BF2 versus Norton Internet Security

[EnsignPulver]

Please post your tech opinions on this matter.....

Situation:
I have an underpowered PC for playing BF2. 1.4GHz AMD CPU; 128 MB GeForce 5200, APG, graphics card; 512 MB memory.

Symptom:
When I play BF2 I experience a choppy screen update and my disk drive is in overdrive. Choppy screen update meaning that the screen moves and freezes up, continually, while I play. It is extremely annoying. Some nights it is so bad that ignore the moving targets and resort to "hunting" stationary targets (like C4'ing the commander assets, booby traps, or throwing mines in choke points. So I was thinking that if I eleiminate the disk drive hammering, maybe that would free up the system resources and have a smooth screen update.

Possible Solutions:
(1) Turn off the Norton Internet Security feature that monitors network attacks. I am thinking that Norton is scanning every Fah King BF2 packet while I play. Yeah, thats right. I went into the Task Manager and removed non-essential process, so nothing but BF2 would be talking on the network. I turned off the network attack monitoring component, fired up BF2, and........ AAAAAAHHHHHHH smoooooth update! No disk hammering! OOHHHH BAy bie!! They could run, but not far, I was picking them off.

(2) Spend more $$. Buy a faster CPU, 2 Gig memory, 256 MB PCI express graphics card, 7200 rpm disk.

Side Effects:
(1) Vulnerable to the attacks that Norton would otherwise block.

(2) Wallet looses $900 in weight.

What do you think?

[Balti]

I feel your pain Pulver. BF2 and 2142 both recommend turning off virus scanning software. Correct me if I'm wrong Parasite, but turning off your Norton while you play BF2 shouldn't harm you at all. Norton pretty well protects you against web site/email hacking attempts and as long as you remember to turn it back on (or reboot after you play) - that shouldn't hurt you.

Your video card is what I had. I upgraded from that and moved up to 1GB RAM. My gameplay is pretty good after that.

I'm by no means a tech help guy...learned some things just by asking the same questions.

See what your gameplay is like with Norton off. If it is still not up to your par of playing, I would go with a boost in RAM then the graphics card. New CPU at a last resort, but I'm sure others will have more informed opinions.

[Roo]

You should buy Chairbornes new computer......he never uses it!!!!!!

[odrater]

yes norton is a bitch to do anything with, if you want network protection that's free use Avast its been pretty good to me. If you want to pay for internet security stuff spyware doctor is pretty good and user friendly I hear.

So option 1 for now cause norton is the devil! :evil:
Option 2 (save up more money) wait till vista comes out and build a system around that.

[Tombstone]

One other thing that can cause some of the drive activity, if soultion 1 did not solve all of it, is Windows and the Game using your hard drive for loading textures into the game because of your PC's small amount of RAM.

Pulver if you can PM me with your motherboard make/model I may have some cheap and easy upgrades laying around. If you 1.4ghz AMD is a Socket A CPU then I may have a 2500+ Barton CPU that could be dropped in as a replacement. Also, depending upon how many slots you have for RAM I have 2 sticks of 256mb RAM that you could add to your your for a total of 1GB. I have too many spare parts laying in drawers after past upgrades that I get really nothing with on trade in our sale, so I keep them to help friends out with aging systems. Squad got a video card a while back and I sent TJ a CPU. I also have an ATI 9500 Pro video card (AGP) that when tweaked is the equivalent to the old 9700 Pro. Not sure how that compares to the GeForce 5200 series.

I agree with the others about do what you can now (cheaply) to keep it hovering above minimum specs but soon you'd be better off to save up and re-invest for the next 5 years. At this point, anything you do as a major upgrade to any one part of your system will pretty much require you to replace everything but the case and maybe your CD drives.

I know we have some other more qualified guys that hopefully will post their thoughts on your options.

']['

[Ninja]

The first thing that I would do is dump Norton from now and forever. I would not use either Norton or McAffee for anything. They've become bloat-ware and hog resources like crazy. I highly recommend looking at NOD32 from Eset software. http://www.eset.com. It's not free but you can try it fully functional for 30 days. Programs like AVG free and Avast are ok just don't expect alot for free.

