performance problem (memory management?)

[soulsick]

Hi,
I just installed windows 7 rtm 64bit and I really love it. But i got a performance problem under certain circumstances and hope u can help me
First, here is a list of my relevant hardware:
AMD X2 4200+ @2.7 GHz
3 GB DDR RAM
System drive: 2 x 250 GB (raid 0, about 90 MB/sec reading)
graphics: 9800gt
2 USB Flash drives dedicated to Ready Boost (2 GB and 512 MB)

Now let me describe my problem: I have to run 10 virtual machines on this PC. I use VMWare Server, each virtual machine is set to 128 MB RAM (lowest value possible, any lower values result in excessive swapping). All virtual machines are set up on another harddrive (200 GB, about 40 MB/sec reading), so they don't affect my system drive.
Performance is normally just fine in Win 7 (the virtual machines eat up very little CPU power). But when i use very demanding applications, e.g. Crysis, performance becomes a nightmare (framedrops, game is not playable). The LEDs for my flashdrives and my harddrive are flashing all the time. I guess all my Ram is used and win 7 swaps the data needed for crysis instead of swapping my virtual machines. Only way to play crysis is to stop my virtual machines (which is not acceptable).
In Win XP that wasn't such a big problem, there was some swapping for about 1 minute when i started crysis, then performance was just fine.

Any hints?
soulsick

P.S.: i know my english isn't the best, hope u understood my eplanations

 

[zigzag3143]

Hi,
I just installed windows 7 rtm 64bit and I really love it. But i got a performance problem under certain circumstances and hope u can help me
First, here is a list of my relevant hardware:
AMD X2 4200+ @2.7 GHz
3 GB DDR RAM
System drive: 2 x 250 GB (raid 0, about 90 MB/sec reading)
graphics: 9800gt
2 USB Flash drives dedicated to Ready Boost (2 GB and 512 MB)

Now let me describe my problem: I have to run 10 virtual machines on this PC. I use VMWare Server, each virtual machine is set to 128 MB RAM (lowest value possible, any lower values result in excessive swapping). All virtual machines are set up on another harddrive (200 GB, about 40 MB/sec reading), so they don't affect my system drive.
Performance is normally just fine in Win 7 (the virtual machines eat up very little CPU power). But when i use very demanding applications, e.g. Crysis, performance becomes a nightmare (framedrops, game is not playable). The LEDs for my flashdrives and my harddrive are flashing all the time. I guess all my Ram is used and win 7 swaps the data needed for crysis instead of swapping my virtual machines. Only way to play crysis is to stop my virtual machines (which is not acceptable).
In Win XP that wasn't such a big problem, there was some swapping for about 1 minute when i started crysis, then performance was just fine.

Any hints?
soulsick

P.S.: i know my english isn't the best, hope u understood my eplanations

sulsick

Hi and welcome to sevenforums

Thanks for filling in your system specs. It really helps us down the line.

Onto the problem. have you tried running performance monitor of task manger to see how much disk thrashing is going on. Tell me about your page file set up. Its size and locations.

Ken

 

[pparks1]

Holy moly...you are actually trying to run 10 virtual machines simultaneously on a workstation class machine using VMWare Server 2.0???? And while this AMD 4200+ CPU is running Windows 7 and 10VM's, you want to also play Crysis????

I'm an avid user of VMWare products myself, but when I have to run concurrent machines like this I usually do it on server class hardware with lots of RAM (20GB+) and on RAID arrays with hardware based RAID controllers. Also, the hypervisor based versions like ESX and ESXi are far better solutions for hardware utilization...however you are quite limited in terms of which hardware actually works. There are some whitebox sites which will provide you with workstation class machines capable of running these hypervisor based products.

First thing that I would do is increase the amount of RAM on your box. If you can increase to something like 8GB of RAM, that would help a lot to give each VM more breathing room. Especially considering how cheap RAM is and you are already running 64-bit Windows.

Second, I would shut down any running VM when trying to play games. Especially Crysis. I've got a Quad Core CPU, 8GB of RAM and a 9800GTX+ and Crysis alone can put a hurting to my box when nothing else is running.

 

[mickey megabyte]

indeed! you are asking far too much of your machine.

win 7 is great, but there are limits! even on its own, crysis can bring any system to its knees.

 

[septprince]

Hi,
I just installed windows 7 rtm 64bit and I really love it. But i got a performance problem under certain circumstances and hope u can help me
First, here is a list of my relevant hardware:
AMD X2 4200+ @2.7 GHz
3 GB DDR RAM
System drive: 2 x 250 GB (raid 0, about 90 MB/sec reading)
graphics: 9800gt
2 USB Flash drives dedicated to Ready Boost (2 GB and 512 MB)

Now let me describe my problem: I have to run 10 virtual machines on this PC. I use VMWare Server, each virtual machine is set to 128 MB RAM (lowest value possible, any lower values result in excessive swapping). All virtual machines are set up on another harddrive (200 GB, about 40 MB/sec reading), so they don't affect my system drive.
Performance is normally just fine in Win 7 (the virtual machines eat up very little CPU power). But when i use very demanding applications, e.g. Crysis, performance becomes a nightmare (framedrops, game is not playable). The LEDs for my flashdrives and my harddrive are flashing all the time. I guess all my Ram is used and win 7 swaps the data needed for crysis instead of swapping my virtual machines. Only way to play crysis is to stop my virtual machines (which is not acceptable).
In Win XP that wasn't such a big problem, there was some swapping for about 1 minute when i started crysis, then performance was just fine.

