Use a RAM drive to reduce stuttering

[LoBiSoMeM]

Nothing happens here too.

850MB RAMDISK (bob_3do.SFS, bob_buildings.SFS and bob_ground.SFS)

4GB total RAM memory, Phenom X4 3.4GHz, ATI HD 4050 512MB.

[jimbop]

Makes me wonder about the point of SSDs apart from loading time?

[LoBiSoMeM]

What makes me wonder is this question:

- Devs are so stupid that don't put into their softwares checks for amout of RAM available in each hardware?

I don't think so. I believe IL-2 COD check the RAM available and load all the data possible to avoid loading stutters, and what we see now is simple lack of optimization/bugs, don't solved by this solution.

In ArmAII all this "voodoo" is placebo too.

[335th_GRAthos]

Originally Posted by LoBiSoMeM

What makes me wonder is this question:

- Devs are so stupid that don't put into their softwares checks for amout of RAM available in each hardware?

I don't think so. I believe IL-2 COD check the RAM available and load all the data possible to avoid loading stutters

If I understand your words correctly this would mean that on a 3Gb RAM system CoD would use the available (let's say) 2Gb of RAM wehreas on a 6Gb RAM system it would use 5Gb (2Gb as per previous + 3Gb new RAM)? No it does not.

Mind also that a lot of limitations arise from loading/ unloading a lot of graphics details from the hard disk on to the RAM and, the Video RAM (as the plane flies over large distances).


So there is something to be won.

Now, it all depends by the speed of your hard disk (ms, cache, NCQ, transfer rate, fragmantation) and yes, you may get serious stutters.

Since a lot of us bit the bullet and spent a lot of money on new HW and new hard disks, I believe most of us have very optimised hardware (thus no stutters).
But for some people it may be of help.

I believe a RAMDRIVE is better than a SSD because (hopefully) the transfer rate should be much faster (the SSD has to go through the SATA channel after all).

Anyway, I increased my RAM by 6Gb to 12GB because I was curious yesterday.
Created a 6Gb RAMDISK and loaded the whole CoD on it.
I can not say I noticed any substantial difference (on the other side, I do not think I ever had stutters either).
I run SLI GTX570 and my problem is that over land the GPU utilisation drops at 50%-60% against 99% over sea and wanted to see if the RAMDISK would solve some of this.
It did not really although I noticed at times that my GPUs went to 70%-80% above land.
On the other side, I was flying yesterday on the REPKA server for about 1,5hrs at nice 50fps and no stutter at all and very smooth game (it looks to me more like a placebo effect).


~S~

[LoBiSoMeM]

Originally Posted by 335th_GRAthos

If I understand your words correctly this would mean that on a 3Gb RAM system CoD would use the available (let's say) 2Gb of RAM wehreas on a 6Gb RAM system it would use 5Gb (2Gb as per previous + 3Gb new RAM)? No it does not.

Mind also that a lot of limitations arise from loading/ unloading a lot of graphics details from the hard disk on to the RAM and, the Video RAM (as the plane flies over large distances).


So there is something to be won.

Now, it all depends by the speed of your hard disk (ms, cache, NCQ, transfer rate, fragmantation) and yes, you may get serious stutters.

Since a lot of us bit the bullet and spent a lot of money on new HW and new hard disks, I believe most of us have very optimised hardware (thus no stutters).
But for some people it may be of help.

I believe a RAMDRIVE is better than a SSD because (hopefully) the transfer rate should be much faster (the SSD has to go through the SATA channel after all).

Anyway, I increased my RAM by 6Gb to 12GB because I was curious yesterday.
Created a 6Gb RAMDISK and loaded the whole CoD on it.
I can not say I noticed any substantial difference (on the other side, I do not think I ever had stutters either).
I run SLI GTX570 and my problem is that over land the GPU utilisation drops at 50%-60% against 99% over sea and wanted to see if the RAMDISK would solve some of this.
It did not really although I noticed at times that my GPUs went to 70%-80% above land.
On the other side, I was flying yesterday on the REPKA server for about 1,5hrs at nice 50fps and no stutter at all and very smooth game (it looks to me more like a placebo effect).


~S~

The problem is optimization and VRAM loading, maybe, not RAM usage or disk access at all. Because of that, all the RAMDISK route don't do substantial improvement, as in ArmAII. ArmAII problems arise in early versions because all LOD loading and texture streaming don't priorize right.

You don't understand my words, because my english sucks... That's no need to IL-2 COD use more RAM than it uses now. That's not the problem. We can have smooth gameplay sometimes, and in other flight in the same conditions, stutters. And we can't see consistent improvement using RAMDISK.

So, conclusions are easy.

[335th_GRAthos]

Ah, OK.


I must admit now, I have been playing online during the past 2 days.

I have been fying exclusively the Hurricane (Rotol).
The first thing I must do is to switch off the mirror.

After that I enjoy constant 55-65fps at all moments, no stutters at all, my GPUs are constant on the 85% utlisation and I am very happy.
I needed to install a second fan inside my chassis to bring more cold air inside in order to have the GPU temperature dropping from 92°C down to 85°C but that was all.

I now need to find the courage to test without ramdrive in order to make an objective comparison.

[Ataros]

I stopped using ramdrive 2 official patches ago. Bad stutters over land where removed then.

[jimbop]

Originally Posted by Ataros

I stopped using ramdrive 2 official patches ago. Bad stutters over land where removed then.

Yes, same here. No need for this any more but it was an interesting exercise.