Consistent higher-end FPS using DX9a

[Guest Kurt]

Sounds like another dud tweaking tip ?from this article #34 http://www.xptuneup.com/tip0050.htm----------------------------------"34. Correctly set your level 2 cache and improve performance !!I read about this trick the other day over Internet. Open Registry by going to START-RUN and typing REGEDIT. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlSession ManagerMemory ManagementSecondLevelDataCache. Based on the kind of CPU you have, this value should change. Here are some of the defaults. Intel Celeron - 128 , AMD Duron - 64. PII and Athalon: 512. Cyrix and AMD K6-3 256. Pentium IV-1024. Figure out what your CPU type is and what L2 cache it supports and set it accordingly. It is important to know what critics have to say about this tweak. Opinions vary and I have put following three articles that have been brought to my attention which may help you understand why it may not be effective in some situations:Do not change the SecondLevelDataCache entry (from Microsoft technet article)Some third-party sources have erroneously reported that modifying the SecondLevelDataCache registry entry in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE System CurrentControlSet Control Session ManagerMemory Management can enhance system performance. The second level (L2) cache is recognized by the operating system and is fully utilized regardless of the setting of this parameter. (from Microsoft knowledge base item Q183063)This is not related to the hardware; it is only useful for computers with direct-mapped L2 caches. Pentium II and later processors do not have direct- mapped L2 caches. SecondLevelDataCache can increase performance by approximately 2 percent in certain cases for older computers with ample memory (more than 64 MB) by scattering physical pages better in the address space so there are not so many L2 cache collisions. Setting SecondLevelDataCache to 256 KB rather than 2 MB (when the computer has a 2 MB L2 cache) would probably have about a 0.4 percent performance penalty. (From an arstechnica article) One of the most infamous NT tweaks since the introduction of NT4 has got to be the "L2 cache" tweak, a lone registry entry which stipulates the amount of L2 cache (or secondary cache) that the OS will make use of. Well, as with many things in life, the effects of this tweak are not so black and white. If you're using a processor that implements a direct-mapped L2 cache design (like Pentium I's), then this registry adjustment is indeed for you. However, if you own any Intel processor post-PI, or any modern AMD processor (K6-2 and newer), then your processor is using a set-associative L2 cache design, and thus you need not specify your L2 cache size. Let me explain.If you choose not to futz with the registry key in question, the OS will call on the HAL (Hardware Abstraction Layer) for retrieval of the L2 cache size when you boot your computer. If this happens to fail, a default value of 256KB is used for all logon sessions on that boot session. This is where the myth that NT can only use 256KB of L2 cache comes from. But it's false. See, the HAL is able to retrieve the processor (L2) cache from any processor using the set-associative cache design, it's only the relatively few processors out there with direct-mapped L2 caches that the HAL won't chat it up with. Thus, this tweak only applies to a select number of people anymore (like people with Pentium I procs between 166-233MHz, as lower rated procs had only 256KB cache).-" Kurt M

[brucek 38]

"Search the Internet like I did."You mean like this?http://www.tweakxp.com/idealbb/view.asp?to...F-F6A07CE5128F}http://www.tweakxp.com/idealbb/view.asp?to...F-F6A07CE5128F}and to quote:"It's a bogus tweak.... it's been discussed before it only works for old cpus where the L2 cache isn't built into the die"This is from a site that I trust on XP upgrade issues. I'm not sure wherre you went to find this info.Bruce.

[Guest]

Well whatever they say it improved mine..

[Guest PaulL01]

>I am curious Paul...>>I've seen a great change in the way you communicate your ideas>in the forum in recent weeks. Even yesterday, you ignored a>comment I made about one of your previous threads so you could>post a "you miss the point" response, even though I quite>clearly stated my point.If you didn't notice John, there is a full moon out tonight.:)Seriously, You think I ignored a comment you made so that I could post a "you missed..."?That is simply nuts. If you are more worried about how I post and the "feel" that may or may not be really there than what is actually being shared with you I can't help you as warm and tender have never been my hallmark here LOL!!!>>What it comes down to is you are not the only sim guru on the>forum. Certainly, not an elected "defender of the faith." >What you are is someone I respect highly, and someone who has>made posts which I feel have contributed highly to>understanding of the sim. Posts like this, even if I tend to>agree with them, do not, because they shut people down cold.I do apologize to you and anyone else who would take it that way, Sorry. Really.Mitch, if you felt I was talking

[Guest PaulL01]

>Well whatever they say it improved mine..LOL Shane!The guy just gave you some "real" facts on the subject and you would be unwise to just blow it off.Geeshk, John C. U see what can happen? ROTFLOL!!!

