Threading performance

[Evil]

Hi all,

I was just playing around with the Video Stress Test in CounterStrike:
Source, and noted a lot of odd stuttering.  The demo would run for about
 15 seconds at 13fps, then completely freeze up for about 15 seconds.
Then, it would start running again... only to freeze/unfreeze every 15
seconds or so.

Just for fun, I reniced all the wine processes down to +15.  The result:
 the demo runs completely smooth (well, at 13fps... but that's on
account of my low system specs) from start to finish.

I did some searching and noticed a similar report last year:
http://www.winehq.com/hypermail/wine-devel/2004/08/0306.html

I wasn't having this problem last year, but I've updated so many things
in the last month (like moving from KDE3.4 to KDE3.5, and updating WINE
from CVS), so I'm afraid I can't pinpoint the exact cause right now.

Does anyone know of another, more permanent, workaround rather than
re-nicing after starting WINE?  Is there anything I can do/test that
might help the developers if this is a real threading issue?

-J

AMD AthlonXP 2000+
ATI 9600XT w/128MB
1GB System RAM
Mandriva 2006.0, updated to KDE3.5

[James Liggett]

On Sat, 2006-01-21 at 17:37 -0600, Evil wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I was just playing around with the Video Stress Test in CounterStrike:
> Source, and noted a lot of odd stuttering.  The demo would run for about
>  15 seconds at 13fps, then completely freeze up for about 15 seconds.
> Then, it would start running again... only to freeze/unfreeze every 15
> seconds or so.

Is this sound stuttering you're talking about? If so, I've been noticing
it too since about 2 months ago. I think it has to do with DirectSound.
If you run Steam in a terminal with debug messages turned off, you'll
probably see a message that says something like this (taken from memory
here):

"This soundcard's driver does not support direct access.
The (slower) DirectSound HEL mode will be used instead."
> Just for fun, I reniced all the wine processes down to +15.  The result:
>  the demo runs completely smooth (well, at 13fps... but that's on
> account of my low system specs) from start to finish.

Cool tip. Never thought of it. I'll try that. Thanks! :)
> I did some searching and noticed a similar report last year:
> http://www.winehq.com/hypermail/wine-devel/2004/08/0306.html

Yep, similar symptoms rear their heads from time to time with HL2 and
related games (including CS:S) There's bug 3665 that deals with
something a lot like what you're describing, with the HL2 intro video:
http://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=3665
> I wasn't having this problem last year, but I've updated so many things
> in the last month (like moving from KDE3.4 to KDE3.5, and updating WINE
> from CVS), so I'm afraid I can't pinpoint the exact cause right now.
>
> Does anyone know of another, more permanent, workaround rather than
> re-nicing after starting WINE?  Is there anything I can do/test that
> might help the developers if this is a real threading issue?

You might want to try and get some traces (+dsound would probably be a
good start; I suppose someone more experienced could give some others to
try)

Regards,
James
> -J
>
> AMD AthlonXP 2000+
> ATI 9600XT w/128MB
> 1GB System RAM
> Mandriva 2006.0, updated to KDE3.5

[Evil]

James Liggett wrote:
> Is this sound stuttering you're talking about?

No, I don't think there is any sound in the CS:S video stress test.  The
stuttering I'm talking about is that the test completely freezes (then
resumes, after many seconds pass).

-Jesse

[Tom Wickline]

On 1/21/06, Evil  wrote:
> Hi all,

Hello,
> Does anyone know of another, more permanent, workaround rather than
> re-nicing after starting WINE?  Is there anything I can do/test that
> might help the developers if this is a real threading issue?

At what depth are running X ?

Tom
> -J

[Evil]

Tom Wickline wrote:
> At what depth are running X ?

I have the exact same symptoms, whether running X in 16-bit or 24-bit
color depth.  I had been using 24, but I just now tested in 16.

Renicing the server and pre-loader, again, eliminates the long pauses. 
My fps in 16-bit mode was only about 2 fps faster than in 24-bit mode. 
I run the demo confined to a 1024x768 virtual desktop window, but get
the same results when I let WINE run it fullscreen.

Also, I'm running a pretty recent (within the last week) checkout of Xorg.

Thanks for the troubleshooting test, though!

-Jesse