RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (Full Version)

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fbs -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 5:43:26 PM)


Hmm.. I have a Dual Core processor, and I didn't use the tool. I use the -dual option, and when I check the processor affinity of the running game, it already has it set for CPU0 and CPU1.

So I guess that the utility is needed only for quad cores or dual cores with hyperthreading.

Cheers [:D]
fbs



Iridium -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 6:04:16 PM)

Yeah, upon viewing the affinity of AE it has both boxes for my dual core checked already. Running Vista 64 with a dual core Conroe chip.



Erik Rutins -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 6:06:16 PM)

Actually, if you're experiencing lag you don't want it set to both CPUs, you want it set to just one (CPU 0).



USSAmerica -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 6:44:30 PM)

Can anyone tell us what the -dual flag actually does for the game on multi core systems?



mikemike -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 7:09:22 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: michaelm


quote:

ORIGINAL: treespider


quote:

ORIGINAL: Dixie

Hmmm. Has this worked properly? [&:]

[image]local://upfiles/20142/AB2444804C6C4FF9A9E92C695DE11E08.jpg[/image]


I received the same "Unable to update...." line and I did not see a noticeable change in Loading Speed.


I suspect the "Unable to update" means that it couldn't write the information back into the EXE, so there would not be any change how the EXE uses the CPU.
I don't suppose there is some sort of ownership/privileges issue why it can't write back


As someone has mentioned DOS - have you checked if the EXE has the READONLY attribute set? This can happen if you copied the original EXE from a CD - e.g. if you installed the game from a CD. Open the WitP directory in the Explorer, right-click on the EXE and select PROPERTIES in the popup. The attributes are at the bottom; if READONLY is checked (it may be called write protect - I use a German-language XP where it is called "Schreibgeschützt") uncheck it and click OK, then try the imagecfg thing again.

You may find that the checkbox has a gray background and that you can't uncheck it. In that case go up one directory level in the Explorer, right-click the WITP directory and select Properties again. Uncheck the Readonly attribute and click on OK; you will then be asked to confirm the operation with a choice of applying the attribute change to all subdirectories and files contained in the directory; select this option and click OK again. This will remove the offending attribute on the EXE.



Dixie -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 7:19:16 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: RyanCrierie

This program was written by Intel; when they first began to get serious about hyperthreading, etc, which meant that instead of just one CPU being visible to the OS and it's programs, there would be multiple.

Normally, you could set the core affinity by hitting CTRL ALT DEL and right mouse clicking on the thread you want to set the affinity for:

The problem is, you have to do that each time you start up the program.

What IMGCFG does is writes a little flag into the executable that "locks" it to that core affinity, so you don't have to keep doing it over and over.

[image]local://upfiles/18450/CBBF026ED1E84E8FBDE2A6585765121C.gif[/image]


It works the manual way you've just posted, in fact it flies through the load process now. Still no luck with the programme though. Using an Intel CPU on Vista 64, tried disabling the virus protection and made sure WitP is set to read only off.



LarryP -> RE: Got a Dual/Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 7:48:08 PM)

I did this for a MultiThread single CPU and the game loads almost instantly. I'm amazed. [:D]



sanch -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 10:19:28 PM)

Bingo! It was taking 4-8 seconds to open up a base on my dual-core Dell Vostro 200, and windowed mode was hanging. Great tip - thanks!



fbs -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 10:35:31 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

Actually, if you're experiencing lag you don't want it set to both CPUs, you want it set to just one (CPU 0).


Oh, that's fantastic -- it actually loads faster when it has affinity for a single CPU. Quite an unexpected result.

But, will that disable the -dual flag that I'm using? I guess that flag enables something on a dual processor, and if the program is now forced to run against a single processor, then the flag will have no effect, right?

Cheers [:D]
fbs



aztez -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/29/2009 11:37:02 PM)

Damn teeth still hurts after dentist.

Here is an link to Microsoft Vista forums. You can actually setup Set Affinity on your shortcut icon.

http://www.vistax64.com/gaming/197915-setting-processor-affinity-made-easy.html

Just copy and paste on to your shortcut icon and you are set to go.

I tried with my dual core AMD Turion processor (Vista Home Premius 32) and seems to have made the run much smoother.



jazman -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 12:16:22 AM)

The problem with a program that is not specifically written for multi-core CPUs (or multi-CPU machines), but that churn a lot of CPU continuously, is that the OS tries to balance the load across the CPUs, and so with WITP-AE MS Windows is switching the exe between the two cores constantly. That is a performance hit, in this case a major one, I remember seeing it with IL-2 way back.

