CPU utilization?

jaif · #1 November 28th, 2007, 01:59 AM

I'm playing on a Mac. I was using the tools to design a pretender, and I noticed my fan speed up off the charts. I checked the activity monitor, and I find dom3 is chewing up CPU like crazy. What can it possibly be doing? I'm designing, not running a turn. I'm not even clicking a lot.

-Jeff

Endoperez · #2 November 28th, 2007, 11:16 AM

What background does the pretender creation screen have? If it's the sizzling stars, you've probably left it running for a while and the computer is calculating dozens or even a few hundred little stars. You can try disabling animated backgrounds and see if it removes the problem.

Also, it might be just something to do with the pretender creation screen. Map view, battles etc might actually take less CPU power.

NTJedi · #3 November 28th, 2007, 12:56 PM

I know the processing of a turn sucks up major amounts of CPU. For middle and late stage on super large games I even increase the process priority to above average.

jaif · #4 November 28th, 2007, 04:25 PM

I was on the screen where you pick your dominion/magic/physcial body/etc. Even doing nothing, just being on that screen, seemed to create a big load.

-Jeff

Lazy_Perfectionist · #5 November 28th, 2007, 08:34 PM

Does that screen have the background battlefield?

I have an idea, but I'll have to check into it after I get back home tonight.

archaeolept · #6 November 28th, 2007, 08:54 PM

I'm running winxp currently, and an instance of the game may use up to 100% of my dual cores, even when it is doing nothing. For instance, it may be at 100% just on the menu screen - i minimize it, and it stays at 100, or goes to 50; i bring up the window and minimize it again, doing absolutely nothing else, and the cpu usage then perhaps goes down to 0 where it should be...

SqueekyDragon · #7 November 28th, 2007, 10:57 PM

It's a design feature. If Dominions uses up all of your processing power, you will be unable to run any other software concurrently, so you can keep your concentration on the game.

Lord_Bob · #8 November 28th, 2007, 11:04 PM

Windows Xp and Slow is needless repetition.

Repeat after me:
"I will downgrade."

Zeldor · #9 November 28th, 2007, 11:55 PM

I wish Dominions would use more CPU and RAM and make turns faster... I can have tons of things at background and it doesn't change anything.

Lazy_Perfectionist · #10 November 29th, 2007, 01:32 AM

What macintosh do you have? What does it have for graphics? If you don't know, I can probably figure out just from the model...

There's one command line I'd like to try- I bet it accounts for that 40% cpu usage I see on the main menu with my crappy integrated 'graphics' laptop.

Trick is just remembering where those command switches are.