[Guest]

Don't flame me for it - I thought it was pretty interesting myself

[John_Cillis 2,406]

"....you as warm and tender have never been my hallmark here"Well, I wouldn't agree more :) but in spite of that, when you offer an opinion, I listen. Seriously, don't sell yourself short--you don't hide your brilliance very well. IMHO, your piece on the FS2002.cfg is one example, and your work on Rochester, another.Beyond that, I agree that the forum can take on an Ann Landers look sometimes, or perhaps better thought of as Jerry Springer? Still, why should we care? My PC won't fail if someone decided DX 9 is the cure all. And the fringe benefit--if enough people load it and somehow nuke their systems, those of us who know better will all have more bandwidth to share :) Seriously again, I don't feel we should hold members of this forum up to some type of litmus test of technical or simming accuracy. I feel the forum is a place to grow friendships, and to share our hobby. I didn't come here thinking I was going to find, or be required to provide, all the answers. I have more than enough technical rags at the office to satisfy my hunger for "truth." Among other things, I'm paid to produce a monthly newsletter which no one reads, that deals with such bytes of wisdom as our latest switch purchases, S/W deployment, and T1 contracts. Ask even my boss what I wrote, and he'd say "John's staff deployed "T1 software" so we could "switch" off the lights". Being ignored doesn't hurt me much :)

[Guest]

Hi Paul,One thing that I've repeatedly noticed in your DX9 "crusade" (so to speak :-)) is that you miss some obvious possibilities. One of the most obvious: compiler optimization. Indeed, the code may not have been any more "optimized" internally for DX6, 7 applications... But a different compiler, compiler options, etc. can dramatically effect existing code and its efficiency in execution. This is just one example of how one code base can be "improved" once compiled without actually changing the underlying code.Although I've read just about every post made concerning DX9, I haven't made a comment in them to date because essentially I agree with your position and thus have had nothing substantial to add. It is very possible however that some may see a "slight" increase in performance with DX9 depending upon many factors such as their platform, how optimized the new binaries are for that platform, etc. Lets not forget that regardless of video card and respective abilities, a substantial amount of processing is still done on the cpu in DirectX. Any claims that DX9 will "dramatically" improve framerates should indeed be dissuaded simply due to empirical evidence (in a nice manner - nothing prevents you from giving great advice in a friendly way there Paul ;-)). But threads like this claiming a "3fps increase" or slight improvements? Sure, I can see it - due to many factors.The main point here: no harm is done with a thread like this even if it turned out false (which I'm not saying it did), simply because everyone will eventually have to upgrade to DX9 anyway. Its the out-and-out stratosphere claims ("Look! 100fps with a simple FS ini change!") that really deserve your criticism, since those are the ones that truly lead people down a false path.Take care,Elrond ---Not enough bandwidth to display this signature! Don't reformat hard drive? (y/N)

[Guest]

Hey Paul, no offense taken. Never is! I have broad shoulders and man-oh-man, but life is way too short to get my 'johns' in a knot, LOLI can only report to you what my sim is producing, nonetheless any of my hardware is DX9 specified.Before with DX8.1---I had 'X' frame rates.Now...with DX9a--- I have 'X' plus 3 nominal.That's the end of the story, short and sweet. 3 more frames for the installing of DX9a.I don't write the code...and don't know what they can do to tweak. I only know what is before me and what my sim is publishing. If the sim is publishing 3 more...then they are what I call for lack of a better phrase, 'software real' and not my perceived notion. Those extra 3 frames make a true difference in the fluidity of the sim.Cheers!Mitch R.

[N562Z 4]

Mitch:Well, as someone with almost the same system specs as you, I am very excited by your post. I've never had any problems with VATSIM and the various DX upgrades released in the past, and it's encouraging to hear that people are using both without problems. I've been running DX9 without too many problems, though I have noticed that though rare, FS locks up and crashes a bit more often than it used to before I installed it. Maybe just a coincidence. One other thing worth mentioning, and I don't know what others have experienced in this regard, but even with 640MB RAM I'm amazed by how quickly my system resources are exhausted these days. This despite many tweaking tips about modifying Vcache, etc. I tried resurrecting my old copy of CACHEMAN, to see if it might help in this regard, and lo and behold my simulator sessions seem to be running smoothly, and without incident, and most importantly, without exausting the system resources so quickly Just a thought to those of you who might be having similar issues with easily exausted system resources.http://www.expedia.com/pubspec/images/airlines/smNW.gifAlex ChristoffN562ZMinneapolis, MN

[Bert Pieke 7,584]

Careful with Cacheman on newer systems! I found that Cacheman can cause bottlenecks in the disk to memory transfer, resulting in almost continuous disk access when flying over (changing) scenery.Cacheman was great for me, using Win95 and 196 Meg RAM.. but no more, using WinXP and 512 Meg.. The disk cache when "optimized" can instead become a problem, compared to letting Windows handle it!

[Guest]

Hey there, Alex!Yeah...I was actually quite surprised about picking up three frames.Hey..you can't have enough of em, lol.On a sidenote, I found the latest drivers for MS98SE from nVidia to be the best yet. They bode well for my spec's...Best of all, those three frames were free, LOL!Oh, another thing to mention, after a flight from Dallas-Ft.Worth to Las Vegas...I sat for an hour in spot view and watched the going's on of my A.I. aircraft (I have at least ten airlines loaded) and even with two or three aircraft showing on the screen on T.O's, finals, or at taxi, my FPS's stayed above 12, and that was with custom scenery to boot!I'm happier than a pig in the brown...lolNow..that says it all, lolCheers!Mitch R.