Memory-fix by Harkonnen is out!

[Harkonnen]

bfuerst
I have ATI, so I can test it myself, just had no time so far...

MetHimPikeHoses
I think that setting vertex shaders to 1.1 might greatly speed up globe view, especially with nVidia cards. Someone with Ti 4800 card here had 25 fps there... while all higher cards giving just 3-10.

 

[阿里巴巴]

Just go here and express my great thanks to Harkonnen. You did a great job and make me can play civ4 like in civ3, at least with normal map size.
I really think Firaxis should pay for you or hire you with high high salary.

 

[Chopperhead]

I thought this patch was supposed to be specificaly for people with 512Mb or thereabouts so that larger maps are more playable. so why is it not flexible for me because I only have 512mb?? or did we misunderstand each other?

quote from Harkonnen
Chopperhead
Well, with 512Mb of RAM there's no such flexibility. If you have 256Mb of video memory, then yes - set 'vid_mem_usage' to 150 or 180 - it should become much better.

 

[NeoPolus]

I think that setting vertex shaders to 1.1 might greatly speed up globe view, especially with nVidia cards. Someone with Ti 4800 card here had 25 fps there... while all higher cards giving just 3-10.

Yeah, on my Athlon XP 2500+/1 GB/Radeon 9600Pro 256MB the globe view is sluggish (1-4fps), on my brother's computer: Athlon 1200/512MB/nVidia GeForce 4MX 420 64MB it works at 25fps!

Also I have noticed that on the GeForce 4MX the trees have no animation (no sway) and have simpler geometry (this seems to speed up things a lot). I have tried on a Radeon 9100 IGP (1.4 shaders I think) and my comp (2.0 shaders) and even on low settings the trees have animation and 'complex' geometry.
I wonder if there is a way to make Civ think the card have 1.1 shaders to test if it uses low resolution trees...

 

[SithlordDK]

Does Civ IV even use Shaders??? I mean theres no option in the game ?

 

[NeoPolus]

Maybe it does not use shaders, but somehow it decides to use low-detail trees/terrain based on the graphic card, so far I have tested:

Low-detail (no trees animation):
GeForce 4MX

High-detail (trees animation even on lowest settings):
Radeon 9000 IGP, Radeon 9100 IGP, Radeon 9600

 

[Harkonnen]

Chopperhead
I mean that with 512Mb the fix on itself is not enough (late huge game). Low-res textures aren't enough too. Only together these things make it playable under 512Mb. That's what I meant about no flexibility. You are bound to low details to avoid swapping even with memory fix.

NeoPolus
ATi Tray Tools can do that, but they are incompatible with my fix. I will try to fake it myself, it's easy being inside Just when I tried that, my HDD restarted. I thought I made something wrong, but later I had similar problems and had to put 2nd HDD away. This was power consumption problem. When civ4 is heading 1.1 vertex shaders, GPU eats much more (I think they are more chip-effective than 2.0 version which probably accesses more video RAM).

SithlordDK
Not every game with shaders have options. What's more, if you have no shaders, civ4 will give a wholeload of visual bugs (fallback is coded wrongly), at least some were reported prior to 1.09 patch. Probably 1.09 works better with non-shader videos.

 

[NeoPolus]

Harkonnen
I used RadLinker to force 1.0 pixel shaders and thats what I got:

Radeon 9600Pro 256MB, 5.11 drivers, 1280*960 windowed

Huge map with epic speed 1951ac (so almost no trees left on the map but lots of cities)

1.0 pixel shaders:

Low resolution trees/terrain, no effects (fire on cities...)
Max zoom in: ~13fps, 209kk bytes saved by your patch (#640 version)

edited: ~21fps, 209kk on a second test, seems the window didn't have focus on the first one ^^U​

Max zoom out: ~13fps, 209kk bytes saved

edited: ~14fps, 227kk on a second test, mem used: 488MB​

Globe view: ~3fps (round world)
​

2.0 pixel shaders:

High resolution trees/terrain, special effects
Max zoom in: ~20fps, 211kk bytes saved

edited: ~20fps, 211kk on a second test​

Max zoom out: ~13fps, 231kk bytes saved

edited: ~13fps, 232kk on a second test, mem used: 488MB​

Globe view: ~3fps (round world)
​

Small map 3500bc (some trees, a few cities)

