To improve data downloading to the client and to reduce Packet Loss ( a cause of client side lag ) you should adjust your download speeds that (for windows) is located in preferences in the Network tab.
If you choose too high of a setting the server tries to FORCE that much data down your connection line. If your system CANT handle this ammount of data it ends up overflowing the buffer in your computers socket sublayers. Since Second Life does NOT use tcp for connections and instead uses UDP that means that data packets are NOT gaurenteed delivery. This means any packet that gets dropped because your socket system was overloaded has to get sent from the server AGAIN. Using more system resources and potentially STILL being more than your pc can handle. The end result is with packets getting lost it takes more effort to keep you in sync and the whole system (on your end) slows down.
The appropriate values you should use depends on what type of network connection you have. DSL should start at 250 kbps. Cable internet users should start at 300. DSL2 users should initially try using 350kbps. Now at this point DONT change your network setting again until you've been in an area that maxes out your network traffic. This is noticible because at the top right of your screen the bar on the right fills up. If you are capable of maxing out data transfer WITHOUT losing packets that suggests your particular system is stable enough to bump your network connection up another 25kbps and you should remain stable. If at any point you are getting a lot of packet loss when NOT maxed out id recommend dropping your network setting again.
When Linden Labs finally starts sending asset data via TCP the packet loss issue will improve. Until then we need to manually tweak our network settings for better performance.
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SecondLife's list of DOs & DON'Ts reguarding 'lag' |
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Seronis Zagato
Verified Resident
Join date: 30 Aug 2005
Posts: 454
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05-29-2006 18:50
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Kathmandu Gilman
Fearful Symmetry Baby!
Join date: 21 May 2004
Posts: 1,418
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05-29-2006 20:44
Client side lag is caused chiefly by SL overloading your computer's resources whether it be CPU cycles, video, memory, network etc. The more resources you have to throw at SL, the less client lag you are likely to face. One of the simpler and most effective ways to reduce client side lag is to turn off as much unnecessary stuff you have running in the background as possible. That also means making sure all the spy-ware and viruses you got cruising porn sites and MSN are removed. Your computer being used as a DOS zombie and spam server will definitely slow you down so hygiene is the name of the game. Having 1300 instances of spy-ware will grind you to a stop because each one of those little seeds of Satan are phoning home and eating resources.
Computer Maintenance links: Free computer diagnostics: http://www.pcpitstop.com/ Free and probably the best spyware killer and blocker: http://www.safer-networking.org/ Free internet speed test: http://performance.toast.net/ Free online virus scan: http://housecall.trendmicro.com/ Free installed anti-virus (excellent program): http://www.grisoft.com/doc/289/lng/us/tpl/tpl01 Free driver removal tool to use when installing those new video drivers: http://www.drivercleaner.net/professional.html Also, defrag that hard drive early and often. Once a week minimum, everyday if you can schedule it. Some may say that defragging that often will wear out the drive or some-such which is utter hooey, it takes the same amount of movement and wear to defrag 5 files a day or 150 files once a month plus once a day means no hours long hard drive thrash session and all the heat that generates. Also you save the extra wear from the HD having to deal with scattered files. _____________________
It may be true that the squeaky wheel gets the grease but it is also true that the squeaky wheel gets replaced at the first critical maintenance opportunity.
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Kyrah Abattoir
cruelty delight
Join date: 4 Jun 2004
Posts: 2,786
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06-06-2006 03:16
i wrote a little essay for builders and texturers on how stuffs work behind the scene and how to build the smart way
http://secondlife.com/badgeo/wakka.php?wakka=RealtimeModeling _____________________
 tired of XStreetSL? try those! apez http://tinyurl.com/yfm9d5b metalife http://tinyurl.com/yzm3yvw metaverse exchange http://tinyurl.com/yzh7j4a slapt http://tinyurl.com/yfqah9u |
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Bart128 Address
Registered User
Join date: 23 Jul 2006
Posts: 2
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Editing
07-23-2006 20:47
Hello im bart128 and i just edited my char but i cant move and it says editing character below my name what do i do?
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Angel Fluffy
Very Helpful
Join date: 3 Mar 2006
Posts: 810
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07-23-2006 22:47
Here's Travis' guide to combatting lag, which is adapted from Kex Godel's guide on the same topic.
