Core-Question

[YevGenie]

This kind of goes along with the Source/Dual Core thread but I decided to make another one instead of adding on...

Anyway, I was wondering if there was a way to make TF2 use more of my 2nd Core? I played it for the 1st time in a window and was shocked to see that it was using 77% of my RAM and 100% of my Core1 while only using 5-10% of my Core2...so is there a way I can have it take more processing power from the 2nd core? Its causing some serious lag on my Laptop

[Clay Pigeon]

What OS, and what type of dual core?

I know AMD has released drivers to increase core utilization in gaming.

Its on their website somewhere.

[YevGenie]

I am using "Intel Pentium Dual-Core" and its a Vista OS. Its just wierd that ALL of thew first core is being taken up.

[gator]

What type of graphics is on the laptop? I'm guessing it may be the GPU that's the bottleneck, rather than the CPU.

[YevGenie]

ATI Radeon Xpress 200M by my calculations (which more or less amount to nothing given my computer skills) it should be able to preform without much of a problem? Its just eating apart my RAM and Cores from what I can see...

[diarmad]

I have carefully checked core usage on my AMD and It uses NEARLY equal amounts on each core. As equal as can be expected honestly.

I hate to sound like a fan boy, but chalk up another point for AMD.

[gator]

[quote="YevGenie";p="52709"]
ATI Radeon Xpress 200M by my calculations (which more or less amount to nothing given my computer skills) it should be able to preform without much of a problem? Its just eating apart my RAM and Cores from what I can see...
[/quote]

Yeah, that looks like the bottleneck. It probably has an integrated GPU, which I don't think will yield very good performance for TF2.

If you haven't already, try dialing down either the resolution or the graphics settings for TF2 and see if that helps.

[Simple]

Well your GPU is using up 256MB of your ram and on top of that the OS is most likely taking up 200-255MB of your ram as well which leaves you short on that end which will make your CPU have to work twice as hard to run the game. Thats the problem with having a intergrated GPU. It's basicaly putting everything onto your CPU when you run the game instead of your GPU taking the brunt of it. The best option is to upgrade to a graphics card that has it's own memory so it relieves the demand on your cpu. Upgrading to 2GIGS of ram would probably help a ton as well. Not sure if you are able to upgrade your graphics card, but that would be the first thing I would look at.

Also if you are running a anti virus and firewall these also take up alot of resources which is why you are probably using up all your memory and if your memory is working at 77% it's most likley running hot which will decrease your performance as well.

[YevGenie]

Thanks for the help, is there any way to upgrade the GPU? or since it is integrated I am sunk? I have a great desktop that I play this on at home, I was just trying to play a little whilst at my parents and was slightly put out!

[Simple]

What laptop do you have ?

[YevGenie]

it is a Toshiba Satellite A-135, It is obviously not made for gaming, and thats not what I use it for, this is mostly out of curiosity.

[Simple]

This would be a good start adding a couple of these. If you read the first comment you'll see the guy has the same laptop.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... dy=REVIEWS

I'll get back with you on the GPU.

[YevGenie]

Yea. the wierd thing is, I got 2 gigs of RAM that I bought, and instead of the RAM going down to 20% as logic would dictate, it stayed at about the 40% that he got from 1 stick, but it registers as 2mb, is there a way to run a memory test to see if they are putting out what they are supposed to be?

[Simple]

Search for memtest86 I think it is or just search memory test. If you have 2 GIGs already then I would say it's your GPU. It looks like you have a PCI-E x16 slot from what I can see, but there's 11 models of that laptop. Do you know the model # that comes after the A-135 ?

Also some types of memory work better then others as well. What type/brand of memory did you get ?

If you have the PCI-E slot then there are some nice GPU's out there that make a world of difference.

[Simple]

O and also your video card is only 128MB which would cause a big issue tring to run TFC2.