9 replies to this topic

[Bront]

Some people were not happy with PGI moving the save game data, including the Shader Cache. For people who had their documents directory on an older SSD, moving the shader cache there can actually decrease performance. If you're on Windows Vista, 7 or 8 (or even XP), there's an easy way to move it.

Step 1:
Move the directory to the location you want it to actually be on. You have to move it, because the old directory needs to no longer exist for the second step.

Example:
My save game directory was at C:\Users\<user>\Saved Games\MechWarrior Online, and I moved it to D:\MWO to get it off my SSD.

Step 2:
Start up the command prompt (search and run CMD) and run the following line:

mklink /J "C:\Users\<user>\Saved Games\MechWarrior Online"  "D:\MWO"

This will create a virtual link between those 2 directories. That means that save game directory will point to the D other directory, and the files will actually be on the D drive, but will also appear as if they were on the C drive.

For me, I was getting 40 FPS dips occasionally, and that stopped it, moving it to a more write friendly standard HD. For others, it will let you put the save directory wherever you want it.

Edit: Note, apparently I've been living in the way, way past and newer SSD drives no longer have write speed issues. I appologize for any confusion. However, the move did help stop almost 40 FPS frame drops on my system, so it can help some people. It's still useful if you just want to move the data.

Edited by Bront, 09 February 2015 - 10:33 AM.

[Insects]

How does it hurt performance?
Isn't SSD far faster write speeds?

One SSD issue is that they have a limited write lifespan, but the game shouldn't be a huge factor in burning through it.

[Scurro]

joelmuzz, on 08 February 2015 - 01:06 PM, said:

One SSD issue is that they have a limited write lifespan, but the game shouldn't be a huge factor in burning through it.

That is no longer a case for modern SSDs. They will outlast the lifespan of the computer for the average user. You would have to be hosting a database for a large company for the limited write lifespan to come into effect.

[DrXitomatl]

I've got to admit, I also do not understand how performance would ever increase by moving those files from SSD to HDD. Could someone explain this?

[Bront]

WM Xitomatl, on 08 February 2015 - 03:29 PM, said:

I've got to admit, I also do not understand how performance would ever increase by moving those files from SSD to HDD. Could someone explain this?

older SSD drives hav e slower write speeds. SSD drives are primarily for the great read speed.

Some folks also just want to move the MWO save data anyway.

[Infrasound]

joelmuzz, on 08 February 2015 - 01:06 PM, said:

How does it hurt performance?

It shouldn't hurt performance and should resolve the issues which appear in the last week for a lot of people

If it DOES cause issues you can try without /j (the junction operator) which can cause non standard stuff to not be able to find the link on occasion. It's similar in behaviour but slightly different under the hood.

Edited by Infrasound, 08 February 2015 - 11:57 PM.

[Kamikaze Viking]

Layman explanation - NTFS has the ability to just point somewhere else. Hence the Game looks for the files and the OS says, "they moved to the next room" the Game goes to the next room and keeps loading as normal.

Just beware with NTFS soft/hard links that if you move your hard disk drive letters you'll need to adjust this, eg when you install an extra Hard disk. or take one out. So don't forget you've done it.

I used a tool on my Old Pc to move all my steam games to a different disk (old PC before Steam could do it itself) and it was basically just a GUI that generated the command lines for you.
Never had any problems with games loading (even in odd cases like when the steam install and source engine was still on C: and TF2 was on D:\)

[Egomane]

Bront, on 08 February 2015 - 11:49 AM, said:

Step 2:
Start up the command prompt (search and run CMD) and run the following line:

mklink /J "C:\Users\<user>\Saved Games\MechWarrior Online"  "D:\MWO"

Just in case someone is still running it (this someone really should upgrade to a more modern operating system, for their own security and ours), this will work with WinXP as well and it will also work in the upcoming Win10

Soft and Hardlinks are a part of filesystems for a long time, but outside of unix/linux rarely used or even documented.

[Garagano]

Every other normal program i know, does save all it configuration files into %APPDATA%.

MWO does not save "Saved Games" at all, like other single player games. (in which case the games will save the game states in %userprofile%\documents anyway)

Saving into that path puzzles me, why there???

[Bront]

Egomane, on 09 February 2015 - 12:57 AM, said:

Just in case someone is still running it (this someone really should upgrade to a more modern operating system, for their own security and ours), this will work with WinXP as well and it will also work in the upcoming Win10

Soft and Hardlinks are a part of filesystems for a long time, but outside of unix/linux rarely used or even documented.

Noted that XP it will work with as well.

For some reason, I thought this was a feature added in Vista (forgot to mention that).