Note that parts of it won't work here as I've copied it from an inworld notecard and links will just display as text. If any Lindens are reading this: please consider adding the anti-lag guide by Travis Lambert, or the one by Kex Godel, to the 'Library' section of inventory. Lag Guide for 1.10 =============================== Optimizing your Graphics Settings for Second Life =============================== //6-19-2006 Updated for SL 1.10 by Travis Lambert //Special Thaks to Kex Godel for Kex's Lag Guide! ======================= Travis' Quick-Start Performance Helper ======================= Warning: The quick start settings will suggest that you drop all 'bells & whistles' to the lowest. If your framerate is in hell (Below 5 FPS), this is probably what you want to start with. Best advice: Start with these lowest settings as a baseline, then gradually add/increase until your performance is still tolerable. These settings assume that you've got a low-end computer, and you want the highest performance (FPS) possible: ======Determine your current Framerate========= Step 1: CTRL-SHIFT-1 Opens your statistics bar Step 2: The number up at the top is your client FPS. „ <--Click the Image Step 3: If your FPS is below 6, proceed. If not, you may not need to bring your settings down this far. Note: For reasons explained further on in this notecard, don't expect gigantic framerates in SL. If you're getting 12 FPS in a busy area.... be happy  ====FPS Baselines===== 0-3 FPS: Extremely Poor. Either you need to tweak your settings, or you don't have a powerful enough computer to enjoy SL 4-6 FPS: Generally Laggy: Same as above 7-11 FPS: "Average" framerate for the 'average' computer 12+ : Be happy =====Make the settings changes off the screenshots below===== Step 1: 'CTRL-P' opens your preferences window Step 2: Network Preferences: € <--Click the image! Step 3: Graphics Preferences: ? <--Click the image! Step 4: Graphics Detail: ‚ <--Click the image! Step 5: Adv. Graphics: ƒ <--Click the image! ============================================= ============================================= ============== Kex Godel's Lag Guide ============== v1.2a: fixed CTRL-SHIFT-1 combo syntax (Tlambert) v1.2: added FPS examples, ATI video note v1.1: Added ATI tips to video, some variou stouching up v1.0: Initial draft Introduction There are a few different types of Lag in Second Life. SL is a very cutting edge application which will manage to push the limits on much of your computer hardware. Your video card, CPU, and your network will all be far from idle while you explore and enjoy Second Life. Video: The graphics card is obviously kept quite busy, especially with such a dynamic environment it is constantly loading new textures. Due to the dynamic nature of the SL world, some very fast algorithms (ie BSP trees) can't be used in SL that can be used in 3d games which get to use "static" evironments for their world maps. This means you will get a lower Frames-Per-Second rate here than you will with most of your 3d games. Please Note: It is quite typical to get only 10-20 Frames Per Second even in quiet areas of the world, with a fairly new graphics card. DRAW DISTANCE can have one of the biggest effects on your frame rate, and is always the first thing I ask people who tell me they are lagged. CPU: The CPU does a lot of work in SL compared to other applications. Everything that moves in the world has to be updated, and SL is a very dynamic world. SL will almost certianly run your CPU at full 100% utilization the entire time you have the program running. Network: Your internet connection will also be used heavily, especially as you're flying around the world. Expect your bandwidth to idle at around 20-50 kilobits per second, and peak in the hundreds of kilobits per second while doing large updates. These are the three major sources of lag. CPU, Video, and Network. Often, when one is lagged, the others can appear to have lagged down as well. Here, I will try to give some advice on how to speed up each. Once you have eliminated all sources of lag, then you should go back and re-enable the options you are willing to compromise speed for. ================ VIDEO OPTIMIZATION TIPS ================ Video: For those who own an nVidia brand video card: Under Preferences / Display tab: - All checkboxes listed next to "Performance Options" are UNchecked. - Avatar Rendering is "Normal" - Terrain Detail to "None" Under Preferences / Options tab: - Check ON AGP Graphics Acceleration - Texture Cache Size is set to Large (I have 1GB of memory) - Set your video card memory size. (Some people have remarked that setting it one notch lower than your actual video card memory size can improve performance) - Object, Tree, and Avatar Detail sliders are all the way to the left - Checked ON Avatar Vertex Program - Draw Distance to 64 - Bumpiness Draw Distance is 10 - Max Particle Count to 256 (the default is 4096, you can also disable particles with < Alt Shift + >  - Outfit Composite Limit to 5 (no idea what this does, I think 5 is the default) For those who own an ATI brand video card, I recommend the following differences from the nVidia owners: Under