Gaming Performance Tweaks I reached the 40000 characters long limit for this post, so I have to split it in two. Gaming Performance Tweaks: http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=327922 Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Tweaks: http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=341406 BIOS Disable High Precision Event Timer (HPET) Disable CPU Enhanced Halt (C1E), EIST (SpeedStep) & Cool'n'Quiet Disable Intel Hyperthreading This is a controversial tweak with some conflicting results. Keeping Hyperthreading enabled and disabling Core Parking / optimizing Power Management (see Windows section below) is probably a lot more beneficial. Set Performance Enhance/Mode to higher than Standard for faster memory timings Set Robust Graphic Booster / PEG Link higher than Auto Set CPU PLL Voltage to the most conservative option (Normal) This will improve your overclock reliability. More doesn't traduce to better for this setting. CPU/PCI-E Clock Drive, CPU/MCH Clock Skew: keep them to the lowest possible (lower is better) I won't touch more about overclocking, the web is full of ressources on the topic. Maybe the best community on it is here: Overclock.net - Overclocking.net. Disable integrated audio device if you use an add-on soundcard Disable all unused integrated peripherals (Network, Serial, Parallel Ports, etc.) Drivers Apply all latest drivers for your hardware: Station-Drivers: le site de drivers, bios, firmwares avec un forum d'aide. Intel Chipset Device Software installer is buggy, follow this procedure to improve your system responsiveness A LOT. More complete method by creating a shortcut (image link). AMD Catalyst Von Modded TwL's AMD Catalyst modified drivers Latest official AMD Catalyst drivers Latest AMD Catalyst Application Profiles Remove AMD CCC.exe from automatic startup and/or kill process CCC.exe & MOM.exe before gaming (single card & CrossFireX) AMD improved image quality settings you may apply with minimal performance loss: Anti-Aliasing Mode> Enhance application settings Anti-Aliasing Mode> Morphological filtering Anti-Aliasing Filter> Edge-detect Texture Filtering Quality> High Quality Adaptive Anti-Aliasing> Quality> Method Super-sampling> Enabled Check your LCD monitor (physical) settings for best pixel response times, ensure you have a good overdrive technology Enabling AMD LCD Overdrive can reduce input lag on certain LCD panels (Even if preview image fail to load, you can still enable overdrive, just click cancel for preview) Latest NVIDIA Drivers Downloads Go into your control panel and uninstall NVIDIA Stereoscopic 3D driver, you should get a FPS increase NVIDIA improved image quality settings you may apply with minimal performance loss: Antialiasing - Transparency> Supersampling Maximum Pre-Rendered Frames> 0 (minimizing first person shooters visual latency, optimizing hit registration) Multi-display/mixed-GPU acceleration> Single display performance mode (if only one screen) Texture filtering - Quality> High quality Threaded optimization> On Fernando's Optimized NVIDIA nForce Driver Packs brainbit's Unified ASUS Xonar Drivers (low DPC latency) PAX's Tweaked Drivers for Creative Soundcards Disable unused audio devices (like ATI HDMI) in Device Manager Configure Playback/Recording devices with a right-click to the Volume Mixer, then configure audio card specific tray icon. Always select 2/2.1 Speakers for your headphones if you want full dynamic range. Reduce your audio sample rate to 16 bit, 48000 Hz to improve network to cpu prioritization and to reduce DPC latency. How to enable Creative Virtual Surround Sound for Headphones (X-Fi CMSS-3D) How to enable Virtual Surround Sound for Headphones on C-Media based and Asus Xonar soundcards Rerun Windows System Assessment Tool (WinSAT) after updating drivers, changing hardwares or overclocking: Open a command prompt, type "winsat formal -restart clean" Windows Keep your Windows up-to-date An update is available for Windows 7 and for Windows Server 2008 R2 which provides new functionality and performance improvements for the graphics platform Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1 (KB976932) To successfully install Win7 SP1, if you get errors, you may need this: System Update Readiness Tool for Windows 7 for x64-based Systems (KB947821) System Update Readiness Tool for Windows 7 for x86-based Systems (KB947821) Ensure your system files aren't corrupt by using System File Checker Start Menu> Run> Open a Command Prompt, type "cmd"> then type "sfc /scannow". Reboot when finished. The operating system may crash when you run a D3D application full-screen in an immediate mode on Windows 7 or on Windows Server 2008 R2 HOTFIX How to change limited account to administrator Basic optimization suggestions More good tweaks SSD Guide & FAQ Improve your programs/games loading time by disabling your paging file Minimum 4GB memory recommended About hard pagefaults Disable Windows Resource Exhaustion Detection and Resolution (RADAR) Disable Core Parking Windows 7 Tweak may improve performance You can show those hidden processor performance settings in your Control Panel\System and Security\Power Options\Edit Plan Settings\Advanced Power Options this way: First if you applied above registry edit already, set the ValueMax again to it original value: 00000064, this is REQUIRED for the current solution to work. Now re-open regedit, go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00 Export a copy of this selected branch as safeguard Navigate the subkeys, switch the "Attribute" value from 1 to 0 for every subkey you want to appear in Advanced Power Options. The key ones you probably want to view there are: 0cc5b647-c1df-4637-891a-dec35c318583 "Processor performance core parking min cores" SET IT TO 100% so no cores will park. 3b04d4fd-1cc7-4f23-ab1c-d1337819c4bb "Allow Throttle States" Off Processor Power Management in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 docx should be read before finicking too much with those hidden settings. Additional infos. I uploaded for you guys the latest pwrtest.exe from Windows Driver Kit Version 7.1.0 so you can check your own cpu spec with the command "pwrtest /info:all": Multiupload.com - upload your files to multiple file hosting sites! A last warning: don't disable Processor Idle, this will only increase your cpu temperature, wear & tear and energy bill without performance gain. Turn Off Search Indexer Turn off Remote Differential Compression Start › Control panel › programs › turn windows features on or off › uncheck Remote Differential Compression › ok This makes file transfers (copy, move) faster by turning off “Remote Differential Compression” (RDC). Copying a 1.91 GB folder from the main HDD to a folder on an external USB drive resulting in with RDC turned on: 3:23 - three minutes and 23 seconds. With RDC turned off: 2:25 – two minutes and 25 seconds. Windows Features Control Panel> Programs> Programs and Features> Turn Windows features on or off You can turn off everything EXCEPT: Windows Media Player/Center (if you use it) Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.1 (even if you installed .Net 4, you still need it) Windows Fax and Scan (if you use it) Windows Search (Disabled in Services below, turning it off here is bad idea, it remove search window in explorer) Disable the Windows Customer Experience Improvement Program Task Scheduler List of tasks to disable (privacy & "do not annoy my system") \Microsoft\Windows\Application Experience> AitAgent, ProgramDataUpdater \Microsoft\Windows\Autochk> Proxy \Microsoft\Windows\Customer Experience Improvement Program> Consolidator, KernelCeipTask, UsbCeip \Microsoft\Windows\DiskDiagnostic> Microsoft-Windows-DiskDiagnosticDataCollector \Microsoft\Windows\Maintenance> WinSAT \Microsoft\Windows\SystemRestore> SR \Microsoft\Windows\WindowsBackup> ConfigNotification \Microsoft\Windows Defender> MP Scheduled Scan Set drivers and system code to remain in physical memory (DisablePagingExecutive=1) Windows 7 Ping Spikes [FIX] (NetworkThrottlingIndex=FFFFFFFF hex) Boost your Multimedia Class Scheduler Service (MMCSS) games tasks priorities Code: Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Multimedia\SystemProfile] "NetworkThrottlingIndex"=dword:ffffffff "SystemResponsiveness"=dword:00000000 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Multimedia\SystemProfile\Tasks\Games] "Scheduling Category"="High" "SFIO Priority"="High" "Background Only"="False" "Priority"=dword:00000001 "Clock Rate"=dword:00002710 "GPU Priority"=dword:00000001 "Affinity"=dword:00000000 Copy & paste above codes to a new text document, save it [the name you want].reg, click to import in registry. For your convenience you can also download the default and optimized registry files here: Multiupload.com - upload your files to multiple file hosting sites! You can edit other task categories with it if needed. Remove Multimedia Class Scheduler Service from Windows Audio Service (AudioSrv) dependencies so you could stop and disable MMCSS completely Stop non-essential services with the help of SMART (Service Management And RealEasy Tweaking) Utility v2.0 Consult Black Viper's Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Service Configurations to know more what is best for you. Personally I apply SMART Advanced Tweaks because I don't share files via network between my computers (I use eSata HDD and USB Flash drives). Then I edit all services not keep Automatic Startup by SMART as Manual, EXCEPT: Multimedia Class Scheduler Disabled Remote Registry Disabled Windows Search Disabled The result after reboot look like