Threading CPU/GPU/Memory debug

[genetix]

<p>Have several questions which are probably million times asked on several million different forms and yet people probably never has got any other answer than 'we are working on it/them' or 'Yeah, it's not working'.</p><p><strong>1. Where is the number of physical CPUs game is threading to ?</strong></p><p>Notes: Game has 'cl_multicore' but only return is true, false, 0, 1.</p><p><strong>2. Why is the game only using maximum of 2 thread model for CPU in the first place when you can utilize 4-24 just as easily ?</strong></p><p>Notes: Debug the engine run and we will see that only thing ever threading the game any better is Intel / AMD balance loading.</p><p>Suggestion: If singular thread is only option or only option is to use singular thread + process some data at extra thread model currently (as seen on run time). Hopefully at least it would be possible to create an variable to assign 'Everquest2.exe' application process to cores we want to run the application at. Since of new LaunchPad 4.0 acts as an patcher and we can no longer assign without minimizing the application to free of utilization CPUs for EQ2 to work faster ex. cores 1 and 4. This would be extremely small patch to have simply "core detection" at Launchpad 4.0 and include check marked list(set affinity) of available cores to run Everquest 2 with defaulting to core 4 (backward supported to 2,1) as primary process thread.</p><p><strong>3a. Why aren't the 'Point Light Shadows' code updated to modern usage? </strong></p><p>Notes: Code is still the old code for CPU + it's a older model.</p><p><strong>3b.</strong> <strong>Why aren't the 'in-door shadows' code updated to modern usage?</strong></p><p>Notes: Code is still the old code for CPU.</p><p><strong>4. Is this software product debugged to memory leaks at all ?</strong></p><p>Notes: AMD has now introduced / provided memory pins from GPU as where NVIDIA had memory pin information provided since 2-3 years ago. Shouldn't be too hard to see how the software is utilizing the memory and we are talking about end users, 100 to 1 this information was on corporate world years ago.</p><p><strong>5. For last, how in the world is the game offline every day with nothing fixed?</strong></p><p>Notes: I am paying to play the game. I cannot play the game if the game is every day offlined and yet when the servers comes back alive and me reading the 'updates' there isn't a word ever about actual corrections to the engine we are running, but intead we have updates to servers or other game releated updates which should be priority 51 comparing to whole engine we are running. Of course it is understandable that Sony needed server updates not the users, but the fact that no updates were done before and probably not after the server switches / imports / combinations is just telling me that there was an designer working for 1 period of time to solve/quick fix a singular issue, but not for to develop it to final product.</p><p>----</p><p>Considering whole game being way below graphical level of todays modern graphics and should run very well on highend DirectX 9 card with Windows XP even linux and yet it fails to do so after 7 years of development. Wonder why should anyone believe that there would be an change to the game ever again. I did try to make this post as constructive criticism as I could, but I don't think posting debugger data of execution of the application and few pages of Windows/DX Error Report would exactly be the way to start the discussion. Any developer can debug the engine and I am pretty sure you guys have Intel Performance tools including AMD alternatives to do true debuging of the application.</p>

[Therendil]

<p>As far as threading goes, there seems to be a naive assumption that threading can be added to any application after the fact. In fact it must be designed in from the start. Adding it later means re-writing code pretty much from scratch. While SOE has rewritten a fair amount of EQ2, I think you can be very sure they are not going to rewrite the core engine at this point.</p><p>The reality for <em>any </em>game like EQ2 is that major upgrades that would require architecture changes just are not going to happen. We just have to wait for EverQuest Next to deliver the latest goodies. If you want to play the older game, you live with the limits imposed by decisions made years ago.</p>

[genetix]

<p><strong>@Theredil</strong></p><p>Yep, this is true some of the features or more of an utilized resources would need totally new design and modules on engine (GPU forwarded optimization/utilization) and that would only happen on new title, but the thing is EQ2 engine in a sense would be fine for multi-threading physics, effects, etc, threading model of shadows (GPU) and more importantly better clean data at streaming model (now speaking of graphical streaming not something you download). Architectural changes and something like 64-bit native executable (which EQ2 should have also) would not help the situation at all, if still no modifications to above mentioned engine functions would be made on streaming and threading model the memory gain would yet again give zero advantage not to even mention the total lose of L2/L3 cache in todays CPUs.</p><p>This is kinda also funny since like start of this week they disabled the Shader Model 3.0. Here:</p><p><a href="http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?topic_id=475005" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/...topic_id=475005</a></p><p>an devel talks about how good Shader Model 3.0 looks (and it does looks pretty good) which was never even completed and yet at year 2012 development version same issues occure all because of the singular feature designed to original game couldn't be disabled/debug out that easily on all zones as far I understood. Only way to actually do any of the above would be to go up in shader model and utilize new features as threaded.</p><p>but perhaps we get lucky and they would indeed be testing the SM3.0 soon enough for return it.</p><p><strong>@commonly</strong></p><p>If you answer something please answer with number on front of your answer.</p><p>Thank you.</p>

