How to improve performance

[Bartman]

OK, my GM has asked me to enter my character into Designer format and I am using the opportunity to test drive the app to see if I want to purchase a copy of myself as well. All in all it seems to do pretty much what I want and expect. But by the time I was finishing up entering my character I was having a 10+ second lag between clicking an item and having somthing happen. It sounds from the other posts here that this is not unprecedented. Is there anything I can do to speed this up?

In case it matters I am running it on a 1.4GHz Pentium 4 w/ 512MB RAM and Windows XP Pro as the OS. Any ideas would be appreciated.

[JohnTaber]

Hi Bartman: I have found that my setup drags if I open and close several characters OR when I create several characters without closing the app between. My suggestion as another end user is to ALWAYS close all open characters before exiting the app AND to close and reopen the app between character creations. Simply...when it gets slow close HD and reopen it. Helps LOTS on my P3/450 rig... ;)

[Ghost Archer]

I don't think I have every had to close MetaCreator to make it run faster and it never seems to mind if I have a dozen characters open all at once. Hmm . . . sorry, just stirring the pot a bit.

[Jhamin]

Originally posted by Ghost Archer
I don't think I have every had to close MetaCreator to make it run faster and it never seems to mind if I have a dozen characters open all at once. Hmm . . . sorry, just stirring the pot a bit.

Wow.

I see it all differently now.

My whole world view has changed.

Why oh why did you not post that months ago.

You have converted me to the one true program.

Know anywere that still sells it?

Oh well, back to the supported product that 99.9% of the people in this forum are interested in.

[ProfessorM@ss]

Originally posted by Bartman
OK, my GM has asked me to enter my character into Designer format and I am using the opportunity to test drive the app to see if I want to purchase a copy of myself as well. All in all it seems to do pretty much what I want and expect. But by the time I was finishing up entering my character I was having a 10+ second lag between clicking an item and having somthing happen. It sounds from the other posts here that this is not unprecedented. Is there anything I can do to speed this up?

In case it matters I am running it on a 1.4GHz Pentium 4 w/ 512MB RAM and Windows XP Pro as the OS. Any ideas would be appreciated.

Dan, for the record, this is precisely the same sort of behavior I was experiencing on my Win2k box, with 1.4 ghz and a 512 MB of RAM.

--->M@ss

[Simon]

Originally posted by Bartman
OK, my GM has asked me to enter my character into Designer format and I am using the opportunity to test drive the app to see if I want to purchase a copy of myself as well. All in all it seems to do pretty much what I want and expect. But by the time I was finishing up entering my character I was having a 10+ second lag between clicking an item and having somthing happen. It sounds from the other posts here that this is not unprecedented. Is there anything I can do to speed this up?

In case it matters I am running it on a 1.4GHz Pentium 4 w/ 512MB RAM and Windows XP Pro as the OS. Any ideas would be appreciated.

Well...a couple of things:

1) What version of the app are you running?

2) Please post (or email) the file trace.log from your install directory. Please do this after a slowdown (but before you restart HD). It's important that you not restart HD before sending the file, as it is over-written each time HD runs.

[Bartman]

Originally posted by dsimon
Well...a couple of things:

1) What version of the app are you running?

2) Please post (or email) the file trace.log from your install directory. Please do this after a slowdown (but before you restart HD). It's important that you not restart HD before sending the file, as it is over-written each time HD runs.

1) Version 1.31
2) Attached (renamed because the board wouldn't take .log as an acceptable file type)

I was in the character for only a couple of minutes this time before it started again. I deleted a series of only in HID characteristics and then recreated them. By the time I was done doing so each click was taking 2-3 seconds to register. Then when I clicked to open the skills tab, I was able to slowly count to 8 before it opened.

Thanks for the rapid attention.

[Simon]

Hrrrmm...I don't show you as even being close to the max memory that HD is allowed to take up.

The situation that you're describing sounds like the Java virtual machine churning on memory "garbage collection"...basically freeing up the memory used by old/obsolete objects. But that shouldn't happen until Java has reached its max, which the launcher sets to 128MB...and even then, it shouldn't "churn" on it...

What other applications are you running at the same time as HD? Anything that would have a heavy load on either your memory or the CPU?

What does your task manager show as the overall CPU and memory utilization on your system when HD starts to slow down?

[Bartman]

Both CPU and memory are well within limits. I'm not sitting at home at the moment so I can't give you exact numbers but both were about as low as I ever see them. On all occasions the only other things I had up were a browser window (IE6) and a couple of FTP sessions. Once Designer screeched to a halt, I did do some checks and even when Designer was completely choaking my memory hog apps like Photoshop looked completely normal.

[TechnoViking]

I would start with a basic scandisk qand defrag. I have notice that Java based apps (Hero Designer, Vampire PC game) areextra sensetive to a fragmented hard drive.

Mike

[Simon]

Hrrrm....odder and odder.

Ok, first off, I should probably elaborate a little bit:

What you're seeing is something which only a few people have reported. It seems to be a system-level thing where Java simply does not act the way it should.

