Ok been running this mac for about a week now and I am really impressed tbh. I have spent several hours tweaking the code for my toon and messing around with my video and computer settings. Here is a list of the things that I have done to increas load time and prevent CTDs. I'll prefce this by saying trhat when I first ran this mac I was set on the highest video setting in game. I have 1.5GB of DDR RAM, and Radeon 9800 Pro with 256 DDR on board, and a 2.4 MHZ Petium 2. Not to bad imho. It took me ~4 minutes 23 seconds to do one task (Basically 4 /zones) from the time I got the task till I asked for another one. That time does not reflect the gap between getting a new task since that could be 1 second to 2 minutes before I get another one issued to me.
1. The first thing I did was tunr off all models and drop everything off of the settings menue. Including Texture catching. I noticed that with Texture catching it only lowered the load time by a few seconds and also caused me to CTD after 30 minutes or so. I maintained the resolution at my current setting of 1024x768 and dropped the graphics quality to low. In game I turned off everything in the in the display tab. Char. names Target rings lowed every slider bar all the way to the left. Under the Advanced tab I deselect every boc and dropped every drop down to the lowest setting or turned it off if possible. Shut down the game for the effects to reload then reboot the comp. After doing all of this Avg time for a task droipped to ~3min 16 sec. Not to bad for the easy stuff.
2. Next I went into my computer setting and adjusted how the computer manages the page files for memory. See this link for how to do it.
Everquest Tech Support after this the avg time was ~3 minutes and 2 secs and noticiable decreas in the run time till CTD.
3. Last night I ran the WeaselSpeed.bat and WeaselStart.bat. To clarify I was very nervous on how they might screw my computer. I run XP. Ran the two programs and reboooted. Got into the game and started the mac. Avg time per task ~2minutes 37 seconds.
4. I remembered that when I use to play Quake not understand what resolution ment. I was 16 at the time. I did notice that if I selected the highest resolution I could not play and took forever to load. <Que Lightbulb> I remembered that the resolution was still pretty high so I went inot the options menue once again and looked at the resolution selection. Still at that 1024x768 dropped it down all of the way to 640x480. YIKES! Can we say neintendo old scholl pixels. When you can seethe individual pixels that is taking it back. I got ingame and was crap my Inventoy window about took the whole screen. I tried the mac after rearranging my windows. Started the Mac and sqaw the popup picked a task and off I went went throughhj one whole mission but when I went to my second it didnt read the request rught and assineg the same task despit it not being offered. Zoned and died because I just sat there and got pummeled in Karnors. Tried again and same thing. Only thing I could figure is the the resolutiuon and big menues we messing up something. I then went into the Display options and saw something I missed. In the resolution tab I went back to 1024x768 and also saw the you could change the colors from 32 bit to 16 bit, Big difference. Re adjusted the my layout and started again. Flawless for 5 runes. Drum roll please....2 minutes 6 seconds! Over half of the time Of my first run!
4. I use an ability to make myself invisable instantly. In the code right before I ask for a task I have a line in my mac to remove the invis.
Rich (BB code):
/notify BuffWindow Buff0 leftmouseup
Now the invis is in the first buffslot. Buff slots start at 0 not 1 sopp adjust the slot your invis takes. I use invis to try to stay a little less conspicous when zoning into Karnors and other places. As soon as I get a task I have another simple line liek listed above using /keypress 0 to actiavate the ability. Now the final tweek I discoverd was more or less a minor one for estetic purposes. Close all of the windows you can. except the Hot key button or else the /keypress command wont work and the buffs window showing the invis or else you cant clik off the invis buff with the /notify command. Here are the windows I have up: Buffs, MQ, Mainchat, Hot keys, Abilities, Task window, and request window to get the tasks. Everything else is closed.
5. Taking it to the test. The maximum I have ever had this mac run before CTD was ~6 hours and the shortest is 30 minutes. On average it is around 3.5 hours. After maiking all of the tweeks I listed above I started the mac last night and walked away. I went and watched a movie and went to bed. I got up this morning and was floored! Now 6 hours would have been great. but after 11 hours I was still going strong. I had the Exp split 50-50. and when I begain I was 85% into 64 and was 30% into my next AA and had no AA's banked. This morning I was 37% into 66 and had 9 AA's even. Forgot ot check my plat. Can we say WOOT!
6. Time to crunch the numbers! In an ideal world where every request got me a task the first time would equate to roughly 28.57 tasks per hour. 28.57 tasks X 13% AA exp per task = 3.7141 AA points per hour, or 89.136 AA's per day! Also 28.57 X 73 plat per task = 2,085 plat per hour or 50,054 per day, 350,382 per week, 1,401,529.9 per month, 16,818,358 per year, may calculator broke when it came to decades. Realistically you shoud be getting between 2-2.5 AA's an hour.
I hope this write up helps some of you maxamize your macroing and max you AA's ASAP! PM Me with your results and if you noticeing anything else I missed. My goal is to drop my average run under 2 minutes. Good luck and happy macroing!