Civ running slow on higher-end sys. Please Help!

[kashik]

I'm running into problems with civ running pretty slow once i reach later parts in games. Loading a saved game takes forever. Say I play a Huge sized game, if i save it before i explore much and reveal the map, loading later will be very quick. Once the map is revealed things slow down, loads take forever. Ending a turn and waiting to start the next turn will be slow, enemy units movements will be slow/choppy. Worst of all however, is zooming waaaay out to see the globe. The game will stall, and go very slowly while doing this.

I have all settings maxed out, running at 1680x1050
Although I cannot understand why this would be a problem with my system. I can play FEAR nearly maxed out, and I don't believe civ to be as graphic/system intensive as that game.

My System:
AMD X2 3800+
Asus GeForce 7800gtx TOP - 81.98
1GB Ram
250GB HD
sound from motherboard

I've read that the game is a hog on system resources, but this is well above the recommended specs. Although i have been considering buying an extra gig of ram, would this solve my problems?

Please help

thanks

 

[kashik]

Here is my dxdiag report.

 

[Zydor]

Dont buy the extra gig - pre V1.52 it was using memory like it was going out of fashion, and 2Gb helped. Post V1.52, memory management sorted, and 1 Gb is plenty, 1.5Gb more than enough, 2gb is way over whats needed

This sounds like the classic memory issues of V1. If you loaded from the discs and nopatching, its highly likely the pre-V1.52 memory issues.

Need to purge Civ from the PC, including the cache files

Download Patch V1.52 via

http://www.2kgames.com/civ4/downloads.htm

Before Patching
Windows add/remove in control panel remove Civ - success or failed do the following

Delete the Civ IV Directories in:

- Programs/Firaxis
- My Documents / My Games
- C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Application Data\My Games\Civilization IV\ Its a hidden directory if not seen just check you have "show hidden files" switched on

- Delete Windows/Temp files
- Delete Browser Temp files

Load from discs
Load Patch V1.52

Reducing other settings can help as you indicate, but lets first eliminate the pre-1.52 memory issue

If still issues - post again

Regards
Zy

 

[Smidlee]

I'm running into problems with civ running pretty slow once i reach later parts in games. Loading a saved game takes forever. Say I play a Huge sized game, if i save it before i explore much and reveal the map, loading later will be very quick. Once the map is revealed things slow down, loads take forever. Ending a turn and waiting to start the next turn will be slow, enemy units movements will be slow/choppy. Worst of all however, is zooming waaaay out to see the globe. The game will stall, and go very slowly while doing this.

I have all settings maxed out, running at 1680x1050
Although I cannot understand why this would be a problem with my system. I can play FEAR nearly maxed out, and I don't believe civ to be as graphic/system intensive as that game.

My System:
AMD X2 3800+
Asus GeForce 7800gtx TOP - 81.98
1GB Ram
250GB HD
sound from motherboard

I've read that the game is a hog on system resources, but this is well above the recommended specs. Although i have been considering buying an extra gig of ram, would this solve my problems?

Please help

thanks

My spec are close to yours but got 7800 gt and 2gb of ram.

First the globel view will crawl toward late in the game. For some odd reason when you put cities on the map the globel view crawls but ahuge map without cities is very fast. Since the more cities on the screen at once seems to slow the game down more then try lower resolution to see if it will run better. (Civ4 will not take advantage of your higher specs.)

As your game getting later the less load is being put on your GPU. So late in the game you get the same performance as those with lower graphic cards. What work the GPU the hardest is the trees and jungle which gets chopped late in the game.

I also agree an extra gig isn't as helpfully with 1.52. Still you could check if the game is using over 1gb then increase it.
Since you spend so much on your PC then I would go ahead and buy the extra gig if you got empty slots since more games are starting using more ram. FEAR will high settings can uses a gig by itself (not counting windows,firewall,etc.) Obviously you didn't buy 7800gtx just to play strategy games so go ahead get 2gb to eliminate file swapping all together. With the 2gb of ram and duel core processor I can let my anti-virus program scan my pc (for example) while playing civ4 without any performance loss.

Saved games do take longer but it shouldn't be more than a few minutes with your specs.

 

[kashik]

Dont buy the extra gig - pre V1.52 it was using memory like it was going out of fashion, and 2Gb helped. Post V1.52, memory management sorted, and 1 Gb is plenty, 1.5Gb more than enough, 2gb is way over whats needed

This sounds like the classic memory issues of V1. If you loaded from the discs and nopatching, its highly likely the pre-V1.52 memory issues.

Need to purge Civ from the PC, including the cache files

Download Patch V1.52 via

http://www.2kgames.com/civ4/downloads.htm

Before Patching
Windows add/remove in control panel remove Civ - success or failed do the following

Delete the Civ IV Directories in:

- Programs/Firaxis
- My Documents / My Games
- C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Application Data\My Games\Civilization IV\ Its a hidden directory if not seen just check you have "show hidden files" switched on

- Delete Windows/Temp files
- Delete Browser Temp files

Load from discs
Load Patch V1.52

Reducing other settings can help as you indicate, but lets first eliminate the pre-1.52 memory issue

If still issues - post again

Regards
Zy

I originally posted with 1.52 patch installed, sorry for missing that. But i did not go about it the way you have outlined. Is that really necessary?

 

[redfrog]

Ok, Here's my DxDiag. Civ4 is 1.52.

Same problem. Repeatable, consistant. The game crashes after 5-10 minutes of play.

HELP!

I've done the purge and re-install test. I've got all the latest patches to include Microsoft, DirectX, Graphs, Bios. This is a clear APPLICATION BUG. The 1.52 patch does not fix it.

 

[kashik]

well i don't have crashing.

 

[Neon Deon]

well i don't have crashing.

no crashing and slow down at end, then read this post.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=151525

Try that if you have 1.52 installed and 1 GIG or more of memory.

 

[TitusPullo]

Where do you go to make those changes?

Alos, oddly enough, my wonder movies run beautifully, bud the game itself creeps and is very choppy, should I try the fix mentioned above?

 

[redfrog]

I've tested it with:

set dynamic unit paging to 0
and dynamicanimpaging to 0
and no other apps including disabling anti virus stuff. Yes my system is scanned and patched.

Last night I sent a '.DMP' file to usa@take2support.com. They've not responded to my first email yet. The support phone number 866-219-9839 is disconnected. Are they there? What is going on?