Preferences / Options tab: - UN check AGP Graphics Acceleration (always do this for stability) - Set your Video Card Memory to 32MB (but only if you're getting corrupted/strange/black textures) - UN check Avatar Vertext Program (if your avatar is folded up in strange ways) Network: Bandwidth: In the corner of your window, you should see two small vertical indcators. The one on the left is your PACKET LOSS, the one on the right is your CURRENT BANDWIDTH. These indicators can be green, yellow, or red, depending on the percentage. Bandwidth is not as important of an indicator of lag as much as packet loss. If you see ANY indication of packet loss (even if it's just a small green amount), that's not good. If you see it every once in a while, or in very busy areas with a lot of people, that is normal. But, if you're getting any significant amount of packet loss in quiet areas or while flying around, you need to adjust your Bandwidth under your Preferences / Network tab. - Start with 300 kbps as your default. - If you're not experiencing any packet loss, but feel like the world is loading too slowly and your bandwidth indicator is often yellow or red, then raise your bandwidth to 400 or even 500. - If you are experiencing packet loss, reduce your bandwidth down until it stops. - The "Custom" bandwidth setting is typically not used. I would recommend against adjusting any of these numbers until you've been in SL for a while and are familiar with all the details. Disk Cache Size: - If you can afford the disk space, set your Disk Cache Size to 1000 MB, otherwise set it as high as you can afford. This will save you bandwidth in places where you've recently already visited. CPU/Memory/etc: - Close as many background programs as you can while running SL - Press Ctrl+Alt+Del and look for any tasks you're familiar with which can be closed - I've been told that SL works optimally with 1 GB of RAM (that's 1024 MB). - Rebooting your computer before starting SL can help it have more readily available access to your memory pool - Defragment your hard drive occasionally, especially after you've been playing SL for a day or two (after each installation) so that the cache gets defragmented. Tip: If you need to run background applications while running Second Life, you may want to try lowering the Task Priority for newview.exe just a little bit to give those programs a chance to run a little more smoothly. Don't do this unless you absolutely have to, because it will slow down the SL client. I do this often when I'm browsing the web while running SL, as SL tends to eat up all of my CPU and makes my web browser very slow. Additional Information: - To view your video and network status, press CTRL+SHIFT-1 - Typical framerates are between 10-20 FPS in non-busy areas - Typical network traffic is between 20-50 kbps in non-busy areas Lag occurs most when: - Your Draw Distance is too high - There are many physical (physics-enabled) objects nearby - There is a large group people nearby - You are moving (and therefore loading new geometry, textures, and sounds) - When many objects are moving nearby - You have "fancy" graphics features enabled (Local Lighting, Object Bump, Ripple Water, Shadows, etc) Example Performance Stats: Athlon XP 3200+ 1.5 GB RAM nVidia 7600 256 MB PCI Express Windows XP At 400m Skybox: 45 FPS Quiet Mainland Area, ground level: 20 FPS Inside the Shelter when busy: 15 FPS _____________________
Volunteer Portal (FAQs!) : https://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Volunteer_Portal
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Christopher Boivin
Registered User
Join date: 23 Jul 2006
Posts: 2
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07-30-2006 05:13
 ) is unable to process and render the information provided by the server faster then 25FPS, (your eyes have a refresh rate of 25FPS, I think) so you see visible slowdown and choppyness on your screen. What causes your computer to 'lag': too many textures to render at once and too many polygones to render at once (ground, avatars, objects).Just a point of clarification here, as your guesstimate of "your eyes have a refresh rate of 25fps, I think" is factually inaccurate. Your eyes can see much faster than 25fps, in excess of 100fps in fact, 25fps is just the UK tv standard (you can tell the difference between a game running at 20fps and the same game @ 80fps, so they can obviously see the difference) - it's only when you start to get lower than 24fps, 20fps, when persistence of vision begins to tail off and you can just start to discern the differences between each of the static images. That was the only real fault I could find with this guide though, made excellent reading for this sl newb - thanks for the hard work. |
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Angel Fluffy
Very Helpful
Join date: 3 Mar 2006
Posts: 810
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07-30-2006 06:23
Yeah... I think you may be right about the FPS thing... I remember some old games used to have two refresh rate options - 60 and 65 FPS. They wouldn't have bothered coding that if it diddn't make a difference to the visuals.
