8 Gigs of Ram Not Enough?

[iLLcAtTiViSsiMo 10]

I'm running the game with an i7 quad, 8 gigs of ram and a 660 ti and most of the time when I exit the game I get the windows message stating my computer is running slow and I should switch to basic color scheme.

I'm no computer wiz, but I thought my specs were more than enough and yet my OS tells me I'm short on resources? WTF?

Also, ANYTIME I play multiplayer, after I exit the game, taskbar and windows become unresponsive. I hit cntr-alt-delete, click once, cancel out and everything fixes itself. Is this also possibly a memory issue?

This all started after I opted in and then opted out of the dev build. It was also right around the time when I installed this terrible mod called Dead Nation (has it's own frikkin' launcher and everything).

What I've done so far with no results:

1) verified game cache files through steam for Arma 3

2) cleared steam cache folder

3) uninstalled Arma 3, including manually deleting any leftover files (mods etc) and reinstalled.

4) shut down webroot antivirus

5) opted in and out of beta again

6) scratched my head in deep thought

I'm starting to think 8 gigs ram is NOT enough. Is it possible Arma 3 detects good hardware and treats it as such even though 8 gigs is not enough? I feel like the game is using way more memory than it should allow. Isn't 2 gigs the max, though?

Current tweaks include:

1) -nologs

2).cfg file: changed gpu max frames ahead to 1 and triple buffer to 1 (I use v-sync and it really helps)

3) manually disabled core parking via registry (power options don't seem to work)

Note: Same issues with or without the tweaks. Also, I've disable core parking on two other rigs, a laptop and a PC (with basically the same inner workings), and none of them have any of these issues pop up.

note: I still have the issues with or without the tweaks and my backround processes are using less than 1.5 gigs of resources.

[Greenfist 1863]

Have you checked how much memory is used by Arma? I suspect your memory isn't even half full.

You could try to increase virtual memory size - google it, a simple procedure.

Switching to basic color scheme may improve performance though.

[Sandy* 10]

I'm running the game with an i7 quad, 8 gigs of ram and a 660 ti and most of the time when I exit the game I get the windows message stating my computer is running slow and I should switch to basic color scheme.

Certain games give me this message from time to time, Arma 3 included. I'm not sure if it's the games' fault or some bad feature design on Windows' part, or perhaps a driver bug, but in any case there has never really been any real problem or performance bottleneck, it's more of a false positive error by Windows. You should just ignore it if your game/system is running fine.

PS. Arma 3 is a 32bit application, so even with LAA support on a 64bit OS, it can only use a maximum of 4GB memory.

Edited November 13, 2013 by SandyBandy

[taumargin 13]

Hi mate,

your specs are more or less the same as mine (I7 3770k and gtx660ti) but I have 16gb and I also get that annoying message so it's definitely not a ram issue. Just close it, ignore it an enjoy the game.

[tonygrunt 10]

If you get the message in the screenshot, I don't think there is anything wrong with your PC as I regularly get this message too. Also I have the same problem with mouse clicking not working (if is that what you mean with "taskbar and windows become unresponsive") after I exit Arma3.

Quick PC specs: i7 3930k@4.7GHz, 16GB RAM, 2*GTX 680 4GB, SSD,....

[St. Jimmy 272]

I'm running the game with an i7 quad, 8 gigs of ram and a 660 ti and most of the time when I exit the game I get the windows message stating my computer is running slow and I should switch to basic color scheme.

I ignored that for a while when I changed out from basic theme. Then after a month I changed back to basic theme. I got 10fps increase in the main menu, went from 50->60. There's no way I'd change out from basic theme after sawing that. You can check my specs from my sig.

[iLLcAtTiViSsiMo 10]

Great feedback guys. Thank you. It's always good to know you're not alone when it comes to this kind of stuff. It some how adds a type of closure to the issue. I will switch to windows basic and see if it helps at all. If not, the game itself is running as well as Arma 3 is expected to run, so I shouldn't really be complaining. I'll just deal with it if anything. Thanks again everyone.

[RuecanOnRails 10]

While you didn't post exactly what message/error you're getting. I'm taking a guess that the low resource is low virtual memory. Low virtual memory is directly linked to your pagefile file, try increasing your page file to the same size of your ram, both max and min. You can find some info here. http://windows.microsoft.com/en-ca/windows-vista/change-the-size-of-virtual-memory

as Greenfist stated, do a search along the lines of "change pagefile in <insert OS>"

[NeuroFunker 11]

This has absolutely nothing to do with your RAM, this is because aero theme eats your gpu resources. Just switch to default non aero windows theme and it will dissapear.

[Leon86 13]

Anyone know of a way to disable this annoying message and keep aero on? Have it in every game.

[NeuroFunker 11]

no idea, couldn't figure out by myself. Just switched to default theme.

[jiltedjock 10]

Surely nobody who plays games on their PC uses Windows Aero on their desktop? First thing you do when you get Windows 7 is turn that off.

