Game is unplayable

I finally managed to set everything up and working, and the software itself is working perfectly ( still getting used to getting my characters in synch, but that's part of it! )... but the problem is that the game is unplayable. It's very slow, very laggy, it 'stops/freeze' every other seconds, huge performance drop everytime I see just a zombie ( can't imagine how it'll be if I see an horde of arcane/mortar elite pack )...

Before buying the game, I read about the requirements for multiboxing and I had everything fine. For some reason it listed the requirements for up to 6 diablo games running at the same time, and I had more than enough.

But now I'm running just 4 and it's not really playable. Were those requirement wrong? Or am I doing something wrong?
I even read about how to increase the PC's performance on one of your guide, and set it up to high performance and all...
And I set every single thing in D3 at the lowest possible setting... Still not enough.

And my internet connection is pretty godly, I know that's not the problem. It has to be my computer I guess, but I had all the requirements fine...
I can barely survive fights with act 1 zombies sometime because it's too slow/laggy/etc... I'll never be able to survive against any elite pack in inferno for sure.

I made the quality as worst as possible, even removed health bars/damage numbers and stuff out of the screen to lower the 'load' on the computer, but it's still not enough...
Is there anything else to do? Or should I just give up about multiboxing?
(Alternate question, assuming my computer isn't good enough - despite having the recommended requirement - ... what part is most likely the problem? The video card?)

For the record, when I play diablo3 'normally' with just 1 character, i never ever ever have a single bit of lag/slow/freeze.
Not on any other game either.

[lax]

I have to link you this because everything we're going to discuss is covered in it, and in order to answer your question I need information that this guide helps you find: HOWTO: Tweak your framerate

(Alternate question, assuming my computer isn't good enough - despite having the recommended requirement - ... what part is most likely the problem? The video card?)

I know literally nothing about your computer, and I have no information about what your bottleneck might be.

What are your computer's specs? Important pieces for this discussion are CPU, GPU/Video Card (if you have more than one, please specify!), RAM, version of Windows, and number of monitors. Is it a laptop or a desktop?

You're asking me what your bottleneck (limiting factor) is but this is not something I can determine for you, unless you provide me with numbers from
HOWTO: Tweak your framerate, Identifying framerate bottlenecks. This section of the guide helps you use 2 tools -- GPU-Z and Windows Task Manager being easiest -- to check whether you're running out of System RAM, CPU power, GPU power, or VRAM (RAM for your GPU) at the time that it is going slow. You can look at all 4 of these as a percentage, and if any of them are topping off at 95-100%, that is likely to be your limiting factor. For example, if you're at 100% CPU while system RAM, GPU power and VRAM all say 25%, then this would point at CPU power as the limiting factor (meaning it can't be pushed any harder).

It's possible that NONE of these are the limiting factor; this can be the case if you're using multiple monitors on Windows XP, or if you're using multiple video cards and moving windows between them, or if you're running some other program that is somehow interfering with Inner Space and the game. This is why I have to ask you about your hardware (number of monitors) and what version of Windows you're using...

My specs are as follow :
Quad CPU Q8200 (recommended : 4 cores, check )
with 4GB of Ram ( recommended : 4gb ram - check )
Videocard : ati radeon hd 4870 ( 1GB ) (recommended : 512mb - check )

I'm on a desktop, with a single monitor, and I use Vista.

I'll try to do those other things you mentionned to find the problems, but I'm not very computer savvy so I don't know.
I talked to a friend of mine who's better with computers and he says I might need more ram ( even if I meet the requirement )...
I ordered some, but problem is that my trial will be over before I receive them, and I still won't know if it's gonna be good enough.

Thing is, I even tried running just 2 instances, and it's still very laggy ( although not as bad as running 4 instances ), even tho I have like 2x over the requirement for 2 instances. Found this weird.