_____________________
Volunteer Portal (FAQs!) : https://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Volunteer_Portal
JIRA / Issue Tracker : http://jira.secondlife.com (& http://tinyurl.com/2jropp) |
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Kathmandu Gilman
Fearful Symmetry Baby!
Join date: 21 May 2004
Posts: 1,418
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07-30-2006 09:39
I believe the lowest threshold for persistence of vision is 17 frames per second on film. Film has the advantage of motion blurring which can help a lot in creating smooth movement. In a video game, 17 fps is noticeably choppy because there is no motion blur. SL doesn't smooth out until you get over 30 fps but even then it doesn't equal 30 fps compared to film. Video tape on a VCR is equivalent to 52 fps I believe but again it has the ability to capture motion blur as well. I read somewhere that 52 fps was used because above that you can't really tell the difference.
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It may be true that the squeaky wheel gets the grease but it is also true that the squeaky wheel gets replaced at the first critical maintenance opportunity.
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Sciamachy Moran
Registered User
Join date: 14 Jul 2006
Posts: 1
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Is this lag?
08-03-2006 08:00
Just wondering - I'm able to rezz and to an extent move around albeit jerkily, but the thing that really gets me is that people's faces and clothes don't rezz until I've been staring at them for ten minutes, and then if I look away they go blurry again. I'm fairly sure when I started in SL it wasn't this bad, but two releases later it's got pretty awful.
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Lestat Demain
Registered User
Join date: 2 Aug 2006
Posts: 6
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Lag?
08-04-2006 21:19
regarding client side lag - how many of you windows users have bothered to alter your windows default options hmmmm? improving YOUR side of the problem is a very good place to start and even though im running a gforce2 i have very little lag even though im in australia.
settings like number of threads, mtu, network card speed, internal buffers etc are all in the registry so try them because they actually work - and for those rendering addicts looking to cross platform import and are stuck, try looking at - http://www.okino.com/default.htm it covers nearly all 3D file formats. The only problem i have is that with XP even 512MB ram is NOT enough! even with a memory manager used, once memory has filled and emptied a few times, small bugs like increased rendering times and avatar malfunctions creep in and the only option is to reboot - NOT good mr Gates - but then no-one should need more than 1MB of ram hey (ironic quote from the past) good luck guys see you in there! |
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Rivaryn Kitsune
Registered User
Join date: 1 Aug 2006
Posts: 2
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08-07-2006 09:59
About memory management... From what i know, WinXP uses winNT/2k's memory mapping system, where a program's call for memory is run through the OS's memory mapper. Basically the program says "i want 1 meg ram" and the OS doles out 1 meg somewhere in RAM or virtual mem and says "here is an address" even if that address is virtual. What this means is that a request for memory address 100 may in fact map through the OS to point to another chunk of physical RAM, or even the page file (virtual mem). In light of this, having yet another program managing memory (or trying to) sounds like a waste of CPU cycles, especially if it doesnt actually override the OS's memory manager. Windows NT, 2k, XP, and more recent have the memory manager, 95, 98, and ME do not.
I'll try to dig up information about this (actual links) but I may not have time. Verification of this info by someone else would be appreciated. |
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Fushichou Mfume
Registered User
Join date: 30 Jul 2005
Posts: 182
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09-05-2006 08:16
Scripts don't seem to be the big deals that they used to, in terms of causing lag. Yes, everyone should still practice good script hygiene and just say "no" to loaded-up avatars with combat armor, tons of bling, multi-gadget scanners, hug animators, etc. especially in busy areas like clubs. But really, LL has really lowered script impact on sim performance and "lag" by automatically slowing down script execution time as other activities (like sending object and image data to AVs) start consuming too many sim resources.
