FRAPS steady fps drop while recording Crysis 2

I know that FRAPS is a fps killer but didn't realize it was this big. But the thing I don't get is when I'm recording Crysis 2, fps starts out great about 75 fps but then all of a sudden at a random point in game, the fps drops to like 15. Then if I stop recording and start recording again, fps starts out high then drop like before randomly soon after. Does anyone here know anything about this? :S

 

You're probably running out of memory and it's slowing down because it has to write to disk as well as swap. Just my guess, though.

Recording movies isn't a lightweight affair... are you recording to the same drive that the game is installed on?

 

Yes and you think the fact i only have 20gb left can be a problem?

 

Definitely the reason, I had the same thing happen to me a few times.

Recording to a different drive than the game is installed on will make a huge difference, although you might get the same effect at a slower rate of speed. This happened to me until I switched to recording on a pair of WD Caviar Black w/ 32mb cache in RAID 0 (that weren't the same drive that the game was installed on) to really get to a point where I didn't notice a very significant slowdown while recording.

 

well but I record using FRAPS on C Drive and the game is also installed on C drive :/

 

Precisely. Buy a new HD, even if it has to be external, and it will help immensely. Get one with a large cache and throughput - SATA II over eSATA if it's external. An additional drive built around two HDs in RAID 0 will improve performance to the point that recording with it will only knock you 2-3fps on average (that was my experience, anyway).

 

did you have to have the game installed on the external harddrive when you did this? And really don't have much to spend.. :/ Just got the GTX 580 and thinking of buying 1080p monitor

 

Game (BC2, for instance) was installed on C, which is a sand force SSD - I recorded to 2 HDD's in RAID 0. You could simply record to your external harddrive, instead of reinstalling the game. As long as the tasks are split between the lanes. In some games (BC2, again), knocks me for 2-3 fps at the most.

Again, with only 1 HD to record to, and given the state of your current HD, you may still get the same effect, albeit at a much slower rate at least.

 

Guildmate frapsed our raids, he said that some if his recordings could be up to 300GB raw. I don't know anything about settings he uses but then he sends them to youtube at 1920x1080 resolution and one clip takes up to 8 hours to upload

 

so you think an external hd will help? xD

how long was the clip?

 

Around 4 hours but I don't know if it included something else too.

 

mine will be usually be less than 10m by the way can anyone tell me if this hdd is compatible with my mobo, asus m3a78-cm?
Hard Drive:
Newegg.com - Western Digital Caviar Green WD20EARS 2TB 64MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
My mobo:
ASUSTeK Computer Inc. - Motherboards - ASUS M3A78-CM

Also does this come with cables I need to install or do I have to buy those. :/ Never installed HDD before can people link me to the cables, etc that i need?

 

Drive itself will work just fine. You'll need one sata cable (if no extra ones came with the motherboard) and couple screws, preferably four, to attach drive to the case.

Most power supplies have extra sata power plugs, so no adapters needed.

 

EDIT: nvm now I know

 

Ok so just ordered these two from newegg.
Newegg.com - OKGEAR 18" SATA 6 Gbps Cable, Straight to Straight W/ Metal Latch, Black, Backward Compatible 3 Gbps and 1.5 Gbps cable
Newegg.com - Western Digital Caviar Green WD7500AARS 750GB IntelliPower 64MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive HDD

so these will work with my Asus m3a78-cm motherboard?

 

Yup. Hopefully your SATA connectors aren't stuck under the video card, I always get L-shaped ends on my SATA cables for this reason.