Civ4 Use to Run So Well On My Laptop.....

[manooly]

I have been playing Civ4 for quite some time now. My brother and I have spent many nights playing hot-seat games for hours upon hours. For some reason the game has really slowed down. It is to the point where it is unplayable. It almost seems as though my graphics card has ran out of energy. The game just really lags now. I did not change anything. I just can't figure out why all of a sudden the game performance has gone down the tubes. I just recently added another GIG of RAM to see if this would help. My laptop now has 2GB of RAM in it and still has the same laggy/choppy gameplay. Can a graphics card in a laptop get "tired"? The laptop is a few years old now and it only has an NVIDIA 64MB card in it but it worked flawlessly for over a year with Civ4. Is there anything I can try or change? I am getting desparate to get Civ4 back up and running to the way it was. Any information/help/suggestions would be appreciated.

The only thing I can think of is I noticed at the time when I installed NHL07 the game seemed to start its laggy play. I have since then uninstalled this game to see if I can get Civ4 back running again. Didn't work! I'm just not sure what else to try.

One other thing. Galciv2 ran great in the past also but it started with the choppy/laggy play right around the same time Civ4 started with the issues.

What should I do?

 

[SgtCiof]

Might be related to Spyware/viruses. Would recommend running scans in a couple programs to clear that out. Also check what you have running int he background, as it can slow you down.

 

[Gooblah]

Did you upgrade to BTS/Warlords? Those have different graphic requirements. Next, do a background scan of all systems. Try running a Defragmentation on Drive C (if in Windows) by entering Start<Programs<Accessories<System Tools<Disk Defragmentation. That'll free up some space on your hard drive.

 

[manooly]

I have not upgraded to Warlords or BtS. I only have Civ4 (patched to 1.74). I have defragged my hard drive and it did not make any difference. I have also run plenty of scans for spyware and viruses. I run both Spybot and Adaware periodically. Nothing new is running in the background either. I''ve been just plain stumped as to why my system has run so slow as of late. I wish I knew how to wipe my hard drive clean and start over to see if that helps. Does anyone know where I can get a step-by-step process on how to reformat my hard drive to its original state? I have an HP Pavilion laptop (model#: zv5430us).

 

[Groo the Sword]

Does anyone know where I can get a step-by-step process on how to reformat my hard drive to its original state?

If your laptop shipped with a set of restore disks, you should be able to boot from them and restore your laptop to original factory settings. If not, it may have been configured with a separate hard drive partition that has equivalent information. Either way, the original system documentation shipped with the laptop should have the pertinent information. You could also check with the HP website for an online manual specific to your system.

Hope that helps!

 

[Airefuego]

I have the same problem.

I have noticed that it sometimes occurs after a chunk of map is suddenly revealed, or after I find a new Civ or two. So I assume anything that increases the game load and fills up more memory can make everything slow down.

 

[FoxURA]

The best thing to do in this case would be to
1) Download Spybot Search and Destroy then update and run it.
2) Update and run an anitvirus program. If you don't have one, you can either find a free one on www.download.com (make sure to carefully read reviews before you use one) or you can just skip to step 4 and do step 3 later. The latter is probably the better choice.
3) Run the Laptops, or desktop if you have one, Defragmentation to put the pieces of your hard drives back together again.
4) If 1-3 didn't work go to CyberTechHelp and ask for help in the forums there. The computer experts there have helped me out with problems several times in the past. Best of all, its free.

PS. Even if you don't have game performance problems it would probably be a good idea to go through the steps anyway if you don't do regular computer maintenance (running anti-spyware programs, anti-virus programs, defragmenting your hard drive, ect.) just to make sure problems won't star in the first place.

 

[jhflif]

It's almost certain that you have other processes eating up memory. You said you have scanned for viruses and spyware, but what's killing the performance might be other non-virus or spyware programs you have installed since then.

