Help: Starcraft 2 lag

[Naweo]

I was not sure where to post this so I chose the most popular section (sorry)

Basically I got theese specs:

Standard 2gb harddisk non-SSD
Intel i5 2330k (or something, a decent/bad processor)
Widnows 7 premium
Geforce 560 TI
And a pretty strong Asus motherboard.
1000W power supply.

I play starcraft 2 with Low/medium settings, and everytime I make a new unit or the game gets long (baneling splash etc) I have lag. Anyone who can help?

Is there anything specifically I should upgrade if I iwsh to?

Im thinking about upgrading to SSD hardisk and upgrade my processor too.

[nsrexler]

This is a board about keyboards on a forum dedicated almost entirely to keyboards. You would have much better luck posting this question on a forum dedicated to PC games and equipment.
I don't mean to be rude, I'm just trying to help you out.

[TemurAmir]

What fps are you getting exactly? There should be no need to upgrade from that rig if you are just trying to run starcraft on medium; it should be handling that game very easily. Making sure you have the latest drivers installed from nvidia would be the first thing I'd check. i5-2330k does not exist. You either mean the i5-2550k or the more common i5-2500k. Either of those processors are on the upper end and I would never think to classify them as bad. Also, are you sure you only have a 2gb harddrive? 

If you do intend to upgrade, remember that getting an SSD will not give you any fps improvement in the game itself. The first thing I would consider upgrading is the GPU for gaming and which one would depend on your budget.

[tp4tissue]

It is a KNOWN fact that starcraft 2 requires a minimum of 4.8 GHZ sandybridge, or a 4.5 ghz ivy bridge to Maintain Solid frame rates in Heavy battles.

Also, turning off hyper threading will improve responsiveness in SC2.

In fact, if you can get 5ghz.. that's even better.

[gnubag]

preload textures

[fuzzybaffy]

A couple of things:

1. Lag got much worse with the newest big patch that changed all the battle.net UI recently. I've heard from pretty much everyone that lag got worse for them. So it seems software is a contributing factor.

2. I also used to think SC2 was only highly CPU intensive, but I recently found out that it's quite graphics card intensive as well. I'm running a setup with 2 GTX 680's in SLI, and I wondered why SC2 was running so slowly (I, at first, just chalked it up to the new patch slowing things down a lot). But just a couple of weeks ago, I realized that I had the "disable SLI" option checked (so SLI was turned off the entire time), which I presume was since I last did a system reformat from a few months back.

I enabled SLI again, and SC2 has been running much more smoothly. So, SC2 can indeed benefit from a better graphics card.

So, with that said, I would try to upgrade both the GPU and the CPU at the same time if possible. I'm not exactly sure which would take priority, since I don't know all the FPS numbers and stats for SC2. I have to admit, though, that the 560ti you have does jump out at me, as something that can be upgraded first. But, that's just my personal opinion.

[tp4tissue]

A couple of things:

1. Lag got much worse with the newest big patch that changed all the battle.net UI recently. I've heard from pretty much everyone that lag got worse for them. So it seems software is a contributing factor.

2. I also used to think SC2 was only highly CPU intensive, but I recently found out that it's quite graphics card intensive as well. I'm running a setup with 2 GTX 680's in SLI, and I wondered why SC2 was running so slowly (I, at first, just chalked it up to the new patch slowing things down a lot). But just a couple of weeks ago, I realized that I had the "disable SLI" option checked (so SLI was turned off the entire time), which I presume was since I last did a system reformat from a few months back.

I enabled SLI again, and SC2 has been running much more smoothly. So, SC2 can indeed benefit from a better graphics card.

So, with that said, I would try to upgrade both the GPU and the CPU at the same time if possible. I'm not exactly sure which would take priority, since I don't know all the FPS numbers and stats for SC2. I have to admit, though, that the 560ti you have does jump out at me, as something that can be upgraded first. But, that's just my personal opinion.

It depends how seriously you take starcraft 2..  Playing with the graphics at just slightly above minimum leaving "distinguishing textures" is ideal for practice and rhythm.

the FANCY graphics of starcraft 2 really has no place in the game, it's a major hindrance, not only in the frame-rate sense, but "distraction"

[fuzzybaffy]

Oh, ok. You go on believing what you want to believe now. And, I'll just play the game the way I want to play the game. Thanks.

[Rule16]

Oh, ok. You go on believing what you want to believe now. And, I'll just play the game the way I want to play the game. Thanks.