I've had two other reports of behavior like this since HD was released (note: this does not include folks running low-end systems who report a "slow down" when building Dr. Destroyer with 10 prefabs open).

If you're willing, there's a couple of things that I'd like you to try...I'll explain the reasoning a bit:

I have seen an issue with Java slowing down on one of my own systems once in the past 7 years. It happened about a year ago, where all of my Java apps just started to become extremely slow and would appear to get "overloaded" very easily.

The problem would appear to have been an issue with the Java installation that I had recently put on my machine....even though most of the apps were running off of a different installation.

So, what I'd like for you to do is the following:

1. Uninstall all versions of Java from your system. Including HD and any "standalone" JVMs that you have.

2. Re-install a standalone JVM from Sun. You can get the installer at http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/download.html

3. Re-install HD.

Let's see if that clears up the issue for you at all.

Also, if you could try working on the same character on a different machine (can even be a lower-end box) and let me know if you see the same behavior, that would help....

I apologize for the difficulty, but this is a very hard one to track down, as it does not appear to be a "code issue", but rather an issue between the operating system and Java.

[Bartman]

Sounds good to me. I will folow your steps on the XP machine. And I'll slap it on my laptop and give it a run there. I'll post some results tonight or tomorrow.

Thanks for the help so far.

[ProfessorM@ss]

Originally posted by dsimon
The problem would appear to have been an issue with the Java installation that I had recently put on my machine....even though most of the apps were running off of a different installation.

Interesting.

So, here's what I did. I followed your instructions. And then tried HD. Muuuuch faster. Then I uninstalled the 1.4.1 runtime and reinstalled the 1.4.0 -- much slower.

I then repeated your instructions, and added in the 1.4.1 SDK, J2EE SDK, and all the other Java goodies I had.

HD is still faster! I've noticed some issues with mouse selection in the app (doesn't always like doubleclicks, and rarely selects what I want in the left-hand pane on the first click), but all told, the application mucho faster. It appears to have been a problem with 1.4.0 runtime on Win2k, in my case.

--->M@ss

[Simon]

Originally posted by ProfessorM@ss
Interesting.

So, here's what I did. I followed your instructions. And then tried HD. Muuuuch faster. Then I uninstalled the 1.4.1 runtime and reinstalled the 1.4.0 -- much slower.

I then repeated your instructions, and added in the 1.4.1 SDK, J2EE SDK, and all the other Java goodies I had.

HD is still faster! I've noticed some issues with mouse selection in the app (doesn't always like doubleclicks, and rarely selects what I want in the left-hand pane on the first click), but all told, the application mucho faster. It appears to have been a problem with 1.4.0 runtime on Win2k, in my case.

--->M@ss

Very interesting. Thank you very much for running that and giving the feedback.

The odd part is that HD includes its own copy of the 1.4.1 JRE....so apparently just having 1.4.0 installed on your system will slow all other JVMs down as well. Very odd, though it does match what I've seen in the few other instances that have had this problem.

Hopefully this will fix the other folks' problems as well.....

Thanks again!

[schir1964]

Originally posted by Jhamin
...Know anywere that still sells it?

Oh well, back to the supported product that 99.9% of the people in this forum are interested in.
Since you asked...

Metacreator is sold and supported at: www.alteregosoftware.com

Hero 5th Edition Template is free and supported by: ME (schir1964@netzero.net).

This Template was available to anyone who asked for it in August, 2002. You will find posts from me last fall stating as much under the Software section of this BBS.

Any questions? I thought not. (8^D)

- Christopher Mullins

[Ghost Archer]

Originally posted by Jhamin
Oh well, back to the supported product that 99.9% of the people in this forum are interested in.

Since Chris and I still support MC does that drop the percentage down to 99.8%?

[Bartman]

Explicitly installing Sun's JRE seems to have resolved the issue completely. Thanks for the prompt and effective support.

[Simon]

Originally posted by Bartman
Explicitly installing Sun's JRE seems to have resolved the issue completely. Thanks for the prompt and effective support.

Very cool!

I'll definitely have to tuck this one away as a Useful Tidbit™.

I've picked up a few of them during the release of this app....this is the largest "public" distribution of a Java app that I've been through....there have been some interesting issues crop up.

Thanks for bearing with me!

[lemming]

Originally posted by Bartman
Explicitly installing Sun's JRE seems to have resolved the issue completely. Thanks for the prompt and effective support.

Hmm. Not the only system that this seems to have helped. Gentoo Linux won't run the Hero Designer as distributed by Hero. Though in that case it's a compatibility issue with libraries.

[DoctorItron]

Originally posted by Bartman
Explicitly installing Sun's JRE seems to have resolved the issue completely. Thanks for the prompt and effective support.

Thanks for the advice. I'm getting "memory thrashing" problems on 2 different PCs. One PC has only 128 MB, so I'm not surprised at slow performance. The other PC has 512 MB, yet performs scarcely better than the 128 MB machine. The HD memory usage jumps up and down every time I change tabs (i.e. Background, Characteristics, Powers, Skills, Talents, etc.). It's not unusual to wait ~ 20 seconds each time I click.

Hopefully the full JRE install will improve performance.

