SLOW Performance Issues: post here to report

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Sapient
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SLOW Performance Issues: post here to report

Post by Sapient »

Are you a wesnoth user who is experiencing extreme slowdown or extreme performance-related issues on your system? The more details you give the better.

1) Problem Details -
First, tell what is taking so long and how long it takes. The more precisely you can time it, the better. If you can find a situation where the slowdown or save-times become extremely slow, attach a save file here with your post. Wesnoth's log can also provide valuable details on potential problems. The logs can be found as described here.

2) System Details -
At the minimum, you should give your Operating System, Wesnoth Version, RAM, (Graphics cards are irrelevant), CPU, and network type (broadband DSL/dial-up/t1); and, if you compiled Wesnoth yourself, the compiler version and compile flags used.

3) Performance Metrics -
Additionally, you can measure the CPU and memory usage of the wesnoth process. On Macs this can be done with the Activity Monitor. Windows users can press Ctrl+Alt+Delete to bring up the Task Manager. Include with your report how high the statistic (CPU/memory) gets and how long it stays at that peak level.
Last edited by Sapient on January 7th, 2007, 5:46 am, edited 7 times in total.
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ILikeProgramming
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Post by ILikeProgramming »

I'm using Wesnoth 1.1.7 on Windows XP. A while ago, I was playing "a subterrainian struggle", using save-reload because I kept dying. What I noticed is the following: memory usage increased when I scrolled around the map, but only half-decreased when I loaded a new game. Thus, my memory counter in the task manager jumped from around 40,000 to 130,000 after about six times loading.
MK
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Post by MK »

Wesnoth 1.1.7 on Windows XP. It gets slow on The Lost General on HTTT. I have 256 MB of ram, AMD Athlon 2000+ CPU, and a DSL connection. Also it takes a long time to load saved games (even to access the list of the saved games from the main manu). I have 57 MB of saves, and the save_index file is 350 KB. When it loads a game the CPU jumps to 100% usage, and the PF is around 400 MB usage. On The Lost General scenario, while I play, the CPU usage moves from 60% to 100% frequently. It gets to 100% while I scroll the map, and I notice it gets realy slow when I more the mouse. Also the lightning attacks by dalfador are very slow. Its not the Only scenario that works slow, but on this one it got allmost unplayable.
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The_Lost_General-Auto-Save12.zip
A save for you guys to check...
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appleide
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Post by appleide »

MK wrote: Also the lightning attacks by dalfador are very slow.
Delfador's lightning attacks very occasionally slows down to normal speed even with accelerated speed on. (5-10% of the time). Haven't happened in ages though (months), prolly since I havent played HttT that much. I can't give you much details because I don't usually notice it until after it happens. I have a imac G5 2.0 ghz, 1gb ram, 10.4.7.

(also it takes 30+ second to go from menu and load into the hotseat game menu. I can't imagine what it must be like for slower computers.)

From the kind of game wesnoth belongs to you wouldn't expect it to be that demanding of your computer. (I am talking about every aspect except graphics card).

EDIT: On larger maps, scrolling also slows down.
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Sapient
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Post by Sapient »

appleide wrote:
MK wrote: Also the lightning attacks by dalfador are very slow.
Delfador's lightning attacks very occasionally slows down to normal speed even with accelerated speed on. (5-10% of the time). Haven't happened in ages though (months), prolly since I havent played HttT that much. I can't give you much details because I don't usually notice it until after it happens. I have a imac G5 2.0 ghz, 1gb ram, 10.4.7.

(also it takes 30+ second to go from menu and load into the hotseat game menu. I can't imagine what it must be like for slower computers.)

From the kind of game wesnoth belongs to you wouldn't expect it to be that demanding of your computer. (I am talking about every aspect except graphics card).

