Disk Thrashing in BF2

[Bradtechonline]

The game seems sloppy or is a major system hog. I got 1.5 GB of memory, and I am getting disk thrashing when I close out of BF2. It's weird because this is the only game I've played that has done this. I can play Oblivion which seems to be more system intensive than BF2.

Anyone experience this issue with BF2? It's fun as hell, but seems to have a lot of bugs, and problems. Plus the hitcode is horrible sometimes.

 

[smopoim86]

Doesn't BF2 use like 1.5gb on its own? I think it is a ram hog.

 

[Bradtechonline]

Originally posted by: smopoim86
Doesn't BF2 use like 1.5gb on its own? I think it is a ram hog.

I have no clue, it's the only game to cause disk thrashing for me after upgrading to 1.5 GB vs 512 MB.

This used to happen trying to play Doom 3 or Quake IV when I had 512.

 

[Sforsyth]

runs crappy on my 1 GB of ram system. I have to turn grapghic down low

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Bradtechonline

Originally posted by: smopoim86
Doesn't BF2 use like 1.5gb on its own? I think it is a ram hog.

I have no clue, it's the only game to cause disk thrashing for me after upgrading to 1.5 GB vs 512 MB.

This used to happen trying to play Doom 3 or Quake IV when I had 512.

If you're seeing disk activity when you close the program, it's because Windows swapped other stuff out of RAM to make room for BF2.

Keep in mind that even if BF2 is never using more than 1GB or so at a time -- and it can definitely use more than 1GB at a time -- Windows will try to cache all the map/resource files that BF2 loads and will eventually boot out your other (idle) programs to do so.

 

[bob4432]

unless you are running a ton of other porgrams at the same time i would say you could tune bf2 to run less ram - drop the textures down to medium. but yes, it can be a resource hog - have a look in my link in sig as my evolution of different machines and the ram usage with bf2. hope that helps you out

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: Sforsyth
runs crappy on my 1 GB of ram system. I have to turn grapghic down low

have a look at the link in my sig about bf2 ram - you can get it to run pretty lean and still look good

 

[AMCRambler]

BF2 is a hog no doubt about it. 1.5Gb is pretty good to run it, but it still will use up nearly a gig of ram. What's your idle load on memory look like? If you're using 500 megs or more, than once you load BF2 your system is gonna be hitting the page file on the hard disk. Once you exit, it's going to clean out the page file, hence lots of disk access. If oyu can't reduce the amoutn of memory in use at idle, bump up to 2gb. You'll see faster load times for maps, thats for sure.

 

[imported_ColinT]

Put your virtual memory page file on the second disk - make sure the program disk virtual is NOT used - defrag both drives.

 

[grant2]

is disk thrash a problem for you AFTER you've finished playing?

I think the "windows swapped out stuff to make room for your maps" theory is sound and you might just want to accept temporarily disk action when switching from gaming -> non-gaming.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: ColinT
Put your virtual memory page file on the second disk - make sure the program disk virtual is NOT used - defrag both drives.

i found that just having more than 1 physical drive helped out. even if i disable the pagefile on the c drive, there still is a pagefile.sys on it, so not sure how you are expecting to disable it completely. you can check out what i found with pagefiles in my bf2 ram usage too

 

[imported_ColinT]

"i found that just having more than 1 physical drive helped out. even if i disable the pagefile on the c drive, there still is a pagefile.sys on it,"

I have removed my C: drive pagefile and use the D: drive for it - http://www.aumha.org/win5/a/xpvm.php

 

[40sTheme]

BF2 is a RAM hog. I've seen tests (do not remember where) that on maximum detail settings at 1600x1200, it can use up to 1.8GB of RAM at times.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: ColinT

"i found that just having more than 1 physical drive helped out. even if i disable the pagefile on the c drive, there still is a pagefile.sys on it,"

I have removed my C: drive pagefile and use the D: drive for it - http://www.aumha.org/win5/a/xpvm.php

i have done that but it is still there.... i have the c set to have no pagefile but there is a 2GB one there, i have d set to have none and there is none and i hae e set to have one and there is a 2GB pagefile on e. can you explain this?

