1. #1
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    Strange WoW behavior on lower end system (solved)

    So I was allowed to install WoW on my work computer for what I'm in the middle of installs and just twiddling my thumbs. It's an Athlon II X4 something, with an 9100 iGPU. That said, it runs WoW just dandy on low settings. I usually get 20-40fps in most places. I don't do raidsm it's just simply stuff to burn time (farming, barrens, etc)

    The strange part is this: if one of my characters goes near Nalak's area (without many people there) of Isle of Thunder, the game drops to less than 1fps, and gets a high amount of input lag. This behavior remains until I shut the game off entirely and restart it. Even if I log onto another character that's in an area where it isn't a problem, this massive lag remains. It also seems to really take a performance hit on the rest of my system as well (which is obnoxious, as I'll be running 3-4 VMs, and 3-4 remote desktops). CPU and RAM usage never goes above 40% during this time.

    I'm not looking for a solution really, more just curious as to why this is happening. The solution as far as I can tell, is just "don't go near Nalak while at work"
    Last edited by chazus; 2013-07-19 at 03:45 PM.
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    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

  2. #2
    Maybe there is something that is loaded within the game that is only loaded there(probably Nalak or something to do with them) and once it is loaded, it will persist in the games cache until it is shut down. Could be certain scripts/textures that cause the problem once they get loaded.

    Have you talked to anyone from Blizz about it and, if so, what did they say? If not, talk to them :P
    If you must insist on using a non-sanctioned sitting apparatus, please consider the tensile strength
    of the materials present in the object in question in comparison to your own mass volumetric density.

    In other words, stop breaking shit with your fat ass.

  3. #3
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    I just came across it today. At first I thought it was lag from a billion people being at nalak (as there was the first time I went there) but then later saw the same thing... And then noted that it persisted across characters, indicating it was an actual game client issue, rather than 'something in that area' per se.
    Gaming: Dual Intel Pentium III Coppermine @ 1400mhz + Blue Orb | Asus CUV266-D | GeForce 2 Ti + ZF700-Cu | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 | Whistler Build 2267
    Media: Dual Intel Drake Xeon @ 600mhz | Intel Marlinspike MS440GX | Matrox G440 | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 @ 166mhz | Windows 2000 Pro

    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

  4. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by chazus View Post
    I just came across it today. At first I thought it was lag from a billion people being at nalak (as there was the first time I went there) but then later saw the same thing... And then noted that it persisted across characters, indicating it was an actual game client issue, rather than 'something in that area' per se.
    That is very odd...Maybe something in the texture files or whatnot is corrupted and once it gets loaded into the game, it causes it to bite the dust and the only way to get it to dump that corrupted bit is a restart. You could try the file checker thing that WoW has(or used to have) and see if that fixes it. If not, you might get to try a full reinstall.

    Any chance you can get the exact type of GPU & processor so I can dink around to see if I can find any similar problems?
    If you must insist on using a non-sanctioned sitting apparatus, please consider the tensile strength
    of the materials present in the object in question in comparison to your own mass volumetric density.

    In other words, stop breaking shit with your fat ass.

  5. #5
    Try delete caches and also try run the game in OpenGL mode instead of DX in case the iGPU is the problem.
    Never going to log into this garbage forum again as long as calling obvious troll obvious troll is the easiest way to get banned.
    Trolling should be.

  6. #6
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by tielknight View Post
    Any chance you can get the exact type of GPU & processor so I can dink around to see if I can find any similar problems?
    CPU is AMD Athlon II X4 620 AM3
    Motherboard is an HP OEM Listed as "Pegatron M2N78-LA Violet" but apparently that's just a rebrand of the Asus M2N78-LA.
    GPU is an integrated nVidia 9100

    I'll see if OpenGL makes a difference and go from there. I can't imagine the cache would be a problem since I experienced this issue the same day I installed windows and wow >.>
    Gaming: Dual Intel Pentium III Coppermine @ 1400mhz + Blue Orb | Asus CUV266-D | GeForce 2 Ti + ZF700-Cu | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 | Whistler Build 2267
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    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

  7. #7
    Yeah, that really does sound like a bad cached file, the repair utility or a fresh install should fix it. Alternatively, it may be an addon that is causing the same behavior. Did you just port the game from your regular home PC, or did you do the proper install?

  8. #8
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    It's a clean install from the website with no addons, and everything set to low, with sound off.
    Gaming: Dual Intel Pentium III Coppermine @ 1400mhz + Blue Orb | Asus CUV266-D | GeForce 2 Ti + ZF700-Cu | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 | Whistler Build 2267
    Media: Dual Intel Drake Xeon @ 600mhz | Intel Marlinspike MS440GX | Matrox G440 | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 @ 166mhz | Windows 2000 Pro

    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

  9. #9
    With all the system resources being distributed between the VM's you are running, you may also be running into some resource conflicts, the other possibility (although I kind of doubt it would be this) is that you are overheating the CPU which could possibly cause a downclock. Does this behavior occur ANYWHERE else, specifically in places that consume lots of system resources?

