff everytime just to play the game.  :-\

Any other free alternatives to ASR?


Ste

SD4hider (I think that's its name) -- I use it and it works fine.  It's not a command line thing like ASR; you have to run it and click on 'hide' before starting your game, and then 'restore' when you're done.  But I've never had a problem with it from OFB to Seasons.

It's kinda tricky to find (I found it off a link on the daemon tools forum), so if you can't find it, let me know and I'll send it to you. It's pretty small, so it should fit in a PM.


Oh, and my older P4 Dell didn't have this windows patch installed, so thanks for this tip, Argon!  It does seem to make a small but noticeable difference in boot speed and amount of lag in TS2. About the only time I get noticeable lag now is when I first enter a lot (seems to be the game drawing everything there), and when the ground changes from clear to snow-covered. There's definitely a lot less lag during ordinary play.

Thanks again joe and Argon.  I found sd4hider and it works like a charm :D

Also, maybe this could be pinned or moved to the war room? (or peasantry).  I suppose whatever is appropriate, but I think this is definitely a useful tip!

Ste

Or you could use AntiBlah (http://ww2.cdmediaworld.com/hardware/cdrom/cd_utils_8.shtml#AntiBlah) it does more or less the same thing I do manually. I don't like SD4Hider because it deletes the entries rather than just changing permissions.

So is it automatic then?  Or is it like sd4hider where I have to hide and then restore after I'm done playing?

And... this reminds me... oops... I think I might have forgotten to restore after quitting the game on my sister's machine, and I think she closed the program and I don't know if she restored or not.  Can something really bad happen if I forget to restore?  Or will it fix itself when I hide and restore again.  I hope... :-\

Ste

SD4Hide creates a backup.reg file in its own folder, so the next time you run it, you will still have the option to restore.. assuming nobody deletes that backup file in the meantime.

It gets replaced the next time the system starts up, but it's better practice to avoid deleting stuff in the registry if you didn't have to. This is easier to automate than SD4Hide, since it uses SubInACL (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=e8ba3e56-d8fe-4a91-93cf-ed6985e3927b&DisplayLang=en) which is just a command line tool from Microsoft.

You could therefore do something like this:

Run.cmd
That is assuming that Run.cmd is in the TSBin folder, both ForceCore.exe and subinacl.exe are in System32 (or in a folder defined in the PATH variable), and you are running with Administrator privileges with the image already mounted.

Then you can use off.cmd to restore the permissions later if you want, it's fixed after the system restarts anyway though.

off.cmd

Just copy those into notepad and save them as cmd files in the TSBin folder, you could point your shortcut to run.cmd that way.

Those entries seem to serve no real purpose anyway, and they respawn themselves, so deleting them doesn't really hurt.

Actually they do, I had problems running a few disk management programs, Alcohol 120% has had issues if those reg entries were not there when making an image. By modifying the permissions to hide that reg from the Administrator's group you avoid those issues because it can still be seen by the "SYSTEM" account.

Actually, what would really boost the CPU speed would be if I could run Sims 2 in native 64-bit mode on x86-64 Linux, but I suspect the real bottleneck for my system is probably my hard drive, then the video. In Linux (if they ported it), the bottleneck would probably video, audio, then the hard drive, then CPU.  :P

I have an important question, regarding this fix.

I just received a surprise email from my daughter, which was a confirmation of an order she had placed for a new computer she bought for me. It is a Dell XPS 710 H2C Black. That is a Core 2 Extreme QX6700 (8MB,3.2GHz Factory overclocked), quad-core processor, with 4 GB internal memory and a terabyte raid 0. Can you believe it? (What can I say -- she loves me. She's always been my little gift from God.) My new XPS has an estimated ship date of the first week of April.  :D  [doing a very excited happy dance]

So, I it seems I suddenly need to know if this fix will work for a Core 2 Extreme (quad instead of duo).

I also need to know the best driver for the dual NVIDIA 8800 GTX, 768 MB. I know nothing about that card, but I read that someone else had it a few months ago and said the Sims 2 played good on it. However, it has been out for a while longer now, and I'm not sure which driver is the most stable.

I'm still a little weak in the knees with excitement ....

I thank you appreciate am glad you took the time to alert us to this. I have an P4/HT computer, and while I never thought my performance was "sucky" (at least since I added RAM), I realized I don't have a good basis for comparison.

