Slow zoning

[Darzil]

After the patch, one of our PCs has become much slower zoning (from seconds before patch to minutes afterwards).

This is the case on both a patched catacombs client, and on the darkness rising client. The disks have been checked and defragged (using Diskeeper, so properly), and the antivirus online check excludes the directories.

AMD Athlon processor, ATI Radeon Pro 9600, 1gb Ram, 80Gb Seagate Barracuda drive.

Any ideas ?

Darzil

 

[Darzil]

Little snippet of additional info, if it helps.

On the zoning screen, the progress bar fills up at normal pace, and then pauses for a long time with the bar filled.

Darzil

 

[Pirkel]

The thing that helped to make my loadingtime a lot shorter was adding more memory to my computer. 1 gig feels like a lot but DAoC really loves that memory

 

[Konah]

ye 1gig makes a huge difference to doac, but its not his problem he already has 1gb ram and a fastish disk. sounds like it maybe graphics related, make sure u using latest drivers

 

[Nomans Land]

DAoC needs 2GB RAM after Catas if you want it to run uber smooth. But anyway...

Could be your HD is near full, as it seems to be quite small.

 

[Darzil]

Could be your HD is near full, as it seems to be quite small.

20GB Free space

Darzil

 

[Darzil]

ye 1gig makes a huge difference to doac, but its not his problem he already has 1gb ram and a fastish disk. sounds like it maybe graphics related, make sure u using latest drivers

Will reinstall the graphics tonight and try.

Darzil

 

[Darzil]

Reinstalled graphics - no change.
Took off Anti-virus/firewall - no change.

I timed it, too.
Computer with the problem - time to zone = 55 seconds (bar full after 15 seconds)
Computer without the problem - time to zone = 20 seconds (bar full after 13 seconds)

I wonder what it does after the bar is full ?

Darzil

 

[Nomans Land]

Loads textures and player models

You tried turning down your settings?

 

[Raven]

DAoC needs 2GB RAM after Catas if you want it to run uber smooth. But anyway....

not true, it runs just fine on my BB comp with 768. there are a lot of problems with the DR client, if you are done with DR un-install and re-install catacombs, back up your char files so you keep QBs etc first. if you do need to use DR now and again install a fresh copy of cata/DR in a new folder.

 

[Nomans Land]

not true, it runs just fine on my BB comp with 768. there are a lot of problems with the DR client, if you are done with DR un-install and re-install catacombs, back up your char files so you keep QBs etc first. if you do need to use DR now and again install a fresh copy of cata/DR in a new folder.

When I play Excal I have to use ToA client to run 2 accounts. 2 Catas accounts slows things up abit and gives me abit of lag in RvR.

When on Cluster I have only played with Cata and DR since. Cata in RvR was ok, lag to know when people inc but other than that its ok, DR lags loads when in RvR.

Im running with 1GB RAM... And as I said, 2GB would be needed to run >uber< smooth.

 

[Wazkyr]

after DR i had this problem to. Only when zoning out of Svasud faste into pve zones. There it takes 2-3 mins, all other zonings take around 10-15 sec

 

[Darzil]

Favourite is looking to be graphics card on the way out.

New graphics card, motherboard, memory and processor on order. (Didn't want to get an old graphics card to fit the old motherboard, and the rest just cascades!)

Darzil

 

[arimyr]

late reply but as far as i know a harddrive over 50 % full is really slowing down just wanted to share it ohh btw got my new comp amd 3800x2

 

[Darzil]

Well, fixed it the big hammer way - Geforce 6600GT PCI-E (Zalman cooled), AMD Sempron 3000+, NForce4 motherboard, 1 GB PC3200 Memory, 400W Zalman power supply - runs quiet and fast - no lag seen so far.

The old graphics card had an oxidising heat sink, and the pins holding the fan to it had got so hot they'd melted. Reckon that was the problem.

Darzil

 

[Brackus]

qq my laptop has 256 megs of ram, annoying as hell when I want to zone it or do anything on it more than to just stand still

 

[Darzil]

Well, I got a nice mystery waiting for me at home - the long load time came back.

So far I've swapped everything other than the camelot installation and the case. I guess it's reinstall / repatch camelot time.

Darzil

 

[eggy]

Turn off file indexing service in Windows, make sure active virus scanning is turned off, try it again.

 

[confused]

Try benchmarking the systems to see what the difference is between them, 3dmark03 should do the trick, http://www.futuremark.com/download/ Atleast then you'll be able to see if they're is any hardware problems

 

[Darzil]

Turn off file indexing service in Windows, make sure active virus scanning is turned off, try it again.

I always do. Makes a difference. Though I only run with the camelot directories excluded, so the rest of the PC stays safe.

Darzil

 

[Neffneff]

while the loading bar goes up, communication with the server all but ceases while everything is loaded, afaik once bar is finished, then your PC tries to communicate again with server to get char positions etc. is there a chance that your problem is network connected? problem with you network card/cable/configuration?

 

[Darzil]

Try benchmarking the systems to see what the difference is between them, 3dmark03 should do the trick, http://www.futuremark.com/download/ Atleast then you'll be able to see if they're is any hardware problems

Well, the PC with no problems (other than having a bit older graphics card) scored 1830 on 3DMark03 (the most modern one it could handle).

The one with the slow zoning scored 7951 ! That's about what the sites I've checked would predict from a 6600GT graphics card.

Darzil

 

[Darzil]

while the loading bar goes up, communication with the server all but ceases while everything is loaded, afaik once bar is finished, then your PC tries to communicate again with server to get char positions etc. is there a chance that your problem is network connected? problem with you network card/cable/configuration?

It's the most likely at the moment.

The old problem PC had a PCI network card, and the one with replacement bits an onboard Nforce 4 one. They were both connected via another PC, but I've also tried them on different network cables, and connected directly to the cable modem.

Same result on all.

Darzil

 

[Darzil]

Thanks to Rightnow, the problem is solved !

Looks like the problem was due to the firewall blocking UDP traffic from Camelot. I guess it must try to communicate first with UDP, and then with TCP after it gives up on UDP.

Darzil