this: Code: Name Status Startup Type COM+ Event System Started Automatic Cryptographic Services Started Automatic DCOM Server Process Launcher Started Automatic DHCP Client Started Automatic Group Policy Client Started Automatic Microsoft .NET Framework NGEN v4.0.30319_X64 Started Automatic (Delayed Start) Microsoft .NET Framework NGEN v4.0.30319_X86 Started Automatic (Delayed Start) Network Location Awareness Started Automatic Network Store Interface Service Started Automatic Plug and Play Started Automatic PnkBstrA Started Automatic Power Started Automatic Print Spooler Started Automatic Remote Procedure Call (RPC) Started Automatic RPC Endpoint Mapper Started Automatic Security Accounts Manager Started Automatic Server Started Automatic Shell Hardware Detection Started Automatic Software Protection Automatic Superfetch Started Automatic System Event Notification Service Started Automatic Task Scheduler Started Automatic User Profile Service Started Automatic Windows Audio Started Automatic Windows Audio Endpoint Builder Started Automatic Windows Event Log Started Automatic Windows Management Instrumentation Started Automatic Workstation Started Automatic Multimedia Class Scheduler Disabled Remote Registry Disabled Windows Search Disabled ActiveX Installer (AxInstSV) Manual Adaptive Brightness Manual AMD External Events Utility Manual Application Experience Manual Application Identity Manual Application Information Manual Application Layer Gateway Service Manual Application Management Manual ASP.NET State Service Manual Background Intelligent Transfer Service Manual Base Filtering Engine Manual BitLocker Drive Encryption Service Manual Block Level Backup Engine Service Manual Bluetooth Support Service Manual BranchCache Manual Certificate Propagation Manual CNG Key Isolation Manual COM+ System Application Manual Computer Browser Manual Credential Manager Manual Desktop Window Manager Session Manager Manual Diagnostic Policy Service Manual Diagnostic Service Host Manual Diagnostic System Host Manual Disk Defragmenter Manual Distributed Link Tracking Client Manual Distributed Transaction Coordinator Manual DNS Client Manual Encrypting File System (EFS) Manual Extensible Authentication Protocol Manual Function Discovery Provider Host Started Manual Function Discovery Resource Publication Started Manual Health Key and Certificate Management Manual HomeGroup Listener Manual HomeGroup Provider Started Manual Human Interface Device Access Started Manual IKE and AuthIP IPsec Keying Modules Manual InstallDriver Table Manager Manual Intel(R) PROSet Monitoring Service Manual Interactive Services Detection Manual Internet Connection Sharing (ICS) Manual IP Helper Manual IPsec Policy Agent Manual KtmRm for Distributed Transaction Coordinator Manual Link-Layer Topology Discovery Mapper Manual Logitech Bluetooth Service Manual Microsoft .NET Framework NGEN v2.0.50727_X64 Manual Microsoft .NET Framework NGEN v2.0.50727_X86 Manual Microsoft Antimalware Service Manual Microsoft iSCSI Initiator Service Manual Microsoft Network Inspection Manual Microsoft Software Shadow Copy Provider Manual Net.Msmq Listener Adapter Manual Net.Pipe Listener Adapter Manual Net.Tcp Listener Adapter Manual Net.Tcp Port Sharing Service Manual Netlogon Manual Network Access Protection Agent Manual Network Connections Started Manual Network List Service Started Manual Offline Files Manual Parental Controls Manual Peer Name Resolution Protocol Manual Peer Networking Grouping Manual Peer Networking Identity Manager Manual Performance Counter DLL Host Manual Performance Logs & Alerts Manual PnP-X IP Bus Enumerator Manual PNRP Machine Name Publication Service Manual Portable Device Enumerator Service Started Manual Problem Reports and Solutions Control Panel Support Manual Program Compatibility Assistant Service Started Manual Protected Storage Started Manual Quality Windows Audio Video Experience Manual Remote Access Auto Connection Manager Manual Remote Access Connection Manager Manual Remote Desktop Configuration Manual Remote Desktop Services Manual Remote Desktop Services UserMode Port RedirectorManual Remote Procedure Call (RPC) Locator Manual Routing and Remote Access Manual Secondary Logon Manual Secure Socket Tunneling Protocol Service Manual Security Center Manual Smart Card Manual Smart Card Removal Policy Manual SNMP Trap Manual SPP Notification Service Manual SSDP Discovery Started Manual Steam Client Service Manual Tablet PC Input Service Manual TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper Started Manual Telephony Manual Themes Manual Thread Ordering Server Manual TPM Base Services Manual UPnP Device Host Manual Virtual Disk Manual Volume Shadow Copy Manual WebClient Manual Windows Backup Manual Windows Biometric Service Manual Windows CardSpace Manual Windows Color System