I've been on a journey attempting to troubleshoot this weird lag that I've been getting in this game. I'll try to keep this short and concise however there's a lot to this that may be an underlying problem with my system at this point. I'm playing a DRM free version of Factorio 1.1.109 and it's mysteriously lagging after a certain amount of time passes. It runs perfectly fine at 60 FPS/UPS but will typically lag 5 minutes in. Specifically the FPS will drop to around 9-20 FPS. I went to the forums and learned that FPS drops were a GPU issue so I assumed that my graphics card was the problem. The thing is though is that my graphics card is perfectly capable of running the game. I have a NVIDA GeForce GTX 965m which while not is the best card is still more than enough to run the game smoothly since the minimum requirement is a GTX 260. I did the typical checking task manager to see what was taking up all of my GPU and saw that it was this process called "dwm.exe" desktop window manager. It would jump up to around 50-72% utilization whenever the game was running. After some more googling, others reported that it was Nivida's control panel settings causing the issue so I went in, changed the global settings to "intergrated graphics" and IT WORKED. For now... the game eventually exhibited the same issues although the time it took for to lag was a little longer. Some other advice was to update my GPU drivers, which while outdated by 2 years, seemed to fixed the GPU utilization issue. However the game was still dropping to under 30 FPS even when doing nothing. In fact in the tutorial scenrios the game would still lag after around 2 minutes or a little more.
I've taken a trace snapshot of my system while running the game but I'm not sure how to interpret the data, still researching as I go with this. I don't understand how if there's nothing throttling with my system why the game would be lagging. I mean in all fairness my computer is a decade old but it should still be able to run this game fine especially since I was able to get smoother gameplay from a 2013 Macbook. I'll post my log file, saves, and specs in the next post.
the troubles people go through when they're THIS poorcouldn't be me
>>102420970You'd be surprised the reasons peoples' game can slow to crawl. From AMD drivers to USB adapters. I see this as a learning experience.
>>102420965>macbook>sideloadlydaemo.exe
>>102420920try posting here, maybe they can help you >>>/vg/494799230
>>102420920without debug symbols there isn't much you can do. If game content is provided in the form of a mod (ie. a mod called base game) you can try checking scripts there
>2015 cpuYour CPU is 9 years old, you could've powered through the lag with a better CPU...But, you should try running a profiler like intlel's on the game before the game lags and after, this gives you at least the offset of the function that lags, no fear since there's no anticheat and you're on a drm free version.The game also appears to have a profiler in it too, what are the differences when it lags vs when it doesn't?
look at your mods first.
>>102420920I believe factorio devs provide source code access if you request it. But you need a prominent dev in the community.Doesn't hurt to send your findings to them though.
Sorry for taking so long here's my....>Log files(I only have two of them)https://files.catbox.moe/b4bhd2.loghttps://files.catbox.moe/7e7j2t.log>Factorio Save(It's my first game of Factorio still so don't judge my base)https://files.catbox.moe/hk5uch.zipMy laptop specs are...i7-4720HQ12 GB DDR3Samsung SSD 860 EVO 500GBIntel HD Graphics 4600NVIDA GeForce GTX 965mSomething that I'll say seems a little old looking at the trace snapshot is that my intel graphics card has more activity than my GTX graphics card. Not sure if that's normal but still odd.>>102422525I do not have any mods enabled nor prior to this issue.>>102422492>try running a profiler like intlel's on the game before the game lags and afterWorking on it...>>102422540Alright, I'll try that. I should've done that for the 2013 Macbook because there was an issue where yellow ammo would disappear if you didn't drag into your inventory directly.
>>102422492A follow up to this post, is there any particular reason why a CPU problem would be leading to graphical issues with the FPS drops?
>>102420920"Lag" is a delay between the client and the server due to a poor Internet connection. You are not experiencing lag on a local single player game.
I have zero clue what I'm looking at but it seems useful.>>102422677Would throttling be a better term?
>>102420920running out of vram or thermal throttlinguse a desktop computer, it's better
>>102422781>running out of vram or thermal throttlingIs there any way I could see that happening in the data or is it impossible to measure accurately?
>>102422796it's basic diagnostics just open hwinfo64 sensors you will see your temps, clocks, ram, vram, voltages
>>102422803if you have a separate screen put hwinfo sensors on one screen and the game on the other.if you have one screen put game in windowed mode and put them side by side.Take a screenshot when the game is running well and take another screenshot when it slows down.
>>102422803>>102422828Working on this as well... I'm getting prerequisites installed for the intel profiler.
>>102420970>"wow, software sure is unoptimized nowadays. wonder what's up. oh well time for 4chan :)">read this post>abruptly hit with the realization that people genuinely discourage others from trying to optimize or from getting practice/training in doing soits your fault
>>102422861don't bother with intel profilerjust drop the hwinfo screenshots and I will tell you your cpu is throttled to 1.6 GHz and you need to repaste
>>102422637I have no idea why it says it's using both graphics cards. Could you post a screenshot of the nvidia control panel on the application screen?. (just because I am curious of the settings it has)
>>102423095The intel graphics card is where most of my usage comes from it seems. Is this screenshot good?
Factorio is very optimised and runs great on old CPUs. Of course it runs better on newer ones but for a small-medium sized factory it will run no problem. OP, my primary thought is actually overheating. Check temps.
>>102423152Yeah thx, it was just curiosity. Check temps as >>102423046 said
>>102423188>>102423172>>102423046
>>102423324I still kind have reason to believe it might be something else because it drops even when the game is paused but it could be an issue with the thermal throttling like you guys said.
>>102423334Your cpu is running at 800 MHz. It should be running at about 3 GHz normally.Replace your thermal paste and report back.
>>102423348Okay, but it's still weird that it dips even when I'm doing nothing. I'll be back.
>>102423324Not an expert but 90ºC should probably throttle you cpu. Also, idk if you checked already but check windows power management, it should be on balance or high performance (High performance should lock you cpu clock to max)
>>102423334>80~90c core tempthats probably it.cleaning dust out of your laptop/replacing thermal paste should do a lot to help
it's running at 800 MHz guys. safe to say it is thermal throttling. Even the no lag screenshot shows it thermal throttling to 1.6 GHz.it's channeling it's pentium 3 ancestor
>>102423488>>102423509>>102423538This explains a lot. I'm glad we were able to come to this conclusion and understand why the lag is happening instead of with most YouTube videos you're told a bunch of stuff to do which may or may not work and you don't understand. Thanks a lot guys. Any more resources on general debugging like this?
>>102423608Be careful when cleaning the fan. Do NOT let it spin if you clean it with a vacuum cleaner
>>102420920>>>/v/
>>102423608>Any more resources on general debugging like this?Get a free socket 775 system and overclock it to pieces. Run fun benchmarks like Superpi, cinebench, y-cruncher. Make it play games it can barely run.
>>102420920https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/iot/iot-enterprise/soft-real-time/soft-real-time-devicealso turn off anti-tamper & realtime protection in windows defender
>>102420995>From Nvidia drivers to USB adapters.fixed
>>102423324>Core Thermal Throttling: YesI fucking hate poorfags
>>102425356I'm surprised MS casually has a guide for doing something so retarded with little warnings
>>102420920AMDip
>Bonjour Apple shit>Adobe Creative Cloud shit
>>102425961the only retarded part is IdleDisable=1all the other tweaks are valid options for debugging latency issues.
