Replies: 113 (Who?), Viewed: 52376 times.
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poison123
Test Subject
#51 Old 18th Feb 2016 at 11:34 PM
just saw this on tumblr earlier and it has made my game so much more playable and fun woooooo
tangie0906
Theorist
#52 Old 19th Feb 2016 at 5:58 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by nitromon
I honestly would not know, I'm treading the water of exporation here as well. However, from what I understand and read, it shouldn't really be an issue other than it will drain your battery more if you are using a laptop and on battery. The main reason being core parking is really a Win OS issue and I've read WinXP doesn't even offer core parking. Also there are CPUs out there that doesn't allow core parking. One example is that Microsoft actually made a hotfix for some AMD users b/c the core parking was incompatible and causing problems. The hotfix disabled the core parking completely when those AMD CPUs are detected.

So in reality, core parking is just a Microsoft power saving "option," and all we're doing is saying, "No, we don't want this option." The reason I chose to do the reg version is because I hate running 3rd party softwares. The reg version enables this function's display in the power plan, which already exists inside our Win OS. Many commentators in other forums agree that Win should've enabled this display as default and allowed users to control it. However, we have to understand, they're catering the OS to common users, who really just surf the web, watch youtube, or write Word documents.


------


BTW, this is somewhat related. But for those who never really took a look at this issue. If you are using "high performance" power plan, you will notice that it sets the "min processor state" to 100%. This means that your processor will always run at max frequency. This actually is something that would harm your CPU, or at least shorten the life of it. When the CPU is at max frequency it heats hotter and shortens the life, for obvious reasons - you are using it more. When you are gaming, you need the max frequency, however when you're surfing the web or idling, you don't need it at 100%. This is why in balanced and in power saver, the "min processor state" is set at 5%.

I highly recommend everyone to edit their high performance plan and set the "min processor state" to 5%. This way, your CPU will throttle anywhere between 5% to 100%, using it when it needs to. Don't worry about it throttling during gameplay, it won't. When the game demands it, it will be maxed out.





I don't have that much store contents or mods/ccs, but theoretically, that shouldn't affect the pie menu lag at all. I still think there's something wrong. You might have a store content that is damaged and not installed properly.


I decided to downloaded the app rather than to edit the power profile myself, and I don't see any settings for a minimum processor state? Unless you mean that the max number of cores to unpark should be 90-95% instead of 100%?
¢¾ Receptacle Refugee ¢¾ ~ Where are we going, and why am I in this handbasket!? ~
Laura's Legacy
nitromon
Mad Poster
Original Poster
#53 Old 19th Feb 2016 at 6:41 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by tangie0906
I decided to downloaded the app rather than to edit the power profile myself, and I don't see any settings for a minimum processor state? Unless you mean that the max number of cores to unpark should be 90-95% instead of 100%?


I should probably pin the response to the original post.

"min processor state" is only in your Win power plan and is unrelated to cpu core parking.


With the app:
So basically you want to set both the dc/ac parking to 100% to disable them. I wouldn't recommend touching the frequency scalers, that's not related, it is for overclocking I think.

You should try it with resouce monitor running so you can see immediately if it is working when the cpu are no longer parked.
Sanity is overrated.

Nitromon is a type of Pokemon encountered in the Pokemon Nitrome Version series.

There. Mystery solved.
tangie0906
Theorist
#54 Old 19th Feb 2016 at 5:31 PM
OK - sorry if that was a dumb question but it was throwing me off. I chose the app because it looks like it will be very simple to change back if I want to. I'm all for simple.

I changed the AC on the High Performance power plan to 75% which unparked 6 of my 8 cores (Window 7, i2600k processor) but I will revisit it and change it to 100%. I didn't change the DC power at all because this is a desktop that doesn't use batteries so I didn't think it would matter either way what the setting was on that one.

Going to try it out this afternoon and see how it goes. Thank you!
¢¾ Receptacle Refugee ¢¾ ~ Where are we going, and why am I in this handbasket!? ~
Laura's Legacy
nitromon
Mad Poster
Original Poster
#55 Old 20th Feb 2016 at 12:44 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by tangie0906
OK - sorry if that was a dumb question but it was throwing me off. I chose the app because it looks like it will be very simple to change back if I want to. I'm all for simple.

