Struggling with lag - could use some insight if available

Discussion in 'Gotham City (General Gameplay)' started by Freeman, May 28, 2018.

  1. SethZoulMonEl 10000 Post Club

    When was the last time you cleaned the dust out of the system? As dust builds up, it traps heat in the system and can damage components over time. It can also cause components to throttle back performance as a means to reduce heat generation.

    Use an electronics air duster to clean out all vents, USB ports, etc. after shutting down the system, removing the AC Adapter, and removing the battery if it is accessible.

    WARNING
    Never use a vacuum to clean electronics. Vacuums can build up electrostatic discharge (ESD) and damage components.
    • Like x 2
  2. Great Architect Loyal Player

    Try each of these, one after the other, testing DCUO after each: -

    1. Turn off Windows Indexing.
    2. Increase the size of your Paging File in Advanced Settings to approximately half the size of your RAM.
    3. Get the *latest* Audio and Video drivers direct from the manufacturer - not the Win 10 defaults.
    4. Your laptop starts with a load of cruft that's installed. Switch off anything you do not directly need by running "taskmgr", and disabling practically everything except your antivirus and firewall (and Windows Defender, if you're feeling brave).
    5. Update or Add all versions of .NET in "Turn Windows feature on or off".
    6. Kneel Before Zod.
    • Like x 1
  3. LadyLightning Issue Tracker Volunteer

    1. Get the PCTest client
    2. Get prepared to play
    3. Typ in the chat: /perfmon max

    - What happens with the FPS/Ping when the lag starts to happen?

    Furthermore: Which graphiccard driver settings do you have?
    • Like x 1
  4. Freeman Active Player

    Well... looks like I finally solved my lag issue.

    I did a number of things along the way attempting to solve the problem, like reinstalling Windows, trying different driver versions, tweaking my NVIDIA driver settings and turning off a bunch of unneeded Windows services etc. etc.. But I think what really did it was 2 things.

    1) Replaced my 90W AC power adapter with a 150W.
    2) Removing the battery from the laptop.


    Seems my graphics chip was not getting the juice it needed from the 90W AC power adapter and the battery was hogging all the power for itself rather than delivering what was needed to the video chip.

    My game is running smooth again.

    Anyway. Hope this helps someone else.
    • Like x 1
  5. LadyLightning Issue Tracker Volunteer

    ...which graphiccard?
  6. Doc.Doom15 Committed Player

    Good that OP got this fixed but these things are usually related to the ISP or some local computer problem. Upgrade the GPU/CPU/BIOS drivers to exclude local problems and if that doesn't work it's probably the ISP or an internal firewall/ISP firewall. Focusing on anything else is just noise from a troubleshooting perspective from non-technical people (sorry LadyLightning, I know you're trying to be helpful but you don't seem to know how computers work; MSCE for 20+ years). My guess is that the AC adapter was the problem in OP's case (might have been a Windows update that put the GPU into power saving mode instead of giving maximum power). And perhaps some malware which the Windows reinstall had fixed. This game can run on a very basic system so the graphics card is irrelevant unless it's from before 2010.

    For better troubleshooting you should also post the ping result to the DCUO servers. Just a tip, people complaining about lag never post their speed to the DCUO servers which is more important than the system they have.
  7. Freeman Active Player

    Not sure what noise you're referring to. I run a pretty clean system and the problem seemed to appear out of the blue after running DCUO smooth for years on this particular laptop. I thought that the problem was a combination of upgrading to Windows 10 (drivers and/or background processes hogging up resources and conflicting with what I really want the laptop to do) and possibly something new in a game update that might be bogging the system down.

    But nope. None of that 'noise'. It turned out to be just a simple power issue. I had a feeling that the problem/solution would be something that would be easy to overlook. And it was.

    Your input is a tad late. Not to mention condescending. Not everyone is as clueless as you might like to think. :)

    And LadyLightning.... NVIDIA Quadro FX 880M

    No... it's not a gaming chipset but it is ... has been.... enough to run DCUO so far. ;)
  8. Jack T. Chance Devoted Player

    There's one final thing I didn't see mentioned: Your internet speed. When experiencing lag, I run speedtests to see what kind of speeds I'm getting. I'm lucky enough to have been able to upgrade to Verizon FIOS Quantum Gigabit Internet last November, but several months ago, my speeds slowed to a snail's pace. Turned out the Optical Network Terminal (the main box where the fiber-optic cable comes into your house) had gone bad and needed to be replaced.

    So, anyway, just a piece of the puzzle that's important, but I didn't see it mentioned.
  9. Freeman Active Player

    I was on internet 150 and recently upgraded to 300 (300Mbps down / 20Mbps up). However, my internal network in my house is only wired for 100Mbps and my laptop is hardwired (CAT5-e). Most recent speedtest shows the full 100Mbps.
    • Like x 1
  10. LadyLightning Issue Tracker Volunteer

    Yeah, certainly no good for gaming. That graphiccard has a power saving mode and it porbably did just that...
    At full speed it can barely handle running 3D games. In power sfae mode? probably not.