gameplay slowing down

[orengreen]

Hello all,

I've been playing the game for 2 weeks with no problems, until recently . When I play, after a few minutes the gameplay becomes slow (driving, running, any activity) for a minutes or two, and then goes on back to normal speed for a few minutes, and then slows down again...etc.

 

My system is perfectly capable of running the game smoothly, and I've been using pretty high display options with no problem until now (so please don't suggest to me to use lower settings... I know for sure the system should handle the game smoothly, as it was doing until a few days ago)

 

Win XP + SP2

Celeron 2.8 GHz

1024 MB RAM

ATI RAdeon 9800 PRO

 

THANKS!!

[crazyanurag]

believe me, the game does lag on the highest settings even on the fastest PCs...your specs, save the graphics card, are below my system specs, but i can only run the game at Low Visual FX Quality and a resolution of 1280x1024x32, with no AA or MIP Mapping...so you could try lowering your setting

 

if not, try and upgrade your graphics card drivers, and while you're at it, have yourself an upgrade of whatever else drivers that've been outdated...

 

also, SA is a resource-hungry game, so turn off all background applications (even your anti-virus) and then start the game...the game can also lag dranatically if you're using trainers or other such programs, and for the best performance, you should turn those off...

 

finally, make sure that the files for the radios are on your HDD, and not reading from your disc...moreover, if you prefer listening to your own tracks through the User Tracks station, make sure you don't put shortcuts to your songs into the folder, because that takes a little time to process...

 

hope this helps!

 

You'll Never Walk Alone

[orengreen]

I use 1024x767x32 resolution,

FX on high (not highest)

antialiasing = 1

All other display settings are highest.

 

This doesn't seem so demanding, is it??

 

Besides, the problem is not that the game is always slow, but every few minutes it slows down for a 1-2 minutes, and then resumes normal speed.

This makes me think it's not a resource problem...

 

Any suggestions? some kind of bug??

 

Thanks!

 

[jnzooger]

Sounds like hard drive fragmentation to me. Try defraging your hard drive.

[orengreen]

Thanks for the suggestion. I defragmented my drive (which wasn't terribly fragmented to begin with) and this didn't solve the problem.

I closed all other applications (antivirus etc.)

I lowered the resolution from 1024x768 to 800x600

I lowered effects from very high to low

 

Nothing worked. The problem stayed the same. I re-installed the game (keeping the save files). I deleted the settings file... Problem stays

 

The thing is, I know that the game USED to work PERFECTLY until a few days ago!

 

Any ideas???

 

I tried searching the forum for similar posts, but the search function is disabled!

 

THANKS!