SL Viewer Lag

[lgnot]

I believe I have a reasonably competent PC to run SL as I can play more taxing games without many issues. I'm running Vista as my OS and it's up to date. I've tried switching to another viewer (Firestorm) with EVERYTHING set to low for it to be somewhat bearable and while it's an improvement it's still not really where I can enjoy the experience. It also seemed to load better and faster on it overall than the default viewer. I've read up a bit about slow rezzing and the game maybe having issues with 64-bit systems so that might be it? Any suggestions or advice is appreciated.

 

If it helps here are my hardware stats.

 

[Ren Toxx]

Second Life isn't easily comparable to other 3D games / applications because of its user-generated (and thus not usually very optimized), load-on-demand content, so a certain lag is to be expected, whether due to connection or graphics issues.

 There are some viewers usually regarded as performing better in certain systems, for example older ones; one of the best known is Singularity.

 

Anyway, and regardless of the viewer, the 'high/low' graphics settings are really just quickly selectable presets for a number of specific, individually adjustable settings such as draw distance, objects / avatars LOD (level of detail), shaders type, ALM (advanced lighting model, aka projected shadows), particles, number of low-quality avatars, etc, etc. For challenged systems I always recommend taking the time and effort to adjust all these more precisely to each user's tastes and needs... some people don't care to be able to see things two sims away and prefer short viewing distance in exchange for more quality on the things they do see nearby, or they don't care if the objects are rendered low-detail but want smoother avatars... or don't need to see flexiprim / avatar physics movement but would like to see particles... etc, etc. A much better suited balance that accounts for one's computer performance can be achieved this way.

[Freya Mokusei]

One of the most important things to bear in mind when considering lag, is that your network interface is streaming ALL of the content to your PC through the Internet. Therefore, your Internet connection, local network topology and bandwidth are probably some of the most important determiners for Second Life experience quality. Your OP doesn't mention any of this.

'Lag' is also a very general term. Are you getting FPS lag, network lag, physics lag, asset lag, simulator lag, or are you just losing packets?

The best definitions of the different types of lag I've found, are mentioned here. You'll also probably need an independent, non-skewed speedtest (remember to route it to either Phoenix, USA or Dallas, USA) - I don't know which ISP you use, so I can't suggest a speedtest site. Suggest you read this, research, and post more information.