I believe I installed everything 100% to spec, and found no difference in performance. So perhaps that is why the update is not universally distributed by MS, as it must have some other factors that contribute. Since keeping up with WTF microsawft is doing is not something I regularly do, pointers like this are of value, to me at least.

@amjoie
I'm guessing you still need this because it's still using the same Windows XP kernel (err, well if you want to be technical there are four different kernels: normal, normal Multiprocessor, 4 gigs RAM, 4 gigs RAM Multiprocessor; so you'd actually be using the last), but I can't say from experience. I do know that the latest drivers from Nvidia disable SLI mode with The Sims 2 so you wouldn't get any benefit from having two cards in there :-P

As for Nvidia drivers: I'm using XTreme-G MobileForce XP 97.92 M4 since I'm on a laptop, but they have other variations of it: http://www.tweaksrus.com/index.php?option=com_docman&task=cat_view&gid=67&Itemid=41/

@wes_h
There isn't as big a difference on HT systems, but it helped my desktop with a pretty outdated GeForce FX 5900XT 128 meg video card and 1 gig of RAM. It's a hit and miss with HT cpus.

This is interesting. Is the SLI mode disabled because it caused problems for the Sims 2? Does disabling it solve the blue screen issues, etc? Is it disabled selectively and only for the Sims 2 game, leaving it intact for other things while I am running Sims 2 in windowed mode? If so, then my background processes (like my Desktop Plants on dual monitors, and virus/spyware protection) are still being run off both cards while playing the game, so I would still be picking up efficiency that would give the game more access to available power on the single card. Or am I thinking wrong, here? 

Even if I am using only one 8800 card just for the game, I suspect it will still be lightspeed ahead of the 6800 I'm using now. And the quad core has to be faster/more efficient than the Gen 4 dual that I have now. So I think I'll still see some noticeable difference in the game play. Especially since I'll also be doubling my memory.  :)

I never knew about your fix, and from what I am understanding, I should have already had it on the Gen 4 dual XPS I've been running. Since I was satisfied with the performance of the game up until Seasons, even without the fix, then I'll probably really enjoy the game on the new XPS 710 H2C. But I would like it to be as optimized as possible. I just hesitate to mess with something brand new, unless I know I should.

Thank you for the driver info. I suppose I'll try running what I get out of the box, and not change drivers unless I experience problems. But I would like to at least be informed of the most stable drivers, so I know where to turn if I do experience problems. Is there some website that would likely have the latest info for this, as it applies to Sims 2? Or is this site about as good as any other?

SLI (linking two video cards together to improve 3D performance) can only have one setting at a time, so when the game is running with that profile active, it will be disabled for everything else. I have no idea why they disabled it, maybe there were blue screen problems, all my other computers are more than 3 years old and this laptop only has one 7900 GS so I only know what I read about SLI. Virus and spyware protection has nothing to do with SLI, that's all controlled by the cpu and not the video card.

The game will only use one core out of the four your processor has, but that's not a problem because the background processes are free to use the other three and not interrupt your game. It is possible to use all four for the game, but that's where the studdering and sucky performance comes from, there are sync issues between the different cores so the game slows down to try and correct it (thus the need to set the process affinity; ForceCore does this automatically using the switch you provide).


However, if your new computer is coming with Windows Vista you'll have a whole other set of problems, but the good news is that you won't need the hotfix from Microsoft since it's already part of the OS. There are no good video card drivers for Vista at this point, and The Sims 2 has many graphical glitches.

EDIT: SLI will affect dual monitor displays depending on how you have it set up, if both displays are connected to the primary video card then you will have no problem but if you have the second display connected to the second card with SLI turned on, you will not get any picture on the second display. What SLI does is use the second video card for rendering part of the video, most commonly the picture is divided into the top half and bottom half of the screen. Output is disabled from the second video card because it's being redirected to the first video card so you get a complete picture on your display.

That's good to know about how the monitor needs to be set. Since I have been running two monitors on 256 and I will soon have 768 on each card, running off one card shouldn't ever be an issue. In fact, I don't even see the need for the second card with how I currently use the computer, except for it *might* be needed for Sims 3, and then I would be glad I had it. However, dual cards came as a default (and only) choice with this computer model, so I wasn't going to snub my nose at it.  LOL

(Thinking ...) Can I have SLI turned off all the time, and have each monitor pointed to its own card? That way, I would actually be using two cards (even though it certainly seems like overkill). If I have both monitors pointed to just one card, then isn't the second one sitting there like a veal, not being used for anything? I wish I knew more about this (feeling very stupid about now) but I've never had occasion to learn about dual cards, since I've never had them before.

