Memory-fix by Harkonnen is out!

[atomant]

An update for me regarding 1.52 and slowness.

If I load a saved game that has no unit turns left( red light blinking) , the game runs slow right away or within a few turns. If I save it back out in the middle of a turn and then reload it without even going back to the main menu, it runs fine for an hour. I am playing the earth senario huge map now.

So I always save a game in the middle of a turn and never have any problems. Maybe something to do with the production build popup. Just weird !

I had almost given up and was going back to 1.0 and hark's patch.


Geforce 4 MX 420 64MB

 

[TribeTime26]

Hey are you the atomant from TPG and HighHeat.net??

 

[Harkonnen]

jdurg
You are right on these symptoms, but the speed is not the issue here (at least not average rendering speed).

atomant (actually more for thamer)
I think this is became 'MemSaver' option is not automatic unlike 'insane_mode'. I am not 100% sure, but I suspect that they just move 70% of geometry data into video memory and forget about it. That means that when you scroll away from map portion represented by those 70% sitting in video memory, the rest of the world is shown using only remaining 30%. 'insane_mode' always keeps most relevant geometry in those XX% (controlled by 'vid_mem_usage').

 

[jdurg]

Hey are you the atomant from TPG and HighHeat.net??

Hark: Good. At least I have some semblance of understanding what's going on. Hopefully it will be something that can be fixed.

TribeTime26: Hey there Tribe! Are you the same guy from HighHeat.net and TPG.net

 

[thamer]

jdurg
Bink can play fast when simply blasting movies directly to the screen. The problem in Civ is that we always put the movies inside of a window (even the opening ones). That means that for each frame each pixel must be copied from the bink buffer to the window image, scaled and converted as necessary. The bink player doesn't have to do all that. Some video cards do not support those operations so the CPU has a hard time handling it. For that situation, the low-res movies do help since they only have 1/4 of the number of pixels (half-size).

 

[Harkonnen]

thamer
Well, provided intro movie is ok, all further movies should also be ok (even smaller size). I think that something still performs in the background. Even if animation is frozen (at least intends to become frozen during movies), it still should render something to show the old situation. You either should avoid clearing render target or store background to texture before showing the movie. The fact that same 3D scene is rendered with each movie frame isn't easier for CPU than rendering same objects animated... every frame is like a new one, even if it's static.

BTW, what is the reason of 'AllowScreenshots' checkbox? Just this might affect screenshotting last frame before showing a movie. If it means lockable back-buffer, it does not need to be lockable to get its data...

 

[Willem]

Thamer

I've discovered that it wasn't shutting off my Norton Antivirus that was preventing the game from loading, it was turning InCD off. I've since removed it from my system since I wasn't using it anyway.

Reading these posts, I'm wondering if your Memory Saver option might have something to do with my problems. If I understand it correctly, it pushes some system functions into video RAM so there's the possibility that some cards might not be able to handle the extra load. My guess is unless you have 256 meg of video RAM, that may not be a good option for people. I'm running a game now with it turned off, hopefully that will help.

 

[Woody]

jdurg
Bink can play fast when simply blasting movies directly to the screen. The problem in Civ is that we always put the movies inside of a window (even the opening ones). That means that for each frame each pixel must be copied from the bink buffer to the window image, scaled and converted as necessary. The bink player doesn't have to do all that. Some video cards do not support those operations so the CPU has a hard time handling it. For that situation, the low-res movies do help since they only have 1/4 of the number of pixels (half-size).

Does a GeForce 6800GT 256 mb with the latest driver "support those operations", its not like its an old card. On my sys, Athlon 64 3200+ 1gig ram, I see the wonder movies play for about 2 or 3 seconds then the freeze for upwards of 10 seconds. They then start playing again but not at the point they stopped, they jump to the point they would of been if they had actually played the whole time. Then after 2 or 3 seconds they freeze again etc etc.

BTW 1.52 fixed all my other problems I had except the stuttering wonder movies, to even play at all under 1.09 I had to use hark's patch or I would get CTDs at random times later in the game.

