lag hoodoo quick reference

Approaches to reduce lag, within groups sorted in order of effectiveness, more or less. This does not cover every item mentioned in the series of articles, just the ones that are likely to have the most impact. It also omits hardware and network upgrade options. You may review the previous articles for more details.

Viewer and Operating System items typically affect your local experience, and not others. Those dealing with the avatar and the region (AKA sim) typically affect both you and others.

Enable the Statistics bar to monitor the effects of changes with Control-Shift-1

• Viewer Control Panel Graphics Tab (with Custom box selected)
  
  Note that these are trade offs between speed and quality
  
  
  
  
  • Window Size set to smaller size
  
  
  • Quality and Performance slider moved to left one or more steps
  
  
  • Draw Distance reduced
  
  
  • Atmospheric Shaders and Water Reflections disabled
  
  
  
  



• Viewer Control Panel Network Tab
  
  
  
  • Maximum Bandwidth to 500 kpbs, but adjust with experimentation for best FPS
  
  
  • Disk Cache Size to maximum (usually 1000 MB)
  
  
  
  



• Other Viewer settings and issues
  
  Activate the Advanced menu with Control-Alt-D
  
  
  
  
  • Advanced->Rendering->Run Multiple Threads
    
    This is not helpful if you have one single core CPU
    
  
  
  • Advanced->Rendering->HTTP Get Textures (if available)
  
  
  • Disable Voice, and/or Video (Media) if you are not using them
  
  
  • Experiment with alternative viewers
  
  
  
  



• Local Operating System
  
  
  
  • Run spyware scan, virus scan, and defragmentation (on Windows)
  
  
  • Reboot
  
  
  • Disable unnecessary 'helper' applications and crapware
  
  
  • Reduce window system eye-candy, e.g., Windows Aero interface
  
  
  • Give viewer increased priority
  
  
  • Update drivers for graphics card, network interface, and motherboard
  
  
  
  



• Avatar
  
  
  
  • Check your ARC (Advanced->Rendering->Info Displays->Avatar Rendering Cost
    But never yell at somebody else about their ARC; that is rude
  
  
  • Choose unscripted attachments and clothes in preference to scripted ones
  
  
  • Choose clothes and other attachments that use a minimal amount of textures cleverly
  
  
  
  



• Region (assuming you have permission to create/modify within the region)
  
  
  
  • Remove unnecessary prims, and don't litter!
  
  
  • Use large prims to break up view of lots of smaller sims
  
  
  • Reuse textures
  
  
  • Be careful of scripts, as they can potentially cause serious lag
  
  
  
  

That completes this series of articles. I hope you've found it helpful. May your lag be low and your enjoyment high.