optimizing CPU usage
#1
are there any options that help me optimize my CPU usage? Anything that'll take any amount of load off my CPU at all? My GPU is a HD4670 and the max it ever gets to is 60%. (I'm playing the .hack & .hack GU games) So I'm good GPU wise, the only problem I run into is my CPU (Athlon II Dual-Core @ 2.8GHz) I have moderate slowdowns, nothing killer, but I'd love to figure out how to get it running upto 60fps.
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#2
It would help if you show us your settings.
Core i5 3570k -- Geforce GTX 670  --  Windows 7 x64
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#3
(01-23-2010, 11:12 PM)Shadow Lady Wrote: It would help if you show us your settings.

okie dokie

P.S. the 1600x900 res shouldn't do anything, I've tried native and it does not change a thing, like I said my GPU is fine. Along with the speedhacks, I've disabled each one seeing if any were causing problems. Though if you think a certain speedhack might be a problem by all means.

Also, if a game slowed down during play on an actual PS2, would PCSX2 eliminate that slowdown if you had powerful enough computer, or would it slowdown regardless. The main area I'm running into slowdowns is in Mac Anu, especially the bridge and middle of town, which if I recall, slowed down even on PS2.

[Image: mysettings.jpg]
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#4
Just to see, try testing different VU Cycle stealing settings in incremental values. I usually set mine on one down from the last setting, which gives me decent speed. I've a similar processor to yours, CPU slightly higher, GPU a lot weaker. I can vouch that VU stealing has given me a huge speed boost in many games. Try it out at least. It says it can cause issues or whatnot in games, but honestly, I've not had ANY graphical glitches, crashes, or freezes when using any of the speedhacks. So I don't know why they say that. I guess the developers know better though.

Anyways though, VU stealing has given me around 20% more speed at times, sometimes more. Depends on the game. I'm not sure how it works. Some games, it can cause frameskipping on higher settings.

And PCSX2 shouldn't eliminate slowdown that was present on a real PS2. I can only think of two games that had variable framerates on the PS2- Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. They can go slower or faster depending on the CPU clock. That is to say, slower without making the audio go slower as well. They stressed the PS2 to the limit at some points, so they programmed the game to slow down when the PS2 couldn't handle all the special effects.
System- Custom Build
CPU- Intel Core i5 4670K @4.2ghz
Memory- 8GB DDR3
Video Card- EVGA Nvidia GTX 1060 6GB
OS- Windows 10 Pro x64
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#5
Granville:
You just don't know what to look for when testing for hack breakage (no problem, until it crashes on you Tongue2).
I can tell you that I've seen hangs, crashes and glitches with all of the hacks,
except the "fast forward" one and the EE cyce rate x1.5 one.

Especially the VU cycle steal hack can wreak havoc on games. It depends on what the game does though,
Suikoden3 for example triples in FPS by using the slightest setting!

bds28338:
You cannot offload anymore processing onto your GPU, sorry.
What you can do is try to overclock your CPU. That'll help.
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#6
I have an e8400 at 3.6 ghz, and a hd4870 512 mb at 790:1000, and the .hack G.U. games still give me some slowdowns, mostly in battles when there's a lot of monsters and players/action going on, and in towns when there's a lot of people. Of course, I play with the scaling at 4x because I can't stand anything less, but still, these are demanding. I'd like to be able to use at least 2x msaa with 4x scaling in these games, looks awesome, but sadly, the slow parts become painfully slow. Also, for G.U. games, put Round Mode at nearest in EE and VU.

In the other hand, original .hack games aren't so demanding, actually, they're some of the fastest games I've been able to play in pcsx2, at max graphics settings, without slowdowns, and I didn't even need to use speedhacks (actually, the cycle rate ones break the game at cutscenes). At least that's what I remember from playing them in 0.9.6, I don't know their current state.

Oh yeah, don't use VU cycle stealing with G.U., it causes the known "fake fps" at even the lowest level.
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#7
Watch this video, these are the settings that I think work well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVLHMaa5LaU
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#8
Try overclock a little if that's possible otherwise I would like to share some tips that is great to gain performance boost.

When I installed Windows 7 Professional x64 on my gaming rig which I don't use for Internet, network and other things btw, I removed useless stuff that get's installed and running by default which I always do installing an OS.

I remove all Themes, Windows Update, Windows Firewall etc that is taking up resources. I also shutdown unnecessary services running in the background that is Internet, network or other types of useless related, Print-Spooling, Server, Workstation etc etc.

My Windows 7 installation is now only running the essential services and stripped down to run and play games everything else is gone and I can say that it helps but what helped me the most was the overclocking from 2.8GHz to 3.5GHz, but combining both and I got a lightning fast system playing mostly everything in fullspeed except for a couple of GameCube games.

If you can live without the useless stuff that get's installed if you only play games on it then it's worth the time it takes configuring everything.
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#9
Overclock the CPU only if A) you have sufficient cooling (liquid cooling would be the best option) and B) if you don't mind voiding the CPU's warranty.
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#10
thank you for the suggestions everyone.

VU Cycle Stealing - I've tried this, and while it did improve the numbers of the frame rate, when actually playing, what it seems like to me is it cuts the actual frames render in half, so it runs at the same rate constantly, but it looks slow. (just to make sure as people were praising this as being a big help, I tested it, on all levels, and running through Mac Anu the frame rate jumps up to a constant 60, but your characters run at about half speed)

Slowdowns - I had tested the game on PS2, seeing as I remembered slowdowns in Mac Anu, and it does indeed slowdown.

Overclock the CPU - whilst it's a great suggestion, I don't want to void the warranty, nor do I have any money for extra parts such as the cooler or if anything should break. I like keeping my computer vanilla, hopefully adding a little bit of life to it.

G.U. Games - as for these, I'll definitely try putting round mode on to nearest, but I'm going to finish up the first four and pray that there are improvements to PCSX2 and the plugins in the meantime.

as for my computer itself, I'm extremely OCD so it's always clean as can be. Reading this topic though, I'm actually quite happy with the frame rate I'm getting now. Thanks everybody for taking the time to look at this topic, and give your suggestions.
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