srcds CPU usage question (FPS related)

[dc443]

When I do not have an fps-boosting app open (Flash, Media player), my srcds uses barely 1-2% of my cpu power, and this is with 15 bots and 4 human players. This sounds strange but it's really what Task Manager tells me.

Once I have CS:S running, or a flash game going, or media player open, it jumps up to around 20% cpu usage, and this detracts from the experience when I go in to play on the server.. because the dedicated server is now using more CPU simply because it does when i have some sort of media application open, CS:S client included. Even when i use the fps_max command in the dedicated server to keep the number lower, closer to 64fps, the CPU usage still jumps to 20% or so when I go in to play the game.

So now I want to know, when windows tells me that its only using 1% CPU, is it really only using that much? I find it hard to believe, with 4 users already playing, beating the hell out of the bots. If this is true, why does it always have to jump up to 20 or so percent when I could really use that extra computing power??

Is my only solution to obtain another computer on which to run my srcds?


Another thing, running the srcds and client on the same computer hasn't caused me any problems aside from the unavoidable CPU usage boost that always happens when I try to do it. I imagine this would actually make the server smoother when I come to play on it, since it raises the FPS it runs at?

[skeletor]

alright,let me try to sort through this post, you have a server and client running on the same computer, the server wit only bots and 4 humans runs about 1% cpu, with the high res timer (media player, or something) cpu jumps to 20%. thats understandable.. your going to have a cpu usage increase when its calculating more times per second. and the cpu usage while playing and running srcds, thats a given, they both use tons of resources, and with both them going at the same time, it will slow them both down. i don't think it will raise the server fps though. but either way, if its only 20%.. whats the problem? especially with 15 bots.. why in the world would you want 15 bots anyways?!

[dc443]

Well, 20% is more than 1%. FPS goes down especially in firefights.

See, what I have going on here, is CSSDM (deathmatch) plus the spawnhealth mod. What this does is that I can set the bots to all spawn with 1 hp, but all people who join after that will spawn with the regular 100hp.(this is a bug that happens between the two mods, a really cool bug i must add.) Since I constrain the bots to one team and they respawn instantly once killed, this makes for quite a bit of fun.

I've just noticed that for some reason it keeps running at 64fps and uses pretty much zero% CPU, and yet I can't make it stay that way if I wanted to.

I'll just go put the server on another computer until I get an AMD X2 or something.

But ive gotten off track again. My main problem that I want to understand is why the CPU usage always goes up and stays at a constant rate no matter what FPS the server runs at?

I can limit the server to 40fps by setting an fps_max of around 60, clearly this is a stupid thing to do, but i did it just for testing purposes, and once I had WMP open it still used 20% CPU. I set the fps_max to something huge like 100000 and the FPS jumps to around 500 when i have WMP open. Still 20% cpu.

i just wish i could keep it at 64fps the whole time no matter what, with the low CPU usage, because the users don't complain when it's doing 64fps, so why make the CPU do 20x more work?

[skeletor]

if you want it to stay at 64 fps.. don't open wmp.. or anything.. you don't have to do that... lol.. thats just your computer cpu not liking the high res timer..

[dc443]

well yeah. but once i open CS:S client, it apparently sets the high res timer.

[skeletor]

you have to condisder.. that the game itself uses a lot of cpu, as well as the server.. SO.. its not that the games setting the timer.. its that your cpu doesn't like to do both..