CompuServe Thread

#Page Swapping

6 messages in this thread
#34232From: TOM TORREFeb 22, 1992 11:02 PM
Can anyone out there help me with the optimum Setup Configuration for my PC that is running ACAD 11c2…I have an Everex 486/33, 16 meg Ram, 1.2 Gig HD and running under MSDOS 5.0. My main problem is Excessive Page Swapping….I'm lost when it comes to fine tuning AutoCad for Performance. I have a 1.3 meg Schematic drawing and when I perform a status command at the beginning of the session I get: Virtual memory allocated to Program 9248K Amt of program memory/Total virtual program size: 99% Total Conventional memory: 428K Total Extended Memory: 15360K Swap file size: 25788K bytes Page faults: 0 Swap Writes: 0 Swap reclaims: 0 Now this drawing file is very Text intensive, it contains all ROMANT fonts within each BLock (that contains at least 29 attributes). I need the ROMANT fonts for clarity as this drawing is used for publication. I tried changing to a standard font but upper management really doesn't care for them, as far as readability goes. Does anyone know of a third party font developer that has fonts that compare to ROMANT but with less of a byte count per character, that would help a great deal. Sorry to get off track, but after about a half hour of editing this drawing, I do another STATUS command and get: 22420K, 65%, 432K, 15360K, 97656K, 26935, 11023 and 9791 respectively. All snaps are off, the hard disk has been optimized, and the STATUS info has me baffled. Can someone send a sample Config.sys & Autoexec.bat file that might help me out. My hard drive sounds like it want to take a walk out of my machine…Any help would be most appreciated.. —Tom—
#34258From: Tony Tanzillo [LISP TM]Feb 23, 1992 4:12 AM
Tom – You've got a 25+ megabyte swap file there, buddy! I don't know if its the font, or not, but if you can make some of the attributes hidden, or use ROMANS for editing, and ROMANT for plotting, that might help. Essentially, you've got a drawing that's probably generating a huge amount of display vectors, and AutoCAD has to keep track of each one of them. Usually, I advocate using a font that comes in two versions – one used for display and editing, and the other for plotting. Just swap out .SHX files when you're going to plot the drawing. -TonyT.
#34478From: TOM TORREFeb 24, 1992 4:56 PM
Tony, How've ya been, did you get that 486/50 yet, I just ordered a Compaq 486/50 for use in UPS, I will have to just suffer with this 486/33 here. Tony, I'm lost when it comes to figuring out what all that page swapping tripe means when I do a Status command. I believe I have enough Hardware, if 16 meg of RAM and 1.2 Gig of HD isn't enough, I don't know what is. I have all of my extended memory dedicated to ACAD and stripped the config and autoexec to bare bones. I'm using MSDOS 5.0 with HiMEM and have a good amount of base memory. I even set aside 40 meg for page swapping to the D: drive, I have (2) 500 meg partitions. Am I killing myself with a huge page swapping area? I thought the more the better. I've upgraded the PharLap with the c2 upgrade. I understand what you mean by using a different font for editing and another for plotting. But this drawing is now (21) 8.5" x 11" set side by side and we usually PRplot each page as we edit each. There is a known BUG in R11 that changes the text justification is some block attributes when you use DDATTE. ADESK confirmed the bug on this forum to me but who knows what they plan on doing to fix it. My blocks have at least 31 attributes each and it's a royal pain in the butt to see the text go from centered or left justification. The only work around – is to completely DELETE the text in the dialogue box, hit enter, repick the block and reinsert the text again, and the justification comes back. Other than that, things are the same – work and more work…By the way, I'm going down for the 3rd time, getting married on Apr 11 and going to Cancun for a week…hope to hear from you before then…..Tom [UPS]
#34269From: Craig Sharp [Mem TM]Feb 23, 1992 10:55 AM
Tom: Make up a plot directory and put your original .shx files in it. Copy a romans (which I >think< is the simplest roman font) to your acad directory using the file name romant.shx. When you want to plot, replace the romant.shx file in the ACAD directory with the 'real' romant file. Don't use a different font because the spacing may be different. Also, check out the QTEXT variable. C#
#34479From: TOM TORREFeb 24, 1992 4:56 PM
Craig, Thanks for the advice, please see my reply to Tony T. I have to check out the QTEXT variable, that's a new one to me but always worth a look. -Tom
#34496From: Carl Bethea [Adesk]Feb 24, 1992 6:00 PM
Tom – Zowie. A 1.3 Mb drawing file that expands to 25Mb upon start up, and produces a 97Mb swap file after half an hour of work? My goodness, that's a lot of text. The 29 attributes per block are the main source of the overhead, I'm sure. You might try freezing some of the layers that aren't in use. Now you know the value of extended entity data, eh? As some of the fellows have suggested, you can use different font files for work and for plots. Use the STYLE command to replace ROMANT with TXT while you're working, then redefine the styles for the attributes to ROMANT before you plot.