Instead, the major causes of "lag" these days are these, roughly in order of impact from biggest impact to least impact: 1. Too many AVs within your draw distance. Other AVs require the server to send you all their object and image and position data, which slows both you the server down. By reducing your Draw Distance to a reasonable 64 meters, you're doing a big favor both to yourself and to the sim. If there's less for your computer to render, your graphics card is happier, you get less UDP packet loss and can probably set your SL client's Maximum Bandwidth setting a notch higher. While you're at it, reduce the Max. Particle Count to 256 or even lower, again because its just that much less stuff to render. As for how many AVs are "too many"? More than 6 AVs within your draw distance, and you're going to see reduced performance. As you hit 12 AVs or more, your client framerate is going to plummet. Any more than 20 and you're almost at slide-show framerate levels, especially if those AVs are wearing too many prims (especially tori-hair or other twisted prims) or running too many needless scripts. 2. Sloppy or uneducated builders who use too many tori or twisted prims in their sim, and especially who use too many large textures on their prims. Prims that are using 512x512 or larger textures are murder on sim performance. Builders should be using textures as small as possible. Also builders that use too many alpha (transparent) textures in close proximity, so that they overlap when seen from your camera angle, are hurting you badly. Unfortunately, most novice or hobby builders don't know this and that's pretty much 95% of the population of SL who own land and plop stuff down on it. There's nothing you can do about this except to decrease your draw distance so that you're trying to render less of it at any one time (and the sim doesn't have to spend as much time sending the image/object data to every AV who can "see" the object). This is why you get much less lag way up high in a skybox--there are very few objects/textures (or other AVs) within your draw distance to render/transmit. 3. At the very bottom of the list are sloppy scripts or too many scripts, whether they be useless active listeners on a bazillion pose balls scattered throughout the sim, or ridiculous amounts of scripts in combat armor, or tons of scripted objects on your property. Yes, these *do* add up eventually and they *do* affect sim performance, but nothing like they used to. Instead, when all that object and image data rendering/transmission is going on as described in 1 and 2 above, the sim just cuts back on the time cycles it allocates for all the running scripts. You see this as your various scripts just "slowing down". Your AO will react more slowly. Your AV scanner will report new AVs in your area more slowly. Your spiffy all-in-one HUD gizmo will take forever to change a page or load a new config file. Triggering a hug animator menu will occur much more slowly, etc. Regardless, it really is considerate to everyone to just leave all those neat scripted gadgets tucked in your inventory rather than on your AV or scattered around your property. Especially in any crowded sim, such as the club you're hanging out at. When you go to the club or some popular event, please pare down your AV to the bare minimum. No tori hair. No combat armor and weapons (who fights at a club?). Take off your dang multi-gadget and get a smaller, more pared-down AV scanner if you like to see who's coming and going. Take off your hug animators unless you're actually going to hug someone, then take it off again afterwards. Use a small, compact AO like the WetIkon or ZHAO instead of a bloated all-in-one gadget that slices, dices, and jullienes. Turn off the dang bling. Stop using the damn poofers. Etc. Your fellow clubgoers will thank you for it. Use all these bigger, more bloated gadgets and scripts when you're in a sim with very few other people. |
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Fushichou Mfume
Registered User
Join date: 30 Jul 2005
Posts: 182
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09-05-2006 14:48
BTW, if you are comfortable with using the Statistics Bar (Ctrl-Shift-1), there *is* an upper limit to the number of scripts a sim can handle, which is 6000 active scripts. Even if all the scripts running in a sim are well-behaved, once you get over 6000 you start running into performance degradation because of script handling. Of course, you could have fewer scripts and still have script-related problems because of some poorly written scripts.
But generally, if you're experiencing lag and you look at the stats bar, the point is that if you see fewer than 6000 active scripts listed, then script performance probably isn't the culprit. It's much more likely one of the AV-prim type-texture issues I mentioned in the previous post. Also, there's a serious memory-leak bug that has been responsible for most of the "lag" we've seen in the past month or so (as of the date of this post). Time Dilation drops to very low numbers at the same time that Images Time and Objects time spikes very high. It usually happens when a new AV enters the sim, and it's unpredictable. For details on this, read Torley's Blog entry "CommUpdate - Sept. 3" LL has promised to try and get some better script ID tools into our hands. Here is a relevant snippet from a recent Concierge email (August 22): One additional comment from Steve.. "Regarding scripts on a region: We do know that our scripting system is not currently capable of running > 6000 scripts and maintain good performance. This not a built in limitation, just an observed point at which performance typically degrades. It is not the only factor; there are many many more. It is merely the most significant factor. We are currently working on a tool to help you identify the scripts running on your sim. It is a very high priority task, but we also have a lot of other high priority items in the queue, so that feature will not make it out this release. I do however expect it to make it out in the following release. -Steve" |
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Domino Dutton
Registered User
Join date: 26 Jul 2006
Posts: 2
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09-13-2006 20:00
I am new here and want to thank you all for all the very useful information. I used to play a lot of FPS and actually my husband made a mod for HL. I made a few maps for the mod, so I am a tiny bit familair with some coding, scripting, modeling...