I changed the AC on the High Performance power plan to 75% which unparked 6 of my 8 cores (Window 7, i2600k processor) but I will revisit it and change it to 100%. I didn't change the DC power at all because this is a desktop that doesn't use batteries so I didn't think it would matter either way what the setting was on that one.

Going to try it out this afternoon and see how it goes. Thank you!


Ha, sorry I didn't mean it was a dumb question. It was just asked before a couple of times, so I should post the reply in the original post and that way people wouldn't have to shuffle through all te posts to find the answer.

Yeah, I don't know what's the deal with AC/DC, but if the resource monitor said they're unparked, then they're unparked.
Sanity is overrated.

Nitromon is a type of Pokemon encountered in the Pokemon Nitrome Version series.

There. Mystery solved.
linesa
Instructor
#56 Old 15th Sep 2016 at 7:08 PM
Hi ^^

Following the little discussion's link about unparking in another thread, I have a little question.

To play with the Sims 3, I use the High Performance option (I think it's the english name, since I set it up in french) and made so that all options are desactivated.

Will it cause a problem for my laptop ?

I didn't touch the "Normal Use" options at all ^^

If I'm not mistaking, given how I set up things, I have to keep ParkControl open as long as I play the game ?

Or should I modify the "Normal Use" options and use it instead of what I did ?
Naus Allien
Inventor
#57 Old 15th Sep 2016 at 7:21 PM
Following the little discussion's link about unparking in another thread, I have a little question.

To play with the Sims 3, I use the High Performance option (I think it's the english name, since I set it up in french) and made so that all options are desactivated.
It doesn't matter really. As long as you disable all four options in Park Control, you can use any profile you want.

Will it cause a problem for my laptop ?
It will drain your battery faster, so I recommend that you have your laptop plugged in. It MIGHT increase CPU temp. because your CPU is working at full capacity, but if your PC (or laptop) is in good cooling conditions, this shouldn't be a problem.

I didn't touch the "Normal Use" options at all ^^
As I said, it doesn't really matter. As long as you disable CPU parking and frequency scaling (all four options), it should work as intended.

If I'm not mistaking, given how I set up things, I have to keep ParkControl open as long as I play the game ?
Nope. Park Control is an easy way to change some hidden Windows Registry keys. Once you click APPLY, changes will be made to your Registry. You can then close the program. If you want to go back to your default setting, open the program and change as desired, then click apply again.

Or should I modify the "Normal Use" options and use it instead of what I did ?
Whatever you want. You can even disable CPU parking for every profile.
linesa
Instructor
#58 Old 15th Sep 2016 at 7:25 PM
All right, thank you for your answers @Naus Allien :D
Dixieland
Field Researcher
#59 Old 15th Sep 2016 at 8:49 PM
Question for Naus Allien: How does it affect CAS? Does CAS load faster? Does it make the filter control actually useful?
A fool and his money are soon parted. ~ Thomas Tusser
Naus Allien
Inventor
#60 Old 15th Sep 2016 at 9:24 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dixieland
Question for Naus Allien: How does it affect CAS? Does CAS load faster? Does it make the filter control actually useful?


Nope. The loading of thumbnails in CAS / CASt / Buy-Build Mode is actually done by reading data stored in your drive (either HDD or SSD). Having an SSD will improve this loading time dramatically. I recommend in any case that you install NRaas MasterController and enable Compact mode in CAS. It will make loading at least 3x times faster (since you won't have repeats of the same element with different pre-sets). Using a RAM Disk can also improve loading time, especially in CASt (around 25-50% faster), unless you have an SSD. In that case I'm not sure if there be any improvement.

Filter is always useful but not as good as using Master Controller filtering options because they are GLOBAL, for that save game at least.

