Multi-boxing (Ram) question

[bholmes4]

I am trying to four box but when I load up the fourth instance I get a "system low on memory message" and the game is too buggy to play. Anyone experience this and added more ram? I have 2gb of ram and was thinking of going to 4gb but if my CPU or video card will likely just stop me then I won't bother.

I realize you don't know my full system specs but is EQ extremely dependent on ram? If so this might provide the quick fix I need?

[erik_llewellyn]

How much ram EQ takes up is very dependent upon your graphic settings selected at the main menu. If you are trying to play with all models, high texture quality, animations, dynamic lighting, sound, ect...all at the same time, then EQ takes about 750MB of ram per box depending on what zone you are in. This can be dramatically scaled down by simply reducing the number of models.

Another option is to increase your pagefile in windows. I have a system similar to yours with 2GB of ram then I have adjusted my pagefile to be 2GB as well giving me a total of 4GB of "ram".

Adding more ram would be the more performance route, but it really only adjusts load/zone times of the additional boxes. Once you are in a zone with all of them, the speed difference is negligable.

I run with just high elf male/female, dwarf male, and horses/elementals, resolution at 1280x1024, texture quality at high, everything else turned off takes only 91MB of ram sitting in high hold pass.

[bholmes4]

Right now I can run three boxes and can barely remain stable at times with 4 but it usually bugs out at some point. I mainly want to run 4 at once and would be happy with that. More is even better but 4 is good enough.

You say it wouldn't make a big difference once loaded. Do you think though it might be enough to support all 4 or should I upgrade something else first?

Thanks a lot though on all these points. I don't have all the graphics turned up but I find if I don't keep luclin armor ON then it crashes/freezes. I have turned a bunch of other things down but maybe I should look at doing more.

Any suggestions on biggest hogs?

[xxarthurxx]

i just upgraded from 2 to 4... and my lag issues are all but gone... id just get 2 more gigs you can get a dual stick of 2gig for like $50

[trevius]

By turning Luclin models off, I am able to easily load 7 or so instances of EQ on 2GBs of RAM. If I had models on for all of them, I am sure that would probably drop to about half. Plus zone times are longer and big zones are laggier.

If you don't already have it off, I would HIGHLY suggest disabling sound in EQ when you are multiboxing. If you have sound on with 4 windows, most sound cards can't handle more than a few windows before they start crashing left and right. Sounds like your system is pretty decent, so I am guessing this is definitely a possible cause of your issue.

Let us know how it turns out.

[bholmes4]

Yeah I was thinking today my sound may have been a cause of some of the crashing rather than the Luclin models (I turned off both at the same time). I turned the music off and environment sounds but should I turn off ALL sound? Just do it in-game?

[trevius]

Yes, turn off all sound. I forget how I did it exactly, but it may have been in the setup options before logging in. If there is an option to disable sound there, that is the best place to do it. Otherwise, log in and disable sound in the options there. Then, make sure to log back out and exit EQ before you start loading multiple boxes to make sure that all windows get the new settings.

It should make a huge difference in stability. Did for me.