Improving Trainz Performance

Mines' pretty old, any suggestions on Improving it? Without getting updated cards, etc....

Microsoft Windows XP
Home Edition
Version 2002
Service Pack 2

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Intel(R) Celeron(TM) CPU
1300MHz
1.29 GHz
256 MB of RAM

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Total Size of Disk: 37.2 GB

Used Space: 21.0 GB

Free Space: 16.2 GB

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:eek:
 
1st: You don't have enough RAM. Trainz need's minimum 1 G (With XP you are using now all there is of your memory). Using 2 Gb of memory I have just enough for barely smooth operation. 2nd: Your computer is a bare one. You should have a faster processor. 3rd: Try to have a HDD with 7200 RPM. It speeds thigs better than the older ones. 4th: Try to get a video card with 512 mb memory (This is a very intensive graphics program) Conclusion: In this day and age, quite fast computers cost not much, so try to upgrade.
 
Without getting updated cards, etc....

You could reduce the performance sliders - turning up the fog (both day and night) is a good way of boosting frame-rates.

The cheapest way of upgrading components is new memory, but for some reason even memory is expensive at the moment - you can use several cards if you have the space (this reads/writes faster, thus slightly boosting the performance).

I would recommend Crucial, as I've never had any problems with them.
 
Also you can check the texture files on the items you use the most. Resize them to half size in both dimensions, if you are using something with LOD (look for more than one .im file probably named body.im, body_med.im, body_low.im) look for a file called ???.lm.txt then play with the numbers to only bring in the high detailed skin when you are very close and make more use of the lower detailed ones. Change the screen resolution to 640 by 480.

Also you can tune the Trainzoptions.txt file there used to be a fair bit of info in the old forum.

Cheerio John
 
In my not so humble opinion, more RAM, at least beyond 512M, does not increase frame rate except that it decreases hestation, a worthy goal. If one sticks to less "dense" layouts, preferably using only stuff that is standard with Trainz, the hesitation / jerkiness problem should be minimized.
The standard trainzoptions.txt setting are pretty good. Tweaking it may help or make things worse. Be prepared to return to the original (default) settings.
Take some time to uderstand the effect of the sliders on Trainz performance. In my experience, Draw Distance has the most effect.
What video card do you have?
 
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256mb of Memory may be the minimum on the box, but it is not going to cut it. You'll need at least 1GB, and if your a performance freak, 2GB, but no more than that unless you feel like having bragging rights.

Chuck that Celeron CPU. Get something in the Athlon 64 2.0Ghz+ range or Intel P4 3Ghz+ range, if you want more than that, Core 2 Duo or FX CPU's are the solution.

Get a decent video card, like an Nvidia 7600 or 7900, or ATI X800, X1800, X1900.

I normally would be able to recommend TrainzOptions settings to fix things, but in all honesty, you system is too old to do anything but upgrade.

Cheers,
John
 
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