This improvement is especially good for AI, idle Sims, empty lots, etc. Everything CPU related. GPU elements (unless you have an integrated graphics card) won't be improved, as well as drive-dependent elements (thumbnails, Sim and World caching).
Dixieland
Field Researcher
#61 Old 16th Sep 2016 at 8:01 AM
Thank you for replying. The thing is, I don't really have any trouble running TS3 smoothly...except in CAS. I have used Master Controller for years and set the options accordingly, but CAS, no matter how much CC I remove, still runs slow when it comes to showing the catalog. Even without CC it's slow. I have never understood why the game has to load the whole catalog before you actually get the option to select a filter. Then it loads slowly all over again just to use the filter. It's both ridiculous and badly designed.
Why couldn't it be like:

Visual Key: = Outfit 1 = Outfit 2 = Outfit 3

:cylon: = Recolours

This is how the catalog should look on startup:




Select Outfit 1 ( )
The catalog now looks like this:
:



Close Outfit 1 and click on Outfit 2. You see this:

:cylon:


Of course you could open and keep open as many of the outfits as you wanted, but I would think that this would still have been an overall better CAS load strategy than the one we received in TS3. Now TS4 is starting to get up there in outfits and such, too. I have a bad feeling that I will soon see history start to repeat itself.
A fool and his money are soon parted. ~ Thomas Tusser
Lulu_c
Lab Assistant
#62 Old 16th Sep 2016 at 8:24 AM
Just tried run TS3 with it on my laptop, with i7 and 8GB RAM. I didn't see obvious frame boost, but changinng outfit and AI got definitely faster. One problem is that it dramatically heat up the CPUs, by around 7 to 10 celsius. For someone using a slim laptop like I do, cooling is always a big concern.
nitromon
Mad Poster
Original Poster
#63 Old 16th Sep 2016 at 9:47 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lulu_c
I didn't see obvious frame boost, but changinng outfit and AI got definitely faster. One problem is that it dramatically heat up the CPUs, by around 7 to 10 celsius. For someone using a slim laptop like I do, cooling is always a big concern.


There has been a few reports that it does increase the heating in some systems, but that is often rare b/c technically it isn't using any more power than the design limit. I think it is because you are using a slim laptop designed with very tight restrictions that is why you are seeing a heating increase. In my laptop, which is just a regular laptop, I see no temperature increase at all. This is also why you will not actually see frame boost b/c it actually doesn't make your system run faster. What it does is when the cpu cores continuously park and unpark, it creates a latency. All this does is remove the latency by not allowing the cores to park, so the core responses are increased leading to faster AI responses etc.. because Sims 3 uses multiple agents. Unparking the cores varies from programs to programs depending on how it uses the cores.

However, if you are using the Intel HD GPU, there should be a frame rate increase because the Intel HD is tied directly to the CPU. So the latency in this case would have a direct affect on the GPU and increase framerate by approx 30%. If you are using a dedicated GPU, you won't get any frame rate increase.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dixieland
Thank you for replying. The thing is, I don't really have any trouble running TS3 smoothly...except in CAS.


Have you tried the method in which you put your cache files and thumbnails onto a RAMdisk? This will help increase the CAS performance.
Sanity is overrated.

Nitromon is a type of Pokemon encountered in the Pokemon Nitrome Version series.

There. Mystery solved.
Lulu_c
Lab Assistant
#64 Old 16th Sep 2016 at 11:41 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by nitromon
There has been a few reports that it does increase the heating in some systems, but that is often rare b/c technically it isn't using any more power than the design limit. I think it is because you are using a slim laptop designed with very tight restrictions that is why you are seeing a heating increase. In my laptop, which is just a regular laptop, I see no temperature increase at all. This is also why you will not actually see frame boost b/c it actually doesn't make your system run faster. What it does is when the cpu cores continuously park and unpark, it creates a latency. All this does is remove the latency by not allowing the cores to park, so the core responses are increased leading to faster AI responses etc.. because Sims 3 uses multiple agents. Unparking the cores varies from programs to programs depending on how it uses the cores.

However, if you are using the Intel HD GPU, there should be a frame rate increase because the Intel HD is tied directly to the CPU. So the latency in this case would have a direct affect on the GPU and increase framerate by approx 30%. If you are using a dedicated GPU, you won't get any frame rate increase.



Have you tried the method in which you put your cache files and thumbnails onto a RAMdisk? This will help increase the CAS performance.