I know the virus and spyware programs, themselves, run off the processor. I was talking about the popup windows that call for a screen refresh. I'm playing along and suddenly my game is shoved to the background so that I can see some little window that tells me I'm protected from an outbreak. My first thought is, "I better be." My next thought is "quit bothering me with the obvious -- I'm trying to play a game, here." I had hoped more graphics card power would mean I wouldn't be interrupted. Sigh. Unless, since you say it is being run completely by the processor, does having three cores not being used for the game mean there is hope??

My particular computer still comes with XP pro intstalled, and only "Vista ready." That suits me to a T. I don't want to touch Vista for at least a year, and maybe more. But I will have to eventually move to it, so I am glad to have a card that is specifically designed to run on it.

Getting back to the fix ... Once I get all my stuff moved to the new computer, I can experiment with the fix on the old computer. If it goes well there, I'll put it on the new one. If I mess up, it won't matter because I'll be wiping the drives on the old computer and reinstalling factory settings before my daughter puts it up for sale, anyway.

ok I have

Operating System: Microsoft Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2
Processor: AMD Athlon 64 4000+ Processor with HyperTransport Technology


should I install the KB924441 hotfix and AMD CPU Driver?


if so then should I also download that ForceCore thing?  I never use a shortcut to the game, just pop in the cd and let it load and then I remove the cd and then play...

*is all confused*

Athons have Hyper-Threading?  I thought that was just an Intel thing.

I have no idea if this is still a problem, but nVidia had horrible support for Vista especially with the 8800.  I personally think buying a card just because it supports DX10 right now is pointless since even Avalon¹ runs DX9.1 and it'll be a while for games to use DX10.  Since you were forced to SLI the things there probably wasn't any choice between a DX9 and a DX10 card.

TS2 runs about the same speed in Vista as it did in XP but that might be because Intel's Vista drivers don't suck completely.  I also seem to be really lucky when it comes to these kinds of things though since I also don't have problems with either of my nVidia cards (Geforce 4 MX and Geforce 6100) even when using the latest drivers.

What AV are you using?  It seems kind of odd that an antivirus would alert you about something that doesn't require your intervention.

According to that thread, these multi-core gimpers are still in Vista.  I don't see what the OEMs are trying to accomplish by doing this.

_Footnotes
¹Vista API.  Like AIGLX/XGL(Linux) or Quartz(OSX) it's 3D accelerated so it can do many things that would bring XP to a crawl.  Aero and Live Thumbnails are examples.  Annoyances such as the screen of an application like SimPE turning completely white when freezing is a thing of the past since the window doesn't need to be completely redrawn.  For more information, clicky (http://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/pretty-vista.ars).

Really? This may be an excuse for me to upgrade my new system to Vista Home Premium instead of "downgrading" it to XP Pro SP2 when it arrives on Monday, as this has always irritated me when Firefox freezes like this.

You said,"I personally think buying a card just because it supports DX10 right now is pointless since even Avalon1 runs DX9.1 and it'll be a while for games to use DX10."

Well, now that all depends. I'm not a young thing, and although I am still learning and still willing to learn, I am not looking for a new vocation. I have no desire to become a programmer, and no desire to start building computers from an empty box to completetion.

I cut my computer teeth on a Mac, way back in 1984. I am used to cutting edge technology, and not having to worry what is under the hood, because it just runs. You don't mess with a Mac box. You happily use it until it is time to upgrade. So swapping out cards is not something I am accustomed to doing.

I got involved with PCs around the time Windows 95 was running. But that was on Virtual PC. It wasn't until a few months before Sims 2 first came out that I got my first PC box, primarily to play Sims 2, since I have and will always do most of my computing on the Mac.

So, as a subconscious expectation, I still think the PC will run and keep running without much intervention on my part. I was rather horrified to find out I practically needed to become a programmer to understand how to simply protect the silly computer from attacks. The existence of Winrot was another shocker. But I learned, sometimes the hard way. So now I know what I am doing in that area.

However, unlike most savy PCers, I do not quickly and easily crack open the box, for the sheer joy of messing with its innards. Instead, I would prefer to have a well built box, stable and steady, that I can pretty much ignore for the expected life of the PC. So it is important that whatever card comes with the box will still be a valid and useable card until it is time to buy a new PC. And since my daughter bought this for me, it needs to last for years not months. She bought me the latest greatest Dell, which didn't come cheap. I can't ask her to do that every year.