1.0 pixel shaders:

Low resolution trees/terrain, no effects (fire on cities...)
Max zoom in: 38fps, 24kk bytes saved
Max zoom out: 31fps, 24kk bytes saved, mem used: 139MB
Globe view: 28fps (flat world)
​

2.0 pixel shaders:

High resolution trees/terrain, special effects
Max zoom in: 33fps, 24kk bytes saved
Max zoom out: 23fps, 24kk bytes saved, mem used: 139MB
Globe view: 28fps (flat world)
​

So it seems that using 1.0 pixel shaders helps on the first stages of the game (when there are a lot of trees).
Also it seems that the globe view is not afected by the pixel shader version, but the number of cities or the view being flat/rounded.

edited: I used 2.0 vertex shaders on the tests, using 1.1 vertex shaders didn't seem to affect performance, with 1.0 vertex shaders civ4 complains and sets itself to all-low-quality.

 

[Harkonnen]

NeoPolus
Thanks for the info! Pixel shaders don't hurt a lot. According to game assets (files) pixel shaders are used only for rivers and cultural borders. Vertex shaders should affect performance with cities.

BTW, in my 1961 AD terra save game I still have a lot of trees, especially in southern part of the New World - and they lag a lot. At least they take time to swap in with my 512Mb config.

You can make your testing faster with small map and world builder - there are 3-4 tabs (units, buildings, terraing, etc...). In buildings tab the first icon adds a city. This way I could "achieve" 5-6 fps even on duel map placing cities 1-2 tiles away from each other.

Though, primitive counter shows that globe view is the *least* graphics intensive mode. It renders less things than even main menu does... So this should be something with shaders or incorrect video-mem/AGP vertex buffers placement.

 

[Briareos]

NeoPolus
ATi Tray Tools can do that, but they are incompatible with my fix.

Nah - ATI Tray Tools runs fine with your fix as long as it's OSD option is disabled. Also, forcing the Shader levels works via the registry, so it should work even with ATT unloaded.

Of course, I don't remember forcing low shader settings making the globe view faster, so maybe there's something more your patch could do...

 

[bio_hazard]

Unfortunately, Harkonnen's patch hasn't really worked for me. This was kind of a longshot, as I'm running on slightly out-of-date laptop with an integrated non t&L card. I still have infrequent crashes (seems like its typically at around 1-3 hrs), and game doesn't seem noticeably faster. Also, still have black terrain (unless revealed by map-reveal cheats). Crashes are the type where you need to reboot, either screen goes blank or else on screen graphics 'shatter' and you get crazy lines of different colors all over the screen. These crashes aren't associated with any particular action in the game, often just moving the mouse around.

My specs-
Compaq Presario 2195US
512 Ram
1.8 ghz Althlon 2500+
Radeon IGP 320M
Windows XP SP2

I'm patched to 1.09, and regularly delete the memory cache. Only other thing I've tried was to turn off screenshots, as I think i saw somewhere else that that might help...

I've just done the basic install instructions for Harkonnen's patch. If there's anything else that's more likely to work with a setup like mine, please let me know...

 

[Harkonnen]

bio_hazard
The installer version will have several protections against CTD and also will allow reseting video memory usage without restarting the game - that might help. I don't think it'll become faster, but black-terrain/gray-leader-box problems will be solvable at least by clicking a key whenever they happen.

 

[bio_hazard]

Thanks, Harkonnen! I'll wait for the installer version. I'm also waiting for the Mac port of the game, which should run much better on my powerbook... but in the mean time, I'll make due with the pc version. I finished the first GOTM playing with black terrain- it can be done just not as much fun...

 

[waylander]

waylander
Try deleting/renaming 'Harkonnen.ini'. If the game still starts, that means you have placed it wrongly.

When I rename the 'Harkonnen.ini' then the game does not start, so it seems to be in the correct place.

Any other ideas or suggestions?