  10. #10
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by lordmatthias View Post
    Does this behavior occur ANYWHERE else, specifically in places that consume lots of system resources?
    Nope. Cities (shrine, sw) are fine. Heck I even flew past a Sha of Anger group and there was brief lag as expected, but once they were out of visual range it returned to normal performance. I'm going to test with it more to see if I can't figure it out.

    I don't think the issue is with the VMs or remotes either, since the problem occurs even without them. I was just noting those for the fact that it isn't just WoW, but my entire system that takes a crap.

    - - - Updated - - -

    EDIT: Ugh. I might be retarded. Utterly derp.

    I just realized that, being a new install of WoW, I started playing before it was done actually downloading the game. Last night I let the downloader get everything. Today, I can run past Nalak just fine. Chances are, since it was still downloading stuff, it was causing the game to lag in places where assets weren't loaded, or caching as such. I'm going to test with it more, but... yeah. I feel a bit stupid now. I hope the problem returns, just so I know it wasn't this big a derp. >.>
    Gaming: Dual Intel Pentium III Coppermine @ 1400mhz + Blue Orb | Asus CUV266-D | GeForce 2 Ti + ZF700-Cu | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 | Whistler Build 2267
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    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

  11. #11
    HA! Yeah I actually totally did something similar a while back. I had to do an emergency reinstall right before raid. I started playing at like 20% installed, it actually did really well in raid, but I zoned out on break, and I was like WTF are all these blue cubes doing everywhere!?!?!?!

    Or even better yet, I was leading a BT raid one night, we were going to Shade of Akama (however it if spelled). All of a sudden my FPS took a complete dump which lasted for a few minutes (it was odd, but I was running a laptop at the time and I thought it might just be some environment stuff since we just went into a new room), after those few minutes my system took a total dump and completely shut off. I was like "what the fuck just happened?!?!?!" My Girlfriend told evenone in raid that I was having some computer issues, while I was going through troubleshooting steps. She had her mic open while it had dawned on me that the f'in power cable had fallen out and I had just ran out of power. Everyone in raid heard and it took MONTHS for me "the IT guy" to live it down.

  12. #12
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    Good News: The problem still persists
    Bad News: The problem still persists

    Worse still, it seems this lag will come about on it's own in time. I was just doing farming and making some posts, and FPS dropped from 40 to ~5, and would not go back up until I rebooted wow. I'm going to do some more testing, and maybe try adding a new card to my system tomorrow.

    Frustratingly, it seems that the longer WoW stays on, the more it happens. More testing to be done.

    UPDATE: Holy crap. I think I found the issue. I was trying to see what RPM my drive was in Speccy... And noticed something about the iGPU. Did some more poking, and saw this:



    Sooo yeah. Gonna just bring in a card and turn off the integrated entirely. It's got no fan, and a tiny heatsink. Sort of explains why the previous guy had the side plate off all the time.
    Last edited by chazus; 2013-07-18 at 04:52 PM.
    Gaming: Dual Intel Pentium III Coppermine @ 1400mhz + Blue Orb | Asus CUV266-D | GeForce 2 Ti + ZF700-Cu | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 | Whistler Build 2267
    Media: Dual Intel Drake Xeon @ 600mhz | Intel Marlinspike MS440GX | Matrox G440 | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 @ 166mhz | Windows 2000 Pro

    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by chazus View Post
    Good News: The problem still persists
    Bad News: The problem still persists

    Worse still, it seems this lag will come about on it's own in time. I was just doing farming and making some posts, and FPS dropped from 40 to ~5, and would not go back up until I rebooted wow. I'm going to do some more testing, and maybe try adding a new card to my system tomorrow.

    Frustratingly, it seems that the longer WoW stays on, the more it happens. More testing to be done.

    UPDATE: Holy crap. I think I found the issue. I was trying to see what RPM my drive was in Speccy... And noticed something about the iGPU. Did some more poking, and saw this:



    Sooo yeah. Gonna just bring in a card and turn off the integrated entirely. It's got no fan, and a tiny heatsink. Sort of explains why the previous guy had the side plate off all the time.
    Sweet baby jesus a integrated card is getting THAT hot? If it's got room for a fan and a open connector grab one(pretty sure newegg still has a 120mm fan for $6 with free ship if it'll fit) or if you got a spare card, bring that in.
    If you must insist on using a non-sanctioned sitting apparatus, please consider the tensile strength
    of the materials present in the object in question in comparison to your own mass volumetric density.

    In other words, stop breaking shit with your fat ass.

