Tech Review: Get More out of Your System
First Friday as an Author here on hordereview.com, and today I am going to focus more on my tech passion. Included in this article are a collected variety of tips, tricks, tweaks, and a couple of hacks (don’t worry, none for WoW itself) to help you wrest better frame rates and better ping rates out of your existing hardware. Being a hardware tech at heart, software really isn’t my forte. However, I have delved into the programming depths to uncover and expose several enemies to you and your beloved World of Warcraft. Please note, if you are having issues seeing the screenshots provided, simply click on them to enlarge the images to thier original size so that you can read them better. It’s more for Visual Assistance, as I like to call it.
First and foremost, let’s discuss insane ping rates.
To my understanding, since open beta of the original WoW years ago, this problem has been present in all iterations of the game and has never been fully addressed by Blizzard or Microsoft. The following is a registry edit to help your ping out. Disclaimer: If you feel uncomfortable editing or changing your registry, then please, do not attempt this hack. To get low pings with 2 simple registry hacks do the following (you need to do both settings for the maximum effect).
1 – TcpAckFrequency - NOTE if you are running Windows Vista this setting may not have any effect – a hotfix is needed which I’m tracking down (can anyone point me the right way?). This works fine under Windows XP
Type “regedit” in windows “run..” dialog to bring up registry menu
Then find:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters\Interfaces\
There will be multiple NIC interfaces listed in there, find the one you use to connect to the internet, there will be several interfaces listed (they have long names like {7DBA6DCA-FFE8-4002-A28F-4D2B57AE8383}. Click each one, the right one will have lots of settings in it and you will see your machines IP address listed there somewhere. Right-click in the right hand side of the window and add a new DWORD value, name it TcpAckFrequency. Next, right click the entry, click Modify, and assign the DWORD a value of 1. You can change it back to 2 (default) at a later stage if it affects your other TCP application performance. This tells windows how many TCP packets to wait before sending ACK. if the value is 1, windows will send ACK every time it receives a TCP package.
2 – TCPNoDelay
This one is pretty simple
Type “regedit” in windows “run..” dialog to bring up registry menu
Then find:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSMQ\Parameters
Right-click in the right hand side of the window and add a new DWORD value, name it TCPNoDelay, then right click the entry, click Modify, and assign the DWORD a value of 1. If for some reason, you do not see the MSMQ, it’s ok. Some people it seems don’t have a MSMQ entry in their registry. You will need to add it. To perform this action, the simplest way is to copy/paste the below code into a empty text file, and save it as a .reg file (just call it msmq.reg). Once done right click the file and select MERGE and click yes to the box that follows.
******snip below******
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSMQ] [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSMQ\Paramet ers] “TCPNoDelay”=dword:00000001 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSMQ\Paramet ers\OCMsetup] [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSMQ\Paramet ers\Security] “SecureDSCommunication”=dword:00000000 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSMQ\Paramet ers\setup] [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSMQ\Setup]******snip above******
Click Ok and close the registry editor, then reboot your PC.” Please note that some computers do not have and cannot add the MSMQ. If you cannot add it, then do not worry about it.
!~~ALSO~~!
I found this nifty little program on the Tankspot forums – it does just about everything you need without the need of you yourself editing the registry.
http://wowinterface.com/downloads/info13581-LeatrixLatencyFix.html
Second, let’s discuss some power save features
With the advent of going green on everyone’s minds all around the world, the nice employees at Microsoft decided to add power save features to almost all “unnecessary†running devices. This power save feature can be edited by windows, but the options exist directly on each device. I’m going to show you how to access these power saving options and how to disable them (it’s really easy). I am naturally going to assume that you have Windows Vista, as Windows 7 just came out and Windows XP is still pretty popular. I am sure that similar methods can be easily applied to either system, I just actually like Vista (don’t ask or patronize me, please).
Click Start, then select the Control Panel
In Control Panel, Select Device Manager. If necessary, click Yes at the UAC screen to continue. (Ask me how to turn it off if it bugs you like it does me.)
In the Device Manager Window, expand the Network Adapters and select the one that you use the most (you know, wired for desktop, Wireless for laptop are the commonly used connections).
Now, when the screen pops up, select the Power Management Tab, and Un-check the power save feature.
Third, let’s make WoW run like it did in Windows XP (Vista Users)
Ok, so you see WoW takes a rather long time to load when you make the transistion to full screen mode from the launcher (assuming that you use the launcher). Well this little trick will help you whip it back into shape. Vista introduced the shiny and spiffy Aero themes to Windows. I know, most techy’s disable it (which is an option). However, WoW still renders the aero settings before you go into the game, even if Aero is turned off. Don’t worry, not all programs do this, just some games that are set to use it in Vista still perform the rendering. To alter how these settings affect your WoW loading times, simply make these changes.
First off, we have a general, unassuming World of Warcraft Shortcut on our desktop.
Next, right-click the World of Warcraft Icon and select properties.
Finally, click on the compatability tab, and check Disable Visual Themes and Desktop Composition.
On a side note, I have not seen any significant improvement in performance by running WoW in Windows XP SP2 Compatibility mode. In some rare instances, it might help, but in my testing, no real increase in performance. These fixes may or may not help you. They are not designed to show amazingly improved performance on their own, just a little faster on things here and there. The Ping fix also does not mean that you won’t DC.
In closing, these are just some of the tech reviews I’ll be sharing with you. Over the next few weeks, be looking forward to Ventrilo Normalization, Video Settings, what they mean, and how to set them, Addon reviews, Optimizing your Windows Machine to run WoW (general tips, tricks, and PC Performance Programs to help you run WoW (and everything else) better), and other useful tools to help you enjoy playing the World of Warcraft.
For the reason that a Beginner I am continually looking on the net meant for this kind of information .Thank you:P
This is very detailed and helpful! I haven't tried anything yet, but I know that when I do, I'll know exactly what to look for. =] I use Vista (which I like too, Derfel, so you're not alone!) and it's nice to see someone give advice that isn't "Use Windows XP".
Well thank you very much! i got load of informaiton on tweaking, but these are the ones for Vista mostly. The rest are helpful tools, tips for keeping Windows (of any flavor) running better, and a nice little programs (sorry, only for AMD Users) that will turn your PC into a power PC with one click. Yea, i got info. =]
very good post Derfel glad to see a new topic on Horde Review tat everyone likes!