Vista: Performance Hints and Tips

[Skuzzy]

This is the overall problem with Vista.  It is inconsistent, in part, due to driver instabilities.  NVidia drivers are terrible under Vista.  ATI actually has the upper hand there.

And Sniv, the problems you faced with Vista and various products is all about Vista and DRM.  You older version of Pinnacle will not work due to DRM under Vista.  Creative Labs had to re-create the DirectSound API under Vista, as MS pulled it out becuase they could not figure out how to make it work with DRM.

Basically Sniv, everything you listed as being a problem with a third party is all related to DRM under Vista.

Today, Vista decided to not show me any of the computers in its workgroup.  No way to force it either.  It will not show itself in the workgroup.  I am now relegated to using another computer to purchase anything at Newegg, as my Vista box refuses to work with thier secure pages after the last update.  The more updates I do, the more problems I am getting.

[TARGUT]

I LOVE beta testing for M.S.
At least if you hate their product U can't give it back.
CYA Up
Targut

[flatiron1]

i am new to AH2 and have a new puter with vista home premium. seems to work ok but my current problem is getting voice radio to work, seems the adjustments setting are different. any ideas on how to get the voice radio to work?

[Skuzzy]

I have yet to get voice to work on mine.  I just got a microphone, so I will be turning the issue over to the dev guys.

[Wayout]

Originally posted by flatiron1
i am new to AH2 and have a new puter with vista home premium. seems to work ok but my current problem is getting voice radio to work, seems the adjustments setting are different. any ideas on how to get the voice radio to work?

I assume you mean getting the microphone to work with Vista... If that's the case then see if this works for you. In "Control Panel" open "Ease of Access".  You should see an option "Set Up Microphone".   Make sure your microphone is plugged in, click on "Set Up Microphone" and follow the prompts.

After that you can left click the speaker located on the taskbar, click "Recording Devices" and tweak the settings until you're happy with the results.  Go to th AH help page to get info on how to test the microphone in the game.

[Sniv]

Update of Snivly's further adventures with vista beta.....

Since the last time aside from various Nvidia updates and the like I have
(in no order)

Got rid of the SB Audigy and went back to Ac97 on board
Crashed the onboard ac97 trying to install a driver
Re-installed the SB since ac97 was dead and installsheild was not working.
Finally forund out what to fix on the installsheild error for AC97

Tried to install WIC (world in conflict....hey they have nukes)and spent the better part of a week cleaning out all sorts of errors, and finding out that all sorts of intesting things ...Got it running finally but I can say that if I was charging per hour the bill would be for a minimum  of 24 to 36 hours .

Issues found/solved and their fixes are

Had a problem with my 2 DVD R drives ,Could not get Wic to even load, would crash to a blue screen .
Fix was found on MS tech forums where it would appear that due to the upgrade to vista ultimate my system had copied a lot of the dvd drivers used from various programs ie pinacle,nero etc etc.Had to kill most of the drivers by searching them down and then de installed .Had to make a registry change to kill upper and lower values and bingo it worked.

This does not include other issues that were tried at the same time which include
changing the bios
getting a sata dvd-r since the ide drivers seemed flaky
installing 3 different system cleanup/tunie up programs
getting rid of 3 dvd authoring programs

the list goes on and on.....more later
does it work ,yes, but I have not had to get into this amount of tinkering since dos days it seems

Snivly

[Otterpop]

Thanks Skuzzy and all for the info.  Much better playability now.  Would trying Riva Tuners on a 256M PCIe 7900 GS help any?

Also,  anyone else notice if you set folder options to view hidden files, your 3rd party anti-virus and firewall you installed has an icon on the public/desktop?  Why in the **** would I want to share that?

[TARGUT]

Update: I finally gave up on Vista and installed XP (against the advice of MS and HP) HP tech support helped me round up the correct drivers, and now it is a great gaming box. The only part I haven't got working yet is the mic, but I haven't spent much time on that.

The difference in performance is like night and day, the game runs smoothly and FRs are consistant. Getting rid of Vista also cured the "don't move controls so rapidly" error I was getting as well as the lock-ups.
I still think there is a code compatibility issue with AH / Vista as none of the other games I downloaded would freeze up or give me problems with J.S.

If anyone is going to ditch Vista and go to XP on a new machine just make sure that you have another PC to use to download the correct drivers. 1 of the incompatibilities was the PCI Controller which killed my network card (+ vidcard) so I couldn't go online to get the new drivers.
If you are running a HP PC the tech support recommends against ditching Vista, but they will help you locate the drivers for your hardware.

CYA UP
Targut

[OrionV]

I just discorvered this.  Under windows Vista, multicore processors,  if u have file shariring enabled, you can get a feedback loop with programs trying to access the same registry address.  Can reallly make your day bad.

[John Hynds]

Just got a new computer with Windows Vista. AH seems to run great to what I was using but found a couple of problems. I can't seem to get views to zoom in or out. Also tilde key doesn't work to change size of message window. I have changed the key for the message window but doing to same doesn't seem to work for zooming. Any ideas?

[hawk36]

I am not able to get the Tilde key to work either. quite aggrivating when one is talking crap..lol The mice work, and I get good frame rates, but it has been a struggle.  only issue I am having now is the updater is hosed. so I will have to reload I guess, and then retweak this thing.

[dtango]

Had to upgrade to vista (new PC).  All seems to be working OK except for the "tilde" key as well for the message window.  I've remapped it to the "*" key on the keypad and that seems to work now.

Tango, XO
412th FS Braunco Mustangs

[Skuzzy]

Looks like all the issues I am having with Vista will be addressed in SP1 when it comes out first quarter of 2008.  We shall see.

[Bingolong]

this helped me alot, give it a shot
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2110595,00.asp

[Skuzzy]

No, that is not going to help the problems I am having with Vista.  Many of the SP1 fixes are for the exact problems I am having.

Vista is NOT streamlined out of the box.  It takes  alot of work to get it streamlined.