Author: William Penn
Date: 19:45:11 03/02/01
Go up one level in this thread
On March 02, 2001 at 14:27:56, John Merlino wrote: >On March 02, 2001 at 08:17:53, William Penn wrote: > >>On March 02, 2001 at 07:00:18, William Penn wrote: >> >>>I still get too many engines running in Game Room, infinite time, Thinking Lines >>>& Visual Thinking open, with custom defined personalities. There seems to be no >>>good way to get rid of the extra engines. If I close then reopen CM with the >>>same settings, they're still there. I can close the engines via Ctrl-Alt-Delete, >>>which seems to be the only way. The disadvantage of that method is that Windows >>>98 then kicks the corresponding hash tables up into the win386.swp file, which >>>thereafter grows to a very bulky size and the hard drive does a lot of work. For >>>example right now I'm using 256MB RAM, 128 hash tables, and my swap file is >>>454MB. Apparenlty it works, but it makes most operations slow thereafter while >>>the hard drive manipulates the inflated swap file. I guess all I can suggest is >>>that there should be some way to start up everything without any engines >>>running, then select what you want to run. Apparently there isn't any way to do >>>that at present. >>>WP >> >>OK, if my layout does NOT have the Thinking Lines and Visual Thinking windows in >>it, and I set up the game with the custom defined personalities like I want >>(usually human vs a personality), then I exit CM and reload CM, it comes back up >>with the proper number of engines (one) running. (Of course that isn't very >>convenient, but it works.) I can then open the Thinking Lines window which comes >>up without any boxes checked, and I can select the White or Black box. I still >>have the proper number of engines (only one) running. >> >>The problem is with the Visual Thinking window. No matter what I do to try to >>avoid it, when I first open the Visual Thinking window it always comes up with >>the Chessmaster radio button active. That always opens the extra unwanted >>Chessmaster engine. And with 128MB hash, it is VERY slow to close that extra >>engine if I then check the White or Black button, or if I close the Visual >>Thinking window. It eventually closes the extra engine after several minutes (at >>least 5-10 minutes) of hard drive grinding during which period my computer >>becomes very sluggish. If I close Visual Thinking with the proper radio button >>selected then reopen it, that button remains selected. >> >>I would suggest that operation of the Visual Thinking window be revised so that >>it does NOT come up automatically with one of the radio buttons selected. Maybe >>it needs another radio button, a null position(?). >> >>But to be honest I am less than enthusiastic about this design which >>automatically calls up more than one engine to run simultaneously, and that's >>really the problem I think. I don't think anyone really wants to see the results >>of multiple engines running simultaneously in the Thinking Lines Window thereby >>greatly slowing down thinking, so I'd probably do away with that "feature". One >>engine running at a time is plenty! >> >>CM remembers all of its settings and keeps them the same the next time you load >>CM. That's wrong, I think, as regards the engines. Rather than the programmers >>trying to anticipate what user really wants to do with the engines, or assuming >>user wants to do the same thing each time (time after time) thereby activating >>an engine automatically at startup, the user needs positive control >>(selectability) over exactly which engine runs and when. Solution: Do away with >>all of the radio buttons and boxes on the Thinking Lines and Visual Thinking >>windows! Instead -- have a new Engines Window with boxes in it to select which >>engine user wants to run, the default always being that none are selected when >>CM first loads. I think that might fix this problem. >> >>WP > >The problem is that you are INTENTIONALLY running two engines, both with 128MB >hash tables, when your machine only has 256MB RAM. With Windows and the >Chessmaster program both taking up significant amounts of memory (probably much >more than 64MB combined, and maybe more than 100MB), SIGNIFICANT thrashing is >going to occur. Also, Windows will not clear out the swapfile unless a very long >downtime occurs (and possibly not until you shut down Windows entirely). > >The Chessmaster checkbox in the Thinking Lines window is attached to the same >engine as the Chessmaster radio button in the Visual Thinking window, so the >problem is only that you have one engine playing the game, and another separate >engine analyzing the game at the same time. This is what you told Chessmaster to >do. > >As for the design, most users