Also how long has it been since you have opened up your comp and blown the dust off? A lot of dust collecting on your components can cause a lot of heat retention which is murder for computers. Yeah in that case it can "wear out" but just because you might have crap loads of debris doesn't mean it's worn off, it just means you need to clean it out. A lot of people forget that their comps are machines that need to have their hardware as well as their software maintained regularly. A centimeter thicklayer of dust especially on your processor or motherboard can ruin your whole day.

Heat is also a big enemy. It's a laptop so I doubt you can crack it open and look at every component but make sure the heat exhaust vent is clean and free of debris. Heat can really screw the performance of your computer a lot

 

[azzaman333]

I have been playing Civ4 for quite some time now. My brother and I have spent many nights playing hot-seat games for hours upon hours. For some reason the game has really slowed down. It is to the point where it is unplayable. It almost seems as though my graphics card has ran out of energy. The game just really lags now. I did not change anything. I just can't figure out why all of a sudden the game performance has gone down the tubes. I just recently added another GIG of RAM to see if this would help. My laptop now has 2GB of RAM in it and still has the same laggy/choppy gameplay. Can a graphics card in a laptop get "tired"? The laptop is a few years old now and it only has an NVIDIA 64MB card in it but it worked flawlessly for over a year with Civ4. Is there anything I can try or change? I am getting desparate to get Civ4 back up and running to the way it was. Any information/help/suggestions would be appreciated.

The only thing I can think of is I noticed at the time when I installed NHL07 the game seemed to start its laggy play. I have since then uninstalled this game to see if I can get Civ4 back running again. Didn't work! I'm just not sure what else to try.

One other thing. Galciv2 ran great in the past also but it started with the choppy/laggy play right around the same time Civ4 started with the issues.

What should I do?

64MB is not enough. I know personally as my laptop no longer runs civ 4 past renaissance without crashing.

 

[FoxURA]

Also how long has it been since you have opened up your comp and blown the dust off? A lot of dust collecting on your components can cause a lot of heat retention which is murder for computers. Yeah in that case it can "wear out" but just because you might have crap loads of debris doesn't mean it's worn off, it just means you need to clean it out.

If you do open up a lap top, or any computer for that matter, do NOT blow into it. The last thing you want is to get moisture, aka spit, and other crud from your mouth onto the inner workings of your computer, use canned air instead. Another thing you need to remember is to completely turn off and disconnect any power source, ie. plug or battery, and avoid touching anything on the inside of your computer. Also, make sure to ground yourself by touching something like a metal doorknob to give your body a neutral electric charge to help prevent damaging your computer if you do accidentally touch anything . Before you decide to take this drastic step you should take a look at my previous post in this topic and run through the list I wrote on how to deal with computer slow downs. It is certainly a less risky way to narrow down the list of potential problems. Also, even if you do have anti-virus and anti-spyware, that does not mean you have caught all the problems. It is generally recommended that people have more than one anti-spyware program and occasionally run a free online anti-virus scan just to double check your computer security. Even then, if your computers hard drive is so cluttered and fractured because you have never run the built in system defragmentor program, no level of computer security will ever help it run faster.

 

[jhflif]

If you do open up a lap top, do NOT blow into it. The last thing you want is to get moisture, aka spit, and other crud from your mouth onto the inner workings of your computer use canned air instead. Before you decide to take this drastic step you should take a look at my previous post in this topic and run through the list I wrote on how to deal with computer slow downs.

I meant use canned air, not blowing spittle all over it with your mouth but I thought that was kind of obvious...

 

[manooly]

Thanks for your replies! I currently run Spybot and AdAware quite often. I also defrag on a regular basis. I know I've got alot of processes running in the background, I'm just not sure what to leave on and turn off. I've used the msconfig command and shutdown what I knew I could in the background, but there are so many processes that I'm afraid to touch. It is just strange how all of a sudden the game runs so slow. I wonder if it might be worth taking apart my laptop and "dusting" it out. Hmmmm.......