T2 or network issue?

I've got an odd problem and I've looked through the FAQs and other threads but I'm not even certain if it's a Tribes 2 issue since it seems to work fine some of the time. I figured this was the place to see if anyone knows anything or can help narrow down what could be the cause(s). I hadn't played the game in a little while but recently signed up for the TWL tournament and have played in three scrimmages this week and every time my framerate has been below 20 fps most of the time (bounces between single digits and the 20s). At first I thought it was tournament mode because I can play fine on pubs. Yesterday I spent four hours reinstalling and tweaking things. In fact I got my framerate much higher during pubs (from the dual core to single core switch - I know I have to switch it each time I start unless I try one of those other options). At that point I thought for sure I had fixed whatever the problem could have been. However, last night it happened once more. This time though I had 90+ fps when I first got on a server running in tournament mode, but before I quit that server to go to the scrim server my frames had begun dropping. I thought it had to be the game or my computer. Earlier I had gone through all of the scheduled tasks in Windows and made sure nothing was running while I played. The system resources have always been good though, as T2 is only using about 50% at any one time and TeamSpeak 3 is the only other program running.

After the first map last night I sat out the second and during that time I hooked up my old computer because that had to work, it always had in the past. Nope. It ran slightly smoother but I was still getting low framerates making the game too choppy to use weapons like the laser rifle or shocklance; I had a hard time hitting with any weapon actually. What could this possibly be? Two completely different computers having what appears to be the exact same issue. I'm not getting packet loss and my pings aren't bad but could the network be doing this? Something recently did occur with that. On July 31st my router stopped working. All of the lights except the signal light make it appear to still be functional so I wondered if my cable provider did upgrades or something that made it incompatible (it's an old router). I ordered a new router that should arrive tomorrow, though I doubt that will solve any problems (hopefully it at least works). Could the modem be doing this? The oddest part is that the game works during the day when I'm not in a scrim. All of the scrims have begun around or shortly after 10 PM. Is the Internet provider (Comcast in Southeast Michigan) doing something at 10 PM every night that could kill a game's framerates? Seems unlikely since my ping looks ok (mostly 80-100). TeamSpeak 3 could still be a factor in all of this because that's a new program to me that I had not used before this week. No one else seems to have this problem though. The game has run ok when I had TS3 on while I warmed up for the scrims so it seems unlikely that it would be the cause.

Any ideas? I'm losing my mind trying to figure this out. I just don't see how it can be the game if this occurs on two different PCs with the primary common factors being the network and TeamSpeak 3. One other thing that is occurring now on my newest install is during a game if I hit escape the cursor on the menu screen freezes and skips. Not sure if that's related as it wasn't doing that before nor is it happening on my old PC. I should probably try and find another game to check late at night, just not as familiar with any other PC shooter's online play.

My old PC: Windows XP, Athlon 2500+, Radeon 9800 Pro, 1GB RAM (I think, at work so I can't check but I know it's under 2GB)

Newer PC (but still old, took a PC no longer in use at work and added some things): Windows 7, Intel Core Duo E8500 @ 3.16GHZ, Radeon 6850, 8GB RAM (it's four sticks at 2GB each running in dual channel)

Thanks for reading this and for any help that you can provide :)

Comments

  • The router will have no impact on frame rate.
    Fps and networking are unrelated.
    I am thinking there is something going on with your pc when this happens.
    Something running in the background or whatever.
    Do you have "power saving" or similar enabled in the vid card driver or anything?
    When this happens, what is running on the pc?
    Is your pc getting too hot?
    Also, do you have an effective av? Have you scanned your pc for 1337 H4x0r5?
  • What confused me most is both of my computers had problems and I didn't think they were too similar. I'll do some scans since I haven't done any since June. As far as I can tell nothing is running in background. Not sure about the heat but since the game runs fine during the day I didn't think it would be that since it's hotter in this room then than at night. I've never checked for power saving on a video card, I'll check on that. As ridiculous as this sounds my newer PC is now not working (turns off during the boot up) but maybe something got loose as I moved them around Thursday night. I'm going to look at that now. I'm not the most knowledgeable PC guy, I know the basics but not much beyond. Thanks for the response.
  • I misspoke to a degree in my above reply. Networking can have an effect similar to reduction in fps when the network is having dificulties such as packet loss and lag. When this happens you will see the screen stutter or even freeze, but your fps remains normal. So this begs the question; how are you measuring fps?
  • I type show("$fps::real"); into the console command box. Last night I got a good framerate during my match. On Saturday I hooked up the new router and ran malware and virus scans but found nothing. However, I did install new anti-virus software that monitors when programs start and that found that Findfast was trying to start around 9:40 PM Saturday. That could have been the problem. I use an old copy of Microsoft Office and I didn't realize it had that in it. Coincidentally, that Findfast program caused me problems in Tribes 1, when it was part of Windows 98 I believe. I wonder if that was really the issue because I've had that Microsoft Office for a long time and never had problems with Tribes 2 before. It's difficult to remember but maybe I realized it was there last time and managed not to install it. A few months ago I did reformat my hard drive and reinstall everything when I upgraded to Windows 7. I also uninstalled Dropbox since I wasn't using it, though I don't think that program does anything on its own. Whatever, the problem was hopefully it won't return. Thanks.
  • Turns out it wasn't that :-\ It happened again but hasn't happened in more than a week now. My latest guess is it had something to do with power, either in the house or the power supply. Played a few times while not running the AC and unplugging anything I wasn't using, and the game ran ok. I also got a new power supply on Monday so hopefully no more problems but I really have no clue :P
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