game stutters and uses tons of memory...?

from Sins Forums
ok well basically in game at time it will just slow down to a halt or stutter but my audio is corrupted at times,
but the big thing is i noticed that when i exit the game my commit charge stays at like 1900-3900 when it was only at 500ish when the game started. in game it runs at 2700,, it wont go down from 1900 after i have exited!!,, is there a fix for this. i think that the game uses too much of my systems resources then it should, as weird as it sounds!
technical
4,172 views 16 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
Thanks for giving us precise, detailed info on your computer's specs...

Try this : In the game's options, disable "Bloom Effects".
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
ya bloom is off,

sorry i have
asus a8v-deluxe 3500+
creative audigy2 zs
2g of ocz plat, rev 2
evga 7600 agp
Start11 - Customize the Start Menu and Taskbar in Windows 10/11.
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
I, also, have an AGP GeForce (a 6800).

I use the official (non-beta) December 2007 nVidia drivers for XP : version 169.21.

What's your videocard drivers's version ?

Have you updated your soundcard's drivers -- considering what you describe ?
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
well creative hasnt had an update since 2006,
and another problem i do have is my card or computer,, is very picky,
out fo the blue when i'm just loading windows the screen goes all multicolers and textured then freezes,
but i'm currently running 163.75, i had to roll back,

whats wierd is in the beginning of playing the game, it runs fine, but then after awhile it just starts to slow down.
and when i exit, it almost seems the process is still running. but it's not
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
7600 graphics card are notorious for being crap, i think the 7600 was basically designed to be the entry level graphics card and more designed for use as a media center.
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
the screen goes all multicolers and textured then freezes
End of quote


Ovwrheating?
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
7600 graphics card are notorious for being crap, i think the 7600 was basically designed to be [an] entry level graphics card
End of quote


Not very diplomatic of you, but my research indicates that you are right.

Even my 2½ year-old 6800 is better than a 7600 : the model number and the release-date of a videocard do not represent reliable indicators of quality and power.

Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
alright noted, but would that explain the fact the game makes my computer lag even when i have exited the game?
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top

I've noticed that the Sins program seems to linger on, even after exit.

That can be seen when you control/alt/delete-up the Windows Task Manager : the Sins program can be seen to linger on the user-related program list.

When that happened to me, of course, I terminated the Sins program myself, in the WTM.
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top
alright noted, but would that explain the fact the game makes my computer lag even when i have exited the game?
End of quote


try turning down the games settings so it uses less memory, you dont need planets , ships and structures at there highest settings unless you zoom in on them to admire there glorious textures all the time, just keep ship effects up high.
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
Have you ever used Process Explorer? Great way to track down misbehaving items.
Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top
7600 graphics card are notorious for being crap, i think the 7600 was basically designed to be the entry level graphics card and more designed for use as a media center.
End of quote


That is a load of crap. The 7600 was a great midrange card when it was released and should have no problem running Sins.

Sins becomes rather CPU limited in big games with lots of units shooting at each other. I get crazy slowdown sometimes with my 2.5GHz Athlon64x2 3800+ and I have a 512MB 8800GT.
Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
Turn off elevators and dust and turn off AA. It makes a world of difference in frame rates and you don't even notice them being gone.
Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top
I run this game on an A64-3200 (2.0ghz OC'd to 2.4ghz), 512MB 3-3-3-8 Pc3200 Dual Channel RAM, and an EVGA 8600gt 256MB vidcard.

The game runs well on high settings all extras and max AA enabled @ 1360x768 with no slowdowns, except in large battles, and I'm talking about nearing 100 ships, and only when I'm zoomed in very closely on the battle. Considering how cheap these vidcards are and how much cheaper the older versions of the Geforce series are, you can't ask for anything better than that from this hardware at their respective prices. this game was built with older video cards in mind. Some people seem to want all the eye candy on old cards, and that is simply not possible, but that shouldn't keep you from running the game on lower settings just fine. I'm sure if I put everything to medium and removed a few of the extra eye candy from the options, I could probably run it smoothly in up close large scale battles. however, I don't think these slight slow downs are detrimental to game play, I find that I often don't have enough time to sit back and watch the battles for long anyways, and I can still zoom in close enough to see every ship and their weapons fire with no problem.

In short, sins is an excellent balance between 2d and 3d, and its requirements aren't as demanding as most games of today, but still delivers very decent graphics. where some games require a dual core or top of the line video card to even be play able today and still look good, sins doesn't.
Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top
If your XP sp2 system is using 500megs of memory before you even start the game then I think you've got other problems to be worrying about!

That is not normal. It should be more like 128-200 megs. My system for example is usually about 132 megs and I suppose I could tweak it to bring it down further..but there's not really a need to. Try disabling some of your background programs and unnecessary stuff that gets loaded at startup. Your performance should improve overall.

Also bad drivers are an issue. With Nvidia the latest drivers are not always the answer sometimes you need to roll back to an earlier driver (drivers have bugs believe it or not).

Also graphical artifacts can be caused by bad drivers, shader errors or overheating. A game doesn't have to be a graphical juggernaut to cause overheating. Overheating can be caused just by the way the game engine is written to render things. It causes a heavy load on your card causing overheated video memory and/or gpu. This can be resolved through drivers, optimization of the game engine, Frame throttling, better cooling, higher quality makes of hardware with better tolerances.

Lingering game software is usually the last part of the exe that is running cleanup,writing logs etc... before completely shutting down. It can take longer than usual if there is a problem or a lot of memory to clear.
Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top
yeah there are plenty of services you can access through the control panel under 'administrative options > services'. most of these you don't need or use. such as wireless config, unless you have a wireless router, or help and support, automatic updates, secondary login, print spooler, etc. these all take up resources in the background. also try disabling indexing service, and try defragging not only your hard drive, but your MFT to, just google 'defrag mft' to find out how. there is a program call tuneup utilities and it can defrag your registry, along with removing invalid entires and fixing any structural mistakes. these all help speed up your computer. try to get rid of any running background programs like Instant Messengers, you might find most in your taskbar, but for some you're going to have to go to run > msconfig > startup, and uncheck most of those. you shouldn't have any problems figuring out what to uncheck, but if you do, I suggest you find out what each program in that list is for. right now the latest stable driver from nvidia for XP is 169.21, try upgrading your DirectX to the november 2007 version.