Well, hes not WRONG, in almost any e-sport you benefit from lesser graphics.

[tp4tissue]

Oh, ok. You go on believing what you want to believe now. And, I'll just play the game the way I want to play the game. Thanks.

I'm just letting you know that you may have never actually "played" starcraft 2...

Looking at flashing lights is all you've done... 

You're like one of those kids who thinks they're good at Marvel vs Capcom because they can input a quarter circle forward + Punch 3x

 ) ) ) ) )


eh.. if you wanna be the baby in the crib, that's fine, thanks for your $40 support for Blizzard


When you grow up, maybe you'll come actually be capable of playing the game.


ontop of all that,, any form of Antialiasing also introduces latency... now if you're playing original CS, AA might be useful, so you can see very fine hair width pixels over edges.. but those days are long gone... so... yea.. you also don't want AA.

[Binge]

Street fighter is all bout them 1 frame resets!

[tp4tissue]

Street fighter is all bout them 1 frame resets!

yes it is.. which is why I wasn't a huge fan.. because with anything 1 frame, you role the dice...

2 frame is good, but 1 frame in a 3D game... 

[birthdaymonkey]

Since HoTS came out (actually since just before that - in the WoL patch where they rolled out the major changes to the game engine) I have also been getting little freezes when an animation or sound plays for the first time.

The way that they've changed the resource loading code seems to cause major annoyances for me (and many others). In fact, I quit playing the campaign because I was so irritated by the crap performance on my extremely capable PC - and the story was terrible too.

I have a 4.5GHz 2500K, a 670, and a Samsung 840 SSD. Not impressed, Blizzard.

[tp4tissue]

Since HoTS came out (actually since just before that - in the WoL patch where they rolled out the major changes to the game engine) I have also been getting little freezes when an animation or sound plays for the first time.

The way that they've changed the resource loading code seems to cause major annoyances for me (and many others). In fact, I quit playing the campaign because I was so irritated by the crap performance on my extremely capable PC - and the story was terrible too.

I have a 4.5GHz 2500K, a 670, and a Samsung 840 SSD. Not impressed, Blizzard.

Hmmm.... i haven't had any problems setting everything to low, and textures to medium.. 7970 cfx, but cfx disabled, because i take SC2 seriously, and single card is much more responsive.

running 5ghz 2500k.. Intel insurance ftw.. 1.43v

[birthdaymonkey]

Since HoTS came out (actually since just before that - in the WoL patch where they rolled out the major changes to the game engine) I have also been getting little freezes when an animation or sound plays for the first time.

The way that they've changed the resource loading code seems to cause major annoyances for me (and many others). In fact, I quit playing the campaign because I was so irritated by the crap performance on my extremely capable PC - and the story was terrible too.

I have a 4.5GHz 2500K, a 670, and a Samsung 840 SSD. Not impressed, Blizzard.

Hmmm.... i haven't had any problems setting everything to low, and textures to medium.. 7970 cfx, but cfx disabled, because i take SC2 seriously, and single card is much more responsive.

running 5ghz 2500k.. Intel insurance ftw.. 1.43v

Maybe it's the nvidia drivers then, who knows. I haven't tried minimal graphics settings, as the issue seems so tied to loading from disk, and I'm also a very casual player so I like the game to look decent.

Actually, I had very similar issues during my brief time playing Diablo 3. Something weird going on with my computer and Blizz games; other games play fine.

[TemurAmir]

It is a KNOWN fact that starcraft 2 requires a minimum of 4.8 GHZ sandybridge, or a 4.5 ghz ivy bridge to Maintain Solid frame rates in Heavy battles.

Also, turning off hyper threading will improve responsiveness in SC2.

In fact, if you can get 5ghz.. that's even better.

Can you link me to benchmarks that show this is true? Most serious starcraft players play 1v1s and maximum supply cap there is 400 so I'm surprised as to why you need such a high clock to get satisfactory frame rates. From this video's benchmarks,

they got over 60fps at ultra settings with a 7770 at 1080p no AA. The benchmark was done at more intensive scenarios then a 1v1 match usually is at. This, btw, was on WOL not HOTS.

The 560ti the OP has is a better card than the 7770 yet the point here is that he is getting lag on low/medium settings, which I do not think should be happening. Also, i5 2500k/2550k does not have hyperthreading so he can't turn that off.

[tp4tissue]

It is a KNOWN fact that starcraft 2 requires a minimum of 4.8 GHZ sandybridge, or a 4.5 ghz ivy bridge to Maintain Solid frame rates in Heavy battles.