I have a few questions and seemed like you guys might have answers. First one is, everyone in SL has this slang/lingo, they use called "rezz." I always thought the term was, render? Some people call is drawing...perhaps even downloading. I JFGI'ed and could only come up with a word "de-rezz." That came from TRON, and also a hacker term. Meaning to disolve. Just wondered why this term was adapted in this place? Second question/statement is the hair deal. I have for example, went to play a game of slingo and it was in an area where there was also a mall in the middle of the place. The place was packed with people. I was new and had a script on and the host pretty much chewed me a new one for having it on. Everywhere I looked, from tip jar, to HUGE flexi hair monsters, things were moving. The flexi-haired monsters were all playing AND dancing. Right behind me, tons of mall objects and scripted signs spinning. I just want to know, isn't 10 people all dancing with massive wads of hair swaying with each move as much of a problem as say, a shiny necklace I had on? Thirdly, I haven't tried much building in here yet. Its a hard adjustment to make using a program like Hammer where I can build outside of the game with 3 views, to attempting to do it in game. So kudos to all of you who can, that's a challenge! My question is..isn't a lot of the lag got to do with polygon counts? I was suprised to see that a chunk of land's object limitations are limited by the number of primitives, rather than polys. Seemed less than effective for controlling the amount of lag in the sim. Again, I have very limited knowledge, so maybe its not the same for SL. Would seem if they done this, it would create more efficient and responsible building. That's just mho. |
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Clara Christiansen
Registered User
Join date: 9 Jul 2006
Posts: 1
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Switching everything off in Client settings no solution
09-25-2006 03:25
Changing view distance to 64m, if more isn't neeeded, is a good thing. But suggestions to switch off nearly everything and reduce content resulution is only an option for people with _very_ slow computers or those who only want to chat and do not care any content.
Concert advice: Sim/parcel owners: - Reduce the amount of textures! - If there are moren than 20 avatars in, think of having walls around the concert area (with windows, you cannot look through) so that the client has not to load all the textures outside, too. - About the sourroundings: less is often more. - And a moving spotlight may look nice on the first view Bit prim spotlights hide the artists and reduce FPS for users. Visitors: - Do not redress, when you are already there. In RL you would not put on you dress (or hair) in the ballroom or whereever you go, too. - Look for clothing that does not have so many prims in it. maybe a primless dressing works, too? - Yes there is hair in SL that has not even one prim and looks nicer than some of the prim hair. And BTW: what counts heavy prim hair for you in a concert, if others do not see it at all? Shop owners: - reduce the texture count in the buiding itself - make different rooms for different kinds of things and a good directory to find them - make smaller pictures and let the users see larger, more detailed ones only, if they are interested in a certain product. Yes it is nice for moving in a mall, if one can place avatar just in the center of a large mall and move only with camera. But where is the advantage, if one has to wait endlessly then for texture loading? There is a maximum of prims, a sim can have. Prims people are wearing do not count on this but they count on server and client load. Clara |
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Kittyhawk Zeta
The Cat Who Flies
Join date: 18 Oct 2006
Posts: 27
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10-22-2006 18:37
Lag' defined: BadGeo - Lag This is a MUST read for anyone creating anything in SL. Hmm, this link is dead, does anyone have a copy?  |
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William Waverley
Registered User
Join date: 19 Oct 2006
Posts: 5
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10-23-2006 03:36
Thirdly, I haven't tried much building in here yet. Its a hard adjustment to make using a program like Hammer where I can build outside of the game with 3 views, to attempting to do it in game. So kudos to all of you who can, that's a challenge! My question is..isn't a lot of the lag got to do with polygon counts? I was suprised to see that a chunk of land's object limitations are limited by the number of primitives, rather than polys. Seemed less than effective for controlling the amount of lag in the sim. Again, I have very limited knowledge, so maybe its not the same for SL. Would seem if they done this, it would create more efficient and responsible building. That's just mho. Having experienced the issues surrounding poly counts when map making, this is a valid point I would imagine and one I hadn't thought off. I remember hideous FPS loss/graphical lag from even the slightest error when creating a map and can't see how it would be any different in SL. |
