Anyone know how to minimise lag on late stage huge maps?

[Wiz33]

Huge map will go above 1GB in late game so having more than 1Gb will definately help. Afterthat, having a faster CPU will help crunch thru the numbers faster.

 

[NanoPug]

set ur screen refresh rate to 75Hertz. The game somehow changed my refresh rate setting during the installtion process.

 

[Psyringe]

I just played the 1000 AD scenario ( huge Worldmap ) it run pretty good until I made the mistake and asking an other civ for the world map . I got the map and since then the game is sluggish. So IMO the memory is mainly used for map display I guess ...

Interesting find. Just to make sure - you didn't also trade *your* world map to the AI? (If you did that, then the AI might have a reason to do a lot more pathfinding.)

 

[Frewfrux]

I don't know about anyone else, but I always need to restart my computer after playing a game in order to allow other programs to run at normal speeds. I only have 512 ram, granted, but the speed of my other programs seems to stay slow, even after I quit (exit to desktop) the game. Restarting is the only thing that I've found that seems to work.

All that being said I haven't actually monitored memory useage or speed or the like...maybe I'll start doing that.

 

[Smidlee]

I don't think it is the AI -

I just played the 1000 AD scenario ( huge Worldmap ) it run pretty good until I made the mistake and asking an other civ for the world map . I got the map and since then the game is sluggish. So IMO the memory is mainly used for map display I guess ...

I have 512 MB - and I guess there is no other way then go for 2 GB RAM to solve this problem ....

You are right. The more the map is revealed and the more cities/units on the map the more memory the games uses and the more lag you going to have.

 

[MRM]

Interesting find. Just to make sure - you didn't also trade *your* world map to the AI? (If you did that, then the AI might have a reason to do a lot more pathfinding.)

No I did not. It was a tech excange, but because the french wanted a far more expensive tech from me than they offered, I ask im to add the world map to his offer and he agreed.

Before this trade I had only uncovered a little fraction of the world map, so unless it is uncovered even a huge map don't use much RAM - at least for me it seems so for me since this game ...

And I guess it would not made a difference since Louis knew already my tiny holy roman empire ...

don't know about anyone else, but I always need to restart my computer after playing a game in order to allow other programs to run at normal speeds. I only have 512 ram, granted, but the speed of my other programs seems to stay slow, even after I quit (exit to desktop) the game. Restarting is the only thing that I've found that seems to work.

All that being said I haven't actually monitored memory useage or speed or the like...maybe I'll start doing that.

Same problem for me - IMO it's a sign for a memory leak, because the program should free all memory when you exit it ...

 

[WuphonsReach]

I don't know about anyone else, but I always need to restart my computer after playing a game in order to allow other programs to run at normal speeds. I only have 512 ram, granted, but the speed of my other programs seems to stay slow, even after I quit (exit to desktop) the game. Restarting is the only thing that I've found that seems to work.

Probably because your other applications got swapped to disk to make room for Civ4. And once Civ4 is done running, WinXP is being slow about bringing those other applications back in from the swap file.

If you have to run a swap/page file, get a small/fast 2nd disk drive and put the swap/page file there. (But it's generally cheaper and easier to add more memory to most machines.)

 

[Smidlee]

Which makes the minimun system requirements of only 256 ram a joke. I couldn't imagine trying to play Civ 4 with only 256 of ram. IMO The very min should be 512 while recommend 1Gb.

 

[Psyringe]

Which makes the minimun system requirements of only 256 ram a joke. I couldn't imagine trying to play Civ 4 with only 256 of ram. IMO The very min should be 512 while recommend 1Gb.

I disagree. I play Civ4 with 256 MB RAM and have no problems whatsoever. I am limited to the smaller mapsizes. But it wouldn't be reasonable to expect to be able to play the largest maps when I just barely surpass the minimal specs. And I can enjoy the smaller maps to the fullest.

 

[Psyringe]

No I did not. It was a tech excange, but because the french wanted a far more expensive tech from me than they offered, I ask im to add the world map to his offer and he agreed.

Before this trade I had only uncovered a little fraction of the world map, so unless it is uncovered even a huge map don't use much RAM - at least for me it seems so for me since this game ...

Interesting observation. Someone should start a One City challenge on a huge map without ever exploring the map ... this should minimize the effects of displa-related issues beause of the crowded map. If you're right, then such agame should run considerably faster than a "normal" game with the same settings on the same computer.

 

[Madryoch]

Yes, check your PC specs. Use Task Manager to find out what your peak memory usage was and whether that was forcing you into your swap file.

(I play huge maps with 2GB of RAM and peak memory used can hit 1.5GB in a late-game map.)

I did this, and peak memory used got up to 1.68Gb with the game I was having a problem with (late game on huge map with 11 civs). No wonder there was so much lag, 1.5Gb!!!

It did run marginally better with my wireless, my Norton Internet Security, Quicktime, and most other stuff in my system tray turned off - but only marginally. It managed to run well for about 1min before the lag returned. I think I may just abandon this game and start over on a smaller map.

Another thing that's been happening to me is that even after I quit to desktop the Civ music keeps playing for about half a minute. Does that happen to anyone else?

 

[snepp]

Another thing that's been happening to me is that even after I quit to desktop the Civ music keeps playing for about half a minute. Does that happen to anyone else?

It's taking the game that long to get itself unloaded from memory (civ4 process runs until it's done).

 

[WuphonsReach]

In another thread I had posted memory requirements for various games that I loaded from savefiles.

The general (and very rough) rule-of-thumb seems to be take the size of the savefile and multiple by 1500 to calculate the amount of memory required. For instance, a 500KB savefile probably needs 750MB of RAM. My 680KB savefile turned the Civ4.exe process into 850MB memory usage.

My current map is a large/continents with 8 AI civs. I'm only in 1700AD, but the game is definitely snappier then it was with huge/continents maps. We'll see how well it does when it gets to 2000AD and I'm going to war with dozens of stacks of units.

 

[BirraImperial]

Probably because your other applications got swapped to disk to make room for Civ4. And once Civ4 is done running, WinXP is being slow about bringing those other applications back in from the swap file.

If you have to run a swap/page file, get a small/fast 2nd disk drive and put the swap/page file there. (But it's generally cheaper and easier to add more memory to most machines.)

I've also noticed that civ4 still runs in the background after you close it. That is probably why your computer still runs slow even after you close civ4. Just kill the .exe file using the Task Manager.

 

[Tae]

So having 2gb ram over 1gb would help playing the huge maps?

 

[Olie]

Madyroch, hi, you mentioned that you're playing on a laptop.

One factor that could be causing this drop in performance is temperature. Laptops, especially gaming ones, cannot regulate their internal temp. as well as desktop and this affects performance.

At present my laptop is easily my (close to outdated) desktop's technical superior, but I can think of several cases where after longer periods of play on it I've had to run games on lower setting than on the desktop.

Unfortunatley, short of playing in some sort of giant fridge there's very little that can be done about it.

(Having said all that it's probably your RAM or something)

 

[Smidlee]

dp .............

 

[Smidlee]

So having 2gb ram over 1gb would help playing the huge maps?

I've notice an improvement in late game of Huge with 2gb. But it doesn't solve all the lag especially when zoom out to the cloud level. It doesn't take long to get back into Civ4 from desktop since it doesn't requir any file swaping with the HD.