[Wingrider01]

<p>remember one thing - this is an online game played by a multitude of players, not all have nor can they afford the latest and greatest enhancement in gaming machine toys - it is logical that the game be coded to run on the lowest common denominator of hardware configurations, if you want to play something that will tax your super Hal 2000 gaming machine with the Nvida 5800000 and the 100 core procesor, play a standalone. Know people that are still playing on a Pentium 4,  a Nvidia 8400 GS, Windows XP and 1GB of memory. with the advent of F2P you will see more players with the lower end machines coming in to try the game</p>

[genetix]

<p><cite>Wingrider01 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>remember one thing - this is an online game played by a multitude of players, not all have nor can they afford the latest and greatest enhancement in gaming machine toys - it is logical that the game be coded to run on the lowest common denominator of hardware configurations, if you want to play something that will tax your super Hal 2000 gaming machine with the Nvida 5800000 and the 100 core procesor, play a standalone. Know people that are still playing on a Pentium 4,  a Nvidia 8400 GS, Windows XP and 1GB of memory. with the advent of F2P you will see more players with the lower end machines coming in to try the game</p></blockquote><p>Aren't you a bit now exaggerating<em> the fact what we are currently/been in past 8-10 years running?</em></p><p>Lowest possible hardward for past 8 years has been Shader model 3.0. Lowest Possible processor you can buy has had more than 1 core since netburst(May I remind you that was year 2000 it is now 2011) and lowest memory amount would be 1-8GB DDR1-2 and todays tech DDR3. We can have machine to spin Crysis with 300e, if not cheaper. Hell I have 50 euros machine in my desktop drawer which could spin EQ2 in what it can offer in full which anyone can buy with any used hardware department or website.</p><p>There's a difference where does the game default, scale and how well the engine is build to function in different setups. EQ2 has pretty wide variety of everything else except anything newer than 5 years.</p>

[TalisX1]

<p><cite>genetix wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Wingrider01 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>remember one thing - this is an online game played by a multitude of players, not all have nor can they afford the latest and greatest enhancement in gaming machine toys - it is logical that the game be coded to run on the lowest common denominator of hardware configurations, if you want to play something that will tax your super Hal 2000 gaming machine with the Nvida 5800000 and the 100 core procesor, play a standalone. Know people that are still playing on a Pentium 4,  a Nvidia 8400 GS, Windows XP and 1GB of memory. with the advent of F2P you will see more players with the lower end machines coming in to try the game</p></blockquote><p>Aren't you a bit now exaggerating<em> the fact what we are currently/been in past 8-10 years running?</em></p><p>Lowest possible hardward for past 8 years has been Shader model 3.0. Lowest Possible processor you can buy has had more than 1 core since netburst(May I remind you that was year 2000 it is now 2011) and lowest memory amount would be 1-8GB DDR1-2 and todays tech DDR3. We can have machine to spin Crysis with 300e, if not cheaper. Hell I have 50 euros machine in my desktop drawer which could spin EQ2 in what it can offer in full which anyone can buy with any used hardware department or website.</p><p>There's a difference where does the game default, scale and how well the engine is build to function in different setups. EQ2 has pretty wide variety of everything else except anything newer than 5 years.</p></blockquote><p>Look here:</p><p><a href="http://www.hardwarezone.com.sg/feature-voodoo-beginnings-10-years-gpu-development/timeline-2003-0">http://www.hardwarezone.com.sg/feat...timeline-2003-0</a></p><p>and here:</p><p><a href="http://processortimeline.info/proc2003.htm">http://processortimeline.info/proc2003.htm</a></p><p>and you will see what was available 8 years ago. You are just flat out wrong about minimums for that time  frame. Even after your edit to reduce the specs.</p><p>Silat</p>

[MindiMaxi2]

