PowerBar Training Utility

[jeannie]

(Info about my computer continued)
My current game has about 30 cities and 9 workers; with 'SU' on and most of my workers automated, the video slows down. Most of the time it doesn't go 'black' on me, but it makes it seem as if Conquests is very slow - maybe about 30 seconds or so to respond when I click on the Conquests screen to make Conquests the active task.

I assume it's possible that other people who have fairly high-end computers are also seeing this same 'slowdown' and don't realize it's the video processing that's bogged down.

I have absolutely no clue how to see anything about my video processor or how to tweak it to improve the performance.

(BTW, I have a 120 Gig hard drive that is mostly empty, I've set my page file size to 512, and the task manager shows my page file usage is around 200 MB, even if I'm experiencing this 'slow down', so I know my system isn't 'thrashing')

Again, I consider this a low priority problem - I hope this info helps.

Congrats on your graduation!!!!

 

[Nexushyper]

Could you send me the saved game you are currently using and I can tets on it. If teh video is slowing down I have no clue... unless theres something with that Vid card... PB only messes with the C3C memory usage.. hmm.. Do you have the most current video drivers? (And I mean from the company cuz the Windows update page always has old drivers not the current ones.) You can try http://www.pcpitstop.com/ and try to run the tests tehy have on that page to see how you computer is running. If it finds problems it can tell you how to fix them/optimize your computer. I did this a while back and it worked for me. You can go download a Video Benchmark program and see how your computer handles. I did this to and discovered the factory settings are lame. You might just have to do a search for your video card, but I know there are sites out there that tell you how to tweak settings to get the best performance.


Again, if you could please send me your saved game I'll test on it and see what my computer does. plus I can monitor the code to see if the problem does lie in PB. I have a feeling that C3C has something built in to deter memory trainers with slow refreshs...

 

[jeannie]

Here's a copy of a game that slows down the video. http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads7/slow_video_with_powerbar.zip

And here's a copy of the results from PCPITSTOP. http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads7/Detailed_Summary_pcpitstop.zip It says my video performance is 118%. I'll try later to find some tools to tweak the video card, but I'm going to New York City for the weekend. (Since I had the slow video problem with my old PC with a different graphics board, I'm not sure this will help. But at least I'll learn something!)

And thanks for the infor about PCPITSTOP.

 

[Nexushyper]

Well, other than a few extra CPU proccess running I see no big issues that just stand out and say 'I'm causing a problem'. The only thing I see that needs tweaked is the things running and defrag your hard drive and clean up the junk files. But none of that should cause the problems you mention. Atleast not on your system. 8% fragmentation is by far no cause. Nor are those junk files. The programs running shouldn't do it either. Oh, just for your sake you may wish to adjust your Internet Exploer stuff like is says to get better use and more use of your connection speed. I was able to get mine from 80% to 100% from that page.

Have you downloaded the latest drivers for your ATI Radeon 9200 64MB and all the things on your computer. I know I play another game, which I wont mention the name here, and I was having video issues until I download the latest drivers. I checked ATIs webpage and new drivers came out days ago. http://www.ati.com/support/drivers/...&prod=productsXPdriver&submit.x=15&submit.y=9

That should be the link for your drivers page. My guess is that your card is fine even without teh new drivers. I will test some more but I guess, and only guess right now, is that this slow down issue is due to the effects of a memory trainer. C3C most likely detects the memory change and tries to update everything with refreshes and causes a slow down because the memory has changed outside the scope of being changed by C3C. If that makes sense. I have a feeling based on my current tests that there is no way to fix this and is the side effect of PowerBar memory trainer.

Thanks for all the imput and the saved game.

 

[jeannie]

I have a feeling based on my current tests that there is no way to fix this and is the side effect of PowerBar memory trainer.

Thanks for all the imput and the saved game.

I agree - I was just suggesting that other people's problems with Powerbar being 'slow' might actually be this video problem, which ultimately is a problem in Civ, I think - it just shows up with Powerbar when I have automated workers as SuperUsers, because the Civ screen updates more often. With the old Powerbar and my old computer, if I built harbors or airports, Civ 'slowed down' whenever it finished one, (because it had to update the display to show the harbor or airport icon?)

I've also noticed that my 'slowdown' problem almost disappears if I set my preferences to turn off animations and showing my manual or automated moves.

Thanks again for your help! I'd be interested to hear from other people who say Powerbar has slowed things down.

(BTW, my device driver for the Radeon is dated 3 weeks ago, since my computer is set up to automatically update drivers - something I found out while doing research on this stuff. I didn't even know I had that option turned on, or that it even existed!)

 

[Nexushyper]

I understand what you are saying Jeannie. And I agree it is most likely a graphics issue cause the noted slow down. And that is awesome you figured it out. I hadn't even thought of that.

Auto update drivers, cool I'll have to see if I can even do that with Nvidia. Again, thanks for your help. Did you get my PM?

 

[jeannie]

I'm wrong about the auto-updated drivers. While researching my video board, I found that there's a 'control panel' for ATI but it wasn't on my system I downloaded it from the web site and installed it, and THAT'S what updated my driver. When I used my control panel to look at the hardware, I clicked on the option to update the driver, and it pulled a year-old driver from the folder in Windows. I guess the ATI Radeon people haven't done something to notify Microsoft of the new driver, since WINDOWS UPDATE on Microsoft doesn't show a new driver for the graphics card when I search for driver updates.

