When i'm playing starcraft....

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Sun Dec 04, 2005 3:23 am

my music in windows media player skips. i'll be playing my game, listening to the song, and then it will skip over literally one second of the song.

anyone have any idea why that should be? my specs are in my profile, but should be more than sufficient to run both of them at the same time.

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Sun Dec 04, 2005 4:18 am

Do you run WMP with no visualisation? The system shouldnt take that big of a hit from a song.

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Sun Dec 04, 2005 2:59 pm

right, no visualizations. although i've also noticed that when i'm not running starcraft, and have windows media player full screen with visualizations, it will occasionally skip over 1 second.

I have a sound blaster live sound card, so i wouldn't think it's that, but at this point i'm not sure.

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Sun Dec 04, 2005 8:53 pm

Try another media player, like Winamp or something, and see if that helps any. *shrug*

ScottE · Post by **ScottE** » Sun Dec 04, 2005 9:30 pm

StarCraft is a real system hog. Really taxes even the best systems. The graphics are freaking sweet though.

Zerohero · Post by **Zerohero** » Sun Dec 04, 2005 11:24 pm

I have a few questions...

Do you have Star Craft mounted to the HD?
Does it do this if you have any other program running the background?

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Mon Dec 05, 2005 1:08 am

Zerohero wrote:I have a few questions...

Do you have Star Craft mounted to the HD?

I don't know what that means.

Does it do this if you have any other program running the background?

I can run my music while surfing the web, running chat programs (msn), and writing a paper without any problems that i can think of.

I don't usually run it during other full screen games like call of duty because i like those sound effects. do you think it could have something to do with my video card and going full screen?

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Mon Dec 05, 2005 1:10 am

Jim wrote:Try another media player, like Winamp or something, and see if that helps any. *shrug*

That might help, i'll try that out too.

CoolJ · Post by **CoolJ** » Mon Dec 05, 2005 2:46 am

Not to change the subject, buy are you good at SC? My friends have a game every weekend and I get destroyed. I am usually the terrans because they are fast. Do you think it is good to have a bunch of different guys, or have something like 70 golaiths and 100 cloaked wraiths?

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Mon Dec 05, 2005 4:25 am

Build the dragoons!

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Mon Dec 05, 2005 2:21 pm

CoolJ wrote:Not to change the subject, buy are you good at SC? My friends have a game every weekend and I get destroyed. I am usually the terrans because they are fast. Do you think it is good to have a bunch of different guys, or have something like 70 golaiths and 100 cloaked wraiths?

I used to be pretty good, yeah. These days all i play are the custom, use map settings, games. Back in the day, my main strategy was to make mass something. it didn't really matter what, just so long as it was only one thing. You might try giving that a shot.

CoolJ · Post by **CoolJ** » Mon Dec 05, 2005 4:24 pm

golfnintendoboy wrote:I used to be pretty good, yeah. These days all i play are the custom, use map settings, games. Back in the day, my main strategy was to make mass something. it didn't really matter what, just so long as it was only one thing. You might try giving that a shot.

Thanks man, i'll give it a try. I like the wraiths because you can cloak them

I liked the protoss too, but man do they build slow.

Zerohero · Post by **Zerohero** » Tue Dec 06, 2005 9:09 am

golfnintendoboy wrote:I don't know what that means.

I can run my music while surfing the web, running chat programs (msn), and writing a paper without any problems that i can think of.

I don't usually run it during other full screen games like call of duty because i like those sound effects. do you think it could have something to do with my video card and going full screen?

You need to do this....

Download a program (or I can give you the full version for free if you want) of Alcohol 120%. Then make a image with that program. On that same program you can "mount" the image to your HE (HD = Hard drive). Now your computer won't be reading the game from your disc, but rather you HD which improves perfromance of the game as well as your computer.

About your video card... What kind do you have? Is it the regular stock card etc? Let me know

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Tue Dec 06, 2005 2:34 pm

Zerohero wrote:You need to do this....

Download a program (or I can give you the full version for free if you want) of Alcohol 120%. Then make a image with that program. On that same program you can "mount" the image to your HE (HD = Hard drive). Now your computer won't be reading the game from your disc, but rather you HD which improves perfromance of the game as well as your computer.

About your video card... What kind do you have? Is it the regular stock card etc? Let me know

I'll give that a shot. I have a Nvidia Geforce FX 5200 video card. I'll let you know how it works.

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 3:43 am

Update:

I tried using the Alcohol 120% version. Ran starcraft, played music with windows media player--occasional skipping remained. Ran Starcraft again, played music with real player--still occasional skipping.

Since it still skips with real player and without the cd, i can rule out the music software as the problem. my guess right now is either something to do with the sound card, the video card when it goes full screen, or possibly even something with virtual memory.

any ideas guys?

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 5:18 am

Has it always skipped?

