ArmA 2 I/O analysis results

[cjph 0]

Hi december - what are your system specs ? I also tried a flyby of Chernogorsk (with a few groups from either side battling it out) and definately did not see an increase.

cjph

[TimRiceSE 10]

I definatley notice an improvement with both flyby and actually walking around, with and without combat in cherno.

Core i5, Radeon 4850 512mb, 4gb DDR3, Win7

[december 0]

I didn't test with AI but just did a flyby with and without the patch, very different.

E6850 @3ghz, 8800 gtx, 2gb , settings on high or very high 1680X1050

[cjph 0]

D'oh - looks like I downloaded the patch 59323 instead of 59857. Downloading now . . .

cjph

[oktane 0]

Hi december - what are your system specs ? I also tried a flyby of Chernogorsk (with a few groups from either side battling it out) and definately did not see an increase.

cjph

Note that there is some kind of shore/water issue at the moment, will be fixed in next patch. Causes FPS to drop. Found it mentioned somewhere in the beta forum section.

[waimser 10]

Is it possible to use junction to make a 1.8g ramdrive work. If I had enough ram i think i could junction the whole addons folder and delete the original but I dont know how to make it work with anything smaller. With the junction named "junction to addons" the game wont read it. But I cant rename it to "addons" because that makes 2 folders of the same name.

[tcp 10]

Modfolder

[liquidpinky 11]

Is it possible to use junction to make a 1.8g ramdrive work. If I had enough ram i think i could junction the whole addons folder and delete the original but I dont know how to make it work with anything smaller. With the junction named "junction to addons" the game wont read it. But I cant rename it to "addons" because that makes 2 folders of the same name.

If you just use it as a mod folder or use the symlink tool in the tut in my sig if you have Vista and you don't have to piss about with mod folders.

[cjph 0]

Note that there is some kind of shore/water issue at the moment, will be fixed in next patch. Causes FPS to drop. Found it mentioned somewhere in the beta forum section.

I saw some comments on that - I notice with my system that a lot of the flickering textures have gone (not completely) and performance feels about the same, maybe slightly improved.

[frag85 10]

something i had been wanting to do with a1 or a2, although the quality didn't come out real good.

edit:fixing

edit2: audio and video was skipping a lot, and stretched and squashed in random places, going to have to recapture...

Edited October 31, 2009 by frag85

[oktane 0]

Is it possible to use junction to make a 1.8g ramdrive work. If I had enough ram i think i could junction the whole addons folder and delete the original but I dont know how to make it work with anything smaller. With the junction named "junction to addons" the game wont read it. But I cant rename it to "addons" because that makes 2 folders of the same name.

I dont see a difference doing a junction/symlink and just calling the drive in the mod command.

if my ramdrive is F:\ and it has the @ramdrive modfolder on it, when I launch the game I do arma2.exe -mod=f:\@ramdrive ...seems to work fine!

Did anyone experience any differences of direct drive letter vs symlink/junction?

[lt_darkman 0]

Overall fps down with latest beta build 59857 but definitely smoother than 1.04 and previous betas, and that's without the RAM disk.

Going to give that a try now and see how much more potential BIS have unlocked.

Edit: Hmmm, not much (if any) different. I'm using the -mod=R:\ method to point to the RAMdisk.

Does anyone know for definite if you have to move the corresponding .pbo files out of the AddOns folder to get the game to use the files on the RAMdisk, or can you leave them there?

P

Edited October 31, 2009 by Lt_Darkman

[waimser 10]

I can get it to work great using the mod line. -mod=F:\@ram;R\@ram

R being ramdrive and F being the usb drive. So I dont actually need to use junction at all for that.

On Pub servers this is fine. The problem arises on our clan server where only certain mod lines are allowed. I have requested this mod line be allowed but as not the entire clan has "SEEN THE LIGHT":notworthy: of ramdrive am not sure it will go through. And I cant just start telling our clan leader to start using a different verification method for our server. Although

"kju" if you are able to tell me a bit more about verify signatures it might be something im able to suggest, though im fairly sure that avenue would already have been explored.

I was hoping to find a way around this without changing OS from XP.

I know, or at least think I could make it work with junction if I had enough ram to hold the entire addons folder as I could just replace the existing folder with the junctioned addons folder.

Keep the suggestions coming guys. Ive been trying every thing and learning a heap along the way.:)

lt Darkman.. ramdrive deffinately works for me without moving anything from the original addons folder

Edited October 31, 2009 by waimser

[oktane 0]

Does anyone know for definite if you have to move the corresponding .pbo files out of the AddOns folder to get the game to use the files on the RAMdisk, or can you leave them there?

P

Below is wrong, as confirmed by Suma. Any -mod folder will take precedence over original addons, so you're free to leave them there!

Yes you have to move them, otherwise how do you know what the game is going to load?

Simply make a folder in Arma2/Addons/ called CopiedToRamdisk and move the files in there. Then when you have your ramdisk on, COPY them to the ramdisk. That way you still have a backup of the files that you can move back. (simply move the files from CopiedToRamdisk back into the parent folder 'Arma2\Addons' to go back to normal, this move is very fast because windows doesn't have to copy the files)

---------- Post added at 07:14 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:09 PM ----------

The problem arises on our clan server where only certain mod lines are allowed. I have requested this mod line be allowed but as not the entire clan has "SEEN THE LIGHT":notworthy: of ramdrive am not sure it will go through. And I cant just start telling our clan leader to start using a different verification method for our server. Although

"kju" if you are able to tell me a bit more about verify signatures it might be something im able to suggest, though im fairly sure that avenue would already have been explored.