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WannaPiEcE Crabgrass
Clearwater Beach, Florida
Join date: 13 Aug 2006
Posts: 93
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10-25-2006 17:48
Do
******* Reduce Max Particle Count as low as you can go if you want I have mine set at 400 (just fine) Cache size @ 500mb too low=lag too high has been proven to cause lag over time (Clear cache regularly) If you have a faster than 1.5 mb/s connection than put your bandwith all the way up Dont display other avatars names and dotn use temporary (if you want to find out their name hold your cursor over their avatar) Keep your computer clean of ALL spyware and Viruses (adaware, [I dont reccommend Spybot at all] Zone alarm..) Dont run programs larger than 10k memory on your task manager menu status (dont run any programs in the backround if you dont have to) DOnt play streaming music or streaming video Refomat your computer if you have to (you will not see lag after a reformat) Update your video card drivers Overclock your video card (not reccommended but availible) (coolbits, Rivatuner) Dish out the dough for a new video card! I have a Nvidia 256mb video card it works Fine on SL Run SL in a window (Controvercial BUT I always get higher FPS when I run in a window) Basically... If you have a computer with a 1.5Ghz processor, 128mb Video card, and over 512mb of ram you should NOT have issuse with lag on SL) ALTHOUGH... Lag can be caused by the server ie. In a sim with more than 30 people in the sim you WILL experience long loading times, lots of lag and plenty of bugs/artifacts I follow my lame rules and always avoid lag, however my new PC on the way will help even more ;P Donts: ***** Do the oppositte of what I just said =) _____________________
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Kathmandu Gilman
Fearful Symmetry Baby!
Join date: 21 May 2004
Posts: 1,418
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10-25-2006 19:12
Do ******* Basically... If you have a computer with a 1.5Ghz processor, 128mb Video card, and over 512mb of ram you should NOT have issuse with lag on SL) ALTHOUGH... Lag can be caused by the server ie. In a sim with more than 30 people in the sim you WILL experience long loading times, lots of lag and plenty of bugs/artifacts I follow my lame rules and always avoid lag, however my new PC on the way will help even more ;P I'd say that might have been valid 2 years ago but if you are running a 1.5 Ghz CPU 512 ram and something like a MX4000 128 today you are mired in a 2- 6 fps lag tarpit. Turn up draw distance to 256 meters and no matter how recent your drive reformat or how few particles are set you are looking at 1/4 frame per second slideshow. On the other hand I can't really fault the rest of your advice as it is sound computing practice mostly. _____________________
It may be true that the squeaky wheel gets the grease but it is also true that the squeaky wheel gets replaced at the first critical maintenance opportunity.
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Usagi Musashi
UM ™®
Join date: 24 Oct 2004
Posts: 6,083
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10-29-2006 19:56
I think a good start would be if someone could write a few words on how to pin down whether the 'lag' you are experiencing is client or server side, though that ties in with reading the sim stats of course. I would write something, but am sure there are some who are better 'qualified' to write a concise version. Spoken by a high IQ user! THANK YOU for pointing this out where otehrs did not even put a thought to this issue. _____________________
Never Quote People that have no idea what they refering to..It give them a false feeling the need for attention...
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Darena Bryant
Registered User
Join date: 22 Nov 2006
Posts: 10
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Here's another good thing you can get to help increase performance
11-22-2006 21:34
It's something called Omega Drivers.
Custom designed by a professional and fairly regularly updated, it is a set of drivers that are designed to get the absolute maximum performance out of Nvidia, ATI Radeon and 3dfx cards. Before I got it, I was using a Diamond Stealth 9550 256 mb AGP card... I couldn't use the AGP feature, and though I had a dual processor, I was getting only about 5 to 10 FPS in SL. Local lighting didn't work, and crashes due to lag and graphic problems were fairly common. Afterwards, I was able to use AGP and local lighting, and my FPS increased to 20-25 FPS. Check here to find the latest versions; be sure to read the faqs so you don't make any mistakes during installation (there are several versions for various card types). http://www.omegadrivers.net/ |
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Darena Bryant
Registered User
Join date: 22 Nov 2006
Posts: 10
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Also, to help me and to help others...
11-22-2006 21:36
Could someone do a complete explaination of all the various information you get from the panel opened with ctrl-shift-1? There are a lot of lines there, and not all of their purposes are obvious to me, and I'm sure others as well.