I DO remember seeing something about automatically updating drivers somewhere in the options on my system, and I've turned it on, but I guess it won't do any good if a manufacturer doesn't tell Microsoft about new versions of drivers <g>.

I DID get your PM. BTW, now that I'm running the true latest driver for the ATI Radeon 9200 (dated sometime in April 2004), I haven't been able to force the video slowdown.

 

[dbrewer842]

Thank you for your work on PB. It is greatly appriciated.

Dave Dee

 

[areeves79]

Great job on the Power Bar.

I only have one problem so far, when I click on the UNIT button its says "Can't Apply Selected Filter". I am using the Nilla version on a 2.4 Ghz machine. This was on a saved game and a new one.

Any ideas?

Thanks

 

[jeannie]

Great job on the Power Bar.

I only have one problem so far, when I click on the UNIT button its says "Can't Apply Selected Filter". I am using the Nilla version on a 2.4 Ghz machine. This was on a saved game and a new one.

Any ideas?

Thanks

I get that message if the city currently shown on the CITY view (or it might be the civ selected) doesn't have any units in it, and I got that with the old version of POWERBAR, too

 

[Boris Badinov]

Nexushyper:

Many thanks and kudo's for the work with PowerBar. I keep the auto-timer set to 2.5 seconds as it seems to give a good refreash rate, also auto-clean on polution is great!The best way around the rail/roads problem is to make 6+ workers and set them to autobuild roads as Super Units (SU). This can also be used to set city tiles for best (read optimum) irrigation and mines. I also have noticed the blank production window, which while annoying is of no great consequence yet. My gripe is that when I click on the 'LOAD' button it seems to take greater than a minute to re-load the player data.

PC infoIII 1.7 GHz, 1.0 GB ram, XP home with latest patches, will check PCpitstop for quick fixes.

Again thanks for the super job, now go sew on those stripes and party, you've earned it!

 

[jeannie]

I keep the auto-timer set to 2.5 seconds as it seems to give a good refreash rate, also auto-clean on polution is great!!

OK, your auto-timer seems to work, so I've done some retesting. My auto-timer also seems to work, even if I don't see it flash red when I'm in the middlle of a turn.

Do you (or anyone) know what timing the auto-timer is using, elapsed time, cpu time in Powerbar, cpu time in Civ, or something else? If it's using some kind of CPU time, then that can explain why the auto-timer didn't seem to work for me - I had it set at the default 5 second interval, and 5 seconds of CPU time takes a lot longer in 'elapsed' time, so I'd give up on auto-completing production when I'd built a new city, and manually hit the 'CP' (complete production) button!

But thanks, Boris, and I'll retest the auto pollution cleanup once I start polluting in this new game, since I at least THOUGHT I had a problem with that.

 

[knac1055]

I found away around the build roads you need 10 to 15 workers to work together building the roads and use the super unit option and you can build all roads in one turn.

you can also lay railroads these way to but it might need more workers

you can plant forest with 5 five worker

pullution I have not been able to do yet but if you have enought workers you can do these in 1 turn.

 

[jeannie]

I found away around the build roads you need 10 to 15 workers to work together building the roads and use the super unit option and you can build all roads in one turn.

I've also found it helpful to use the 'automate this city only' CIV option - one worker will improve all the city tiles very quickly. When the worker is finished with that city, I hit 'automate', follow the worker to a different city, and interrupt the worker to do the 'autoate this city only', until there aren't any more cities where I can do that. It takes more micro-managing, but it improves the tiles more quickly than just using 'automated' workers.

 

[knac1055]

Nexushyper:

Many thanks and kudo's for the work with PowerBar. I keep the auto-timer set to 2.5 seconds as it seems to give a good refreash rate, also auto-clean on polution is great!The best way around the rail/roads problem is to make 6+ workers and set them to autobuild roads as Super Units (SU). This can also be used to set city tiles for best (read optimum) irrigation and mines. I also have noticed the blank production window, which while annoying is of no great consequence yet. My gripe is that when I click on the 'LOAD' button it seems to take greater than a minute to re-load the player data.

PC infoIII 1.7 GHz, 1.0 GB ram, XP home with latest patches, will check PCpitstop for quick fixes.

Again thanks for the super job, now go sew on those stripes and party, you've earned it!

How do you set the timer?

 

[jeannie]

How do you set the timer?

right-click on the 'auto' check box - you'll get a pop-up window asking how frequently the auto-timer should kick in - the default value is every 5 seconds.

 

[jeannie]

Bug report (applies to C3C version)
OK - you asked for feedback! IMHO, this one is EXTREMELY low priority!

If I use the Neutral/Enemy/Friend settings for a civ, then use the yellow DEFAULT button with CTRL or ALT to try to set the defaults for all enemy or friend civs, I get error "Run time error '91': Obect variable or With block variable not set", and PowerBar shuts down.

I have no clue whether this worked with previous versions of PowerBar. I was testing this because I'm trying to create some documentation for Powerbar.

 

[SpiderZord]

Nice work Nexushyper!

 

[ainwood]

Nice work Nexushyper!

Its good to see you checking-in though, Spiderzord.

 

[Lambda]

i've detected a bunch of bugs.
-run time error in INFO menu: city info and world domination tabs
-the suppress polution every turn and complete production every turn for every city doesnt seem to work, also there is a lack of information about using the shift key to get the function to work to all cities:am i supose to shiftclick on the icon and then shift click on the box to mark it?i really dont know how to use it.


i also wanted to know if the next version will have the road button and the pollution button working at 100%

very nice work, continue!