Also, because of the way Vista handles graphics, etc, eventually everyone will be moving over to it. That may be a couple years off, but I will still have this new computer at that time. It is a comfort for me to know that my grahics card was actually built to take advantage of the Vista capability, because the card won't be outdated as soon as programmers catch up to the changes in Vista. And I won't have to face changing out a card, and not being sure if my power supply, cooling system, motherboard, etc can handle the load that the new graphics card demands. In short, I probably won't need to learn how to build a box, just to stay current with the Sims 3.

NVidia is putting out new drivers for Vista 8800 practically every month. Improvements have been made, on a regular basis. They'll get it right, eventually, probably about the time I am ready to switch to Vista. [If I live that long.] So that doesn't concern me, at the moment. All I really care about right now is that Sims 2 runs well on XP, and I have read only good things about that. Nothing negative on the 8800 and Sims 2 on XP, so far.

My AV is Norton, which may be invasive and unwieldy (as well as being annoying, at times) but I know how to use it; and my computer has been safe since installing it. I could not say the same with the previous AV. So for now, I'll stay with Norton. And Ad Watch, and Adaware, and Defender, and Wintasks -- and my long in the tooth XP pro.

Wow, that sure was a long and windy way of saying I disagree with your statement.  LOL

I think I should probably go finish configuring a new copy of Starry Nights on my beautiful 24" iMac (Orion should be peeping over the horizon right about now), before starting up the Sims 2 on the PC .... that should keep me out of trouble for a while.  :D

You should know that in my experience Norton is about as useful against viruses as putting fairy wings on a freight train. I've personally been infected a few times (and I have very strict policies on web browsing and keeping my firewall settings straight), and I've witnessed others becoming infected as well. YMMV, but I'd find a product that actually gets the job done (or better yet, just unplug from the internet as I do now when using Windows).

Internet Security Norton craps out networks regularly too. I uninstalled Norton's suite about two years ago. Nod32 is the one I've been recommended next.

On the topic of dual cores, I'm going to try Argon's suggestions today on my big machine. I've backed up my data and ready to try. None of the suggestions appear to affect the RAID array, so I'll give it a bash. I have a AMD 4400 dual core and I always thought the Sims performance should have been even better than it is.

If that works I also have a new laptop with  2Ghz Turion dual core but it's running Vista, so I don't know if the instructions would be the same?

Where should I be looking for boot.ini?

So far all I can find is reboot.ini and boot.ini.backup

Tools > Folder Options... > View > Uncheck the box next to "Hide protected operating system files (recommended)"

Go to the root folder of your hard drive (typically C:\) and look for boot.ini.

If you follow the link to where he got the initial info, it gives specific instructions on where to find boot.ini, so you can get there easily.

Here is the part you need to know, as a quote from that page:

"Now look at your boot.ini to make sure that the command /usepmtimer is there, by right clicking on My Computer go to Properties, click on the ADVANCE tab, then under Startup and Recovery click on Settings, then click on EDIT....make sure your boot.ini has the /usepmtimer in there (located in the last line), if NOT then just copy and paste /usepmtimer in there. (NOT the entire boot.ini example)

Note: If you have an AMD dual core and installed the AMD drivers, the /usepmtimer would be inserted into your boot.ini for you."

Follow the instructions, and you'll be up and running in no time. :)

Aha.  I thought I already had everything visible, but that box was still checked. 


Well, Venusy's instructions worked for me.  But that last statement would explain why the switch was already in there, once I did find it.

For future reference: Press Win+R and type the following:


That will allow you to edit that file.

Well I followed the steps and haven't noticed any difference as yet. I had the switch in the boot.ini already so didn't install AMDCPU. I applied the two hotfixes and rebooted after each, also added the forcecore 2 switch to the sims2 path. The huge lot I'm playing currently seems to lag about the same.  :(

I notice this hotfix info comes from a notebook computer forum, so I was wondering if this also applies to desktop computers as well.  I presume it would but I am not a programmer so I can't be sure.  I can say for certain that my Windows folder does not contain KB896256 and I have an AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 5000+.  Is this something I really ought to do?

I used it on my Dell desktop (HT processor) and it seemed to help; can't vouch for duo-core desktops.