Thanks

 

[Caesar69]

anyone having this problem: when you play as an arab nation after several cities with arab names it starts using american city names..Funny really out of all the city names it uses american names lol

Also any news on when the installer version will be available? cant believe fraxis has done sh** all to fix the numerous amount of problems this game has. If it wasnt for Hark's patch no one could play the game no wonder piracy is dominant in software industry who in their right mind would pay for a product that doesnt work? should take legal action for company's that are dishonest to paying customers!

By the way hark did you get your nickname from fallout by chance?

 

[osakki]

I just want to say this patch is perfect. After installing it I've had absolutely no problems, I can play the huge earth map with 18 civs to its very end (thig that I couldn't do even in civIII) and still have a smooth game, very ocasional 15-20 seconds wait between turns, I can perfectly see the wonder movies very smoothly at this point (one or two frames lag in ocations) and I can zoom out to the world view even with the isane thing activated, I also can alt/tab with no effects on the graphics. Honestly I can't see how it could be improved but if you are doing so, way to go!

 

[staggerbite]

I cant seem to get the game to play please help me out here.

I have patched to 1.09
I have tried to unpak ART0.fpk but couldn't find it at all. Even used search. So I unzipped Assets0, Assets1, Assets2, and Assets3.
I applied your patch.
Uninstall/Reinstall/Tried every thing in different orders/Updated Drivers/Restarted turning all the startup programs off/Changed my page file siz/Tried to find cahce and delete it/Held down shift during start/Messed with configation settings on your's and civIV/Reinstalled XP/Updated/Threw computer out of window......

I have
3400+
1gb of Ram really 896mb because of intergrated video card
ATI x200 intergrated 128mb of ram cat 4.12
2gb min page file/3gb max page file
160gb hard drive

The first time I installed the game it worked fine with patch 1.09/cat 4.11 Then I tried scenarios and the game crashed and has ever sense.

Is it becasue of ATI?
Would '.net 2.0' fix it?
I'm upgrading to a x800GTO and hope to unlock 4 more pipes so it will be like a x800XT PE would that help?
You said you have an updated version with FPS meter where do I get that version at/where do you post your updated versions? (using one off front page)
WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS THING?????

Thanks

 

[NeoPolus]

I have tried to unpak ART0.fpk but couldn't find it at all. Even used search.

It 'should' be on "...\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Assets\ART0.FPK",
where "..." is the place you instaled the game. After unpacking with Firaxis' PakBuild you don't need the file anymore, but in that case you should have a bunch of folders inside your "...\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Assets" folder.
I think the 1.09 patch divides that file on some 100MB files... maybe that's the reason you can't find it.

Is it becasue of ATI?

As far as I know the "ATI fix" was only needed with 256MB cards so it should work with yours even without unpacking the art0.fpk file. (If it's the 'ati' problem it should display a "Failed to Init Renderer" message).
Also, I have seen the game working with 2 ATI integrated graphic processors: Radeon 9000 IGP (64MB own mem, 5.11 drivers) and Radeon 9100 IGP (64MB shared mem on a 512MB system, 5.05 drivers) without problems.
Your ATI x200 is more avanced than those chips so it should work.

Would '.net 2.0' fix it?

Civ4 it's written on Python, so I don't think it uses .net. I would rather try with a diferent driver version. Catalyst 5.11 seems to work.

an updated version with FPS meter where do I get that version at/where do you post your updated versions? (using one off front page)

See post #640 on this thread.

 

[staggerbite]

I think I'll download the new cat 5.13's and use my x200 and hope the x800gto will get er done next week.

Thanks Though,
I can get it to play for like 10 tens then it shuts off.

How is mutiplayer?
Is it a mess?

 

[Harkonnen]

waylander
As generic it may sound, but I think you'll have to wait for installer version. Some improvements (not changes like it was with post #640 version) will be placed there.

Caesar69
Heh, probably that's a bug with city list. In C3C city names started with 'New Babylon', then 'Babylon 2', etc... In SMAC I could reach only 'Kappa Sector'

My nickname comes from Dune2 by Westwood.

osakki
Thanks

staggerbite
Probably you have overestimated 'vid_mem_usage'. Try '60' for post #1 version or 100 for post #640 version. I don't know if x200 card is fast enough. Probably it's too slow because of GPU, not because of swapping...