Manual Windows Connect Now - Config Registrar Started Manual Windows Defender Manual Windows Driver Foundation - User-mode Driver Framework Started Manual Windows Error Reporting Service Manual Windows Event Collector Manual Windows Firewall Manual Windows Font Cache Service Manual Windows Image Acquisition (WIA) Manual Windows Installer Manual Windows Modules Installer Manual Windows Presentation Foundation Font Cache 3.0.0.0 Manual Windows Remote Management (WS-Management) Manual Windows Time Manual Windows Update Manual WinHTTP Web Proxy Auto-Discovery Service Manual Wired AutoConfig Manual WLAN AutoConfig Manual WMI Performance Adapter Manual WWAN AutoConfig Manual If you don't mind about Aero, Desktop Window Manager Session Manager stopped/disabled give an impressive snappiness feeling to 2D (desktop) and mouse movement. Stop Microsoft Antimalware Service if you use the excellent Microsoft Security Essentials as anti-virus before entering a game. Even with real-time protection turned off, the service manage to interfere/scan periodically causing choppiness and important fps drops. Disable Windows Defender, type "defender" in Start Menu search window to find it Disable anti-virus before gaming, some anti-virus cause high DPC latency Stop any services or processes associated to other non-essential applications before gaming Disable Windows Firewall if you are behind a router Network Get a router compatible with Tomato USB firmware, Toastman's Collection highly recommended! (Best router is Asus RT-N16) Disable "Inbound Layer 7" in your router. Layer 7 filtering or shaping is identifying traffic at layer 7 (Application Layer) of the OSI model. Instead of shaping/filtering based on the port and source/destination, you are identifying a stream based on its contents. This is also sometimes called deep packet inspection since it works by looking into the contents of the packets not just the headers. If you're concerned about performance: IPP2P and especially L7 are slower than simple IP, MAC or port matches. L7 can't cope well with encrypted P2P traffic in background while gaming. Enable SYN cookies in your router If you look into Performance Monitor (Start Menu> Search), you'll see some IPv6 interfaces hooked to your real running network adapter(s). Disable IPv6 tunnel adapter & interfaces By the way, if Performance Monitor report you some performance counters are disabled, open a Command Prompt (Start Menu> Run> type "cmd" or Start Menu> Search type "cmd"), type "lodctr /r" to refresh/re-enable them all. Disable unused network adapters and IPv6 related interfaces in Device Manager, tick "Show hidden device" in Device Manager View tab to show them all Disable all ISATAP, 6to4 and Teredo Tunneling interfaces Go to your network adapter properties, disable Flow Control and Interrupt Moderation Latest Intel NIC drivers properties> Receive Side Scaling Queues: set to max Realtek & Nvidia NIC drivers properties> Large Send Offload V2 (IPv4): Enable Control Panel\Network and Internet\Network and Sharing Center> Connection> Properties: disable TCP/IPv6 to fix lag spikes, disable everything except TCP/IPv4 if you don't share with other LAN computers Apply the SG Vista TCP/IP Patch Detailed article: SpeedGuide.net :: Windows 7, Vista, 2008 Tweaks Apply the SG TCP Optimizer You should use optimal settings + TcpAckFrequency=1, TcpNoDelay=1 DO NOT activate LargeSystemCache, you may experience a severe, random decrease in performance and random burst of lag ecncapability=disabled or you won't be able to log into EA Online Disable Nagle's algorithm (TcpNoDelay, TcpAckFrequency), alternative tool Disabling "nagling" allows for very small packets to be transferred immediately without delay. Note that disabling Nagle's algorithm is only recommended for some games, and it may have negative impact on file transfers/throughput Softwares Maximize your Windows timer resolution with Timer Resolution (free v1.2 work for Vista & Win7 too). Just keeping this little application open in the background will reduce DPC latency, improve responsiveness. Increases system responsiveness and helps to prevents system stalls with Process Lasso. Gaming Mode highly recommended! Alternatively you can manually edit and save processes priority with Prio - Process Priority Saver and boost foreground application AboveNormal with TopWinPrio. Defrag your HDDs with UltimateDefrag. Best defragger around BY LARGE, you can manually select which files/folders to place on HDD outer rings (fastest) or leave the program do an awesome job automatically with Last Access Time Stamp enabled. Prevent fragmentation and reduce disk accesses (I/Os) in real-time with Diskeeper 2011 Pro Premier IntelliWrite, I-FAAST & HyperFast. I use both, Diskeeper for 24/7 real-time management of my workstation and UltimateDefrag