[Simon]

Originally posted by DoctorItron
Thanks for the advice. I'm getting "memory thrashing" problems on 2 different PCs. One PC has only 128 MB, so I'm not surprised at slow performance. The other PC has 512 MB, yet performs scarcely better than the 128 MB machine. The HD memory usage jumps up and down every time I change tabs (i.e. Background, Characteristics, Powers, Skills, Talents, etc.). It's not unusual to wait ~ 20 seconds each time I click.

Hopefully the full JRE install will improve performance.

I'd recommend uninstalling any existing JREs before you install the new one from Sun. This seems to be an issue with an existing JRE horking all others on your system (HD uses its own regardless of what you install)....best to just clear them all out to be safe and install a new one.

[zornwil]

Originally posted by Ghost Archer
Since Chris and I still support MC does that drop the percentage down to 99.8%?

99.7% even :D

[Jhamin]

Originally posted by Ghost Archer
Since Chris and I still support MC does that drop the percentage down to 99.8%?

Ok, that was a little mean and ignorant of me. :(

It just seemed a little unhelpful when somebody was asking for help and one of the first replies was along the lines of "if you used my software instead of the one this board is dedicated to you would be better off"

I was irritated and got way more nasty than was warrented.

My apologies.

[schir1964]

Just trying to keep the misinformation down to a minimum. (8^D)

- Christopher Mullins

[Killer Shrike]

Kool. I was having this problem as well on a 2.2Ghz w/ 512 MB but figured it was just a memory leak and consigned myself to close and reopening the app when it got sluggish.

Turned out I had JRE 1.3.6 installed :rolleyes:

Dumped that and installed 1.4.1 and HD seems much happier. I stress tested it by opening Dr Destroyer, Dark Seraph, and a half dozen other CKC characters and the app did not exhibit the behavior it was previously showing (1 good sized character would bring it to a crawl, much less 6).

Thanx!

[Patriot]

I must be doing something wrong....


I have tried the Java Fix , and yes i did have an older version
I followed your directions as best i could(Un-installed every java file i could find)

re-installed everything

It worked better for a while, after about an hour , it started boging down again, with only one character open

I am Using
Windows XP
2.0 Ghz processer
128 ram
And version 1.35

[Simon]

Originally posted by Patriot
I must be doing something wrong....


I have tried the Java Fix , and yes i did have an older version
I followed your directions as best i could(Un-installed every java file i could find)

re-installed everything

It worked better for a while, after about an hour , it started boging down again, with only one character open

I am Using
Windows XP
2.0 Ghz processer
128 ram
And version 1.35

When you say you "uninstalled every Java file you could find" what exactly do you mean?

What you need to do is to go to the Control Panel -> Add or Remove Programs and uninstall all Java versions that you have installed. That will remove the registry entries that seem to be causing difficulties.

Once you do that, you can reinstall Java 1.4.1 (from the Sun website -- www.java.sun.com) so that you have Java available on your system (for your browsers, etc) and then reinstall HD.

With only 128 MB of RAM, you're running at the bare minimum for the app, so it's never going to be completely smooth. Parsing a DOM or SAX XML document takes a fair bit of RAM to accomplish....but it should work and should gradually bog down on you anymore.

[Patriot]

I Have done what you stated, so I guess, when i get a job, i need to upgrade .

[Killer Shrike]

Huh. Ok, well, all seemed well for a good stretch after removing the older JRE, but after an extended period of use (about an hour) I started getting the slowdown problem again.

2.26 Ghz P4 Alienware w 2x 256Mb (512 total) PC800 RDRAM Windows XP

v 1.36 HD, 1 character open. Not even a complete character at that, just a powers list I was prepping for a preFab.

[Patriot]

Glad i"m not the only one...

[DoctorItron]

Sun tries to get people to use Java, then implements a run-time environment with assorted memory problems. Almost makes me think that Microsoft isn't so bad.

Dan, I haven't touched Java for 14 months. I recall that there are some memory management switches for JRE. Do you think we should start playing around with some of the defaults?

[Simon]

Originally posted by DoctorItron
Sun tries to get people to use Java, then implements a run-time environment with assorted memory problems. Almost makes me think that Microsoft isn't so bad.

Dan, I haven't touched Java for 14 months. I recall that there are some memory management switches for JRE. Do you think we should start playing around with some of the defaults?
Sun produces the Java specification and maintains the language...other companies produce JVMs which implement the specification.

There are a few issues with some JVMs on some systems (no where near all). This is no different from issues that exist with languages like C, C++, Python, VB, or any other.

The fix is an easy one, as detailed above.

HD (in its current incarnation) places a heavy load on the system. There are enough inter-linked abilities and interdependent calculations and enough SAX parsing that the memory and CPU load that HD exerts is not light. Some systems have a problem with this. It is entirely dependent on the individual system and the individual configuration as to how much of a slow down this will present.

There are several things that I'll be working on to ease the load that HD places on the system as I work on v2. I won't know how much of an effect I can have until I really get down to work, however, so I make no promises at this time.

I would not advise playing with memory settings unless you are very comfortable working with Java and want to play around a bit to see what you can find.