How to Fix Late Game Slowdown

[Artosoft]

I moved from 1GB to 2GB and I did not notice much improvement, if any. My PC is 3 years old - at least... (Pentium 4 3.2Ghz HT 800Mhz, 2GB pc3200 Ram, Geforce 4 6800GT, 72GB Raptor.)

I only like the big maps, I want even bigger maps if possible. The land gets sucked up so quick.

How is the movie? I mean something like stonehenge or great wall movie. Are they great on your setup or not smooth?

Regards,
Arto.

 

[Bushface]

Upgrade to 2GB ? If only I could, but my motherboard won't handle more than the 512MB I have, which makes Large maps horribly slow after about half-time and Huge ones impossible. Must - get - new - computer . . . must - get - new - computer . . .(mutters off into the distance, counting change from back of sofa).

 

[Charles 22]

Yeah...

Patch not coming yet .

Regards,
Arto.

How in the world do you know what your MHz speed is on your DDR? My manual states several speeds and I have no way of knowing the real one. This is just in case I do buy some more RAM. Does RAM stick have a speed sticker on them, or what?

 

[boneys26]

I've never had lag on this pc (P4) but i get lag on my other pc (athlon xp 3000) take a look at my sig for system spec's

 

[Artosoft]

How in the world do you know what your MHz speed is on your DDR? My manual states several speeds and I have no way of knowing the real one. This is just in case I do buy some more RAM. Does RAM stick have a speed sticker on them, or what?

By knowing your CPU we can determine the speed for your RAM. Or using motherboard manual will be a great help. If you know your motherboard name and type, you can try google to get the information you need.

Do you know your motherboard manufacturer and type?

Regards,
Arto.

Nb: ups, didn't read you read manual. On that case, what is your memory sticker on it say? Mine is KVR333X64C25/512 which is translate as 333MHz, 512MB memory.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

How in the world do you know what your MHz speed is on your DDR? My manual states several speeds and I have no way of knowing the real one. This is just in case I do buy some more RAM. Does RAM stick have a speed sticker on them, or what?

Go here http://www.crucial.com/index.asp and click the "scan my system" button half way down the page middle right, it'll tell you exactly what's in your comp at the moment. PC3200 is always rated 400 MHZ (even though its actually 200Mhz just Dual DR does in effect what it says and doubles the speed), PC2700 in rated 333mhz etc.

That site will explain it all if you care to read


EDIT: Or for even more precise info dload this tool here http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php , once unzipped run the cpuz.exe, it'll tell you EXACTLY the make of the RAM even and its serial number, plus CAS latency etc.

 

[Charles 22]

Thanks DB.

 

[Charles 22]

By knowing your CPU we can determine the speed for your RAM. Or using motherboard manual will be a great help. If you know your motherboard name and type, you can try google to get the information you need.

Do you know your motherboard manufacturer and type?

Regards,
Arto.

Nb: ups, didn't read you read manual. On that case, what is your memory sticker on it say? Mine is KVR333X64C25/512 which is translate as 333MHz, 512MB memory.

Oh yeah, I have it at home, but I will see if I can remember to bring it to work tomorrow. I believe the board is something like a PC4800 or some such and is an ASUS. It's a P4 running at 2.81 GHz anyway w/1GB RAM. The top speed they mentioned, as I recall, was 800MHz which I thought applied to my own (and now I see that an 800 board would be the same thing but it seemed it had variable speeds, which might be that dual DR thing).

 

[Artosoft]

Oh yeah, I have it at home, but I will see if I can remember to bring it to work tomorrow. I believe the board is something like a PC4800 or some such and is an ASUS. It's a P4 running at 2.81 GHz anyway w/1GB RAM. The top speed they mentioned, as I recall, was 800MHz which I thought applied to my own (and now I see that an 800 board would be the same thing but it seemed it had variable speeds, which might be that dual DR thing).

If your motherboard is 800MHz FSB, most probably you are max to DDR400MHz. Or PC3200 memory. For sure, check with the software like CPUz.

Regards,
Arto.