Also, turning off hyper threading will improve responsiveness in SC2.

In fact, if you can get 5ghz.. that's even better.

Can you link me to benchmarks that show this is true? Most serious starcraft players play 1v1s and maximum supply cap there is 400 so I'm surprised as to why you need such a high clock to get satisfactory frame rates. From this video's benchmarks,

they got over 60fps at ultra settings with a 7770 at 1080p no AA. The benchmark was done at more intensive scenarios then a 1v1 match usually is at. This, btw, was on WOL not HOTS.

The 560ti the OP has is a better card than the 7770 yet the point here is that he is getting lag on low/medium settings, which I do not think should be happening. Also, i5 2500k/2550k does not have hyperthreading so he can't turn that off.

I've been following SC2 scene since core 2 and i7 920,  we KNEW back in the day of 920 C0 what it would take to have 60fps WORST CASE since SC2 scales linearly with Cpu frequency..

best at that time was 4 - 4.2ghz on the  920 D0 stepping...

Look this is an OLD issue we're talking about here... IDK about this random youtube guru you posted about... anyone serious into SC2 hardware would agree on 4.8ghz sandy, which was the FIRST time we actually crossed the threashold for solid 60fps worst case..

Benches were usually 3v3, this was because otherwise, there'd be too many splotches where frame rates would climb extremely high, thus thwarting the results..

In an RTS, you have to test worst case... because when you have very few units, your fps climbs to 100+, 200+,  now if these sections were averaged into the benchmarks.. which in a 1v1 would happen,, then you'd come out with something like 70fps average,, when minimum frames could be 24fps...


This is the difference between FPS game testing and RTS....  because in FPS, the game is pulling at a much more consistent rate.


As far as OP's cpu he mentioned something something 23xx 25xx , so I can only assume that He may have a 255k or 25k OR something 23xx, which might have hyper threading.. so I suggested, that turning it off would benefit SC2... simple..

[fuzzybaffy]

Oh, ok. You go on believing what you want to believe now. And, I'll just play the game the way I want to play the game. Thanks.

I'm just letting you know that you may have never actually "played" starcraft 2...

Looking at flashing lights is all you've done... 

You're like one of those kids who thinks they're good at Marvel vs Capcom because they can input a quarter circle forward + Punch 3x

 ) ) ) ) )


eh.. if you wanna be the baby in the crib, that's fine, thanks for your $40 support for Blizzard


When you grow up, maybe you'll come actually be capable of playing the game.


ontop of all that,, any form of Antialiasing also introduces latency... now if you're playing original CS, AA might be useful, so you can see very fine hair width pixels over edges.. but those days are long gone... so... yea.. you also don't want AA.

Yea. I never pretended to be a pro-level player. I'll play with the graphics up however the f*ck I please.

Also, the OP is still getting lag with low/medium settings, so improving his graphics card, regardless, would still be of benefit, IMO.

[tp4tissue]

Oh, ok. You go on believing what you want to believe now. And, I'll just play the game the way I want to play the game. Thanks.

I'm just letting you know that you may have never actually "played" starcraft 2...

Looking at flashing lights is all you've done... 

You're like one of those kids who thinks they're good at Marvel vs Capcom because they can input a quarter circle forward + Punch 3x

 ) ) ) ) )


eh.. if you wanna be the baby in the crib, that's fine, thanks for your $40 support for Blizzard


When you grow up, maybe you'll come actually be capable of playing the game.


ontop of all that,, any form of Antialiasing also introduces latency... now if you're playing original CS, AA might be useful, so you can see very fine hair width pixels over edges.. but those days are long gone... so... yea.. you also don't want AA.

Yea. I never pretended to be a pro-level player. I'll play with the graphics up however the f*ck I please.

Also, the OP is still getting lag with low/medium settings, so improving his graphics card, regardless, would still be of benefit, IMO.

my point was you're not a player at all.. you're merely an owner of a car with delusions of having ever raced...  ) )

[TemurAmir]

It is a KNOWN fact that starcraft 2 requires a minimum of 4.8 GHZ sandybridge, or a 4.5 ghz ivy bridge to Maintain Solid frame rates in Heavy battles.

Also, turning off hyper threading will improve responsiveness in SC2.

In fact, if you can get 5ghz.. that's even better.