My laptop is installed with Nvidia graphic card, which is another reason for the heating problem. The increase of CPU temperature is dramatily using the "highest performance", and in "high performance" it is around 5 celsius which is OK. I would like to give it another try for longer time since I play my game using StoryProgression, and lagging caused by SP could show improvement, if I understand the "park" thing correctly?
nitromon
Mad Poster
Original Poster
#65 Old 16th Sep 2016 at 12:39 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lulu_c
My laptop is installed with Nvidia graphic card, which is another reason for the heating problem. The increase of CPU temperature is dramatily using the "highest performance", and in "high performance" it is around 5 celsius which is OK. I would like to give it another try for longer time since I play my game using StoryProgression, and lagging caused by SP could show improvement, if I understand the "park" thing correctly?


Depends on what you mean lagging. If you mean frame rate lagging, it probably won't change anything. Because sims games are running so many mini AI agents, so reducing the core latency will increase AI efficiency. They will be less "idling"

If heating is a problem, you can always get a cooling pad for the laptop and see if that helps. My laptop gets hot during summers, so I can't turbo during summer. In winter, it runs fine.
Sanity is overrated.

Nitromon is a type of Pokemon encountered in the Pokemon Nitrome Version series.

There. Mystery solved.
Dixieland
Field Researcher
#66 Old 16th Sep 2016 at 3:09 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by nitromon
Have you tried the method in which you put your cache files and thumbnails onto a RAMdisk? This will help increase the CAS performance.


Not yet, but it's something I am giving very serious consideration to doing.
A fool and his money are soon parted. ~ Thomas Tusser
ElaineNualla
Inventor
#67 Old 13th Aug 2017 at 8:48 PM
There was a concern shown above about possible heat problem after unparkng CPU. Surpsisingly I observed lately something quite opposite: unparking actually lowered heat output from CPU. The difference is not very high but noticeable (between 3-5'C). I wonder if anyone observed something similar.

technicals:
CPU: i3 2310M (2.1GHz) 2cores 4 threads, 8GM RAM, NVidia GT 520M, 5200rpm HDD, Win7 - Acer laptop after cleaning and modernisation, "potato class" for the current standards

One hour playing data (gathered with RealTemp GT), each game is heavily (and I mean it) modded:

parked:
The Sims 3: max load: 95, max temp: 74
CK II: max load: 98, max temp: 70
Skyrim* (Classic, jogging around biggest towns): max load: 95, max temp: 72
idle: max load: 20, max temp: 45 (vary: 39-45)

unparked:
The Sims 3: max load: 90, max temp: 70
CK II: max load: 90, max temp: 52
Skyrim (as above): max load: 90, max temp: 68
idle: max load: 20, max temp: 40 (vary: 32-40)

GPU is locked on 32 fps, as result never hotter than 60'C

Which is interesting (maybe just for me) it's only 2 core CPU which should not benefit much from unparking (only virtual cores are "unparked", not real) and while there is a little performance difference or I did not notice any serious, there is a temperature output one. Does anyone observed something similar or it's just particular machine anomaly?


*yes it is playable after some work if 28-32 fps does not bother you much.


NOTE: it is technically necro but I dunno if experience described above was observed elsewhere (anyway, it's my 1st necro ;p maybe cutting hand shall be enough? Or a finger? )
Fox-Lambert (A)RL
hiatus 'till the life run again in the normal-abnormal way
favorite quote: "When ElaineNualla is posting..I always read..Nutella. I am sorry" by Rosebine
self-claimed "lower-spec simmer"
nitromon
Mad Poster
Original Poster
#68 Old 14th Aug 2017 at 1:09 AM
Again, unparking the core simply removes the latency between shutting off and turning on the core. Theoretically it should increase the temperature slightly in prolonged use, b/c an off core should remain cool. But it doesn't b/c if you look at the resource monitor, you'll see the cores are constantly being shuffled. No core stays "off" for more than a few mere seconds. The concept of parking is to reduce power usage.

Would it also reduce heating? Maybe... if turning on and off the cores actually generate more heat, but I doubt that. Heat is usually an issue with power and prolong usage. The longer a power is running through, the hotter it gets.

But this thread is somewhat outdated. I heard that in Win 10, core parking is now done on the hardware level in the BIOS and not in the OS, so I'm not entirely sure this method will benefit people on more modern computers and OS. I don't know since I don't have one to test, some other people have to report it in.

