lagging gameplay

[lullemans72]

hi everyone

i've recently bought civ4 complete with both expansion packs.

after having built and expanded my civilization to a considerable size, i started experiencing extreme lagging while playing beyond the sword. it practically takes 5-10 seconds or more for even the slightest thing to work, which is very annoying.

i've heard of these downloadable patches and stuff, but there seems to be several versions of them, and i'm not sure as to which one i should go for to get this pesky problem fixed (or if i should download a patch at all)


all advice is greatly appreciated

[jbp26]

this happens to a lot of people. really all you can do is save your game, quit to desktop, and restart civ4.

[TriMiro]

Just save and then load work for me. I don't have to restart Civ. There seems to be no fix for it and I am not sure what causes it in the first place.

[Blaupanzer]

If you play BTS, apply the 3.17 patch. This is an independently good idea, it will not help the speed problem for those that have it.

[snoopy369]

What sort of machine do you have? CPU, Graphics card, memory?

[Unimatrix11]

Yes, yes and yes

[lullemans72]

Hi again

thanks for the advice. i tried reloading/restarting the game whenever it started getting slower, and it did seem to work although it lags at times still, but i guess that can't be helped...


as for my pc, it's a nec. bought in 2004. i'm not sure about the other details you asked for to be honest (never really had any issues with my pc until now), but i'll check that out and let you know.

[Krill]

Buy a new PC maybe? 2004 PCs, even top of the line ones, will be woefully outdated by now.

[TriMiro]

The lagging problem seems to be more than old hardware. I build my PC in 2007.

CPU AMD X2 2.3Ghz, 4GB RAM (reads only ~3.5, RAM is not the issue anyway), GF7300GT 256 (GPU heating is not an issue either, I don't know about video ram).

The problem persists in both Linux and Windows. While AI turns and graphics in general is slower under Linux, the lag is smaller (in several hours Windows get unplayable while Linux reaches a level of lag and stays there).

[Krill]

7300 is a very slow graphics card; I have a 7600GT, and it struggles in the late game due to the amount of units. I'm considering upgrading it to a 4850, or maybe an 8800GT if you can get that fior about 70% of the price of the 4850. The processor is also slow, but that is probably quite difficult to find to upgrade now.

[lullemans72]

Snoopy 369

I've got my pc details right here

Pentium R 4 CPU 3.20 GHz
3,19 Ghz 512 MB RAM with windows XP version 2002

Graphics card seems to be a Radeon X600/550 series

What standards do 2008 PCs come by?

[Krill]

About 3-4 times faster than that, for about £800, less if built by yourself.

[TriMiro]

Originally posted by Krill
7300 is a very slow graphics card; I have a 7600GT, and it struggles in the late game due to the amount of units. I'm considering upgrading it to a 4850, or maybe an 8800GT if you can get that fior about 70% of the price of the 4850. The processor is also slow, but that is probably quite difficult to find to upgrade now.

If the issue was the hardware, then the game would be slow always. The game starts OK (fast) and in several minutes/turns starts to slow down. The CPU only slows the time for AI turns, not the lag between moving my own units and entering city screen.

[Krill]

That is because as you uncover more of the map, the graphics card has to remember the terrain, texture it etc, as well as animate the extra units. It's the graphics card that is your bottleneck during your turn, and the CPU when the AI is moving (though if you have animate enemy moves on and you are in the middle of a war the graphics card will also slow down the game during the AIs' turn).

[snoopy369]

It is also that the GPU gets hotter as the gameplay progresses... which is why shutting it down and restarting can help. (That said, I don't doubt that there are memory allocation issues as well... it's impossible not to have them, with the number of distinct things Civ4 is doing at any one time ...)

To the OP, you probably should increase your memory (RAM). 512MB is the low end of playable, and with large maps or late in the game, will not be playable. Your CPU is also a bit old, but it's rather easier to replace your memory.

I'd also be curious about your graphics card's onboard memory, that could be an issue if it's <128MB (This will combine with the general memory lack to be a bigger problem).

You should also make sure your drivers for your graphics card are up to date. If you still have your 2004 drivers, that is a large part of the problem right there.

Finally, definitely install the 3.17 patch. Not because of lagging issues, per se, but because it fixes lots of other problems