How much temp-space during installation?

[T'PAU]

First of all... Merry Christmas to all of you !

I'm planning to buy UT3, but I need to know one important thing, which can be a k.o. criteria for me: Does the installer of the final game behave the same, well... not optimized way according to the consumption of temporary HD-space on the Windows-partition?
For the demo you need at least 2.4 gigs free temp-space on C: for installing it (on another drive)! It was a very hard task to get so much space free and honestly I don't want to do that again.
Once installed, the demo runs flawlessly, with no problems at all.

So please tell me (only if it's true of course ) that the final game installer doesn't need so much temp-space! And if so, how much exactly

Thx in advance.

[Gareee]

The full game requires 8 gig at LEAST, so if yer already tight on HD space, it's time to add a new larger one to your system. I think my ut2004 folder had about 22 gig in it when i uninstalled it, and that's back when maps and content were far less hd space intensive.

HD space is very cheap now, and one of those things that yer foolish if you havin't expanded. They used to say if you can get a gig for a buck, that was a great deal.. now you can get a gig of hd space for like 30 cents.

Don't install all your programs on your c partition.. use a app mover utility to relocate them to another partition if you are tight on space.. or relocate your my music or my picture folders elsewhere.. they eat up gobs of hd space.

[Epickiller]

Yup you'll need to upgrade... which is cheap nowadays anyway, whats your current hd size?

[T'PAU]

Sorry guys, I think you don't get me right. I don't mean the amount of HD-space, where the game actually will be installed (which is not C:, for games I use E: ), I mean the amount of space on C: (Windows) used during installation process!
And the demo uses 2.4 GB of temporary space on my windows partition, no matter where (here E: ) I install it.
I use several partitions for different purposes, C: for Windows XP and system-near software, D: for other progs, E: for games etc.
And of course I keep my Windows-partiton as small as possible, normally I have around 1 - 1.3 GB free there. On my games-partition I got at least 20 gigs free. I can install gigabyte-monsters like Bioshock or Crysis with no problems, even with less then 1GB on C:.

So my question is: How much temporary space is needed on C: (Windows) to install the game?
If Epic didn't change the installer since the demo, I could imagine, that much more temp-space is used then for the demo!

[Gareee]

Beats me.. the only way to tell would be to actually look while its installing, and I don't know anyone with that small amount of free hd space on c: at all.

If 2 gig free is all you have, then that probably affects windows performance as well, since some applications swallow 4 gig whole.

UT3 even runs better with 4 gig instead of only 2, and even my c: cache is over 4 gig.

A 300 gig ata drive will only run ya like $69 shipped, and that's not even counting christmas deals.

"I can install gigabyte-monsters like Bioshock or Crysis with no problems, even with less then 1GB on C:."

And while that does work, windows is wratching your HD like crazy simulating memory, trying to keep up.. that slows down the install process, and while in games slows them down as well as windows simulates free memory on your system.


If yer only keeping 1 gig free there, you are severly throttling your system.

If you use windows memory management system, it dynamically uses hd space as simulated memory during operation. it's highly recommended to defrag your drives, and then create a static cache, that is consecutive blocks, and to allow no LESS then 2 gig static cache per partition.

And that's only for memory management purposes.

There's no benefit to keeping the amount of free space on c: as low as possible.. especially not in the days of 600+ gig hard drive availability.

Currently I have 80 gig free on c:, 4 other partitions with no less then 30 free gigs of hd space, and each partition has I think 4 gigs of static cache for memory management.

20 gigs free on your game drive is nothing.. as I said before UT3 requires at least 8 gig + and just with a few of the new downloaded maps, Xan, and a few mods, I'm already up to 9 gig in my UT3 folder. I'm guessing once we see maps released full throttle and a few bonus content packs, we'll easily see UT3 folders with 30+ gig used.

[T'PAU]

Actually I use Windows memory-managment system, but not on my C:-drive.
I told Windows to use another partition, with more space, for that.
Works like a charme since years now, especially when I upgraded my RAM from 1 to 3 GB a few months ago. Things are noticeably "smoother" now, especially games of course.
What I found a bit strange is, that I read several times about this insane temp-space consumption of the demo-installer in the demo-section of this forum. This represents my experience with the demo-installer as well.
But I didn't found one single post, which deals with that problem, when it comes to the full-game installer. "Only" these .cab read-errors etc.

After my demo-experience, you might understand, that I'm a bit sceptical if Epic has fixed this bug (nothing else this is imo) for the final-game installer.
So my hopes are, that someone could tell me here, how much temp-space is needed for the installation-process.

[Gareee]

Welll you probably haven't read anything because most people don;t keep such a small amoutn of available space on their drives.. and while you might be telling windows to use your cache on another partition, windows really needs to have available cache on ALL partitions for the best speed.

Each of my partitions all have allocated space to increase thier performance, and if you read cache optimsing websites, you'll find the same info I've given you here.

Do whatever you choose that seems to make the best difference, but I highly advise reading cache optimising websites, and you'll soon discover that you aren;t benefittting at all from being space stingy.

Any programs also work best when installed on C:.. what do you do when you need to install a new program that really wants to be on C? Repartition your HD again?

If you have HD space to spare, give each partition 30 gig or so, and forget about micro managing it.. you'll be far happier.. and also consider again what i said about UT3's required space... I checked, and since my last post, I've added 3 gig in new content, mainly maps with textures, and the few character additions that are out there.