 

[Charles 22]

The MB book says I have a P4C800 deluxe. It says the DDR DIMM for it is either pc3200/pc2700/pc2100. The memory frequency 400/333/266. The scan of my computer turned up this data:

ASUSP4C800 - DDR PC4000, PC3200, PC2700.
dual channel=yes
cpu: genuineintel
CPU 2.80G model 2, stepping 7

So what do those variable speeds mean? It sounds to me like it still can't tell what speed those two 512mb RAM's are running at. I have two slots left with max of 1GB per slot. Suppose the 512's are 3200 and I buy a 4000 1GB strip?

 

[DrewBledsoe]

The MB book says I have a P4C800 deluxe. It says the DDR DIMM for it is either pc3200/pc2700/pc2100. The memory frequency 400/333/266. The scan of my computer turned up this data:

ASUSP4C800 - DDR PC4000, PC3200, PC2700.
dual channel=yes
cpu: genuineintel
CPU 2.80G model 2, stepping 7

So what do those variable speeds mean? It sounds to me like it still can't tell what speed those two 512mb RAM's are running at. I have two slots left with max of 1GB per slot. Suppose the 512's are 3200 and I buy a 4000 1GB strip?

The Variable speeds mean that your board will support all those speeds, the higher the faster (its just 8 x the clock speed of the ram), therefore pc4000 is 500mhz, pc 3200 is 400mhz, and pc2700 is 333mhz.

Just checked your board out, I think the info you quoted comes from the "crucial" test site. You missed the part where it tells you whats in at the moment, scan again, and look under the diagram of each slot (top left of page). Slots 3 and 4 will say empty, and under 1 and 2 it will say either pc4000, 3200 or 2700. Both will be the same, and since your motherboard is dual channel, you need to upgrade in identical pairs.

If you are mega rich, you could go crazy and actually buy 4 sticks of 1gb as your board supports that much, but I can't think why anyone would ever need that much RAM (at present that is) for a pc that isn't acting as a server. Buy 2 matching sticks of 512mb RAM, so that all 4 are rated the same speed (4000,3200, or 2700) because if they are different, then the RAM will only operate at the lowest rated speed.

2 x 512mb pc4000 is $182 on that site and 2 x 512 pc3200 is $139, which I'm betting is what you have in your board now...you can probably cut quite a bit of that price if you shop around.

Hopefully you're sorted now

 

[Charles 22]

The Variable speeds mean that your board will support all those speeds, the higher the faster (its just 8 x the clock speed of the ram), therefore pc4000 is 500mhz, pc 3200 is 400mhz, and pc2700 is 333mhz.

Just checked your board out, I think the info you quoted comes from the "crucial" test site. You missed the part where it tells you whats in at the moment, scan again, and look under the diagram of each slot (top left of page). Slots 3 and 4 will say empty, and under 1 and 2 it will say either pc4000, 3200 or 2700. Both will be the same, and since your motherboard is dual channel, you need to upgrade in identical pairs.

If you are mega rich, you could go crazy and actually buy 4 sticks of 1gb as your board supports that much, but I can't think why anyone would ever need that much RAM (at present that is) for a pc that isn't acting as a server. Buy 2 matching sticks of 512mb RAM, so that all 4 are rated the same speed (4000,3200, or 2700) because if they are different, then the RAM will only operate at the lowest rated speed.

2 x 512mb pc4000 is $182 on that site and 2 x 512 pc3200 is $139, which I'm betting is what you have in your board now...you can probably cut quite a bit of that price if you shop around.

Hopefully you're sorted now

Yes, I used the crucial one. Thing is, the slots just seemed to show the RAM amount and not the speed or type. I will look again this afternoon. One thing though, are you saying that if I get an 1GB RAM that the occupied slots also have to be 1GB? and that I have to get them in pairs? So that to get 2GB I have to buy two more 512MB strips or two 1GB strips. Man, that is awfully expsensive for a fix to this game. I know one thing I'm at least going to wait until the next patch to consider RAM, even if the two 512's will work with one 1GB strip.