FYI: My wife got a new Dell laptop, and it already had both the hot fix and the extra command in boot.ini installed.  So Dell at least knows about this.

I used it on my AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ desktop and got noticeable improvement in everything except Sims. In my game, the change has been slight at best.

However, I also have crappy onboard graphics, which has been on my list of things to take care of, just not at a very high priority.  This has moved getting a decent graphics card up the priority list. I expect that's the limiting factor now.

I executed these hotfixes a few days ago and here are my results.  First, a noticeable improvement in OS response and most programs except Sims2.  Second, Forcecore does not seem to improve performance at all and in fact seems to make my Sims2 slightly more sluggish, especially when scrolling a large lot.

I totally missed the irony in this at first and blindly followed the directions like a good sheep.  This post is recommending a hotfix for dual core and HT issues, and then advises completely bypassing the hotfix by using Forcecore to make Sims2 run on only one core.  (Sometimes my brain does not catch up with what I read until days later.)

I would recommend these updates to anyone but the Forcecore I would not.  I don't see it could hurt anything to try, though.

[Interresting related tangential note]  I have uncommon BSOD since GLS of the generic, 'Stop error, thread stuck in device driver' kind that causes an instant reboot of my computer.  I had small hope this might find some solution to that issue.  Alas, no, but what is certainly curious is that now I have gotten different error messages after restart and no more of the old familiar 'stop error' kind.  (I realize the instant reboot is still a stop error, but now the details of the stop error messages have changed.)  I know a lot of people have been having problems of this sort and most seem fixated upon a problem with nVidia drivers.  My experience with this makes me wonder if the problem is not deeper than simply graphics card or software issues, perhaps involved with the problematic timing of dual core CPU's mentioned here as well.

Argon, would you happen to know if the root bug also exists in 2003 and Vista?

Does this impact Vista Aero at all?  I have C2 Duo as well, with 4mgs Rambus on laptop.  I noticed a slight lag and the graphics are blurry.  Should I do this fix or not?  Thanks so much for the info.

@Jordi
I don't know much about 2003 since I never bothered to hack one up to work as a workstation but the forcecore thing should still be the same. I do know that Vista does not need a hotfix because it's already built into the os.

@cptsmurphy
That's a graphics card issue, Vista running Areo sucks more video card memory than XP would so the game has less to work with. The minimum requirement for the Areo interface is a 128 meg video card, so if you have 256 megs you only have half to work with for the game; normally on laptops they're crummy integrated cards so you're actually using slower system memory.


@all
There's some confusion about what the ForceCore and hotfix do, so I'll explain it like this:
The game engine was made before dual core computers were around and the game gets no benefit because of it (unless they added this in Seasons, which I highly doubt since C&C 3 specifically tells you it supports dual core on the box while Seasons does not). HT is not very good to begin with, it's more of a half assed Intel attempt at multiprocessing and has been dropped in Core 2 Duo series and later processors. The hyperthreading actually cuts your processing power in half and many game developers suggest you have it turned off because it causes sync problems (for example: with the special event camera on HT systems, the audio will be lag behind near the middle of the movie and will not recover). On dual core systems, only the game is run in single core mode using ForceCore allowing your pc to do what it was built for: multitasking. With the game only using one core, background processes can run without interfering without having to take time away from the game's cpu time.

ForceCore is simply a program which automatically sets the affinity for a program, the tip for running the game using only one processor came from the guru3d.com forums and an Nvidia drivers forum (it was more from hours of google searches I guess).

For anyone wondering how to turn off HT there are two steps:
1) Go into your bios and turn off hyperthreading
*2) right click My Computer>Properties>Hardware>Device Manager>Computer>ACPI Multiprocessor PC
update driver>choose from list>"Advanced Confi.. blah blah (ACPI) PC">next through everything then restart

* most people don't know/forget they need to do this

Thanks for the thorough explanation, that was great! :D

So now I'm wondering...

1) Will turning off HT on my sister's compy help?  Even tho I've already installed the ForceCore thingamabobby on her machine?

2) Will turning off HT affect regular, non gaming use of her compy (performance wise)? or will the effects be negligible?

3) If I do turn it off... then can I simply revert her machine back to using ASR with daemontools and nix the sd4hider thingy?


Ste

PS.  Incidentally... I'm not sure if necessarily noticed any performance difference... but then again, the performance overall is improved in comparison to my old compy anyways (speed, loading, and graphic wise).  Additionally... I don't really multi task much on my compy while I'm simming.  I kinda got into that habit to begin with, so that was usually never a problem anyways.