 

[jdurg]

My intro movies play completely fine and always have. In version 1.00 all of my wonder movies played fine. In 1.09, none of the wonder movies ever played fine. In 1.52, the first one or two may play fine, but after that they all turn crappy. Right now I have a few different python files open and the more I read the more I understand, and the more I understand the more I realize that I don't understand.

EDIT: I went into the CvWonderMovieScreen.py file and altered it so that the bink movies would NOT be resized or scaled when played in the game. While it made the movies not exactly line up inside their defined screens, at least I knew that there was no resizing or scaling going on. Sadly, the same problems happen. Intro movies play perfectly fine. Go into game and the first wonder movie plays perfectly fine. Every movie after that plays wretchedly. ARRRGGHHH. This is frustrating trying to figure out what the problem is. Kind of makes me wish I didn't start exploring the python files.

 

[thamer]

thamer
Well, provided intro movie is ok, all further movies should also be ok (even smaller size). I think that something still performs in the background. Even if animation is frozen (at least intends to become frozen during movies), it still should render something to show the old situation. You either should avoid clearing render target or store background to texture before showing the movie. The fact that same 3D scene is rendered with each movie frame isn't easier for CPU than rendering same objects animated... every frame is like a new one, even if it's static.

BTW, what is the reason of 'AllowScreenshots' checkbox? Just this might affect screenshotting last frame before showing a movie. If it means lockable back-buffer, it does not need to be lockable to get its data...

If the intro movie is ok but later movies have trouble than that is a different case, probably related to vid memory.

We do store the frozen background image to a texture when playing a render movie so it's not rendering the background world (although some have reported that it does for them).

AllowScreenShots does mean lockable buffer, I'm not sure if that is still used. I'll check on it. Let me know if you see a difference with that off.

 

[Diemort]

The game here seems to run slowly, so I was try use this new patch that would resolve my problem, because I have the minimum required configuration by the game and it would run very well!

(My computer)
AMD Athlon 2000+
RAM 768 Mb
GeForce4 FX5500 256Mb
WinXP Pro SP2
Civ4 v1.09

However, after "install" this new patch, all works in the same way - the memory leak doesn't happen anymore - but the game runs slowly yet , or the great performance that you are speaking in this topic is a smooth scroll in the zoom in/out and in the game movements but so slow compared to the dynamic of Civ3 (maybe due to it isn't 3D). The movies runs with no problem during the game...

I'm using "insane_mode=1" and "vid_mem_usage=120" but sincerly the game still works (in terms of game graphics) very similar than before the "installation" of the patch. I disable Anti-virus checker and programs that would can decrease the perfomance of my computer but phyical memory isn't the problem. For comparison I play Age3 here without problem, with a resolution no so low but in Civ4 isn't happening!

So, if anyone can help me... Thanks.

 

[atomant]

My intro.bik plays much better under 1.52, but the wonder movies still are crazy slow/choppy and occasionally crash to desktop. WE here think the wonder movies are worse using 1.52 verus Hark's patch. Also under 1.52 playing the wonder movie, we need to click right away to get the OK button or it has a chance to crash. It doesn't seem to be related to anything going on in the background since if we use debug mode and build a wonder very early the movie is still very slow/choppy.

If the intro movie is ok but later movies have trouble than that is a different case, probably related to vid memory.

We do store the frozen background image to a texture when playing a render movie so it's not rendering the background world (although some have reported that it does for them).

AllowScreenShots does mean lockable buffer, I'm not sure if that is still used. I'll check on it. Let me know if you see a difference with that off.

 

[atomant]

Hey are you the atomant from TPG and HighHeat.net??

Sorry - not the same person.

 

[atomant]

I just tested building a wonder(chichen thingy ) in turn 1, 4000 BC using debug mode and the movie plays very slow and choppy using patch 1.52.
Hope that helps.

 

[jdurg]

If the intro movie is ok but later movies have trouble than that is a different case, probably related to vid memory.