The next thing I would do is do some upgrades, especially your RAM to at least 1GB, 2GB if you can afford it but don't bother going over 2GB because you won't see much difference and in some cases more than 2GB has had negative effects on systems. Upgrade your video card but don't go crazy. A 256MB PCI-E card would suit you fine. As for the CPU, there are lots of deals out there right now on single core chips. Try and find something over 2Ghz. For the hard drive, if you have SATA on your mobo, look into a 10,000 RPM drive and a 16MB cache. If you've only got IDE channels then try to find something with a large cache on it.

Now on to the non PC stuff. The best thing you can do for yourself protection wise is buy a NAT router. Even if you're only running one PC, get a router because most if not all new routers have built in firewalls that protect you from the outside world and will unable you to completely dump Norton and all of it's pain in the ass attributes. Look at brands like D-Link or Linksys.

That's my quick take on your situation. I wouldn't go crazy on the upgrades and expenditures because Vista and DX10 are just around the corner (January 30th for retail). I'm sure I've forgotten something and I'm fairly positive someone will come in disagree with everything I just said. If you have any questions send a PM or we can talk on TS.

[Comet241]

id personally go with option number 2. thats the one im saving up for.

as far as what somebody said about vista, if you buy a new pc from best buy till the end of the year, you get a free, yes you heard me right, FREE upgrade to vista when it launches (the disks wont actually be mailed till march or april, but thats ok, let the bugs get worked out) I should know this, im a manager in the computer department at best buy, so trust me.

here's what you do: buy a mid-range tower, just the tower. id recommend a gateway or hp for this. you can get a tower with a core 2 duo processor in it with two gigs of ram for as low as 699.......

thats already 50 times faster than your current pc. then you can at least work from there, transfering everything you want to from your current pc, like the graphics card. if you wanted to, you could update that for around 200 more. so yea, you are looking at around 900-1000 bucks, but i promise you that the speed increase from your current system you are going to see increase is going to be amazing. it's worth 900 bucks imho because something like that wont be obsolete for 5 years or so. that's 200 bucks a year, think of it as an investment

[Heenalu]

What a salesman Comet....very good...

Now if ya just want to hold off on spending money.....First dump Norton, Mcafee, or any other virus or firewall protection you have.......I use AVG Free Edition for my antivirus and Free Zonealarm for my firewall......no problems what so ever......and the best part.........FREE

However....you do need a new 'puter soon

[Ninja]

as far as what somebody said about vista, if you buy a new pc from best buy till the end of the year, you get a free, yes you heard me right, FREE upgrade to vista when it launches (the disks wont actually be mailed till march or april, but thats ok, let the bugs get worked out) I should know this, im a manager in the computer department at best buy, so trust me.Nice sales pitch Comet. :D However, I think Dell is offering the same free Vista upgrade as well.

The last I heard is that Vista isn't available to consumers until January 30th and even that's probably not set in stone yet. I think the gold master went to press this week. I personally wouldn't run Vista as my primary OS until at least 6 months to a year after it's release. Who knows how secure it even is. Time will tell. :)

[Parasitic]

I'm running Vista at work and it's pretty solid but not ready for a full push into mainstream.

My question is how many games do you play besides BF2? If there is a demand for power then your best bet is a new pc. However if you can find some spare part upgrades from Tomb that works that will settle you until that big break.

I'm not even concerned about upgrading until maybe end of year 2007 or even 2008. Why? nothing is multi-threaded (as far as gaming goes) or 64-bit native.

If anything visit http://techbargains.com/dellcoupons.cfm take a look every week and see if there are any deals for you. Some tips are to price your system without a monitor unless you like a flat panel LCD. Upgraded to a Core 2 Duo E6300 1.86 GHZ, buy a PCI-X Video separately, and probably just stick with onboard sound or get a $50 Creative Labs.

I'm sure a majority of us can get on TS and discuss this further with more options.

[Comet241]

surprisingly, it wasn't meant to be a sales pitch. i get jack if anybody buys from best buy, it was just my honest opinion. but, like somebody else mentioned, evaluate your own playing level and determine if it is going to be worth it to you. dont buy unless the value created by the new equipment is going to outweigh the troubles that weaker equipment might create. if you dont play enough, then just upgrade ram and the video card, if you play a lot, get a whole new system.

and yes, i wont be getting vista either, at least not for a year or two anyway. when new games start requiring it, thats when i switch.

