Late game performance issues, anybody else other than me?

[Spiral]

I would blame Windows Vista. Aside from a couple people in this thread I've never heard anything good about vista. Many computer vendors are stocking their PC's with XP again because Vista has been such a failure.

Civ4 also has a memory leak. If you're running vista with 1gig memory that's probably causing you serious problems. I know on my 2nd PC I need to reboot Civ occasionally clear up the horrible performance during late game.

@ the guy who said between turns are only using CPU power. I would say that's not true. The CPU has to access memory to make calculations. If your memory is unavailable and it's trying to use Virtual Memory you're talking major performance losses. Since you're running Win Vista with only 1 gig of ram, your memory shortage is likely a major culprit.

 

[Kalimakhus]

@Spiral

I didn't say that between turns lag is (only) due to processing power. I said it depends mainly on it. The idea that using virtual memory would cause major performance loses is true but this can happen only with less than 1GB RAM systems. It is not likely that the data needed for processing between turns is that huge so that it needs paging-in and out of the virtual memory. Actually most processing loops through the same pieces of data again and again but each time for different purpose. i.e. you loop through all players and thought all the cities and units they have so many times. So the data used basically is the same only the algorithms used are different. It is by no means a memory problem but a processing power one.

 

[T_F]

Civ4 also has a memory leak. If you're running vista with 1gig memory that's probably causing you serious problems. I know on my 2nd PC I need to reboot Civ occasionally clear up the horrible performance during late game.

Yeah, that's exactly what happens to me. Hope they clear that up in the next patch.

 

[Smidlee]

Brad from Stardock mention a year ago he had some worries over Vista especially when it comes to "handles". He recommended wait a while before jumping to Vista for gaming. I admitted I really don't understand what Brad was referring to "handles" problem but I've seen "handles" used in Vista have doubled from XP just as he said it would. From my experience so far 1GB seems too small with Vista to run much. In GalCiv2 I have trouble with Vista on my Laptop until I added more ram. Even Galciv2 uses a lot of memory when I playing on huge maps.

 

[Marlowe13]

I got my new Vista system just a day after I got BTS. Right now I am in late game on a huge map and it is running somewhat better than on my old XP rig. Of course, a Core Duo 2.67, 2 gb RAM and an nVidia 8800 GTX don't hurt (the XP machine has a P4 3.6, 2 gb RAM, ATI 1900 XTX). I havn't had a chance to play much else on the new system yet--it will be interesting to see how it does with Bioshock, which should be delivered tomorrow.

 

[Legal_My_Deagle]

I knew I would have to upgrade to 2 gigs, so I am not really mad or anything.

The thing is, like I said in the OP, Vista takes up more of your memory just to run, however it's coding for managing your RAM more efficiently is better. So although that apparently doesn't make enough difference with 1gig to overcome the increased OS required memory, with larger amounts of RAM the difference would be dramatically faster on Vista.

It is true that people always whine about new Windows versions, and it is popular to whine about any new Microsoft product actually. However come time for the next generation of OS, they will be talking about how Vista is way better than the new OS and how the new OS is a real POS. They did the same thing with XP, I remember. 98 rulz!1

It also doesn't help that my virtual memory runs off of a 5400rpm HDD =/

 

[T.A JONES]

.

@ the guy who said between turns are only using CPU power. I would say that's not true. The CPU has to access memory to make calculations. If your memory is unavailable and it's trying to use Virtual Memory you're talking major performance losses. Since you're running Win Vista with only 1 gig of ram, your memory shortage is likely a major culprit.

No no. I said after you max ram (in otherwords take care of the memory problem) Its only proccesor power that will break you through to new levels of perfomance.
I said mem alone won't heal these huge deleys. Theres a big dif there man.

In Civ3 the max ram was 512 and after that no upgrade in that category could improve those huge waits on lategame huge. It wasn't till I got a handle on more powerful monocore ghz output that improvment was realized again.
IM talking all the way to where I eventually overclocked up to 4.0 and completly eradicated lag on Maps up to 200x200 20 civs late game ( that gets you close to the hardcode city limit of 512, unheard of in Civ4

With CIv4 i think that potential for ram to improve performance peaks at much higher, like around 2g and after that processor makes the final push on AI speed.