Elite: Game talk

HoleyMcMoley
20 Mar 2021, 3:57pm
SakashiroThe stutter you see in the video is not a result of CPU or GPU load, but disk activity.

Agreed, 100%. It's also consistent with the report here:

QuillmonkeyMemory is sitting constant at around 28% but true - disk usage is fluctuating between 20% and 100% during play.


I didn't see an answer to the question "HDD or SSD" but it looks guaranteed that it's a HDD kind of issue (even if the game itself is installed on an SSD, I suspect that the system volume (C:) is a HDD.)

Something I do on most HDD-based machines (and have to redo every major Windows update, cos MS know best about which services to run, argh) is disable Superfetch (aka Sysmain). It rearranges stuff on disk to "make things quicker" but hammers the disks while it does it, and it's not very clever at choosing good times to do it.

However, the particular disk activity that caused these problems looks likely to be something pretty transient. Sometimes Windows will spend shedloads of time scanning the disk right after updating the anti-virus signatures etc. If an update had just run through (even if you hadn't rebooted yet) then this may have been the culprit. If the problem was indeed transient, or at least comes and goes, then malware wouldn't be terribly high on my list of suspects. But if you have surfed dodgy sites lately then it's certainly worth keeping an open mind. (Any kind of malware that wants to consume your CPU/GPU time will NOT be hammering your disk though.)
Quillmonkey
20 Mar 2021, 4:50pm
Hi all,
Fresh install had no effect. I’ve tried both steam and Epic - both equally affected so its definitely my machine. Other games (Divinity 2, Civ 6, X-Com2, Cities: skylines) all play without problem. So not specifically gpu / cpu / ram or a directx12 issue.
I have stopped win def accessing ED but intermittent HDD and network performance hitting 100% still.
Yes, Steam apps are on HDD. Sys (C: ) is on dedicated M.2 SSD.
Have written support call to fDev. In the meantime will do some rl stuff?
Meowers
20 Mar 2021, 4:55pm
Try to pinpoint the process that causes that much HDD load. It's more common than hardware problems, if you don't hit you PC with a foot often, HDDs are pretty reliable.
Waylongway
20 Mar 2021, 7:30pm
If you have sufficient space on the SSD, try to install E:D there.

I'm not sure what you mean by the following.
QuillmonkeyI have stopped win def accessing ED

Just to be clear: Any other program should preferably not run at the same time as E:D or at least not access files on the same drive E:D is installed on.
Meowers
20 Mar 2021, 10:42pm
WaylongwayJust to be clear: Any other program should preferably not run at the same time as E:D or at least not access files on the same drive E:D is installed on.


Have some 3d-modeling stuff in dormant mode, in case I'll need it urgently (happens a dozen times a day, so keeping it running saves my time), but while it won't trying to plunge in HDD access buffer, it's fine. But it need to be trusted software, that don't bugger you with sudden 10 Gb updates or doing some caching/cleaning/indexing while you not expecting this.
Waylongway
20 Mar 2021, 11:19pm
Well, my suggestion was aiming at the test case at hand, in order to ensure that Quillmonkey can enjoy his game. If a program is known to not cause issues, it's fine of course. It depends on the software and the computer. I also run EDdiscovery, EDMC and EDDI in parallel to the game all on an older laptop. But E:D is intentionally installed on the system partition at the SSD.
Ray Collins
21 Mar 2021, 7:54am
Why are there automated mining operations going up on the hillside from the front of Dav’s Hope?
Seen today 3/21/2021 3.07 EST in Solo mode.
Episparh
21 Mar 2021, 8:04am
Ray CollinsWhy are there automated mining operations going up on the hillside from the front of Dav’s Hope?
Seen today 3/21/2021 3.07 EST in Solo mode.

It is a random thing.

Last edit: 21 Mar 2021, 8:14am
Claude_Glystra
21 Mar 2021, 8:32am
QuillmonkeyHi all,
Fresh install had no effect. I’ve tried both steam and Epic - both equally affected so its definitely my machine. Other games (Divinity 2, Civ 6, X-Com2, Cities: skylines) all play without problem. So not specifically gpu / cpu / ram or a directx12 issue.
I have stopped win def accessing ED but intermittent HDD and network performance hitting 100% still.
Yes, Steam apps are on HDD. Sys (C: ) is on dedicated M.2 SSD.
Have written support call to fDev. In the meantime will do some rl stuff?



After much research before I did my last upgrade, I ended up getting a 1Tb SSD specifically for games/Steam apps. It was prompted initially by DCS World, but applies to ED as well. So I have a 500G M.2 system drive (C: ), 1Tb SSD gaming drive and then a couple/few 2Tb Hdds for backup/data.

Using an SSD made a big difference to DCS performance.