Equalmodrequired doesn't stop anything though. It only forces the client to use the same -mod string as the server, which is dumb. (its an old old parameter from OFP) You could still copy 'bad' files to the addons directory/edit the originals afaik, and get in the server, because that doesn't modify your -mod string.. hence why most of us think its not useful.

But for this ramdisk, you HAVE to have a -mod string that is custom.

Tell your admin's to look into sigchecks, there are plenty of posts describing it. Tell them what they have now isn't really effective and is simply annoying for the end user, you. :)

http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/ArmA:_Addon_Signatures

If you had enough ram, the only way to get around this 'equalmodrequired' crap is if you had an OS capable of doing symlinks/junctions and you moved the WHOLE addons folder to the ramdrive, then set up the link so the game couldn't tell the difference between a real 'addons' folder and your junction. Then you wouldn't need a -mod command.

Edited November 1, 2009 by oktane

[waimser 10]

Thanks octane, this info may be of help to me

[tcp 10]

It's kind of sad that people think enforcing a mod line does anything.

To get around it without having to move your entire default Addons folder, move everything from one modfolder to a second modfolder. Delete the first modfolder, and create a junction from the ramdisk (with key PBO files) to the ArmA2 directory with the same @Name as the first modfolder.

This is also a good way to make friendly names for your launcher.

Just don't load any game-changing addons that would piss your clan off, however, it their folly for not enabling signature checking.

[.kju 3241]

My bat file:

xcopy C:\ArmA\AddonsSSD x:\AddonsSSD /S /I

[waimser 10]

Forcing the mod line has done something for our server. It stopped server crashes related to the mod line when no other way was known to work. I believe the server admin is quite new to all of this as well and still learning.

Now although I dont like the fact that you just essentially badmouthed my clan tcp. I still think your a genius for thinking a little outside, or inside the box. I may have solved my problem by using the allowed mod folder in the ram drive, adding the pbo files to it and junctioning to it.

I have to go out for dinner now but will test fully when I return.

[.kju 3241]

@ waimser

Do NOT use: equalModRequired.

Do use: verifySignatures.

[ginger mcale 11]

Very missleading informations here in a few posts earlier. You dont need to move the files, you dont need a symlink/junction. Guys, just use the -mod command with full paths like -mod=J:\@RAMDISK

Its easier and works like a charm.

I have created a Ramdisk with 1660 MB size, at this ramdisk i do copy:

- Directory: @RAMDISK
-- Subdirectory: AddOns
--- File: buildings2.pbo
--- File: buildings2.pbo.bi.bisign
--- File: chernarus.pbo
--- File: chernarus.pbo.bi.bisign
--- File: plants2_Tree.pbo
--- File: plants2_Tree.pbo.bi.bisign
--- File: structures.pbo
--- File: structures.pbo.bi.bisign

The Ramdisk has the drive letter J.

My ArmA shortcut looks like this:

"G:\ArmA 2\beta\arma2.exe" -mod=J:\@RAMDISK;beta;@SOUNDS -nosplash

In that order first the game loads the things from the org. AddOns Subdirectory, then the files from the Ramdisk, then the beta files, then the sound addons which i have.

The original files at the \ArmA 2\AddOns subdirectory stay untouched. The game recognizes that you want to load some files from the ramdrive instead of the default AddOns subdirectory of ArmA 2. Dont forget the 1kb .bi.bisign files for each .pbo file. With that you dont get kicked from servers that use bisign files verification.

With the Process Monitor from SysInternals i checked afterwards if the game realy loads the files from the Ramdisk instead of the default AddOns subdirectory of ArmA 2 and it does.

I have prepared the @RAMDISK directory in my ArmA 2 directory and copy it everytime to the Ramdrive when i want to use it.

By the way, excellent analysis qwertz! Thanks for your efforts! Excellent job! And thanks to Leon86 for showing the method with the -mod=X:\Directory\Subdirectory thing.

Regards

Mariusz aka Ginger

Edited November 1, 2009 by Ginger McAle

[-BBE- Soul Assassin 0]

Thanks Ginger McAle, good/helpful post! Also have to thank the topic starter for his efforts. I just tried it with buildings2, plants2_tree, chernarus and structures and it worked very, very well.

My HD (Spinpoint 1TB) was apparantly really the culprit here. I always thought it was a relatively good HD but it's nowhere near fast enough for ArmA2 I suppose. ;)

Anyway, I can play through the urban missions now with a lot less hickups. FPS is still not great on Very High settings (15-30 in Cherno), but atleast it's a lot more stable which is more important to me now.

Thanks once again!

[Tankbuster 1735]

Sub $80 SSDs due this month!!! These are intel clones, 40GB drives. Write speed aint all that compared to other SSDs, but still way quicker than a rotational drive. If you can squeeze your OS and Windows directory onto one of these, it's going to be a solution that is well within the budget of many users.

http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=20935

[Basil Brush 10]

I cannot get ramdisk to help. I am using superspeed ramdisk+ and then

launching with "C:\Program Files\Bohemia Interactive\ArmA 2\arma2.exe" -mod=R:\AddOns

but performance is no better???. I am sick of this game I have tried so many things and it still plays like a slug.

[Pyronick 21]

Nah, I'll pass until there are SAS2-spec SSDs with hardware TRIM.

[TimRiceSE 10]

I cannot get ramdisk to help. I am using superspeed ramdisk+ and then

launching with "C:\Program Files\Bohemia Interactive\ArmA 2\arma2.exe" -mod=R:\AddOns

but performance is no better???. I am sick of this game I have tried so many things and it still plays like a slug.

Seems youre doing something quite wrong anyway, based on your system specs.

In addition, if you expected a FPS boost from this, you had your hopes in the wrong place. Its about reducing stuttering and texture/LOD popping.