have responded positively to it, stating that >having the multiple portions of the Thinking Lines window active simultaneously >is "cool". Although, admittedly, the people on this board are NOT the typical >users, I suspect that there are a few people here who agree with the usefulness >of seeing the thoughts of more than one engine simultaneously. > >Additionally, you have actually circumvented the initial design by replacing the >default Chessmaster personality with one that allocates 128MB of hash, meaning >that you have NO CHOICE but to allocate all of that memory when you want to use >a mentor feature (Analysis, Advice, and both the Visual Thinking and Thinking >Lines windows). The original Chessmaster personality allocates only 1MB, so if >you had not modified these files, you would not be having this problem. >Therefore, I would file this problem under user error, rather than a bug. > >The extra engine(s) WILL go away eventually, once Windows is able to handle all >of the allocation and deallocation of the memory. But, as you are witnessing >(and as I have duplicated on my machine), this can take several minutes. This, >once again, is not the fault of the Chessmaster program. > >jm > >p.s. Now that I've talked about what you SHOULDN'T have done, let me quote from >the ReadMe file for the 1.0.2 patch (which should be released within 10 days). >This section refers to an easier (and more "expert user") way of telling >Chessmaster how much memory should be allocated for the mentor engine's hash >table: > >----------------- >7. Added a special INI file setting for expert users, allowing them to override >the amount of memory allocated for the mentor engine's transposition table. By >default, the Chessmaster mentor personality only allocates 1 MB of memory (the >same as the default Chessmaster personality that you can play against). However, >several users asked for some way to increase this. Here's how you can do it: > >-- Go to your user folder. You will find this by going to the folder in which >you installed Chessmaster 8000 (usually "C:\Program Files\Chessmaster 8000") and >going to the "Users" folder under that. In this "Users" folder, there will be >one or more folders, one for each user that has been created. Let's say your >user name is "MyUser". This means that the full path to your user folder would >be "C:\Program Files\Chessmaster 8000\Users\MyUser". >-- In this folder, there will be a file called "MyUser.INI", where "MyUser" is >the name of the user. Open this file for editing with your favorite text editor. >-- Add the following text: > >[mentor] >ttable_size=2 > >where '2' above is the number of MEGABYTES of memory that you want Chessmaster >8000 to allocate for the mentor engine. Chessmaster will only allocate up to 256 >MB of memory, so any number greater than 256 will be assumed to be equal to 256. >Numbers less than 2 will be ignored entirely. >-- Save the file and run Chessmaster. Any time you use a "mentor" feature >(Natural Language Advice, Game Analysis or the "Chessmaster" setting in the >Visual Thinking and Thinking Lines windows), the mentor engine will now allocate >the specified amount of memory. >WARNING: This feature is intended for expert computer users only! Entering a >number that is larger than or close to ONE FOURTH of the amount of PHYSICAL RAM >that your computer has can cause your computer to slow down significantly, as >Windows attempts to allocate the memory by "swapping out" other allocated memory >to your computer's hard drive. This can even cause Chessmaster (or Windows) to >stop responding entirely. Keep in mind that both Windows and the Chessmaster >program require significant amounts of memory (as will any other program that >may be running at the same time as Chessmaster). Another good rule of thumb is >to subtract 100 from the total amount of RAM that your machine has, and then >divide that number by 2. This is a reasonable maximum for this setting. So, if >your machine has 128MB of memory, then you should beware of using any number >larger than 14. Use this setting with great care. If you do not know how much >memory your computer has, then you should not use this setting! >----------------- I find the "simultaneous multiple engines running" design/idea all very confusing, and it doesn't work right for me. I know how to avoid the associated problems, which requires some non-standard workarounds, i.e. I can still use CM8000 effectively nevertheless. I just thought you might want to fix it for the average user who runs CM8000 but don't understand such technicals!? But I guess not. So be it. Everyone has their own design ideas as to what's best, I guess. Kind regards, WP
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