Potential Solution for Low Framerates in FFoW (v.1.0.1) when using a single core CPU

[WhiskeySix]

A lot of people have been plagued by low framerates when using single-core CPUs with Frontlines: Fuel of War version 1.0.1. I myself have a P4 running at 3.1GHz, 2GB DDR2-800, and an x1950xt (670/945). With that rig, I would load Solar Farm with around 35 players and get 10-15 FPS... unplayable. Well, our friend Sc1ence did some experimenting and stumbled onto an way to fix the problem: Simply disable your pagefile! After setting my pagefile to zero and rebooting, I reloaded some larger maps with larger player counts and instead of getting teens, I got FPS in the 30-50 range!!


If you don't have 2GB of RAM or more, you shouldn't try this... If you do try it, don't blame me if you start getting "low on memory" errors from windows. (Though you should be fine)


To disable the page file:

1. Right-click My Computer, and select Properties.
2. Go to the "Advanced" tab and click the top "Settings" button in the "Performance" section.
3. Go to the "Advanced" tab and click the "Change" button at the bottom under "Virtual Memory".
4. Select No Page File
5. Save and Reboot.


This worked for me, running 2GB and a P4 processor. It also worked for Sc1ence, who's running 4GB and a single-core AMD processor. If you give it a try, post here with your results!

[sc1ence]

Thanks for posting this W6. My framerates on street went from low teens to never dipping below 40. I am playing at 1600x1050 on high settings on an 8800gtx with an amd single core clocked at 3.4ghz, 4 gigs of ram, and windows xp.

I did two things to my machine. I added a /3gb switch to my boot.ini file and I disabled the pagefile.

It seems the page file disable works just fine on its own. you should try that first. If you want to go further and change the way windows uses the memory address space you can also add the /3gb flag.

1. In Windows Explorer, navigate to the system partition. This is the partition that holds hardware specific Windows files such as Boot.ini and NTLDR.
2. If you cannot see the Boot.ini file, it could be because the folder options are set to hide protected operating system files. If this is the case, in the Explorer window, click Tools, Folder Options, and then click View. Clear the Hide protected operating system files (Recommended) check box. When prompted, click Yes.
3. After the Boot.ini file is visible in Explorer, right-click the file, click Open With, and then click Notepad to open the file.
4. Add the /3GB switch to the end of the line starting with "multi" under the [Operating Systems] section.
5. Save the changes and close Notepad.
6. Restart the computer for the change to take effect.

The /3GB switch changes the way the 4GB virtual address space is split up. Instead of splitting it as 2GB of user mode virtual address space and 2GB of kernel mode virtual address space, the split is 3GB of user mode virtual address space and 1GB of kernel mode virtual address space.

If you do this, make sure you have a way to restore the old boot.ini file if you can not start up windows. I have no idea if this is doing anything. But I was desperate to find a solution to the single core framerate issue.



Some programs really will not like it if you disable the page file. photoshop is a big one. There are always some detractors that say disabling the pagefile is an ill advised move. But for me, it increased the overall performance of my system as well dramatically increased framerates for ffow. There are plenty of people that use thier computers without the pagefile enabled and claim it gives their system more speed. There are also some that claim you should never disable the pagefile on a mission critical system - regardless of the performance claims.

the last thing you want to read after pressing save for that giant parts catalog the boss wants is an out of memory error and a locked system. so use this at your own risk.

[2wiSteD]

No-go for me. =( 2.6 GHz AMD and 1.5 GB RAM.

[DigitalAssassin]

Didn't seem to help me much either. Was averaging 19-20 with pagefile enabled and 21-22 with it disabled.

Only about 1 to 2 FPS increase by disabling the pagefile. I guess I'll re-enable it and just drop my settings from Medium to Low as I get almost a 10 FPS increase from that and it still looks pretty good. P4 2.55Ghz, 2GB RAM, 256MB 7800GS OC AGP here.

[OscarTheGrouch]

I can only run this game on med settings.....when I go any higher it frezzes. I'm sure someone will post what to enable and disable within the video settings.

[Exploding_Silver]

Originally Posted by OscarTheGrouch

I can only run this game on med settings.....when I go any higher it frezzes. I'm sure someone will post what to enable and disable within the video settings.

nvidia cards on high settings can sometimes freeze with foliage on high
experiment, set everything else to high (or even very high) and put foliage to zero