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 12:57 pm

YARDofSTUF wrote:Has it always skipped?

For as long as i can remember anyways. I've had this computer for about 2 years or so. I've upgraded the hard drives (have 2 total, both are new), doubled the ram (came with 512), put a new power supply (500watts), and a new fan inside.

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Sat Dec 10, 2005 12:34 am

anyone have any more ideas?

CoolJ · Post by **CoolJ** » Sat Dec 10, 2005 1:03 am

Hmm, do you have the latest drivers? (sound card)

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Sat Dec 10, 2005 7:01 am

CoolJ wrote:Hmm, do you have the latest drivers? (sound card)

i've gone to creative's website and done a check and they said i do. i may be able to get an x-fi after christmas, and if i do i'll let you know if it still skips

RicRogue · Post by **RicRogue** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 12:21 pm

golfnintendoboy wrote:anyone have any more ideas?

RAM?

Maybe you need more. 512 seem a little low for XP anyway. I bet if you had a gig you would see no skips.

Disclaimer: This was a fictitional bet, no real bets made and/or implied.

Cya,

Ric

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 10:33 pm

RicRogue wrote:RAM?

Maybe you need more. 512 seem a little low for XP anyway. I bet if you had a gig you would see no skips.

Disclaimer: This was a fictitional bet, no real bets made and/or implied.

Cya,

Ric

Actually I do have 1 gig of ram. 4 sticks of 256mb each, synchronous 3200 speed. Could it be something with virtual memory? Right now my initial size is "1536" and my max size is "3072". Does that sound right? I think I used pcstats.com to make that setting, not sure though.

Meggie · Post by **Meggie** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 11:48 pm

wow starcraft?

Thats so oldschool. didnt think ppl played it anymore. I love that game

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 1:19 am

At present, it's slow when only 25000 people are on, and busy when 75000+ are on. So yeah, still pretty popular.

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 1:29 am

Meggie wrote:didnt think ppl played it anymore.

The entire nation of South Korea disagrees.

Meggie · Post by **Meggie** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 7:51 am

Jim wrote:The entire nation of South Korea disagrees.

i think thats why i stopped playing... i got tired of playing with 13 year old kids from various countries in asia

CoolJ · Post by **CoolJ** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 11:19 am

My friends just got me into it a year ago. I feel way behind. EVERYONE destroys me. And I don't want to put tons of hours in on an old game. If Starcraft 2 was ever released, then i'd make sure I got good.

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 4:24 pm

CoolJ wrote:My friends just got me into it a year ago. I feel way behind. EVERYONE destroys me. And I don't want to put tons of hours in on an old game. If Starcraft 2 was ever released, then i'd make sure I got good.

Anymore, all I ever play are the custom UMS (use map settings) games. Those are fun because they do things very unlike the traditional game. Things like stacking, turning lights on and off, having thousands of units on the map etc. If I played a traditional game today, I'd get smoked too.

Anymore ideas on why my music skips though? I mentioned virtual memory before, as i'm not very knowledgable in that area, and thought perhaps someone could tell me if my settings look okay or not.

CoolJ · Post by **CoolJ** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 11:10 pm

I really doubt this would work, but im just trying to throw things out here. When whatever application is running your mp3s (winamp for example), hit "ctrl + alt + del" and highlight winamp under the process tab. Right click it and set priority to high.

ScottE · Post by **ScottE** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 11:56 pm

Meggie wrote:i think thats why i stopped playing... i got tired of playing with 13 year old kids from various countries in asia

Oh but you had StarCraft geek buddies all over the world!

golfnintendoboy · Post by **golfnintendoboy** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 3:17 am

CoolJ wrote:I really doubt this would work, but im just trying to throw things out here. When whatever application is running your mp3s (winamp for example), hit "ctrl + alt + del" and highlight winamp under the process tab. Right click it and set priority to high.

I'll give it a shot. Is there a way to set it that way permanently if it works?

codek · Post by **codek** » Sun Jan 08, 2006 2:51 am

Zerohero wrote:You need to do this....

Download a program (or I can give you the full version for free if you want) of Alcohol 120%. Then make a image with that program. On that same program you can "mount" the image to your HE (HD = Hard drive). Now your computer won't be reading the game from your disc, but rather you HD which improves perfromance of the game as well as your computer.

About your video card... What kind do you have? Is it the regular stock card etc? Let me know

I am an avid fan of Starcraft and just made an image and mounted it to my hard drive but I get annoying warning saying that my cd is not in the F drive twice before it will start.

Any way to remedy this?

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Sun Jan 08, 2006 4:01 am

codek wrote:I am an avid fan of Starcraft and just made an image and mounted it to my hard drive but I get annoying warning saying that my cd is not in the F drive twice before it will start.

Any way to remedy this?

its probably because the mounted drive is different than where it was installed from so it has paths saved to the F drive. Might find them in a config file, doubt it though.