Any hints?
soulsick

P.S.: i know my english isn't the best, hope u understood my eplanations

10 VMs on 2.7 ghz processor and with 3GB ram thats too much dude....

 

[soulsick]

Hi and thx for responding,

I know that i torment my machine. But as I said, I didn't have such big problems in Win XP. Performance in Crysis was almost the same, no matter if the virtual machines were turned on or off.
Unfortunately my motherboard supports only 4 GB of Ram, so i can't upgrade very much
To answer zigzag3143's questions: my page file is set to 4GB and located on my system drive (C:, same partition as win 7). And i made a screenshot with crysis and resource monitor opened, hope u can help analyze it (sorry for the huge size, i thought maybe the information displayed in crysis could be useful too). Disk 0 is the drive for my virtual machines, disk 1 my system drive, disk 2 and 3 are my flash drives.
http://img44.imageshack.us/img44/4867/resourcemon.jpg

Maybe u guys are right and i want too much, but asking here doesn't hurt anybody, right?

Edit: oops, forgot to link my 2nd screenshot: http://img2.imageshack.us/img2/1874/resourcemon2.jpg
Edit 2: ok, i think now i understood the information displayed in the resource monitor (that thing was new to me, please correct me if i'm wrong). When playing Crysis, i need almost 5GB of RAM. Thats why the pagefile is in heavy use (hard faults/sec). So, maxing my RAM to 4gb would probably help?!
I know, a new PC with a quadcore and 8 GB of RAM would be the better option, i just don't have the money atm
What i still don't understand: Why are my USB flash drives also under heavy use? I always thought readyboost would just store small files on flash drives (cause they can be read faster from flash memories than from hard drives).

 

[pparks1]

Soulsick....just out of curiosity....what is the reason behind having to run 10 VM's simultaneously at all times on your machine?

 

[soulsick]

hi pparks1,
well i didn't mention it by purpose. But ok, here is the reason: earning cash. Have a look at this site: GOMEZ PEER ZONE - EARN CASH WITH YOUR PC
If you register there, you can download a small program which tests the speed of websites, and you get paid for that. You are allowed to run that program on multiple machines, thats why I need the virtual machines
I know, thats pretty sick, but i didn't chose my username accidently

Maybe someone has another idea that enables me to run at least 11 instances of that program, that would be highly appreciated!

 

[zigzag3143]

hi pparks1,
well i didn't mention it by purpose. But ok, here is the reason: earning cash. Have a look at this site: GOMEZ PEER ZONE - EARN CASH WITH YOUR PC
If you register there, you can download a small program which tests the speed of websites, and you get paid for that. You are allowed to run that program on multiple machines, thats why I need the virtual machines
I know, thats pretty sick, but i didn't chose my username accidently

Maybe someone has another idea that enables me to run at least 11 instances of that program, that would be highly appreciated!

soulsick

hey. first you have 4 gigs but your system is only able to use 3.x (32bit limitation) and >92% of it is being used. The disk thrashing is because its swapping to disk (C: and since the OS and the pagefile is on the same hd you are getting a bunch of HD trashing. If you could move the pagefile off to a different physical disk and maybe even increase it. You could let windows manage it. The thing that would help you the most is RAM of course.

Ken

 

[soulsick]

Hey Ken,
you misunderstood something i guess: i got the 64-bit edition of win 7. But thats no problem.
What do you think, if i upgrade my physical RAM from 3 to 4GB AND move my pagefile to another drive, will that end my problem? Sure there would still be some swapping, but maybe it wouldn't be that disturbing?!
Thanks again for your help, Martin

 

[zigzag3143]

my bad then why is task manager only seeing 3 gigs?

3 to 4 gigs will be an improvement as will moving the pagefile but with 64 bit its gonna be tough

 

[soulsick]

Atm i got only 3 gigs physical RAM. But my pagefile is 4GB in size.

 

[zigzag3143]

Atm i got only 3 gigs physical RAM. But my pagefile is 4GB in size.

Man IM having a tough day. 3 gigs of ram on 64 bit, with VM. You're not asking much of your hardware are you. The extra gig would lower the % of ram used from 95 to abt 75.

Ken

 

[soulsick]

Man IM having a tough day.

I know these kind of days
Well, i don't only ask much of my hardware, i torment it
But i want it to pay its energy bill by itsself, so i can save more money for a new PC.
Ok, thanks for the hints, i'll upgrade to 4 gb and move the pagefile. Hope that helps; if it doesn't, i'll have to boot into win xp when i want to play games.