I tried running a single instance with isboxer, just to see if that was the problem, but no, I can run a single instance with isboxer just as fine as running the game normally. So there's that.
But as soon as I load up a 2nd one, it gets super laggy.
And I'm talking, here : a single instance with all the highest possible settings/details/resolution : runs perfectly fine
2 instances with the lowest possible settings/everything : Very laggy.
Considering it only shows 1 windows at any time, it seems weird to me, especially considering I drop the settings all down low, when I usually play ( single instance ) with all the highest quality settings and I never lag at all.

[Mahther]

Are you also lowering the game resolutions, or just the visual settings?

[lax]

Considering it only shows 1 windows at any time, it seems weird to me

The other window still has to do all of the work of rendering, it's just not showing it to you on your monitor.

Thanks for providing your specs, this gives us some better idea of what to expect, but still in order to tell you what your limiting factor is it would help to have some of the performance information while running. % load of CPU and System RAM, GPU and VRAM. With those numbers we can talk specifics, right now we can just guess based on your hardware and your symptoms ("it runs slow"). Your OS and number of monitors/GPUs rules out a multiple monitor performance hit (e.g. if you were on XP and had multiple monitors, there would be a potential problem).

Your CPU Strategy (which you can change any time using the CPU Strategy Wizard from the Wizards menu) could also make a difference; sharing your configuration can help with recommendations for that (see sticky post). If you want to play 2 instances of D3 on your Q8200 you might be well served by "Select all CPUs with every window", much more-so than the default round-robin balancing.

Your hardware is certainly not bad, but consider that the Radeon 4870 is a 4 year old part and if you compare it to the 7970 for example, the 7970 is several times more powerful and is going to eat your 4870 for dinner playing Diablo 3. I can't tell you if you're pushing your 4870 too hard until you tell me what % it's at when you're playing. I can't tell you if you're pushing your Q8200 CPU too hard without knowing what % it's at when you're playing. This is what the section of the guide I linked helps with...

I've upgraded my ram ( when from 4g to 8g ), still very slow at times.

I've read the "HOWTO: Tweak your framerate, Identifying framerate bottlenecks." thing and downloaded the program, saved a "Open Hardware Monitor Report". Should I post it here?


If it's any help.. I don't know how much you know about the game, but it seems to lag mostly in act 3, especially in the zones like 'stonefort' and 'skycrown battlements', wide open areas with lot of stuff happening ( rocks falling from the skies and so on ).

I don't experience that much lag in act 1, or in the 'closed' areas such as the act 3 keeps.
But it gets worse when there's much stuff happening on the screen ( say, an horde of monsters with arcane sentries and mortars, desecrator, molten, stuff like that ). And that's pretty much the one time you NEED no lag because it's hard enough to dodge all that stuff with 4 characters alltogether, and the lag makes it impossible, then one character dies, and it all goes downward from this point.


So yeah I got that report file, I tried to look at it myself, it... I think the CPU are close/at 100% capacity.. But I just upgraded the ram, from 4 to 8 ( and 4 was the recommended amount ) so I'm not sure what the problem is.

[MiRai]

So yeah I got that report file, I tried to look at it myself, it... I think the CPU are close/at 100% capacity.. But I just upgraded the ram, from 4 to 8 ( and 4 was the recommended amount ) so I'm not sure what the problem is.

Call me dense... but what is this "recommended amount" you keep referring to in these posts? Where are you getting these numbers from?

I am using a Intel 975 and Nvidia GTX 680 (2GB RAM) and computer ram is 12 GB and I do experience lag or freeze every now and then especially during the first elite spawn in Act 3. Most of the time I got wipe at the first elite group I encounter. I am four boxing on two monitor.

Recently, I install a SSD drive and put D3 into the SSD drive. The screen freeze have disappear and the game play have smoothen a lot.

Hope it help in some way to solve your problem.

PS. All my D3 video setting is on Low.

Call me dense... but what is this "recommended amount" you keep referring to in these posts? Where are you getting these numbers from?

Got it from http://isboxer.com/wiki/Multiboxing#Min ... quirements

4 instances: 3-4 CPU cores, 4GB RAM, 512MB video card