NoteCaddy performance-tweaks

[karstenkloss]

As performance-problems are quite common, here a small guide:


1. hardware (aka the mysterious stuff inside your computer)

CPU
NoteCaddy requires a lot of CPU-power when creating notes, especially when you use a lot of definitions on a big database. Atm Intel's I7 is first choice. If you can afford it, go for it! If you are on something like an Intel I3, don't get too worried now. I was testing on my wife's laptop (I3, 8GB RAM, SSD) with a 1kk hands database and about 650 definitions........playing 24 tables on Stars was still possible without major lag, but creating notes at a whopping 18h/s was a pain in the a**.

To summarize it: the faster the better, especially if you plan to use a lot of sophisticated definitions.

RAM
From my experience 8 GB are enough, but 16 won't do any harm.

Harddrive
SSD is a must-have. NoteCaddy and HM greatly benefit from those kind of drives. The optimal solution is to get 2 SSDs, one for your Windows and programs, the other solely for your database. When buying a SSD you should choose the ones with the highest IOPS and 4k random read/write speed. Bigger SSDs are faster than their smaller siblings. Good place to inform yourself before buying something is here:

Tom's Hardware: Hardware News, Tests and Reviews

Short-note regarding RAID-arrays: 2 SSDs in a RAID0-array are faster than a single SSD, but the risk of failure is not worth the gain of speed.


2. software and settings

Postgresql-config & Windows
Go for the tweaks mentioned in 7. and 12. of this thread:

http://forums.holdemmanager.com/mana...ease-tips.html

If you use Windows as OS, don't set the values for shared buffers and effective cache size higher than recommended in this thread, there is no benefit in it.

If your OS is a 64bit version of Windows, you should go for a 64bit version of postgresql too. I recommend version 9.0 64bit, you can download it here:

Download PostgreSQL | EnterpriseDB


HM2-config
The HM2-config-file is located in:

C:\Users\YourName\AppData\Roaming\HoldemManager

Open it with an editor and insert the following code in the section "General" and save it:

<Key Name="ProcessWorkingSetBase" Value="500000000" />
<Key Name="ProcessWorkingSetHandAmount" Value="000" />

HM2-config.png

This change to the HM2-config is only recommended if you have 8 or more GB of RAM. It will increase the static cap and removes the dynamic per hand capping. HM2 will now use more RAM, but if you had problems with pop-ups lagging, this change will help you quite a lot.

Antivirus & firewall
First choice here are the Windows-firewall and Windows Security Essentials. Windows S. E. is free and doesn't impact your HM2-NC-performance. The downside is, that it's really only a basic protection. All commercial AV-programs and security-suites will protect you better, but imo the best AV sits in front of the screen....you.

Important is to set exceptions for all poker-related *.exe- and *.dll-files in the antivirus and the firewall.


Hope this is helpful

[HossendeHaai]

Great post!

One minor thing:

It will increase the static cap and removes the dynamic per hand capping.

It is my understanding that using 0 makes that no allotted memory is added per hand, and it doesn't remove the cap. If you have 16GB+ memory you could try to set this value higher (maximum is 850), as well as the other value (2100000000). Got a minor extra improvement with it.