EDIT: On larger maps, scrolling also slows down.
The attack animations should be a lot smoother in the next release, because of some tweaking Xan did. So, that problem has been addressed to an extent. And before you post in this thread read and follow the instructions on how to provide Details! Thanks
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DakaSha
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Post by DakaSha »

hey.

i used to play wesnoth 1.0 on my 400mhz 256mb RAM system without any problems at all. (using DSL)

now i have a 1ghz 256mb RAM machine and it is very slow...

any solutions to this?

this is all on XP
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Sapient
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Post by Sapient »

DakaSha - thank you for providing some details about your system, but you forgot one part:
Finally, tell what is taking so long and how long it takes. The more precisely you can time it, the better.
In other words, please be more specific.
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DakaSha
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Post by DakaSha »

oh sorry.

but i did kinda explain whats wrong. its just very slow overall... scrolling is bumpy. selecting and moving units takes longer then it should. when units move they kinda "hop" to thier destination.

just an overall slow gaming experiance... its very annoying in multiplayer games.

like i said i had no problems whatsoever in 1.0 even though i had a slower system so im wondering if its because of the new sounds/graphics.
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Sapient
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Post by Sapient »

The speed in animations and movement was reduced compared to 1.0.x but that change was intentional. If you don't like watching the units move, press Ctrl+A for accelerated mode, or hold down the shift key.
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Yogibear
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Post by Yogibear »

MK wrote:Also it takes a long time to load saved games (even to access the list of the saved games from the main manu). I have 57 MB of saves, and the save_index file is 350 KB.
The issue of showing the list of savegames has been addressed with 1.1.8. It should show up almost immediately now.
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podunk
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Post by podunk »

AMD Sempron 3100
1 Gig Ram
Radeon 256 meg vid card
Win XP home - latest patches
DSL broadband

It's much better! Faster I mean. Did you make the AI smarter? It seems the bad guys are smarter about rotating out to heal. as someone commented before - its when you get to the Lost general that things get slow, so I started there.

I loaded The Lost General from 1.1.7 At the start
1 min 8 seconds per turn
Mem used 140,564
Page file 477 megs

By the end of the scene
1:14 per turn
Mem Used 207,044
Page file 520

Hasty Aliance (Version 1.1.8)
Times ranged from 1:08 to 1:20 (getting longer as you go on)
Mem used 287,044
Page file 576

Moved on to Scepter of Fire but didn't play. It took 1:19 to save the game
Mem used 316,832
Page file 605

I loaded Home of North Elves 1.1.7 - sorry just timed it, hadn't thought about checking task manager at that point. It's much faster than 1.1.7 ranging between 2:18 at the start ramping up to 2:31 by turn 8.

It's sort of strange? I would think the part that would take longest would be while the AI was thinking out it's moves - but it's the bit after the AI that takes up around 50% of the times. The little movement indicators on your units turn green, cpu usage shoots from around 45% to 100% and stays there until the turn bell.

It's much much faster! Thank you!
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Yogibear
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Post by Yogibear »

This description sounds very much like the autosaves are major part of the problem. This will be one of the next things i have a look at.
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podunk
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Post by podunk »

First of all - the info in my earlier post on this was incomplete. Where I said:
Mem used 140,564

It should have said
Mem used 140,564K - the k means that is 140 megs of memory?!?

After playing for about an hour it ran up to 316 megs of ram? Most computers off the shelf don't have 300 megs of ram. :-)

Just for the halibut, I installed Wesnoth on my old computer which is
AMD Althon 2600
512 Ram
Integrated video controller using 64 megs of system Ram
Win 98 Se

It ran fine. No hesitation. I copied Swamp of Dread from this computer and loaded it over on the old machine and it made 3 turns to every one turn on the Win XP home system.

Hope that helps, thank you for all the work!
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Post by Xan »

Just out of curiosity, I installed the official Windows binary for 1.1.8 on a 400Mhz Pentium 2, 128MB RAM.
Suprisingly (or not), I didn't think it was too bad, though certainly I know some people who would never want to play on it. :wink:

Attached is some timings from stderr; the last entry is particulary interesting.
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First_Run_stderr.txt
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zaimoni
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Post by zaimoni »

Yes.

PII doesn't have hardware branch prediction, so the code may need to be reviewed for how well it interacts with P4 or higher branch prediction.
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