 

[Philippine Mango]

Originally posted by: Bradtechonline
The game seems sloppy or is a major system hog. I got 1.5 GB of memory, and I am getting disk thrashing when I close out of BF2. It's weird because this is the only game I've played that has done this. I can play Oblivion which seems to be more system intensive than BF2.

Anyone experience this issue with BF2? It's fun as hell, but seems to have a lot of bugs, and problems. Plus the hitcode is horrible sometimes.

Here are three Key bits of information we need from you.

1. What is your texture setting at?
2. What is your screen resolution at?
3. When you start up your computer or right before you loadup BF2, open up task manager and tell us how much ram it is using.

 

[imported_ColinT]

"i have done that but it is still there.... i have the c set to have no pagefile but there is a 2GB one there, i have d set to have none and there is none and i hae e set to have one and there is a 2GB pagefile on e. can you explain this?"

I dunno - I run XP Pro also and if I access the virtual memory allocation table as per the instructions I see C: as having NO pagefile set and D: as having 3070 MB.

 

[Fike]

I had the same problem on my old system that had 1.5 GB of RAM. It took a minute or two to clear out BF2 and get back to functioning Windows. Now I have 3 GB in my system with the windows 3GB switch enabled, and it exits instantly to fully functional Windows without any thrashing.

I also had the same problem when trying to ALT-TAB out of BF2 to change my vid card settings. Now the ALT+ TAB works flawlessly.

Clearly BF2 hogs memory, but it's cool too, so I guess we can't complain too much.

 

[dfuze]

I used to have the same problem; close out BF2 and wait, and wait, and wait... And it happened when I had 2gb of ram (512x4). I think it has more to do w/ the quality of ram and amount of ram chips. I have since upgraded to 2 x 1gb ocz ram chips and it is smooth now. Don't forget AMD has the problem with 4 ram chips, that if all slots are filled it moves the ram speed from 200 to about 166.

 

[Auric]

First off, in no way does BF2 require >1GB RAM to preclude incessant paging. To reiterate, set Textures to Medium and if it still a problem then take the hint that your idle system is a corpulent mess and needs trimming anyway.

Regardless, pagefile on a seperate drive when possible is SOP. Also fix the size (same min/max) to preclude fragmentation (particularly given sufficient contiguous free space to begin with -after defragging, if necessary). Defrag the game volume too to minimize read times.

It is advisable to maintain at least a minimal pagefile on the OS volume so that if a stop error ever occurs, a dump file can be created and debugged to find an unspecified source.

If pagefiles remain on volumes after setting them to none and rebooting then simply delete them which will be possible if they are not active.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: ColinT
"i have done that but it is still there.... i have the c set to have no pagefile but there is a 2GB one there, i have d set to have none and there is none and i hae e set to have one and there is a 2GB pagefile on e. can you explain this?"

I dunno - I run XP Pro also and if I access the virtual memory allocation table as per the instructions I see C: as having NO pagefile set and D: as having 3070 MB.

i use a program called sequoia view to see where all of my data is or if i forgot to delete an image, and it shows it ...weird

what if you go into my computer, tools -> folder otpions -> view -> and then uncheck "hide protected operating system files" then look at c and see if you see pagefile.sys

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: dph1077
I used to have the same problem; close out BF2 and wait, and wait, and wait... And it happened when I had 2gb of ram (512x4). I think it has more to do w/ the quality of ram and amount of ram chips. I have since upgraded to 2 x 1gb ocz ram chips and it is smooth now. Don't forget AMD has the problem with 4 ram chips, that if all slots are filled it moves the ram speed from 200 to about 166.

on certain a64 revisions made you run 4sticks at 166, but yo always had to run it at 2t...

 

[Bradtechonline]

I figured out what the problem was guys. I run NOD32 Anti Virus. For whatever reason the AMON module in it was scanning stuff after BF2 closed down. I uninstalled NOD32, and the problem went away. Closing BF2 is now like closing Firefox down. I am just going to set it up not to scan the BF2 folder real time.