UKGPL Season 23 (2012) - Snetterton - Aug 3

[bernie]

I also had a freeze in practise , so maybe a server issue there ?

The race was terribly boring for me as I didnt have a proper set up and anyway had decided to race within my own comfort zone , after an age , when I thought I had almost had enough , I risked a peek at the pit board which said there was only another 52 laps to go 

Congrats to Andreas , the podium bouys and to all the other stars who finished  , my sincere commiserations to all the losers 

[Cookie]

Grats Andreas and Bernie for the finish.

I had a freeze in quali too, had to close GPL via ctrl+alt+del and rejoin.
Does anyone know a way to log such events for the server?

My "race" lasted about 100m when a flying BMW hit me...

[BadBlood]

Really difficult to log these events automatically. Don't think it is possible except manually.

[Nigel Smith]

Just been reading this thread, and I don't know if this has come up previously, but years ago when pc's were 'simpler' I remember a lot of game crashes- all types of games- that stated something like 'not enough virtual memory, please adjust settings'. Does anyone think this may still be relevant.
Also I notice a lot of people restart their pc after a freeze- does the problem persist after the restart ?
Could re-booting the pc clear something like the virtual memory ?

[s2173]

I don't think virtual memory or pagefile is relevant at all... I'ts used only when psychical memory is full, so it transfers it to harddisk...I don't think GPL can fill 2 gb memory, which probably all computers besides mine have. I do have memory problems, but it appears completely different, as CTD when loading track from menu. Once you start driving, the memory doesn't do major swaps, because everything is ready to use. And I havent noticed GPL to behave better after restart.

[maddog]

Virtual memory is used, to supplement the chip ram, with pre-allocated hard disc RAM.  It usually comes into play, when chip Ram reaches capacity.  This is less likely to happen nowadays, as modern computers have large RAM amounts.  Because it's data access is much slower, when used, it's more likely to cause screen freezes.  When that happens, I suspect the virtual disc space isn't the problem, but speed of access.

By way of interest, there are  Sims, more graphically intensive than GPL, where, even chip RAM  speed becomes too slow, if data is constantly changing.  Programs have been written, to defrag the RAM, to restore it's speed, without exiting the Sim.  The only ones I've seen are payware, and I've not tried them.

   

[BadBlood]

Virtual Memory paging is orders of magnitude slower than RAM.. once you are paging you are in trouble but the size of RAM on both motherboards and graphics cards these days makes virtual paging unlikely in GPL. If you use onboard graphics, the RAM is shared between the system and the graphics - that is more problematic but you can change the graphics settings down until you find a sweet spot. Do not forget that playing in 640x480 is much less intensive than 1920x1280 (an eighth as much for similar settings!)

[Hristo Itchov]

As Paul said, freezes never happen offline. And in addition, freezes never happen on the 11 original Papy tracks, regardless of the mod. It's not so simple as to narrow it down to memory management or whatever.

[garethhall]

As Paul said, freezes never happen offline. And in addition, freezes never happen on the 11 original Papy tracks, regardless of the mod. It's not so simple as to narrow it down to memory management or whatever.

They do happen off line, as i siad earlier, I used to have freezes all the time at spa, with the orignal release on a standalone machine.

[Ronniepeterson]

Yeah for certain they happen offline. In particular the 69x mod causes me freezes in offline mode on papy tracks as well as add on tracks. Just had one today at Mosport. But never had one at Montjuich of all places with the 69x mod even with everything running at max detail settings!

[bernie]

As Paul said, freezes never happen offline. And in addition, freezes never happen on the 11 original Papy tracks, regardless of the mod. It's not so simple as to narrow it down to memory management or whatever.

ch


Not so Hristo , freezes do happen off line , as I habackground ve stated above . cannot comment on the Pappy tracks thing as I havn't driven (drove) much of the other mods on the original tracks .

Also Pappy tracks are all now so heavily modified from the original form , who knows what effect they have on different PC configurations of MB , chip set , processor type , speed , RAM CPU what have you ?

Often wonder what problems the various  firewalls and AV programms have on GPL , I for one have had a large dose of screen freezes and CTD's which  could only be cured by swapping / disabling whatever firewalls and / or AV's I had running at the time .

[Hristo Itchov]

I've never EVER had a single freeze offline. I'm quite sure if you did, it's for different reasons than those we get when we race online.

[bernie]

I've never EVER had a single freeze offline. I'm quite sure if you did, it's for different reasons than those we get when we race online.

Must be the Ether in Bulgaria 

[BadBlood]

I have never had a screen freeze offline but I have had GPL crashes - these are usually to do with screen saver, anti-virus toolkits, java downloads, windows updates etc etc.

[EvilClive]

Just a thought here having read the various posts and opinions about freezes and crashes etc.

There seems to be a consensus of opinion that many of these issues might be server related, with the mods which are heavier on the graphics front just making the problem more likely to happen?

Therefore, it might be worth a PM to some of the other leagues to see if they have similar issues with their servers on the same track/mod combinations and have they noticed an increase in disco's???

Although the mod generating team do a fantastic job in bringing all of the new cars and tracks out into the GPL community, I doubt that they have the massive number crunching capacity to test ALL of the software implications and parameters against possible glitches that the major games software manufacturers have? Plus, of course, we are talking about upgrading GPL software on a huge variety of client PCs with any number of possible configurations of patches and mods installed. I can see that with the necessary exchange of info between server/client/memory/graphics it only takes one element to hesitate and things start to collapse. I have often noticed a hesitation on the visuals with a momentary drop in frame rate when racing on line, which I am doubt is anything to do with my 4Gb of ram and 1Gb graphics card and more likely a data exchange issue?

Going back to my original suggestion, I was really wondering if these freezes etc are more to do with loss of data between server and clients because of the ever expanding traffic load on the internet.

Because, if that is the reason, we are all fighting a losing battle until we can guarantee a dedicated internet for UKGPL traffic only??  and why not???!! after all this is VERY important