Slow startup/loading time ?

[binbinhfr]

Hi,

I am under steam in 12.26

since 2 last subversions, I noticed that the game is much more longer at start time (loading sprites).
I have these timings, with a fresh install, no mods, full screen :
0s: first run
6s: 45% sprites
then it is very slowly increasing till around 55% at 45s.
50s: the game is loaded.

I have a rapid machine with a SSD. I find this drastic slowdown around 45-55% sprites very strange and new.

I installed back to 12.24 with steam and the starting time is 10s. Which seems normal.
Under 12.25, the starting time is also slow.

I checked the cache integrity. No problems.

Attachements : logs under 12.24 12.25 and 12.26

factorio-current 12.24.log

(1.19 KiB) Downloaded 263 times

factorio-current 12.25.log

(1.21 KiB) Downloaded 194 times

factorio-current 12.26.log

(1.21 KiB) Downloaded 218 times

An idea ?

For the moment, I revert in 12.24 because it's not easy to test and write mods with this slowtime.

Have a nice day.

[daniel34]

The same problem was posted on the steam forums:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/427520/di ... 351827934/
The solution was to update the drivers.

[binbinhfr]

Well on this post he has a 20 mins loading screen I am only at 1 min (instead of 10s under 0.12.24)
I have a nvidia drivers 361.43 of 21/12/2015 and they released 362.0.
I'll give it a try right now !

[binbinhfr]

Aaaargh, well I updated the drivers, and now it's worse !!!

1 min 20s of load time, with slowdow starting at 33% sprites loading...

So it must be a graphical issue (is the game loading sprites in the GPU memory at the start ?), but my drivers are fresh now. NVIDIA 362.00-desktop-win8-win7-winvista-64bit-international-whql

Help !

because under 12.24 I notice that I cannot even reload 12.26 maps...

PS : could someone tell me what is your average loading time when running factorio ?

[starholme]

I get about 17 seconds to load. Reasonably fast laptop: SSD + i7 + intel 5500 graphics

edit: Adding WaiTex brings it up to about 25 seconds.

[binbinhfr]

I get about 17 seconds to load. Reasonably fast laptop: SSD + i7 + intel 5500 graphics
edit: Adding WaiTex brings it up to about 25 seconds.

Thanks for your answer. So my previous loading time of 10 seconds on a good desktop is normal. The new loading time of more than 1 minute is abnormal. I tested with no mods.

Maybe I should have posted thsi in "bug report" if I want the devs to have a look at it...

EDIT : to be sure, I just update Win 7 x64 with the very last updates. A few one were missing. But the problem is still here. They must have change something in the way they load sprites between 12.24 and 12.25...

[sillyfly]

12 seconds for me on a mid-range laptop (i5 3210m, Integrated Intel HD4000 with a Crucial SSD).
I am playing on low graphics, though, so presumably all sprites are smaller in size.

[binbinhfr]

Yes 12s seems fine

For info, I tested with the --force-d3d : no change.

Then I tested with option video memory = all (instead of high) and it seems to correct the problem. Back to a loading time of 10 sec.

But I am surprised, because my card has 2Gb ram. So it shouldn't be a problem... And it was working under 12.24 . So dev guys, you should check this.

My card : ASUS strix GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2Gb, last drivers, win 7 x64, last updates

[daniel34]

Yes 12s seems fine

For info, I tested with the --force-d3d : no change.

Then I tested with option video memory = all (instead of high) and it seems to correct the problem. Back to a loading time of 10 sec.

But I am surprised, because my card has 2Gb ram. So it shouldn't be a problem... And it was working under 12.24 . So dev guys, you should check this.

My card : ASUS strix GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2Gb, last drivers, win 7 x64, last updates

That's interesting. I also have a GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB and have noticed a short lag at around 44-45% of the loading screen, making the startup time for Factorio 19s. (other hardware: Phenom II x4 3,2GHz and 16GB Ram, using the non-steam 0.12.26)
After changing the video-memory-usage from high to all it only takes 11,5s to launch.

With both settings the CPU is the bottleneck with a constant 25% CPU usage until Factorio is loaded. Overclocking the CPU to 4,0GHz brings these values down to 16,5s/9,7s. Overclocking the GPU makes no difference.

Further tests (overclocked):
video-memory-usage = medium needs 24s
video-memory-usage = low needs 29,5s

I guess when lowering the video memory usage the sprites are stored in a different way, probably compressed, which takes longer to put them into VRAM. I'm just wondering why Factorio doesn't adjust this value based on the amount of VRAM available, or use threading to speed up this task as it seems to be using the CPU.

[BlackKnight]

...Then I tested with option video memory = all (instead of high) and it seems to correct the problem. Back to a loading time of 10 sec...

This solved the game loading very slowly for me. Not sure how typical this problem is but I would recommend it be saved under an FAQ elsewhere until this issue is solved.

symptoms for me: on execution, the game became a white window (with several border lines) for about 20 seconds before moving on to the progress bar.
The white window is now gone and the progress bar loads noticeably faster