<p>I always thought the problem with EQ2 is the way they miscalculated the direction computers were headed and as a result wound up with a graphics engine that is something like an Edsel or the quickly defunct Pentium D (or even Vista, as far as that goes).</p> <p>They knew what they had, but they didn't know where they were going because the road they thought would lead them to graphic greatness never opened.</p> <p>This whole discussion makes me think of someone asking why a Model T performs poorly on modern highways.</p> <p>So all they can do with what they got without going through tremendous expense and time (and I am hardly an SOE fangirl) is make do with what they got and hope that the decisions made today while creating EQ Next are a best guess that creates a winner in the long  run.</p> <p>It's the reality of then and now and the direction hardware took since the game was first developed.</p> <p>However, a Model T (or even an Edsel!) can look mighty fine on the road. The graphics in EQ2 are not too shabby and can look pretty good also.</p> <p>I just think that the dumping of all the goodies on us at once (launcher, F2P, AoD, Freeport Reborn,etc.) created some unforseen problems that has made it difficult for many (self included) to play and  a challenge for them to unravel and fix.</p> <p>The Alertlog (for me) shows resource leaks, so they do have some way of checking that out.</p> <p>Here is a snippet of an example:</p> <p>build="SOEBuild=8340L" version="SOEVersionString=2011/12/14 16:15:56" build_type="USER OPTIMIZED" ls_address="none" zone="Camping" loc="-143.67 -26.16 209.06" performance="7" alert="G:liveeq2frameworkresmanResourceManager.cpp(114): Resource leak!</p> <p>The UI log logs problems with .xml. and I have my share of those too without ever having used a third party ui (or even eq2 maps).</p> <p>If this info gets sent back to them via the launcher, I have no idea, but they do have the capability to monitor the resources used by the game in pick up resource leaks. Otherwise, the alertlog would not contain information about them and the log info changes with each hang. So hopefully the info is going somewhere useful instead of being deleted.</p>

[Wingrider01]

<p><cite>genetix wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Wingrider01 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>remember one thing - this is an online game played by a multitude of players, not all have nor can they afford the latest and greatest enhancement in gaming machine toys - it is logical that the game be coded to run on the lowest common denominator of hardware configurations, if you want to play something that will tax your super Hal 2000 gaming machine with the Nvida 5800000 and the 100 core procesor, play a standalone. Know people that are still playing on a Pentium 4,  a Nvidia 8400 GS, Windows XP and 1GB of memory. with the advent of F2P you will see more players with the lower end machines coming in to try the game</p></blockquote><p>Aren't you a bit now exaggerating<em> the fact what we are currently/been in past 8-10 years running?</em></p><p>Lowest possible hardward for past 8 years has been Shader model 3.0. Lowest Possible processor you can buy has had more than 1 core since netburst(May I remind you that was year 2000 it is now 2011) and lowest memory amount would be 1-8GB DDR1-2 and todays tech DDR3. We can have machine to spin Crysis with 300e, if not cheaper. Hell I have 50 euros machine in my desktop drawer which could spin EQ2 in what it can offer in full which anyone can buy with any used hardware department or website.</p><p>There's a difference where does the game default, scale and how well the engine is build to function in different setups. EQ2 has pretty wide variety of everything else except anything newer than 5 years.</p></blockquote><p>happy for you that you have funds to keep you equipment up to date, unfortunatetly not everyone does, deal with it or play single player games.</p><p>Bottom line, tye are not going to spend a lot of time or precious R&D funds in rewriting eq2 base game engine code or adapting the latest and greatest game engine to an old game, the next version of the game will have the toys and abilities that are current when the engine is being developed. Basic development cycle management and fiscal responsiblity to the company</p>

[genetix]

<div><strong>@TalisX1</strong></div><div></div><div>heh, no.. you can go and look yourself on wikipedia. Intel shipped them through November 2000 to 2008 and even if we would be talking about 5 years that is amount of time in hardware world to get 1 real update to almost any component.</div><div></div><div>@<span><strong>MindiMaxi2</strong></span></div><div></div><div></div><div>That was a novel you wrote there with only thoughs. As pointed out in the first post I explained even noted singular features which the game engine is missing. You cannot put that in concept 'whole' as you are now trying to explain there, heh. If we would to build an EQ2 machine now we would use Pentium 4/D, DX9 card and DDR1/DDR2.</div><div></div><div></div><div>@<span><strong>Wingrider01</strong></span></div><div></div><div></div><div>As above try'd to explain this post has nothing to do with keeping equipment updated either. The equipment utilizing features mentioned has been here more than 5 years anyone using anything older would seek the nearest local electronics dismiss service and buy old/new box with 50-150$.</div><div></div><div></div><div><strong>@commonly</strong></div><div></div><div></div><div>I really didn't make this topic to discuss with people on concept 'how the game works in general', but instead 'how much better already existing game code would work' and 'how much developers could add with more resources to use to the game experience' with already existing equipment. The fact that 99/100 of any large hardware company updates in past 10 years has been hoax crap and that we are every single year going downgrade and never get upgrade to hardware doesn't mean that in these kind of time periods the architectural changes of the hardware itself wouldn't already in itself give 10 times more power to do what we used to see of utilizing entire hardware. I am not even asking to push any hardware to the limits all I am saying it would lose up resources of all equipment giving better game experience if configured and coded in properly.</div>

[MindiMaxi2]