Oh, I see, I do have to buy 512's to get 2GB the easy way. That's pretty awful spot to be in though if you have to upgrade again. So if I'm reasoning this correctly, you can have 1GB Ram, 2GB RAM, or 4GB RAm, with nothing inbetween?

 

[DrewBledsoe]

Yes, I used the crucial one. Thing is, the slots just seemed to show the RAM amount and not the speed or type. I will look again this afternoon. One thing though, are you saying that if I get an 1GB RAM that the occupied slots also have to be 1GB? and that I have to get them in pairs? So that to get 2GB I have to buy two more 512MB strips or two 1GB strips. Man, that is awfully expsensive for a fix to this game. I know one thing I'm at least going to wait until the next patch to consider RAM, even if the two 512's will work with one 1GB strip.

Oh, I see, I do have to buy 512's to get 2GB the easy way. That's pretty awful spot to be in though if you have to upgrade again. So if I'm reasoning this correctly, you can have 1GB Ram, 2GB RAM, or 4GB RAm, with nothing inbetween?

You could add a 1 gig stick on its own, except without going into any long winded explainations, it won't work very efficiently, and may cause problems, as you have dual channel which is designed to work in pairs. (If anyone else wants to write the essay needed to explain feel free )

So you could insert 2 X 256, 2 X 512 or 2 x 1 gig, as long as all the modules are rated the same clock speed (pc 2700,3200 or 4000)....therefore you can have any combo made up of 2 lots of 2 pairs of either 256, 512, or 1 gig, which is something like 1, 1.5, 2, 2.5, 3 and 4 gigs (eg pair 1 and 2 are 512mhz 3200, and pair 3 and 4 are 256mhz 3200 = 1.5 gig total or pair 1 and 2 are 1 gig each and pair 3 and 4 are 512mhz each = 3 gig total and so on)... ....Wow its exceeding late / early time to crash...

 

[Charles 22]

Oh I see, so the speeds have to match but the sizes have to be in pairs, so there is a lot of flexibility. Should it come to it, it will be tough to decide between 2 512's or 2 1GB's. Don't worry about the hyper-threading deal, as I do have some notion of it, it's just that I thought for some reason there was just one 1GB strip in there, but given hyper-threading I can see how they wouldn't do that.

Yes, I will be going beddy-bye too, but this is my normal sleep time thanks to this graveyard job I have.

 

[Charles 22]

Okay, I have pc3200, but that's all it shows me where it shows the slots.
This is what it states:

Each memory slot can hold:
DDR PC4000,DDR PC3200,DDR PC2700 with a maximum of 1GB per slot.

So why does it say it "can hold" pc4000 when it's clear it's holding pc3200 inboard currently? They suggest you go with the setting it has pc3200, and then go and contradict that by saying you can put in pc4000 too. Maybe pc4000 will physically fit, but it just seems dumb to suggest one thing and then tell you it can hold the higher speed. With what they offer, the brand they're selling I wouldn't buy the pc4000 anyway, but I will be buying it from a local shop, so I do need to know what I'm getting myself in for if I wish to go pc4000.

If I buy any memory I'm leaning towards 2 1GB strips, but that's going to be the ridiculous price of over $300 just to play one game, to say little of the ripoff price Warlords was, which only served to get me into this mess in the first place (vanilla had my problem fixed with the patch). I will have to wait on the patch for sure if I'm going to fling over $300 away.

 

[Artosoft]

Your computer will run faster with DDR PC4000 than DDR PC3200.

Regards,
Arto.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

Okay, I have pc3200, but that's all it shows me where it shows the slots.
This is what it states:

Each memory slot can hold:
DDR PC4000,DDR PC3200,DDR PC2700 with a maximum of 1GB per slot.

So why does it say it "can hold" pc4000 when it's clear it's holding pc3200 inboard currently? They suggest you go with the setting it has pc3200, and then go and contradict that by saying you can put in pc4000 too. Maybe pc4000 will physically fit, but it just seems dumb to suggest one thing and then tell you it can hold the higher speed. With what they offer, the brand they're selling I wouldn't buy the pc4000 anyway, but I will be buying it from a local shop, so I do need to know what I'm getting myself in for if I wish to go pc4000.

