Anormally low FPS

[Thibaud Merlin]

Hello, I post a question here on behalf of my best RL friend, who thinks I am better in english.
She has the following weird problem:
When she logs in SL at home location, she gets about 12 fps with graphics prefs set on high, but after a few minutes, without moving the avie nor the cam, the fps drop to 1.2-1.5 and remain so.
Now after minimizing SL and maximizing back, the fps get their initial value of 12 or so, and then fall down again to 1.2-1.5 after a short time; this cycle is endlessly reproducible.
On other sims, values may differ but the phenomenon is basically the same.
Same problem whatever the type of connection to the router, wireless or cable, but only with SL (even long YouTube HD videos run smoothly)
Config is as follows:
laptop with AMD Turion 64 X2 and nVidia 8600M GS, running SL Viewer 1.23.4 under Vista SP1
We have tried the following without result:
- full deinstallation of SL (including deletion of disk cache and settings folders) and reinstallation,
- reverting to 1.22.11,
- trying different values of max. bandwidth, disk cache size and allocated texture memory on graphics card.
I am now clueless, any explanation would be welcome, in particular about the effect of minimization. Suggestions for corrective action(s) would be even better.

[Pabl0 Roffo]

Have you checked the laptop's power saving features?  The CPU and GPU clocks could be reduced in a power-saving mode and therefore reduce your fps.

Try disabling all power-saving features or set to "Maximum Performance" and see if the problem persists.

[Thibaud Merlin]

I omitted to mention it but the described behavior occurs also when the laptop is plugged in. Your suggestion is interesting anyway and we will check that. Thank you.

[Clyde Lindman]

Most likely the problem is in the graphics preferences. First have her check the "custom" box in the graphics preferences and find the draw distance slider and set it to 64. If this doesn't improve the problem, gradually downgrade the other preferences until a balance of performance and visuals is reached. On my desktop I have aan 8900 GTS with 640meg of video RAM. I still find it helpful to turn the dd way down (I use the Emerald Viewer that as a dd slider on the botom buttons)  when teleporting and only increase it for pictures or panoramas.

[Thibaud Merlin]

I would like to emphasize that at startup the viewer performs quite normally and no downgrading of the graphics preferences is necessary. The actual problem to which a solution is sought is that the performances degrade after a few minutes without, as i wrote, any motion of the avatar or of the camera.. Yesterday we found out that minimizing and maximizing back the viewer restored the normal performances, but only for a short time; i hope this feature can give someone a hint of what is happening.

[SaintLEOlions Zimer]

I have been having these same type of issues.  I worked with LL and Dell and believe it to be my computer is overheating.  I’m getting the heatsink and motherboard replaced today so we will see if that helps.

[Thibaud Merlin]

That sounds very interesting indeed, because the problem has been noted for the first time in early summer, and internal cooling of laptops can be problematic. The GPU could be overheating when the viewer is maximized. I'll be working on that. Thanks a lot!

[Craig Susanowa]

I also have had the same problems with my laptop, an older Dell. I tried the things suggested earlier and then deduced that it was overheating. I spent $25.00 on a dual fan cooling pad which partially solved the problem as well as a small quiet 3 inch fan which really keeps the laptop cool. With that unit, $8.00 at Target, the laptops fan never kicks in to high and sl runs pretty well. Also, performance improved after installing Cool Viewer 1.23.4.

[Thibaud Merlin]

May I ask you to confirm that on your laptop also, after minimizing the viewer for some time, things were improving momentarily?

[Craig Susanowa]

It did for me. I always run it minimalized now. Cooling externally was the big improvement for me though.

[Arksun Tone]

This does sound like an overheating/auto throttling down issue.

It being the graphics preferences doesn't make sense if its a higher frame rate to start with and always bounces back up after minimising (again that would go along with a heat issue because when sl is minimised its not taxing the GPU, allowing it time to cool down).

 

As well as the return/fan suggestions, you can also buy specific cooling docks for laptops which dissipate the heat away faster which might help.

Good luck!

[Thibaud Merlin]

Okay, I have received quite a few tallying advices now which point to an overheating problem. I must admit I was not struck at once by this possibility, because I use a desktop with an internal fan of respectable size so I never met similar problems, but overheating is clearly the cause of the problem observed by my friend. Thanks to all, my question was satisfactorily answered. I hope this post can help others too.