  14. #14
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    Honestly, to get that hot, I think something is wrong with it, so I'm just going to bring in a card and shut it off entirely. I did some further testing, and both WoW and GW2 started to take a crap when it hit about the 122c mark, reproducibly. It must have been sheer coincidence, or maybe because of better textures or something (or maybe just amount of time played from doing farming, then going to isle), that caused it to crap out right then.

    Either way, will put in a new card and see if that resolves it. That would make a lot of sense. I'm just surprised that this system runs so well when it idles at 110c, but 120c is somehow so much worse >.>
    Gaming: Dual Intel Pentium III Coppermine @ 1400mhz + Blue Orb | Asus CUV266-D | GeForce 2 Ti + ZF700-Cu | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 | Whistler Build 2267
    Media: Dual Intel Drake Xeon @ 600mhz | Intel Marlinspike MS440GX | Matrox G440 | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 @ 166mhz | Windows 2000 Pro

    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

  15. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by chazus View Post
    Honestly, to get that hot, I think something is wrong with it, so I'm just going to bring in a card and shut it off entirely. I did some further testing, and both WoW and GW2 started to take a crap when it hit about the 122c mark, reproducibly. It must have been sheer coincidence, or maybe because of better textures or something (or maybe just amount of time played from doing farming, then going to isle), that caused it to crap out right then.

    Either way, will put in a new card and see if that resolves it. That would make a lot of sense. I'm just surprised that this system runs so well when it idles at 110c, but 120c is somehow so much worse >.>
    You think things would start melting/warping if they were at 110c+ for any real amount of time. That is just crazy that there are 0 fans in there. If you got a spare case fan, bring that with ya and throw it in there to get some air flowing around that heater.
    Last edited by tielknight; 2013-07-19 at 12:22 AM.
    If you must insist on using a non-sanctioned sitting apparatus, please consider the tensile strength
    of the materials present in the object in question in comparison to your own mass volumetric density.

    In other words, stop breaking shit with your fat ass.

  16. #16
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    Well, I threw my spare 460 in there and it... sort of resolved the issue? No more lag. However there are still two issues.

    1) The onboard chip, despite being disabled automatically, is still active. It no longer registers anywhere in the system, but upon a curious poke, I now have a sore burnt fingertip >.> The BIOS on this prebuilt is more barren than a desert. I can change the time, turn on/of LAN, and change boot priority, even with the newest one.

    2) The heat generated from the onboard is seeping across the board it seems, causing my 460 to spin up to max speed every few minutes >.<. I'm going to buy a $15 6450 in hopes of finding something quieter that'll work. I don't think I can swing management to get a new system because this one at this point I would consider faulty.
    Gaming: Dual Intel Pentium III Coppermine @ 1400mhz + Blue Orb | Asus CUV266-D | GeForce 2 Ti + ZF700-Cu | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 | Whistler Build 2267
    Media: Dual Intel Drake Xeon @ 600mhz | Intel Marlinspike MS440GX | Matrox G440 | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 @ 166mhz | Windows 2000 Pro

    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

  17. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by chazus View Post
    1) The onboard chip, despite being disabled automatically, is still active. It no longer registers anywhere in the system, but upon a curious poke, I now have a sore burnt fingertip >.>

    2) The heat generated from the onboard is seeping across the board it seems, causing my 460 to spin up to max speed every few minutes >.<.
    The integrated GPU is built in with the motherboard chipset and as such can not be disabled completely, although one would think it runs cooler without the GPU part in use. I had similar problems before with old AMD motherboard where the chipset would regularly go over 50C and cause stability problems because of motherboard overheating. I fixed it with ugly hack of installing a 120mm casefan blowing directly towards the chipset heatsink.
    Never going to log into this garbage forum again as long as calling obvious troll obvious troll is the easiest way to get banned.
    Trolling should be.

  18. #18
    Moderator chazus's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by vesseblah View Post
    I fixed it with ugly hack of installing a 120mm casefan blowing directly towards the chipset heatsink.
    I think this may well be my end solution, something like this. Right now the heatsink is a dinky 3mm plate of metal the size of a wheat cracker. I don't think I can convince the boss the system is 'broken' in that it works just fine, technically. I'm going to get a cheap card to make room (the 460 is enormous in there), and get a bigger heatsink.
    Gaming: Dual Intel Pentium III Coppermine @ 1400mhz + Blue Orb | Asus CUV266-D | GeForce 2 Ti + ZF700-Cu | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 | Whistler Build 2267
    Media: Dual Intel Drake Xeon @ 600mhz | Intel Marlinspike MS440GX | Matrox G440 | 1024mb Crucial PC-133 @ 166mhz | Windows 2000 Pro

    IT'S ALWAYS BEEN WANKERSHIM | Did you mean: Fhqwhgads
    "Three days on a tree. Hardly enough time for a prelude. When it came to visiting agony, the Romans were hobbyists." -Mab

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