for optimal files placement of my Steam/games eSata portable HDD! Essential Softwares (ES) 7-Zip WinRAR DirectX End-User Runtimes Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable Package (x86) Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable Package (x64) Microsoft .NET Framework 4 Microsoft Silverlight Microsoft Security Essentials Avira AntiVir Personal Java Runtime Environment Adobe Flash Player Adobe Shockwave Player Adobe AIR Sumatra PDF Reader Opera SRWare Iron Shark007's Codec Packs Media Player Classic Home Cinema VLC GIGATweaker TweakNow PowerPack 2011 AIDA64 FRAPS MSI Afterburner & Kombustor FurMark DPC Latency Checker Resplendence Advanced System Tools LinX Steam TeamSpeak Ventrilo Mumble CDBurnerXP Google Earth The TweakGuides Tweaking Companion (TGTC) Alternate download site for ES How to deal with suspicious files, recovering the goods without getting the s**t Test files or compressed files containers (rar, zip) with online multi-engines antivirus scanners (best analysis): VirSCAN.org - Free Multi-Engine Online Virus Scanner v1.02, Supports 37 AntiVirus Engines! VirusTotal - Free Online Virus, Malware and URL Scanner Jotti's malware scan Try to disinfect the file(s) with Dr.Web CureIt! Run suspicious files sandboxed with Sandboxie. Delete your sandbox content immediately after use. Complete PunkBuster Updating Fix a lot of CTD (crash to desktop), freeze/hard lock-up and others issues Uninstall PunkBuster Service with latest PunkBuster Service Setup (pbsvc.exe) Go to your game folder, locate the "pb" folder Delete the content of the "pb" folder but DO NOT delete the folder itself In Windows Vista & 7, PunkBuster copies files from the game PB folder to another commonly located at C:\Users\<User>\AppData\Local\PunkBuster\<Game>\pb\ However PB Setup updates the files located in the game PB folder by default and sometimes fails to copy the updated files Delete the content of the "pb" folder in C:\Users\<User>\AppData\Local\PunkBuster\<Game>\pb\ Just change <Game> to the game you are having issues with (ex BC2) Re-Install PunkBuster Service with latest PunkBuster Service Setup (pbsvc.exe) Now you can manually update the PB folders using PBSetup (pbsetup.exe) Run PunkBuster as an Administrator Start a game using PunkBuster Press Ctrl-Alt-Del> Start Task Manager> right-click process PnkBstrA.exe> Properties> Compatibility> Change settings for all users> tick "Run this program as an administrator"> Ok Repeat the same for PnkBstrB.exe PunkBuster FAQ
Reduce your audio sample rate to 16 bit, 44100 Hz or 48000 Hz to improve network to cpu prioritization. could to detail a little more on that? (i mean, why is that way) and what's the bad-effect of that? (if there is one)
Having tried what he suggested with the TCP / IP settings, I can confirm my SpeedTests results fell in half.
http://www.betanews.com/article/Mic...scovery-of-Vista-Network-Slowdowns/1188244273 You won't hear the difference, but you may leave it 24 bit 96k if you want. Optimizing is about setting a lot of little things that change sometime not much.
Yes disabling Nagle's algorithm improve latency for some games but reduce overall throughput. Go back to TcpAckFrequency=0, TcpNoDelay=0 if you want your full speed. It's not as bad SpeedTest report it, I get the same result that you but TcpAckFrequency=0, TcpNoDelay=0 i get 500KB/s with a "real" download. TcpAckFrequency=1, TcpNoDelay=1 i get 450KB/s with a "real" download. So you lose 10% speed "in real life".
Isnt slim DX just for devs or it has benefit over normal DX? and why is a windows activation workaround tool linked? whats a piracy tool have to do with performance tweaks?
Tests before and after this tweaks (i've got many before bcs i've upgraded to 10mb and didnt know which real speed i had ) Upload speed its the same, and i dont care about download one, not a hungry downloader and 1mb/s its enuf xP. The ones @ day 29 its with tweaks applied. It says "average ping", it does 5tests to 5 countires.
done xP: Media ping = average ping Media rutas = average routing (i guess its the time spent of stabilishing conection) Velocidad descarga/subida = Download/upload speed.
ping average was between 120 and 130 (usually around 126) Now its usually around 118-120 Routing its almost the same (did more than the ones @ screen). Download speed was average 8300kbps and now its 7800kbps. Upload speed its the same.
altho i restored nagle alg. (tcp nodelay and ackfreq to defaults) and now im getting that download speed... I guess im sync at less speed that other days. i guess the speedtest im using doesnt get affected by that algorithm now i get back to 8xxx speeds bcs ping its also back to 12x
Some games need it, softwares section is just a commodity, essential ones that almost anyone should have for a complete general/gamer system.