Binding it to a CPU means it will run on that core and only on that core. You cut out the OS switching the exe back and forth between the cores, so there goes the overhead, overboard.

If you right-click on the windows taskbar and select "Task Manager" and look at the "Performance" tab (and I think on XP you select a check box to show CPUs independently), you can see the difference. Before: the CPU load is balanced across the two cores (or four, as applicable). After: one CPU is pegged. This is good (and assumes nothing else is eating CPU).

Also, it ought to work for AMD CPUs, since setting the affinity is an OS kernel-level activity, not CPU chip related. Thus, the executable is probably inserting some Windows-specific junk to make this work. After all, you can manually do this, as shown earlier, by right-clicking the process and setting it. It's all OS, not CPU.

I think.



jazman -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 12:35:30 AM)

It's possible that Windows has Intel-specific codepaths for making this work, so AMDers may be out of luck. Worth a try. I would, except my gaming box is off, trying to keep the heat down (in Seattle, it is all-time record heat today). If no one else posts about AMD later tonight, I'll give it a whirl.



OldCoot -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 12:43:42 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: aztez

Damn teeth still hurts after dentist.

Here is an link to Microsoft Vista forums. You can actually setup Set Affinity on your shortcut icon.

http://www.vistax64.com/gaming/197915-setting-processor-affinity-made-easy.html

Just copy and paste on to your shortcut icon and you are set to go.

I tried with my dual core AMD Turion processor (Vista Home Premius 32) and seems to have made the run much smoother.


I tried that, but it doesn't go. Here's what I have as the shortcut properties target. Am I missing something?

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /C START "War in the Pacific Admiral Edition" /high/affinity 1"C:\Matrix Games\War in the Pacific Admiral's Edition\War in the Pacific Admiral Edition.exe"



Erik Rutins -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 12:58:03 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: OldCoot
I tried that, but it doesn't go. Here's what I have as the shortcut properties target. Am I missing something?

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /C START "War in the Pacific Admiral Edition" /high/affinity 1"C:\Matrix Games\War in the Pacific Admiral's Edition\War in the Pacific Admiral Edition.exe"


Add some spaces between high and affinity and 1 and "C:\, should be:

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /C START "War in the Pacific Admiral Edition" /high /affinity 1 "C:\Matrix Games\War in the Pacific Admiral's Edition\War in the Pacific Admiral Edition.exe"



OldCoot -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 1:12:18 AM)

Thanks Eric - worked like a charm!



jrcar -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 2:56:54 AM)

Woeked a treat on my Laptop, Dell M6300!

Cheers

Rob



fcam1387 -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 4:16:13 AM)

Nah, makes no difference for me. But for some reason when I copy and paste Erik's target, the "high / affinity" part disappears.

Still reckon its a graphics problem.

Does anyone here use an NVIDIA 9600M GT card?



fcam1387 -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 4:18:17 AM)

Is there a fast way to temporarily disable your graphics card in Vista and revert to the default factory installed vga chip? It's pretty last ditch but it worked for me when I uninstalled my drivers last time.



Toddr22_slith -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 4:33:12 AM)

Should this make the turns run faster?



Erik Rutins -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 4:36:24 AM)

The other fix that seems to work on some systems is to run DxDiag and turn off DirectDraw acceleration.



fcam1387 -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 5:36:52 AM)

Erik,

Yeah, but my only problem is that for some bizarre reason I cannot turn of my video acceleration in display settings or dxdiag because it says: "your current display driver does not allow changes to be made to hardware acceleration settings". I think a few other users have this issue as well.

Sorry to consume your time with this, but the game really isn't playable for me. It's a damn shame too!



jazman -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 5:51:19 AM)

Ach, I get the same error:

"IMAGECFG: Unable to update configuration information in image."

AMD Dual-core CPU. I have AMD's Dual-Core Optimizer running, too.

Looks like it's Intel-only. I'll try the exact same thing on my laptop at work tomorrow, it's Intel dual-core.

(Running on Windows XP x64)

When I start WitP-AE, and manually set the affinity in Task Manager (once WitP-AE is running), I can see the expected effect. In Windowed mode, screen refresh is downright snappy!




jazman -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 6:09:08 AM)

Sorry for the number of posts, I'm trying to work through this completely.

For AMD users with Windows XP, it's worth manually setting the affinity in the Task Manager, once it's running. Here's a pic of the CPU usage once I've set affinity. CPU 0 is doing little, and CPU 1 is doing AE work. It's very quick and snappy, it's worth the 15-30 seconds it takes to set it.

I Googled setting processor affinity with AMD, and didn't come up with much where I could pass in command-line options (like -w -altFont).

