improving computer performance?

[littlebottom]

EDIT: this post has been solved, new question has been posed further down the page.

i wanted to use a program, but it comes up with an error whenever i try and use it, i found the problem was that i need direct X 9.0

ok, no major problem, i just went and downloaded and installed direct X 9.0 from microsoft.

problem is, is after it starts to install it then goes "searching for updated Direct x runtime components and updating as nessisary" which is fine, but it doesnt seem to do much for 5 or so seconds, then an error pops up going "a cabinet file nessisary for instillation cannot be trusted. please verify the cryptographic services are enabled and the cabinet file certificate is valid" and to this error i can only click ok. so i click ok, it goes back to the installer saying "instillation failed" and my only clickable option is "finish" so i cant sort the problem out and dont know how to.

the sound of the error is odd considering its coming directly from the free download from microsoft. so im stumped. i cant do what i wanted to do until i can get direct x 9.0 but i cant get that due to this error, its driving me mad!:smallfurious:

[Gullara]

i wanted to use a program, but it comes up with an error whenever i try and use it, i found the problem was that i need direct X 9.0

ok, no major problem, i just went and downloaded and installed direct X 9.0 from microsoft.

problem is, is after it starts to install it then goes "searching for updated Direct x runtime components and updating as nessisary" which is fine, but it doesnt seem to do much for 5 or so seconds, then an error pops up going "a cabinet file nessisary for instillation cannot be trusted. please verify the cryptographic services are enabled and the cabinet file certificate is valid" and to this error i can only click ok. so i click ok, it goes back to the installer saying "instillation failed" and my only clickable option is "finish" so i cant sort the problem out and dont know how to.

the sound of the error is odd considering its coming directly from the free download from microsoft. so im stumped. i cant do what i wanted to do until i can get direct x 9.0 but i cant get that due to this error, its driving me mad!:smallfurious:

Can you get a different download? Or maybe try downloading DirectX 10 or 11 instead.

[lesser_minion]

Have you tried downloading the file again?

It's possible that part of the download became corrupted somehow, which would cause it to appear wrong when the file is checked.

Also, do you have more information on the program you're using and your version of windows? It could potentially be some sort of compatibility problem.

[littlebottom]

i did try downloading it again to no avail, the exact same error came up at the exact same place.

i am using windows Vista (since it was what was on the laptop) and the program in question is the FFXIV benchmark, to gauge roughly how well the computer will perform at running the game when it comes out.

the reason i want to find out is that im not sure if my laptop will run it smoothly, or infact at all. if it would run it, i know its worth the time to install it onto the laptop, it it would run it but slightly below par, i would try and clean up the laptop a little and see if i can make it any better. or if it would be a waste of time to install it on my laptop, and just play it on my home PC instead. its not the end of the world if i cant get this to work, but it is certainly infuriating.

ive tried downloading it again, that didnt work. and direct x 9.0 is the only one i think i could find on the microsoft website. but ill check again.

[Jimorian]

That is weird that a new game is asking for DirectX 9.0. I've seen some circumstances where an old game needed it, but wasn't programmed to recognize that there might have been an upgrade to 10+.

Also, even 9.0 has different flavors, with the most recent being 9.0c, so you might try downloading and installing that specifically.

Sometimes other game discs will have a DirectX installation program on them, so you might fish through some of them to see if they have a directory for it and install from there.

Other than that, dunno. You might try a repair from your Vista install/recovery disc as well, it might be one of the cabs from windows it's talking about as bad rather than the DirectX install.

[Erloas]

DX10 should include all of the older DX9 files as well, but still a lot of games re-install the parts they need. I'm assuming you've played a number of games on this system to have all the needed files installed.

You might run DXDIAG (type into the run/search part of the start menu) and see if it comes up with any errors.

The requirements for the game itself says DX9.0c, and I expect that is the case with the benchmark too, almost nothing uses 9.0, everything uses 9.0c.

If you can give us the specs on your laptop we can probably give you a fairly good guess as to how well the game would run based on the minimum and recommended settings they list.

If you don't really know, running the DXDIAG and clicking "save all information" and copying the system information and display device parts and posting them here will give us something to go by.

Knowing a lot of laptops, you might have a really poor graphics card, which wouldn't necessarily cause the problem you are seeing but it might give us something to go on.

[littlebottom]

thank you all for your advice, i tried some of it, and some didnt work, but i went and found a completely different source for the download and tried it again, that seemed to solve the problem.:smallcool:

now a slightly different "problem" arrises.

i tested the benchmark, and didnt do very well at all. but it worked. so i tried cleaning up my computer a little, to only a slight improvement.

so i was wondering if there was any advice as to how best to go about improving the functionality of my laptop without having to spend any (or atleast much) money.

i was considering just formatting the drive, since i can move pictures, music and other things i want to keep onto a memory stick and put them back on later, and most of the programs on here will either not be much of a loss or i can simply reinstall them. is it worth it?

[Gullara]

Its worth it if you think that's the problem. It may not be though.

By the way finding a new source for the download was what I ment when I had said to get a different download. All that trouble and you could have just listened to the first person who replied:smalltongue:

[Erloas]

Cleaning up the computer might help, but how much its going to help would be at best a guess. Most of the time background applications running and many of the sorts of things you can clean up with a fresh install generally free up RAM and some CPU usage. Most games any more are graphics bound, and not CPU or RAM bound, at least with most moderately new computers.

If you can give us the specs of your computer, using DXDiag I mentioned before, we should be able to see where your potential bottlenecks are and what sort of changes you would need to increase performance.