[iLLcAtTiViSsiMo 10]

I can't believe it. I switched to windows basic and not only did game performance significantly increase, but I did not get the "your computer is running slow" message at all. Not even once. Looks like I may have to try and increase my virtual memory after all. My resource monitor displayed less than 40-50% memory usage at any given time. My cpu wasn't even breaking a sweat. My gpu was 99%, but I have it set to max performance in nvidia control panel.

No kidding, I was on a King of the Hill server with framerates never dipping below 40. I dropped my textures down to "very high" and virtually eliminated almost all scope lag. Hmmm. Let's see if it still works tonight...

---------- Post added at 08:47 ---------- Previous post was at 08:21 ----------

Question. I've searched the net and found varied answers. Windows 7-64bit, 8 gigs ram and SSD. How much virtual memory is safe? I don't want to over do it and start seeing crashes and instability issues.

Edited November 14, 2013 by iLLcAtTiViSsiMo

[maddogx 13]

I dropped my textures down to "very high" and virtually eliminated almost all scope lag. Hmmm. Let's see if it still works tonight...

FYI: Antialiasing and AToC can also contribute to scope lag. Setting AToC to "off" or "trees only" (anything without grass) and reducing your antialiasing setting can help there.

Question. I've searched the net and found varied answers. Windows 7-64bit, 8 gigs ram and SSD. How much virtual memory is safe? I don't want to over do it and start seeing crashes and instability issues.

I've had mine limited to 2GB for as long as I can remember without any problems. If you're worried about it not being enough, just allow Windows to dynamically expand it when necessary, which shouldn't really happen outside of extreme circumstances.

[NeuroFunker 11]

you don't need virtual memory with 8 gigs + SSD, i have it off, and never have problems with it. Moreover, some of my friends, who had not enough ram, 4-6, and had constant crashes, after geting another 2-4 extra gig of ram, and turning virtual memory off, fixed constant crashes issue.

[Sandy* 10]

Surely nobody who plays games on their PC uses Windows Aero on their desktop? First thing you do when you get Windows 7 is turn that off.

Windows automatically turns off Aero when you run games in fullscreen mode, so yeah, most people play games with Aero on.

[iLLcAtTiViSsiMo 10]

you don't need virtual memory with 8 gigs + SSD, i have it off, and never have problems with it. Moreover, some of my friends, who had not enough ram, 4-6, and had constant crashes, after geting another 2-4 extra gig of ram, and turning virtual memory off, fixed constant crashes issue.

As of now, I don't see why any gamer would need more than 8 gigs of ram. I have to ask you, do you have ANY problems at all with virtual memory disabled? Your OS is OK with that?

[NeuroFunker 11]

As of now, I don't see why any gamer would need more than 8 gigs of ram. I have to ask you, do you have ANY problems at all with virtual memory disabled? Your OS is OK with that?

like i said, i have it disabled after ive got upgraded my ram from 4gigs to 12. No problems.

[iLLcAtTiViSsiMo 10]

FYI: Antialiasing and AToC can also contribute to scope lag. Setting AToC to "off" or "trees only" (anything without grass) and reducing your antialiasing setting can help there.QUOTE]

I'm fully aware of how demanding both of those are (as any PC gamer should be). However, turning them off completely did not change scope lag as I expected it to. I would hope my 660ti would be able to handle some extent of AA without performance dropping substantially, which it can. Usually, textures are not the issue with my card, but in this games case textures certainly seem to have a substantial impact on framerate, contrary to what many of the "guides" claim. This game is such a mangled mess of cpu/gpu use it's almost impossible to find the "sweet spot" in terms of graphical settings, especially when public servers give the false impression that your rig is running poorly.

[NeuroFunker 11]

did you turn ambient occlusion off as well?

[iLLcAtTiViSsiMo 10]

did you turn ambient occlusion off as well?

Guys, I've already been through the whole graphics tweak thing and know my card VERY well. I'm really interested in the virtual memory thing as I truly feel this is where most of my problems lie. The question is, do I increase the max or disable it all together? I've never checked what it was set to since I literally just learned about it today. Can't wait to get out of work and see what it's defaulted at.

I have a very good feeling this is somehow linked to the "unresponsive windows" thing I mentioned in my OP. I will check what PC's that don't have this issue are set to and compare them to mine. I have a feeling since my rig is a few years old now it may be set lower. Besides, how else do you explain why switching to windows basic resolved my "your computer is running slow" message?

[ratszo 17]

Page file?

Got mine set min/max to 10545mb having 7gigs ram.

10545 is the windows recommended max size.

Setting min/max to the same size is an old tweak from other games.

[fred41 42]

... yep, setting a pagefile (i prefer fixed size too) never hurts. Windows does'nt really access it if you have enough free physical RAM.

If you disable your pagefile completly, windows can no longer swap, if it needs to free, for some reasons, more physical RAM.

[iLLcAtTiViSsiMo 10]

So I should set min/max to same value?

[NeuroFunker 11]

if you are worried, turning on pagefile off, might hurt your system, ive never heard it does, as it did nothing wrong to my system so far after 2-3 years without using it. Every system is different, just try few days without it and few days with, to compare. And yes, its recommended to set min/max size to same value, for performance and disc space. Use 2048mb or 4096mb.