nickie on 16/1/2015 at 14:28
Good points, Sly.
Quote Posted by SlyFoxx
or flat out can't run on their hardware . . .
As a matter of interest, testers registered at shalebridgecradle have the opportunity to list their pc specs purely so authors can choose a variety of systems. A quote from 3. under How Should I choose testers.
Quote:
If possible, try to include testers with different computer configurations so that you get your mission tested on multiple platforms and setups. It may also be useful to have the mission tested in both Darkloader and Garrettloader. This will help ensure that fewer people have problems with the final release.
And add to that testing with FMSel, with and without the EP or other mods, on all difficulty levels, the more time an author gives you, the better.
Damn, my specs completely out of date. :o
cavador_8 on 16/1/2015 at 16:06
Quote:
My system uses 4 out of 8 cores with Thief 2 running, but I don't think it's the game, it might be the other stuff in the background.
Exactly. This is what I was thinking. It might LOOK like Thief 2 is using all cores but it could just be background programs that's using all cores. Thief 2 might just be using one core. Thief 2 runs smoother for me if I turn threaded optimization off. I have been told that because the Dark Engine is pretty old that it only uses ONE core. How could that have changed?
baeuchlein on 18/1/2015 at 21:26
Thanks for mentioning that. The results of that are quite interesting.
The Core i3-2350M processor of my laptop apparently has two cores with two CPUs each, meaning there are four CPUs available. According to the Win7 Resource monitor, DDFIXed versions of Thief 1 and 2, without NewDark, tend to mainly use one CPU. A second CPU, most likely located on the other core, may show some bit of activity, but usually its load is lower than that on the other CPU. The other two CPUs are almost completely idle.
With NewDark, it's almost as with Thief 2 v1.18: One CPU takes the main load, but another one is active as well. It's possible that the load on the second CPU is a bit higher than with Thief 2 v1.18, but I'm not sure.
Only if a mission is being installed, NewDark will use three or four CPUs here.
Whether Thief uses only one CPU while sound and graphics drivers use the other one, or both CPUs are used by the game, I can't say. Neither do I know why both cores reach similar temperatures although one is less active than the other. Even after all these years, Thief is still a mystery.;)
Judith on 18/1/2015 at 22:25
Quote Posted by cavador_8
Exactly. This is what I was thinking. It might LOOK like Thief 2 is using all cores but it could just be background programs that's using all cores. Thief 2 might just be using one core. Thief 2 runs smoother for me if I turn threaded optimization off. I have been told that because the Dark Engine is pretty old that it only uses ONE core. How could that have changed?
Well, maybe it does use more cores, this is how the CPU load looked like after I terminated Thief2 process after a while:
Inline Image:
http://s11.postimg.org/5cre0jt2r/image.jpg The grayed out cores are inactive. So it uses 4 cores and newer FMs don't benefit from it that much, since the overall load is only 13%.
nbohr1more on 19/1/2015 at 01:51
Nvidia's "Threaded Optimization" driver setting has caused more problems than it has helped. Let the engine coders
decide what threads will be in charge of what rendering task.
Intercepting engine API calls and threading those on-the-fly is a "bad idea".
If I understand the testing results correctly, NewDark is spawning it's own threads without help from Nvidia, eh?
bjack on 19/1/2015 at 19:17
Speaking of CPU, my Althon 64 3500 is usually running at 99% while playing any FM, be they super fast or terribly slow. I turn off/kill all other applications (such as suspending anti-virus, killing wi-fi, etc.), so it is T2 that is sucking down a huge portion of the CPU (processes window show it as such). This is playing on Windows XP SP3.
This last week I finally got T2 to run on Wine using Ubuntu Linux. Same Althon box with 2 GB of RAM and an NVidia 610 2 GB card. I have a set of cold swap hard drives, so I can run either Linux, Windows, or even just old DOS. How does T2 NewDark run on Ubuntu? It looks and feels the same. Not noticeably slower or faster. However, the CPU is just 35% used instead of 99%. Maybe the Ubuntu drivers are allowing the GPU to do more work in Linux than in Win XP, thus reducing the CPU load?
I cannot fine tune the GPU card very well in XP, since the super wiz bang wizards only work in Win 7 or higher, and with Core 2 or higher CPUs. My system has only the basic NVidia console. I can set any-aliasing on or off, and a few other things, but the over clocking and more specialized tuning is not there for me.
Nevertheless, following all the recommended tweaks that can be done has no effect on slow FMs, at least for me. Going down to 800x600 resolution or course does help a lot. I got through some rough patches in Soul Tear's mission by reducing resolution, then upping once through the bad parts. Still have not finished it though.