Having looked at the game requirements, they imply more GPU focus, but overall the requirements look fairly high. Considering most laptops are more likely to be graphics bound rather then CPU bound, and that is not something you can improve with cleaning up the computer, I would guess that its not going to gain you too much. Knowing your specs would help give you any advice though.

[littlebottom]

Its worth it if you think that's the problem. It may not be though.

By the way finding a new source for the download was what I ment when I had said to get a different download. All that trouble and you could have just listened to the first person who replied:smalltongue:

sorry :smallredface: i just thought if there was one version that should work, it would be the one from microsoft directly...


If you can give us the specs of your computer, using DXDiag I mentioned before, we should be able to see where your potential bottlenecks are and what sort of changes you would need to increase performance.

Having looked at the game requirements, they imply more GPU focus, but overall the requirements look fairly high. Considering most laptops are more likely to be graphics bound rather then CPU bound, and that is not something you can improve with cleaning up the computer, I would guess that its not going to gain you too much. Knowing your specs would help give you any advice though.

right well, the laptops coming up to 2 years old now, so my hopes were low.

Seemingly relavent info: (if you want more ask)

OS:Windows Vista home premium (6.0, build 6002)
Processor: AMD Turion Duel-core RM-70 (2 CPUs), ~2.0GHz
memory: 2814 MB RAM
Display: NVIDIA GeForce 8200M G
Intergrated RAMDAC
Approx total memory: 1394MB
display mode: 1280 X 720 (32bit) (60Hz)
C: drive free space: 46GB out of 139GB

the free space has gone up from 32GB before i cleaned it up a little. im not nessisarily bad with computers, infact, im quite good with them, but largely on the software side, im not that good with the hardware side. ive left some info out since it seemed less relavent, but if theres any you need i left out then ask.

[Erloas]

Well it looks like you have shared memory with your video card, and as it is, a lot more associated with the video card then it could possibly hope to use. You might see a little bit of improvement from reallocating much of that back to the regular system. Sometimes its trick to do, sometimes its not bad, you would just have to look up how to do it with your specific laptop. I would probably only leave 512MB for the video card, maybe only 256MB.

Unfortunately, your video card is way under the minimum specs. It is more of what is referred to as a multimedia card, designed for video decoding and not much else. It is also not something you can do anything about, short of replacing the laptop.

[littlebottom]

ah shame, life would of been much easier if it would run decently on my laptop.

by video card you mean graphics card?:smallconfused: if so, cant i just buy a new one. i understand its harder to change in a laptop than a computer though, wouldnt it be much cheaper?

[Galdor]

I wouldn't try changing the graphics card myself, but if you're feeling up to it you can try. I uninstall/delete all programs/files I'm not using anymore, and save ones I still need but don't use often to a backup disc drive as an archive, but it only really helps with common tasks, not so much games. That's probably due to my really cheap video card though.

[Erloas]

video card, graphics card... its all the same.

As for changing out a graphics card on a desktop, that takes maybe 3 screws, possibly a connector, and a grand total of about 3 minutes.

On a laptop its effectively impossible. I just opened up my laptop to see how mine is done, and it is in a socket so it would be possible to remove it, but a lot of other parts of it are built into the motherboard, so I imagine it would be possible to change, but only within a limited set of options. But with a lower end graphics processor like you have it might very well be directly soldered onto the motherboard. Even if it is in a socket, I don't even know where you would go about buying a new one, they aren't standard like they are in desktops.

[littlebottom]

ah. i see. well ill keep looking into this, but somehow i think my laptop just isnt gonna cut it.:smallfrown::smallsigh:

still, any advice to get this thing to a point where it might run it is highly appreciated. having the game on a portable laptop instead of just a desktop PC would be highly advantagous to me.

is it only my Graphics card that is way too low?

[Erloas]

Given your specs and the requirements they listed it is only your GPU that is the problem. While your CPU is on the low end of things, it is at least at what they want, and given how it ran on my system I would imagine its almost always going to be GPU bound.

Well I decided to download the benchmark and see what it looked like for myself. I don't remember what number it gave me, 3500-4000 I think, running on high. I could say for sure it doesn't look at all like an MMO, which helps explain the fairly high (almost prohibitively so for an MMO) system requirements.

I was running FRAPS and the FPS was almost always in the 45-55 range, using GPU-Z my GPU load was in the 85-90% range almost the whole time and using the Task Manager my CPU was averaging around 75% usage. So it really was doing a pretty good job stressing the whole system. I forgot to check system RAM usage, Video RAM I don't think was ever over about 300MB.

You might run the same programs and track your numbers and that will give you a better idea of how well your system is actually running the game, because the number they give you is rather meaningless. You can also see if your GPU is running at 100% and the CPU isn't stressed at all then that tells you exactly how much of a bottleneck the GPU is.

[Irbis]

is it only my Graphics card that is way too low?

Possibly. My laptop has worse specs, yet, thanks to 4 GB of ram and 8800M card runs practically every new came.

[IonDragon]

To see the greatest increase in performance, reformatting and reinstalling is your best bet.

Do that.

Then get a new computer. You usually want to replace a laptop after about 5 years (ballpark from experience)

[littlebottom]

ive been considering a format. and just use the recovery discs i madefrom shortly after buying the laptop.

ill proberbly do this at somepoint soon after putting the odd program on an external harddisk.

but i feel theres no point yet, as basically i dont need it to perform anybetter yet untill the 22nd.:smallsmile: so ill proberbly try doing this around the 20th