Can you link me to benchmarks that show this is true? Most serious starcraft players play 1v1s and maximum supply cap there is 400 so I'm surprised as to why you need such a high clock to get satisfactory frame rates. From this video's benchmarks,

they got over 60fps at ultra settings with a 7770 at 1080p no AA. The benchmark was done at more intensive scenarios then a 1v1 match usually is at. This, btw, was on WOL not HOTS.

The 560ti the OP has is a better card than the 7770 yet the point here is that he is getting lag on low/medium settings, which I do not think should be happening. Also, i5 2500k/2550k does not have hyperthreading so he can't turn that off.

I've been following SC2 scene since core 2 and i7 920,  we KNEW back in the day of 920 C0 what it would take to have 60fps WORST CASE since SC2 scales linearly with Cpu frequency..

best at that time was 4 - 4.2ghz on the  920 D0 stepping...

Look this is an OLD issue we're talking about here... IDK about this random youtube guru you posted about... anyone serious into SC2 hardware would agree on 4.8ghz sandy, which was the FIRST time we actually crossed the threashold for solid 60fps worst case..

Benches were usually 3v3, this was because otherwise, there'd be too many splotches where frame rates would climb extremely high, thus thwarting the results..

In an RTS, you have to test worst case... because when you have very few units, your fps climbs to 100+, 200+,  now if these sections were averaged into the benchmarks.. which in a 1v1 would happen,, then you'd come out with something like 70fps average,, when minimum frames could be 24fps...


This is the difference between FPS game testing and RTS....  because in FPS, the game is pulling at a much more consistent rate.


As far as OP's cpu he mentioned something something 23xx 25xx , so I can only assume that He may have a 255k or 25k OR something 23xx, which might have hyper threading.. so I suggested, that turning it off would benefit SC2... simple..

I don't know the "random" video uploader that well either but I do know that he works for NCIX and I trust that his benchmarks are accurate, which is the only reason why I linked to the video. The benchmarks he did were not done in the conventional fashion. Without some sort of statistics, I find it hard to believe what you claim without anything to back it up, not that I am saying you are lying. I think the benchmark was done with 30 medivacs and 50 zealots in a test setting on each side. In my opinion, this is way above the average amount of action you will see during a 1v1 match, and the original poster mentioned "baneling splashes" as sources of lag. From this, it's likely he is experiencing lag in rather low intensive situations without very large battles taking place like in a team game and I do not think it requires such a high overclock to maintain 60fps. Obviously, that number is still an average but because of the nature of the test they conducted, I don't think the lowest framerate will be too unacceptable for playing with.

There are no Desktop Sandybridge i5s to my knowledge that use hyperthreading which is why I mentioned that. Also, from the original post, I think it's reasonable to conclude that he meant the i5-2550k or 2500k which both do not use hyperthreading.

[fuzzybaffy]

Oh, ok. You go on believing what you want to believe now. And, I'll just play the game the way I want to play the game. Thanks.

I'm just letting you know that you may have never actually "played" starcraft 2...

Looking at flashing lights is all you've done... 

You're like one of those kids who thinks they're good at Marvel vs Capcom because they can input a quarter circle forward + Punch 3x

 ) ) ) ) )


eh.. if you wanna be the baby in the crib, that's fine, thanks for your $40 support for Blizzard


When you grow up, maybe you'll come actually be capable of playing the game.


ontop of all that,, any form of Antialiasing also introduces latency... now if you're playing original CS, AA might be useful, so you can see very fine hair width pixels over edges.. but those days are long gone... so... yea.. you also don't want AA.

Yea. I never pretended to be a pro-level player. I'll play with the graphics up however the f*ck I please.

Also, the OP is still getting lag with low/medium settings, so improving his graphics card, regardless, would still be of benefit, IMO.

my point was you're not a player at all.. you're merely an owner of a car with delusions of having ever raced...  ) )

And how is this not trolling?

[fuzzybaffy]

Oh, and here's a video of a pro playing with medium settings:

You can go kill yourself now.

For reference, I'm going to quote a post from you earlier. You wrote:

It depends how seriously you take starcraft 2..  Playing with the graphics at just slightly above minimum leaving "distinguishing textures" is ideal for practice and rhythm.

the FANCY graphics of starcraft 2 really has no place in the game, it's a major hindrance, not only in the frame-rate sense, but "distraction"

The video of Startale Sound is nowhere near "slightly above minimum". I know what low settings on Starcraft 2 looks like. That is not "low" with "medium textures". Not "low", with "high" or above textures. That is a solid "medium" or above.