Last edit: 21 Mar 2021, 8:41am
Quillmonkey
21 Mar 2021, 9:49am
WaylongwayJust to be clear: Any other program should preferably not run at the same time as E:D or at least not access files on the same drive E:D is installed on.

Virus scan was checking steam folders while I played but don't worry I turned off the pesky virus scanner.
I have since run several 3rd party virus scans and the best they've found is a minecraft launcher from a couple of years back that they then tried to charge money to remove (ahem snake oil).
Claude_GlystraI ended up getting a 1Tb SSD specifically for games/Steam apps. It was prompted initially by DCS World, but applies to ED as well. So I have a 500G M.2 system drive (C: ), 1Tb SSD gaming drive and then a couple/few 2Tb Hdds for backup/data.

Using an SSD made a big difference to DCS performance.

I have 2x SSD in my pc. My data drive where I do my work is 1TB and backed up to my network. My system drive, 500GB M.2 contains Windows and a few programs - including my epic account of E:D. This also suffers the same hangs. So, it doesn't matter if its SSD or HDD.
All my steam acc is on a large HDD as it doesn't matter if that fails, I know the data is safe.

Can I ask what kind of mtu and average ping time people get on E:D? It's in the network options. I'm thinking this may be the problem now. My ISP might be throttling my upload service.
Rebecca Hail
21 Mar 2021, 10:37am
Claude_Glystra
QuillmonkeyHi all,
Fresh install had no effect. I’ve tried both steam and Epic - both equally affected so its definitely my machine. Other games (Divinity 2, Civ 6, X-Com2, Cities: skylines) all play without problem. So not specifically gpu / cpu / ram or a directx12 issue.
I have stopped win def accessing ED but intermittent HDD and network performance hitting 100% still.
Yes, Steam apps are on HDD. Sys (C: ) is on dedicated M.2 SSD.
Have written support call to fDev. In the meantime will do some rl stuff?




After much research before I did my last upgrade, I ended up getting a 1Tb SSD specifically for games/Steam apps. It was prompted initially by DCS World, but applies to ED as well. So I have a 500G M.2 system drive (C: ), 1Tb SSD gaming drive and then a couple/few 2Tb Hdds for backup/data.

Using an SSD made a big difference to DCS performance.


Some games are literally unplayable without an SSD (looking at you, Total War: Warhammer 2) because of their ridiculously long load times.
Sakashiro
21 Mar 2021, 12:37pm
QuillmonkeyCan I ask what kind of mtu and average ping time people get on E:D? It's in the network options. I'm thinking this may be the problem now. My ISP might be throttling my upload service.

Network issues make other players disappear from your instance (think combat logging) or prevent transitions from one instance to another (think Braben tunnel, Orange Sidewinder etc.). They don't make the screen stutter or freeze.

As long as your task manager still shows those bursts of 100% disk load you reported earlier, don't bother looking elsewhere. Find the process that causes these spikes, because they're absolutely not normal.

In Windows 10 high disk activity sometimes occurs after system startup, e.g. when WaasMedic Agent checks OS files for corruption. This can take several minutes, and if I launch ED during that time, I see stutter very much like yours. But once those checks are done, disk activity rarely exceeds 10% and gameplay is smooth, even while I record it on video (using OBS Studio). I don't have a SSD by the way, only one HDD with everything on one partition that's currently 90% full. If I can run and record the game without issues, so should you.
Waylongway
21 Mar 2021, 1:19pm
Sakashiro
21 Mar 2021, 1:46pm
Or Performance/Resource Monitor, which is installed by default.
HoleyMcMoley
21 Mar 2021, 1:59pm
Yeah and in fact even the basic MS Task Manager is excellent at telling you which app is hammering the hard disk. The Sysinternals stuff is excellent for other things (I use Process Explorer every day) - including Process Monitor which can tell you lots of useful things, like which files are being accessed by processes and how long the accesses are taking. Performance/Resource Monitor also very good for some things, indeed.

Post a reply

You must be signed in to post here.
Elite:Dangerous related questions, answers, tips and help. Simply anything that is directly related to the game and its gameplay goes here.
For the discussions about the community, other stuff related to the game like astrophysics and so on please use the General talk thread.

What does belong here:
  • Questions, answers, tips and guides about ship loadouts, game activities like exploration, mining, combat and similar things that directly relate to the gameplay.
  • Game technical issues and problems, if you are looking for a help. For the bug reports please head to the official FD forum.
  • Discussion about "official" events from GalNet and community goals.
What does not belong here:
  • Discussing player actions and activities, general topics about Elite community and player events, topics related to the game but also real world (like astrophysics and similar). Please post these to the "General talk" thread instead.
  • Any off topic discussion, please post this kind of stuff to the "Offtopic" thread.