All of this makes sense of course *if* the CPU is the speed bottleneck, which is not likely to be the case with a relatively modest but modern system. A smokin' hot bleeding edge in every conceivable way system may benefit from this.

TS2 is a CPU hog, so yes, CPU does tend to be the speed bottleneck. The graphics themselves are actually mildly outdated and don't tend to bottleneck a modern system.

By that I simply meant that the CPU tends to be less the performance issue than your average hard drive or RAM speed. Most people still tend to have slow drives and slow RAM, even with relatively modern CPUs.

Yes Ste you could dump SD2Hider and the ForceCore thing with HT turned off, check and make sure none of her programs need HT for anything before you do that though. How you'd go about doing that, I have no idea but the only things I've come across that actually use it are Adobe Photoshop and a glide3x wrapper but that's just me.

Dizzy, hard drives aren't really a factor unless your pc doesn't have enough ram (thrashing the hard drive with the Windows swap file usage). About the only difference you'll see with slower hard drives is the initial load time, and even then Windows has the ability to prefech and keep that data in ram if the game is loaded often enough. This laptop has a 4,200 rpms hard drive, but since it has 2 gigs of DDR3 ram you really don't notice it (especially if you set the executive kernel to only stay in active memory). It's the same with my 3 year old desktop (1 gig of DDR2 ram, it was 512 megs before). I don't remember the clock speeds on the ram right now, but I didn't break the budget on them they're the averagely priced modules.

Best case scenario, the hard drive is used very little only loading data when a neighbor walks on the lot (~300KB and ~5megs for clothing, hair etc. most of which will be held in video memory for the different texture LOD stages) as everything else should already be loaded in memory. Let's face it, any normal lot does not include all 7 gigs of data that makes up this game so it'd be safe to assume that all the data needed for that lot can easily fit into 1 gig of ram maybe even 512 megs for a small lot. Hard drive speed really has no influence in anything besides saving and load times or if your pc has so little ram that it resorts to using the slow swap file.

I tried both doing this and turning off HT on my system, and I get noticeably better performance in TS2 with HT turned off.  Let the 3Ghz processor have at it with no distractions. :)

Granted, during the "live" game play, the hard drive is not as much of a factor. However, drive speed is a critically severe bottleneck with respect to load/saving/building lots, and any transitions between them. Those are the performances areas that most desperately need improvement, ergo they *are* a factor.

Who said anything about upgrading your computer?  I'm saying that DX10 games are so far off that you're better off buying a new system for $1000 when the game you want comes out than waste loads of money for the sole purpose of being DX10 ready.  Even with DX10 capable cards there's no promise that TS3 will run really well either.  I'm guessing that TS3 will take up at least 25GB and take 2GB of RAM minimum, 4GB recommended.  These might be a little excessive but I wouldn't put it past EA for making the game extra bloaty just to force people to buy new hardware (they are the Microsoft of gaming companies after all).  Those cards will improve TS2's rendering now especially if you were on an integrated chipset though.

I really don't understand what makes a card DX10 capable anyway, is it an GPU architecture like PPC or x86?  From what I understand right now, it seems to me that it's saying that a computer is Cω or Python capable.

By the way, Avalon shuts off while you're playing pretty much any game so that's not what's causing the problem.  The slower performance probably comes from the fact that Vista adds a lot of services like SuperFetch and Tablet PC support even when you don't have a Tablet PC.  This is what angers me about Vista the most, they put crap like this in there and there's no way to completely remove it anymore unless you reinstall your entire OS with vLite.

Sorry for being retarded but I can't find my boot.ini (it's been a while, forgotten where it was and a search turned up empty. I found a boot.ini.backup... if I do the forcecore and the XP update without the boot.ini thing, will it not work?

Dudes, do you know of any improvements with Vista?

---Vista HP
---Core 2Duo 6400
---2 gb RAM
---Nvidia GF 7950GT

I have all the expansions and SP's running. The performance coughs a bit sometimes - more lately - I don't think I need to whine, but I want to be sure I haven't missed anything I could do to improve performance. :)


                 

I just want to know why you have a butt symbol ( ω ) on your computer while I don't.  ???  ;D

'cos he's an arsehole who thinks burning live kittens to death is fun?

So they get special "arse" keys?

It now becomes clear.

That's right. :D