[Heenalu]

I was just pokin fun at ya Comet

[Comet241]

i didn't take it in a negative fashion at all, but i did have another thought to add. i suppose the debate is pci-x vs agp....

i personally have only dealt with agp's, and i have never ever had a problem. i just wanted to know what other people thought. my thought would be to go with dual 7900's (assuming you have the space and power supply for that....)

that would cost about 500 or 600 just for those, but just throwing it out there for people whose budget isn't as constrained could really unleash some graphics processing power.

that's my eventual plan. i already have a motherboard with a core 2 duo im buying from a friend for 300, i can transfer over my power supply, cables, drives, HD, all i need is a new case (100 bucks) and id love to have dual 7900's (with my discount from BB would be like 500 bucks for me) (also, not sure what slots the motherboard will have, still have to find out, so that may change the graphics card needs)

.... so, for about 900 bucks i can have a killer custom made pc

any advice or suggestions on that would be helpful.....

[Parasitic]

PCI-X is just another next gen product unused to it's full potential. I won't start nor will I comment further on dual graphics. I think all Pulver needs is a good midrange system that will do the job but at a medium rate.

Pulver you have your picks as far as info is concerned. Now all we really need to know is your goal and what you plan to spend comfortably.

[SniperDoug]

I use Norton Anti Virus (not Norton Internet Security) with no problem on my system. I do however make a few modifications to it. In the Options screen select Security risks. Uncheck everything in the window. These are all the spyware, adaware, and other items Norton constantly scans for. If you have a good spyware detection program such as Spybot Search and destroy, it will detect all the threats I just told you to uncheck in Nortons. Spybot does not run in the background and it only takes a few seconds to run. SpyBot also fixes some registry problems that could also slow your PC down and cause it to stutter and jerk. I have and Pent 4 3.6Ghz Processor, ATI Radeon X850 XT 256MB PCI EX Video Card and 1Gig RAM. Don't get me wrong, I am not singing the praises of Norton. I know it uses a lot of resources that others do not and what I have just given you is a temporary fix that could help you. AVG is the best free antivirus out there. Zone Alarm is a very good active firewall that does not use a lot of resources to do it's job. Zone Labs, the maker of Zone alarm, also makes a good antivirus program that works well with it's firewall. I do think you will need to eventually upgrade your Processor and RAM. A processor of at least 2.3 and at least 1 Gig RAM. I think 1.5 Gig will get anyone the best performance. Whatever you get as an antivirus, try to look for one that also fixes your registries. If it doesn't, try to get a registry fixer. This is one place a lot of people overlook when it comes to problems with their PC's.

[EnsignPulver]

Ill am throwing $100.00 at the problem. I bought a 1 gig stick of RAM today (PC2700 333MHz). My mother board has two slots for RAM, each has a 256Meg DDR stick. I will replace one 256 with the 1Gig so I'll have 1,280 Mega bytes of RAM. Ill post what happens.

[Comet241]

ok, i read this thread again, and i would suggest turning off all your security features and programs whilst you game. yes, you are "vulnerable" to attacks during that time, but the risk is very very small. plus norton consumes more process memory to run in the background than lindsay lohan drinks beer at a kegger (ie, a lot of memory).

turn it off, plus the ram will help out a shit-ton

[SniperDoug]

ok, i read this thread again, and i would suggest turning off all your security features and programs whilst you game. yes, you are "vulnerable" to attacks during that time, but the risk is very very small. plus norton consumes more process memory to run in the background than lindsay lohan drinks beer at a kegger (ie, a lot of memory).

turn it off, plus the ram will help out a shit-ton




LOL.....I did not know lindsay lohan needed a kegger as an excuse to drink a lot of beer. Oh and by the way EnsignPulver, you can turn off nortons while you game. As Comet said, the risk is small, but if you are worried about it you can always do a virus scan after you get done gaming. This will find anything that has infected your system when you turned your antivirus off

[EnsignPulver]

AAAhhhhhh! Memeory is life, more is better.

i plugged in the 1GB stick, poof! No disk hammering. smooth display update.

I will try out the "turn all norton off". It can only get better.

Thanks for your help guys!

[Chairborne]

Good work squid.

Now GET IN THE GAME!!!!




Who Dey!

[Roo]

Now GET IN THE GAME!!!!

Boy, if that ain't the pot calling the kettle black, I don't know what is!!!