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Doodles Casanova
That rabbit's dynamite!
Join date: 9 May 2004
Posts: 17
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12-01-2006 08:31
I see all these other hints, and yet I don't see something mentioned here that's a major issue: SL is lousy at handling multicore processors. If after all this effort you still get laggy, jerky movement, check the following:
1. Bring up Windows Task manager (CTRL+ALT+DEL) 2. Go to the Process tab. 3. Look for "secondlife.exe" in the list of running processes and right click on it. 4. Select "Set Affinity" This will bring up a grey window with a series of check boxes in it. You'll have one check box per CPU core. 5. Uncheck all but one box. This forces SL to run only in that core. 6. Hit OK 7. Close Task Manager. See if things run better then. They always do for me. (AMD Athlon Manchester dual core CPU.) You'll have to do this EVERY TIME you start SL, so keep this set of instructions handy. |
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Jon Schack
Schack the Monkey
Join date: 18 Oct 2006
Posts: 13
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12-01-2006 08:48
I see all these other hints, and yet I don't see something mentioned here that's a major issue: SL is lousy at handling multicore processors. If after all this effort you still get laggy, jerky movement, check the following: 1. Bring up Windows Task manager (CTRL+ALT+DEL) 2. Go to the Process tab. 3. Look for "secondlife.exe" in the list of running processes and right click on it. 4. Select "Set Affinity" This will bring up a grey window with a series of check boxes in it. You'll have one check box per CPU core. 5. Uncheck all but one box. This forces SL to run only in that core. 6. Hit OK 7. Close Task Manager. See if things run better then. They always do for me. (AMD Athlon Manchester dual core CPU.) You'll have to do this EVERY TIME you start SL, so keep this set of instructions handy. See this sticky link in this very same Forum to see how to do this without having to set Affinity every time. /111/9c/141803/1.html _____________________
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AWM Mars
Scarey Dude :¬)
Join date: 10 Apr 2004
Posts: 3,398
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SL Lag and how to make the best of it.
01-02-2007 05:32
I'll try and keep this as short and sweet as possible, given the compelexity of the problem.
As there is no such thing as a 'standard' setup, its hard to assess exactly what everyone should do, but here are a few tips. Per Week: Defrag your Hard Disc(s). Clear out junk on your Hard Disc. Use a Registry Cleaner. Empty the Second Life Cache (preferences, Network tab) and cold reboot your pc straight away. Check for the latest Graphic Drivers. Per Month: Reinstall Second Life (yeah I know, you got to reset all your fav settings  ).In Game settings: Set your bandwidth (preferences, Network tab) to 2/3rd's of your total bandwidth internet connection (checkout Bandwidth Test if you are not sure). Your Operating System uses some for music and movie streams and needs some bandwidth! Set your cache (preferences, Network tab) to the highest you can spare (no point setting 1gb if you only have 50mb available), preferably you should have at least 2gb continous hard disc space available. Take off all HUDS and 'accessories' that use scripts, if you Must use bling, don't try and look like a Christmas tree! Try pressing Ctrl+Shift+1 ingame while wearing all your 'accessories', look at the Active Scripts and Active Obejects counts, take off all your 'accessories' and see how many it has reduced by, you will be amazed!  In Preferences: Set Draw distance to 96. Fog to 2.0 or less. Particals to 50 or less. Composite outfits to 2 or less. Turn off bump mapping. Turn down the mesh detail sliders. Out of Game settings: If you have more than one hard disc on your system, install Second Life onto the Hard Disc that doesn't include your Operating System. Make sure your Operating System isn't caching itself on that same Hard Disc (partitioned hard discs don't count as a sperate hard disc). Ideally, buy a cheap 50gb hard disc just for Second Life, assuming you have the space and connection capacity in your PC, that has a 10,000 rpm. Don't run any other programmes on your PC while you play Second Life, other than virus checkers and firewalls (making sure they are setup correctly). If you use a router, unplug it from the electrical supply, 10 seconds later plug it back in. This will reset your IP address with your internet supplier and place you on the clearest server available (there are 'contention ratios' with the majority of ISP connections, ping times etc all of which are beyond this simple list). The more Ram you have on your MotherBoard and Graphics Card, the better. If your ingame experience is now much better, and you want more eye candy, try experimenting by turning up in small increments, each 'feature' you want to see more of (one at a time and try it). _____________________
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