<p><cite>genetix wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><div><strong>@TalisX1</strong></div><div></div><div>heh, no.. you can go and look yourself on wikipedia. Intel shipped them through November 2000 to 2008 and even if we would be talking about 5 years that is amount of time in hardware world to get 1 real update to almost any component.</div><div></div><div>@<span><strong>MindiMaxi2</strong></span></div><div></div><div></div><div>That was a novel you wrote there with only thoughs. As pointed out in the first post I explained even noted singular features which the game engine is missing. You cannot put that in concept 'whole' as you are now trying to explain there, heh. If we would to build an EQ2 machine now we would use Pentium 4/D, DX9 card and DDR1/DDR2.</div><div></div><div></div><div>@<span><strong>Wingrider01</strong></span></div><div></div><div></div><div>As above try'd to explain this post has nothing to do with keeping equipment updated either. The equipment utilizing features mentioned has been here more than 5 years anyone using anything older would seek the nearest local electronics dismiss service and buy old/new box with 50-150$.</div><div></div><div></div><div><strong>@commonly</strong></div><div></div><div></div><div>I really didn't make this topic to discuss with people on concept 'how the game works in general', but instead 'how much better already existing game code would work' and 'how much developers could add with more resources to use to the game experience' with already existing equipment. The fact that 99/100 of any large hardware company updates in past 10 years has been hoax crap and that we are every single year going downgrade and never get upgrade to hardware doesn't mean that in these kind of time periods the architectural changes of the hardware itself wouldn't already in itself give 10 times more power to do what we used to see of utilizing entire hardware. I am not even asking to push any hardware to the limits all I am saying it would lose up resources of all equipment giving better game experience if configured and coded in properly.</div></blockquote><p>Intel shipping and the reality of what was available to the average consumer is like comparing apples to oranges. Sure, x type of cpu and blah blah this existed, but such machines were out of reach for the average home user.</p><p>When EQ2 came out the <strong><em>average</em></strong> home computer owner did not have access to <strong><em>affordable</em></strong> machines that fall within the <strong><em>extreme hardware configurations </em></strong>that you are citing. When EQ2 came out, the average home computer user thought the "sweet spot" for XP was 512mb ram... </p><p>The problem with EQ2, is that they miscalculated the direction computers were headed and wound up with a graphic engine that is difficult to work with.</p><p>Do you know what a Tandy 2000 is? -  (yeah, I had one of those too in my day) -  The EQ2 engine and the direction they thought computers were going is something like that (used as a comparative and not an actuality)</p><p>I really understand where you are coming from.</p><p>Only thing I can add to all of this is if your rig is having problems and those alertlogs are popping up all over the place and your ui log shows the game and the computer are having a hard time --- send them in.</p>

[Peogia]

<p><cite>genetix wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Wingrider01 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>remember one thing - this is an online game played by a multitude of players, not all have nor can they afford the latest and greatest enhancement in gaming machine toys - it is logical that the game be coded to run on the lowest common denominator of hardware configurations, if you want to play something that will tax your super Hal 2000 gaming machine with the Nvida 5800000 and the 100 core procesor, play a standalone. Know people that are still playing on a Pentium 4,  a Nvidia 8400 GS, Windows XP and 1GB of memory. with the advent of F2P you will see more players with the lower end machines coming in to try the game</p></blockquote><p>Aren't you a bit now exaggerating<em> the fact what we are currently/been in past 8-10 years running?</em></p><p>Lowest Possible processor you can buy has had more than 1 core since netburst(May I remind you that was year 2000 it is now 2011) </p></blockquote><p><a href="http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=6620918&CatId=2326" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicat...&CatId=2326</a></p>

[TalisX1]

<p><cite>genetix wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><div><strong>@TalisX1</strong></div><div></div><div>heh, no.. you can go and look yourself on wikipedia. Intel shipped them through November 2000 to 2008 and even if we would be talking about 5 years that is amount of time in hardware world to get 1 real update to almost any component.</div><div></div><div><snip></div></blockquote><p>You look at wikipedia. Does it say the lowest or even average processor in 03 was multi threaded? No. The first graphics card to come out that supported shader 3.0 was in may of 2004. This was a top end card...not average or lowest. While 4gb of ram was possible on the ultra highend in this time frame 512mb was considered sufficient by most and was the average at the time frame. People were still running xp with 128 and 256mb of memory in 2003.</p><p>The rest of your response is an attempt to change your argument.</p><p>Silat</p>

[MMORefugee]

<p>One core would be just peachy if it even attempted to pretend to be utilizing the GPU.</p><p>But it doesn't.</p><p>"FPS" shouldn't be a question or issue on a 10+ yr old engine with processers dancing around the 5ghz mark.</p>