Ways to reduce system and EQ resources.

[cudacuf]

This is all strictly opinion. I'm no expert or anything, but here is what I usually do.

1. Download and use 3 or 4 trial edditions of antivirus software.

2. Backup my stuff.

3. Go into BIOS and remove IRQ ports that I don't use (i.e. printer, COM). Everything is either enable or disable. No auto detect. Disable components that don't have its own RAM or processor. A better graphics card might be a waste of time. I think EQ and EQ2 are both CPU rendered. But if it's an onboard graphics card, diable it right now. Anything is better.

4. You need about 8 gigs for your C drive, you can do more and get away with it but I'm doing just fine with 8. Remember, the more you put into C the more seek time you get. Closer to the top of the HDD the faster the access time, C drive is always closest to the top of that primary hdd. If you chop it up some, like get rid of useless drivers and stuff that would be great. If you don't chop it up, you might wanna add more memory to c drive. I put the paging file on the C drive as well. Install your graphics card and sound card stuff in C drive. Everything else should go to d drive. EQ goes on a different hdd all together. I wanna say I-RAM but I'm broke so I wont bother with that, but if you do have money go for I-RAM raid 0. More I-RAM you got the better. Check this out.
I-RAM

5. Toss out your Vista disc, it's no good for eq or eq2. XP64 only if you have over 4 gigs of RAM.
6. Tuneup 2009 is great. Especially if you removed valuable windows components. It will clean up the mistakes made in the registry for ya. This is the primary reason why you loose performance with a chopped up OS. I also love the fact that you can make your registry smaller with it. And those useless backup files on the c drive are a real pest, this gets rid of them easy.

7. I never got around to trying this but there is a 1.73 MB Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable Package. I think that compiles your macroquest2 without the system resource sucker of the whole program. Then again, it might not.

Concerning #5, who told you that? There are a number of happy Vista users that would argue against that. Why would you say Vista is no good for EQ?

 

[[40oz]]

I run Vista 64, XP 64, XP 32, and Vista 64 gets the most use these days and I have zero issues. 8GB of Ram, 6 sessions of EQ at 1600x1200 no problems.

If you don't understand how to fix the permissions problems in Vista, I could understand the frustration. But it's an easy two step process:

1. Don't install EQ, it doesn't need it. Just copy the damn thing to a folder like C:\EverQuest\ or some such, and run the patcher. Run Everquest.exe (see #2 below) and it will install the LaunchPad where it needs to go, EQ is not in Program Files so it works fine, etc. If it doesn't make an appropriate icon, here's what you need for a patcher icon:

Target: "C:\Program Files\Sony\Station\LaunchPad\LaunchPad.exe" /game:everquest /realm:live /gamepatchpath:c:\everquest

Obviously, fix your path to wherever your EQ program file are stored.

2. Run anything EQ related as "administrator." (Right click the icon, run as administrator).

Optional tip - don't run EQ native. Get WinEQ 2 or pay for Innerspace. Seriously. Do the above first regardless before using one of these programs.

Solved.

 

[crazyeqplayer]

Questions

I have some questions here regarding a couple of things. First off, however -- this is an interesting thread. Obviously some things have changed and some things have stayed the same.

I hear many people suggesting WinEQ or EQPlayNice or Innerspace. What I am reading is that the primary purpose of these programs is to limit the framerate and therefore the subsequent CPU load of background instances of EQ. Is this correct? Would the in-game framerate limiter not suffice?

I have recently begun three-boxing on my machine but I do experience lag and zoning occasionally slows to a crawl after long sessions. My biggest issue is with boxed accounts not following my lead very well. They lag out and run in circles trying to turn fast enough to face me. I have tried turning up the in-game framerate limiter to fix this (which it does, but only partially). However this taxes the main window heavily, and I prefer a fluid framerate for playing.

I need help. I am willing to start fresh and forget everything I *think* I know about optimisation for running EQ. Will WinEQ help me out? Do I simply need to change a few things in game?

Here is my system specs, such as they are:

WinXP SP3
Core2Quad Q6600 @3.4GHz
P45 Intel Chipset
4 GB DDR2800
GeForce GTX260 c216 896MB
Plenty of HDDs...(Pagefile is set to seperate physical disc from Boot drive & EQ)

Pretty much pertinent info. This system should run 3 windowed instances at 1680x1050, with no discernable lag?

 

[JimJohnson]

I use default ingame fps stuff and WinEQ2 or MQ2FPS with 40fg 30bg I use FPS on both so it strives to get 40/30

You should not have any issues pushing 6 guys with 40/30 with in game settings turned down and maintains a decent follow distance.

 

[crazyeqplayer]

I use default ingame fps stuff and WinEQ2 or MQ2FPS with 40fg 30bg I use FPS on both so it strives to get 40/30

You should not have any issues pushing 6 guys with 40/30 with in game settings turned down and maintains a decent follow distance.

So really the big deal with WinEQ2 is the ability to set a minimum framerate?

 

[Anthrax]

So really the big deal with WinEQ2 is the ability to set a minimum framerate?

For me, it was multiple monitor support and emulated full screen. I've always used MQ2FPS instead of EQPlayNice.

 

[JimJohnson]

So really the big deal with WinEQ2 is the ability to set a minimum framerate?

The render rate not just frame rate.

You can have framerate limited to 30 with only drawing the screen 1 out of every 30 frames(this causes a little flicker effect but its in the background who cares) This is why EQPN/WinEQ2 Pro/MQ2fps > EQ fps limitation.

 

[Xeniaz]

The render rate not just frame rate.

You can have framerate limited to 30 with only drawing the screen 1 out of every 30 frames(this causes a little flicker effect but its in the background who cares) This is why EQPN/WinEQ2 Pro/MQ2fps > EQ fps limitation.

Also if I'm not mistaken, eqplaynice is built into mq2 and also wineq2. Someone earlier in the thread also mentioned windows readyboost helping. Here's some more information on that matter. readyboost is way slower than actual ram, and will never come close. 9 times out of 10, readyboost will actually hurt your performance rather than help it, and here's why. Many flash drives have very slow file read / write, and can be slower than harddrive read / write. When there is not enough memory, vista looks first to readyboost, then to hd paging, but if readyboost is slower than hd paging, you lose performance. Some flash drives are faster than others, and if it's a good one, you might get a slight boost in performance, but realistically it's always better to purchase more ram for the system then try using readyboost. Readyboost is more or less designed to work for systems that shouldn't be running vista in the first place. (systems that can't be upgraded to a reasonable amount of memory)

 

[kalyndrah]

/part off!

Not sure if /part off made an appearance in this thread but it's one of the best freakin things for me. HUGE difference esp in places like temple bertox. omg i hated that place till a friend told me about part off, and I rezoned and amazing difference. it's not the same as the spell density, which also helps, but it turns off cloud particle density in the environment.
I've had to do it every time I log in eq so if there's something i can edit in the ini file that'd be awesome.

 

[Fammel]

Just out of curiousity, has anyone updated this, some of the items within game are not fully upto date ((sky reflection update interval being one of them).

I have done all that is here and found a bit of improvement in boxing, and so far more importantly no more crashing from alt tabbing.

Thanks Coffee

 

[JimJohnson]

Nothing has changed in the Sky Reflection Update Interval. Once per minute still the lowest setting. It just does not show up correctly, just click the first line under the drop down box.