If I buy any memory I'm leaning towards 2 1GB strips, but that's going to be the ridiculous price of over $300 just to play one game, to say little of the ripoff price Warlords was, which only served to get me into this mess in the first place (vanilla had my problem fixed with the patch). I will have to wait on the patch for sure if I'm going to fling over $300 away.

Right, I'm looking at a .pdf of your motherboard manual (you can dload all of them on the net) and its states that it supports pcs3200/2700 or pc2100.(Read sections 2-10 to 2-12 of your manual)

You have pcs3200 in at the moment, if you buy pc4000 then it will only run at the speed of pc3200 (as thats all your board will support) at best, and also because you have pc3200 in at the moment, it will only run at the lowest clock speed, which again will be pc3200. Worse it may cause conflicts and problems, and at very worst it will refuse to work at all.

Stick with pc3200 whether you buy 2 x 512 or 2 x 1 gig and you will have no problems, and believe me with your dual channel architecture, it'll be plenty fast enough to play ANYTHING out there for the forseable future. The 2 X 1 gig (to make 3 RAM total) is totally uneccessary for CIV IV, but its probably a good investment for the future if you can afford it.

This is turning into a technical discussion on RAM and motherboards, which I didn't intend, hopefully you're better informed about your options now

P.S. (Because I bet you'll ask)..The reason that site says you can have pc4000 is because if you plug 3 sticks or RAM into your motherboard, then it will work in single instead of dual channel. Your Fsb ( that tranfers data between your cpu and RAM) runs at 800MHZ. In dual channel the pc3200 (400mhz) is effectively doubled therefore matching the max clock of your FsB. With 3 sticks in single channel, pc4000(500Mhz) is below the max transfer rate, and would therefore work in theory. In dual channel, which you can see is by far the most efficient, pc3200 is simply running as fast as your Fsb can go, therefore its your max...

 

[Charles 22]

Yes, it's so disgusting, because it's the only program I have any probelms of that sort with. I imagine within the next 1-2 years I will have to replace the computer with a new one. If I get the 1GB strips then I can just take them out of the current one and put them in the new one presumably, that is, if I make sure and get one that supports this sort of RAM (though if the new one had the pc4000 series or greater and I slapped in two 1 GB pc3200's, that would slow the onboard RAM to 3200 wouldn't it?).

The only thing I havce that may give my cpu problems would be the game MOHAA which I purchased recently real cheap. I played the demo with this machine and had no problems with it, but I do understand the demo wasn't the worst of the missions, so it might be necssary to have a good full blown MOHAA to get that 3GB RAM. At least the RAM will to some extent make up for some deficiencies that may creep up as the bought programs get faster.

At least my case illustrates for the non-tech how getting proper RAM isn't necessarily a real easy thing.

 

[jprc]

Go here http://www.crucial.com/index.asp and click the "scan my system" button half way down the page middle right, it'll tell you exactly what's in your comp at the moment. (...)EDIT: Or for even more precise info dload this tool here http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php , once unzipped run the cpuz.exe, it'll tell you EXACTLY the make of the RAM even and its serial number, plus CAS latency etc.

Excellent tools!!
Thank you very much for the links and sharing them with us!!!

 

[Artosoft]

Yes, it's so disgusting, because it's the only program I have any probelms of that sort with. I imagine within the next 1-2 years I will have to replace the computer with a new one. If I get the 1GB strips then I can just take them out of the current one and put them in the new one presumably, that is, if I make sure and get one that supports this sort of RAM (though if the new one had the pc4000 series or greater and I slapped in two 1 GB pc3200's, that would slow the onboard RAM to 3200 wouldn't it?).

IIRC, the pc3200, pc4000 is DDR. Now the DDR2 memory is already rise. DDR and DDR2 memory is not compatible.

In the next 1 or 2 years, most probably new mother board will only take DDR2, so your DDR memory can be used on new mother board.

Regards,
Arto.