We do store the frozen background image to a texture when playing a render movie so it's not rendering the background world (although some have reported that it does for them).

AllowScreenShots does mean lockable buffer, I'm not sure if that is still used. I'll check on it. Let me know if you see a difference with that off.

If I have "AllowScreenShots" set to 1 in my Civ4.ini file, NONE of the wonder movies will play properly, and the intro movie slows down a barely noticeable amount. The first wonder movie will stutter and choke after a couple of frames, and all movies after that will not even play. Just a still image appears on the screen. If that option is set to 0, I get the first movie to play and the other movies after that get progressively worse. In case it helps out, I'm using an eVGA GeForce 6800 with 128MB of RAM running at 350MHz core, 800MHz memory (Confirmed stable). I am, however, only able to use up to AGP4x because that is all my motherboard can support. If you'd like to get any other details from me, just let me know. With all the time that I've spent enjoying the Civilization series, I'd be more than happy to spend some time helping to iron out some issues.

BTW, the background in my game is not a frozen image. I see the units are animated, wheels turn, rivers flow, mines have movement, etc. etc. so the background is not a still image for me.

 

[cymru_man]

1.52 has, on the face of things, improved things a lot for me. I haven't yet played a late-game scenario on it though. System:

Athlon XP 3200+ 2.2ghz
ATI Radeon 9600 256 MB
1gig RAM.

 

[kettyo]

Hi thamer!

It's nice to have the lead firaxian in this forum.
You're presence is greatly appreciated.

-Regarding movies
All movies run perfect for me in every situations (v1.52) but sometimes at the end of the wonder movie there is a constant clicking sound which slowly fades away.
I only had movie playback problem a few times with Civ4 v1.00 and with Civ4 v1.09 with Harky patch v2 but very rare with these also.

-Memory management
Scrolling and globe view improved a lot with v1.52.
But with v1.09 + Harky patch with insane mode and proper settings the fully packed huge test-save of Harky could be managed to run without swapping.
With v1.52 that's not possible regardless of memsaver.
So there's room for improvement. Maybe it would be useful to integrate Harky's ideas too.

-Other
I like the new civilopedia look.
Combat success chance is great.
I would rather see more AI initiated wars (the 'Aggressive AI' option is not good because every AI tend to be annoyed towards the human and will not trade while they are still pleased towards each other and make trade so it's unfair)

My system:
-Pentium M 2GHz
-1 GB RAM
-256 MB Radeon Mobility X800XT

 

[Smidlee]

I haven't tried my xpress 200 (onboard) graphic since 1.09 until now and can see an improvement in wonder movies with 1.52. The onboard Xpress 200 can't handle any anti-aliasing (it's very weak) but with AA off wonder movies runs very smooth. (I'm using Harks saved game at OP and watch the wonder on the next turn)
With my 7800 gt card I get some lag with late game movies with anti-liasing X4. Both cards I had everything on high with 1280X1024.
So it seems on my pc the movies runs well from a low-end onboard card up to high-end 7800 gt.

 

[Sisonpyh]

I'm having some strange issues with a certain mod. I seem to CTD while loading a saved game sometimes and no one but me is having this problem. Could you give me some specific instructions on to uninstall your patch? I originally deleted your .ini before I installed 1.52. Is there anything else I need to do?

 

[Seris]

I've got a big crashing problem.

Right after I downloaded your patch, the game loaded fine and ran great, I was able to trade maps on large maps without spending ten minutes loading.

But, this morning I got up and tried to run Civ4, and it started getting weird. First during the "initializing engine" step of loading the screen would just dissapear and Civ4 would stop running. Then, after a few resets it was able to get past that, but it crashes the second the game starts, like it's in windowed mode so I see the Civ4 named window appear, but it's clear and doesn't move. From this point I can't see or move my mouse or do anything to get out of the game, and the only thing I can do is manually shut down the computer.

I haven't messed with anything since last night, so I have no idea what is going on. Also, civ4 is the only program running when I start it.