Found later:

Users can use the cmd.exe hack mentioned earlier. That works on XP, too (at least on mine, which is 64-bit XP Pro). If you want it in windowed mode, add the -w AFTER the "witp.exe" chunk, outside the double quotes. Thusly:

cmd /C START "WITP AE" /high /affinity 2 "C:\Program Files (x86)\Matrix Games\War in the Pacific Admiral's Edition\War in the Pacific Admiral Edition.exe" -w -altFont

I may just do the latter. Either way, the performance gain in-game is worth it.



[image]local://upfiles/23756/EFDCE8E143CF487BA357F8DC8D969506.jpg[/image]



Chad Harrison -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 6:24:30 AM)

I will admit up front: I am not a computer hardware guy. Some of this stuff is over my head. So let me be specific as to what I have:

My new Alienware just showed up and it has a Intel Core i7-920, which is a quad core on Vista Home Premium 64-bit.

Questions:
1. Has anyone else ran AE on a similar, if not the same, rig?
2. Is it worth going through the trouble to get it to use multi-cores?
3. Can doing this screw up anything else? I know that's a loaded question, but again, I don't mess with my computer much.
4. Are there any problems with running AE on Vista?

Thanks in advance!

Chad



jazman -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 6:30:11 AM)

Here's a batch script I put together to make this work easily. Modify to suit your flavor. You'll probably want to modify the WITP_HOME path.

HOME_DRIVE is the install drive; I am using the C: drive
WITP_HOME uses the HOME_DRIVE, I'm not using the default, so buyer beware!
WITP_EXE here is the default exe name
WITP_OPTIONS for windowed and altFont are given; I like windowed mode, and the altFont
USE_CPU is to use the second core here; if you set this to 1 it'll use the first core
CPU_PRIORITY is to make it high priority. WitP AE will pretty much take over the CPU core.

Save the text that follows this line to a file with a .bat extension (say, on your desktop), then you can double-click it to run; I've also included this as a text file attachment:

set HOME_DRIVE=C:
set WITP_HOME="%HOME_DRIVE%\Program Files (x86)\Matrix Games\War in the Pacific Admiral's Edition"
set WITP_EXE="War in the Pacific Admiral Edition.exe"
set WITP_OPTIONS=-w -altFont
set USE_CPU=2
set CPU_PRIORITY=/high

%HOME_DRIVE%
cd %WITP_HOME%
cmd.exe /C START "WITP AE" %CPU_PRIORITY% /affinity %USE_CPU% %WITP_EXE% %WITP_OPTIONS%



jazman -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 6:41:30 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Chad Harrison

I will admit up front: I am not a computer hardware guy. Some of this stuff is over my head. So let me be specific as to what I have:

My new Alienware just showed up and it has a Intel Core i7-920, which is a quad core on Vista Home Premium 64-bit.

Questions:
1. Has anyone else ran AE on a similar, if not the same, rig?
2. Is it worth going through the trouble to get it to use multi-cores?

Chad


I have a dual-core AMD system, it's WinXP x64.

Once you've seen it go fast, you can never go back. I'll even hold your hand to help you get it working. But you can try out the two approaches already described here: the imagecfg hack (which looks easier), or the batch script I just put up (which may be just as easy, now that I've done it for you). Either one should work for you. My script you may need to modify, as I've stated.



wdolson -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 8:26:11 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: fcam1387

Erik,

Yeah, but my only problem is that for some bizarre reason I cannot turn of my video acceleration in display settings or dxdiag because it says: "your current display driver does not allow changes to be made to hardware acceleration settings". I think a few other users have this issue as well.

Sorry to consume your time with this, but the game really isn't playable for me. It's a damn shame too!


This may be due to a permissions issue. If you don't have administrator privileges, I don't think you can change the settings.

Bill



fcam1387 -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 8:31:50 AM)

Nah, unfortunately, that's not the case because I'm running it as an administrator. I think some graphics cards prevent changing these settings (especially on Vista).



Erik Rutins -> RE: Got a Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 2:16:26 PM)

Some additional possible suggestions here:

http://www.hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1028607262&postcount=1



myros -> RE: Got a Dual/Quad Core? Here's how to speed up WITP:AE (7/30/2009 2:24:53 PM)

For some reason using the CMD options or even the bat file suggested doesnt work for me. The command box flashes up then vanishes with no game starting. This is on XP home edition (regular 32 bit).

So I went ahead and downloaded that little tool and hacked the original game .exe file. What a difference it makes ... startup took about 2 seconds, compared to about 15 normaly. I guess AE doesnt like to use multiple cores to much.

Nice job on finding this tweek.



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