It might still be useful b/c regardless of whether the OS or the BIOS is controlling the parking, parking and unparking creates latency and this latency slows down CPU efficiency. The difference is probably most people can turn off the parking in their BIOS. Also, the more cores you have, the more difference you'll see in parking and unparking since the more cores are being turned off and on, the more latency is created. In a dual core i3, there's minimal latency improvement. But, there still should be some. It is just difficult for people to really notice if they're looking at frame rate and loading time, which is not affected by parking/unparking since they're GPU and harddrive dependent. However, unparking and reducing latency can be noticed in AI efficiency - less idling, more lively sims.
Sanity is overrated.

Nitromon is a type of Pokemon encountered in the Pokemon Nitrome Version series.

There. Mystery solved.
daisylee
Theorist
#69 Old 14th Aug 2017 at 8:39 AM
I still want to try this to see if it will generate more sims on community lots for me. On my long to do list.
nitromon
Mad Poster
Original Poster
#70 Old 14th Aug 2017 at 9:56 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by daisylee
I still want to try this to see if it will generate more sims on community lots for me. On my long to do list.


It doesn't generate more sims directly, BUT a lot of times the com lots are empty b/c the sims assigned to visit them is idling. So it would bring more sims quicklier to the com lots.

However, the number of sims on a com lot is determined by 2 factors. 1 is the type of lot. the other is your cpu rating. if you your cpu rating is not 4, you can manually change it in the graphicsrules.sgr file to change it to a 4. The rating is outdated, back in the days of single core where CPU speed is more important. But any modern day CPU within the past 4-5 years should be rated 4.
Sanity is overrated.

Nitromon is a type of Pokemon encountered in the Pokemon Nitrome Version series.

There. Mystery solved.
AGuyCalledPi
Mad Poster
#71 Old 14th Aug 2017 at 12:22 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by nitromon
The rating is outdated, back in the days of single core where CPU speed is more important. But any modern day CPU within the past 4-5 years should be rated 4.

As evidenced by the fact that the game rates everything over, I believe, 2560 megabytes of RAM as "uber". Imagine that. I'm sitting on 16384 megs here and it certainly doesn't feel "uber" to me.
Hypocrisy is only okay if I do it.
( Join my dumb Discord server if you're into the whole procrastination thing. But like, maybe tomorrow. )
daisylee
Theorist
#72 Old 14th Aug 2017 at 3:29 PM
I just looked and my Sims 3 performance is 5.9, so I definitely need to try this.
AGuyCalledPi
Mad Poster
#73 Old 14th Aug 2017 at 6:48 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by daisylee
I just looked and my Sims 3 performance is 5.9, so I definitely need to try this.

Your performance is 5.9? Based on what? I know Windows used to have a thing like that where it rates your hardware, but how'd you rate TS3?
Hypocrisy is only okay if I do it.
( Join my dumb Discord server if you're into the whole procrastination thing. But like, maybe tomorrow. )
daisylee
Theorist
#74 Old 15th Aug 2017 at 8:32 AM
I am Windows 7 and all my installed games have ratings. I checked Into the Future, my last install and it shows 5.9. I think it also said 3.5 is the minimum, 4.5 is recommended, and it showed my rating as 5.9. Made a screenshot of it.

https://goo.gl/photos/mUnPLJpgtG4YP6Zu8
nitromon
Mad Poster
Original Poster
#75 Old 15th Aug 2017 at 11:04 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by daisylee
I am Windows 7 and all my installed games have ratings. I checked Into the Future, my last install and it shows 5.9. I think it also said 3.5 is the minimum, 4.5 is recommended, and it showed my rating as 5.9. Made a screenshot of it.

https://goo.gl/photos/mUnPLJpgtG4YP6Zu8


I wouldn't put too much into that. Those ratings are not really accurate for many reasons. Your number is based on your lowest number of all your hardware components and 90% of the time that is your HDD.

If you use a RAMdisk, then your performance would be well above that, but they don't test for ramdisks.

I can't check right now b/c my laptop is busted. But likewise all my rating were maxed out ... I forgot what the number was 7.9? But I have a HDD and no SSD, so my overall rating is also a 5.9 or something.

If your system is within 5 yrs or so, it should be more than enough for TS3. But the latency in parking is not related to how good your cpu is, b/c they park all CPUs. (with exception on some AMD cpus)
Sanity is overrated.

Nitromon is a type of Pokemon encountered in the Pokemon Nitrome Version series.

There. Mystery solved.
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