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I have a mac mini, with 1.42 ghz g4 processor, 256 mb ram. I play myth, and my computer gets completely random lag. It isn't a connection problem, because my camera cant move around while this occurs. It also affects other people when I host and my computer lags. Anyone have ideas on how I can fix this?

Have you tried running Myth under a different rendering mode? For me I don't usually lag, but there are a few bigger plugins that would make me lag a bit constantly until I switched from OpenGL to Direct3D. Perhaps your computer is overheating? Place a fan towards it (you might have to open the case) and see how it works out for you.

I'd say the RAM is your limiting factor; Myth will need something like 100mb I think, OS X will also be using a chunk of memory. You'll get random slow-down if memory has to be "swapped" onto your hard-drive. I'm afraid there's not a whole lot you can do, OS X is a great OS, but it needs a chunk of memory. MacMini's are really geared towards running simple office applications and the like that don't require much memory at all.

haravikk wrote:I'd say the RAM is your limiting factor; Myth will need something like 100mb I think, OS X will also be using a chunk of memory. You'll get random slow-down if memory has to be "swapped" onto your hard-drive. I'm afraid there's not a whole lot you can do, OS X is a great OS, but it needs a chunk of memory. MacMini's are really geared towards running simple office applications and the like that don't require much memory at all.

If ram is your only problem it's not very expensive to fix. You've only got one RAM slot so you'll have to replace your 256MB with something larger. You can quadruple your present memory and upgrade to 1GB of RAM for under $50, or double it to 512MB for $25.

Probably available cheaper, but these guys are good and they know their Macs - if they say something will work in your particular machine, it will.

http://eshop.macsales.com/MyOWC/Upgrade ... w+Upgrades

is it possible to fix this problem through software? I didn't have this problem until recently, so I'm not sure its a hardware problem.

Well if you didn't have this until recent its possible it is software issue... or an overheating issue. If software... maybe adware/malware or some virus is on your computer. Or maybe you installed one too many programs have have something running as soon as you start the computer up. If its an overheating issue, maybe you just need to clear some of the dust in it and make sure it is ventilated better.

Zaknafein wrote:is it possible to fix this problem through software? I didn't have this problem until recently, so I'm not sure its a hardware problem.

If it's software, then something must have changed recently. Have you upgraded the OS? Added any new software? Applied some Apple OS update recommended by Apple's Software update service? Anything new running in the background? New peripherals? (e.g. Are you trying to use an external 1TB USB 2.0 harddrive through a USB 1.0 port?)


(btw, I am seriously impressed you can even run OS X in 256MB - 384MB is the smallest amount of RAM I've ever tried and I got periodic freezes and crashes running OS 10.2.8 in that amount of memory - 500MB seems to be the lowest amount of RAM I can do much of anything in OS X)

You'll be a lot happier w/ everything.... if you upgrade your RAM. 256mb is not what you use to run OS X.

Not so sure RAM is the problem, unless the OS X in question is Leopard. I played Myth frequently on my 800mHz iBook with 256 RAM under Tiger, and had no problems. Leopard, on the other hand, eats RAM for lunch.

Upgrading RAM is always good, but I suspect something else may be causing the problem.