I wouldn't be surprised seeing 40 gig ut3 folder now within a year's time.

(Keep in mind your cache downloads content you don't have automaticcally when you connect to a server, and if you don't clear it from time to time, you could even double your downloaded content!)

I have an application currently installed that has a total installed content folder of over 140 gig!

[T'PAU]

Thanks for your advices/suggestions Gareee, I really appreciate that!
I'll definatly make C: much bigger on my new PC, which is planned for sometime next year. The cache-thing might not the problem, it works well on my actual system. The problem I see in the last years is, that more and more programs (especially games of course) put their save-stuff onto the Windows-partition, mainly in the "my data"-folder (in german "Eigene Dateien"). I'll definatly not discuss the pros/cons of this behaviour of games, but for me save-data belongs into the game-install-directory and nowhere else (like Valve does it with HL2 plus EPs and Portal e.g.). Bioshock plus Crysis e.g. eat about 1.5 gig of save-data on C: !
So much for the effort in keeping the Windows-partition as clean as possible.

So, my thread-question still floats in this forum: How much temp-space on Windows-partition is neccessary, to install UT3 (on another partition)?

[T'PAU]

Bump...
Let me rephrase the question:
Has anyone managed to install the game (not on Windows partition) on a system with <2GB free space on the Windows-partition?

[Epickiller]

I have an application currently installed that has a total installed content folder of over 140 gig!

WHAT? I've always wandered why there are 1tb storage devices and 600GB Hardrives available, how much crap must you have on your PC to need a TB of space? I have a mere 160GB on my C drive and a recovery drive (D) containing 10GB. Vista swallows 22GB before I've even put anything on my computer. Right now I have 40GB free space on my C drive... so what's that 140gb application of yours?

[Gareee]

I do 3d graphics work for a living, and it's not uncommon for a mesh to have 4-10 texture maps, uncompressed to maintain quality, and all at 4000x4000.

Some cgi scenes will have 5-20 meshes like that in order to generate a scene.

Vue6Infinite can also simulated billions of populated 3d vegetation types for a scene, and the more actual memory you have available the better it works. It's not uncommon to hear of people with 10 gigs of actual ram on their systems or MORE!

I use Zbrush 3, Poser7, Lightwave 3d, Modo, Vue6Infinite, and many more 3d applications. My poser folder alone now has 80 gigs worth of stuff, and the majority of that is even zipped to save space!

That's what people will run into with UT3 as well..the meshes are bigger and more detailed, they now used displacement (normal) maps as well as texture maps and transparency maps, and the maps are all larger in size then in UT2004, so downloads will al be larger, and o course require more space.

There's a price you pay for more realistic graphics, and that price is hd storage, and in game ram requirements.

Running your system "lean" like the OP is doing is just a total waste of energy. Instead, you toss as much HD space and as fast and as much memory in your system that you can afford. One of the huge resolved issues in XP32 , was that it couldn't address more then 3 gigs ram (and that was with a hack)... xp64 and vista can address GOBS more, and most pro 3d people moved to one or the other now because they just HAD to.. and they've been doing that for a few years now.

[Epickiller]

vista 32bit can only address 3.5gb. I didn't know hd space was anything other than storing files, how can it improve performance? If I had 20gb spare instead of 40gb spare would my games run faster? If you're just playing games, why would you need more than 3gb of memory? 2gb is just enough to play the latest games.

Oh yeah, why does ut3 use up 4 times more hd space than Crysis? Surely Crysis has more meshes etc.

[Gareee]

You won't get a performance increase over 5 gigs of free space for most users, and it depends if you are allowing windows to manage memory, or if you've created a static cache.

Vista 64 can address far more memory as well.

Windows "spools" had space to make up for not having enough memory to run applications using more then what's installed on the system. Thats wh6y higher end applications can run faster with more memory available.. windows isn;t shuffling hd space as memory. That slows the application down, and also of course creates a bottleneck of available ram.

2 gig is "enough", 3 gig is better, and 4 gig is what I recommend currently for applications that are pushing the envelope.. keep in mind high end games are NOT developed for today's mid and base systems.. they are developed with higher end systems in mind, because peopkle always want the "latest n greatest". High end games always run better on systems available a year down the road.

UT uses more hd space because there's the editor, and all the available content for all the maps.. and a lot more maps and textured meshes most likely then Crysis.

And every time you log onto a server with music, mods or maps or characters you don't have, the server pushes them onto your system, taking up more space.

I just cleared my old archive downloaded folder for ut2004 off my old system yesterday.. even just zipped downloads (not everything by any means, just the most popular things I wanted to have in case of a re install) was over 5 gigs.. and that's of course on TOP of the base game install.

For best system prefomance, there's a formula to calculating what you'll need based on your available ram. It's recommended to create static caches (hd space that's perm allocated for memory cacheing), and keeping it defragged as much as possible. Having it all in consecutive blocks speeds up it's use, and keeping it fragged also speeds up it's use as well, hence speeding up all applications that use it.

Google "static memory cache" or windows mempory management for more detailed in depth info, and tweaking your system to optimum performance.

There is zero benefit to running your c drive with no (or low) vailable hd space at all, other then a mental satisfaction.. and since HD space is so cheap now, it's foolsh to constantly be dicking around doing hd space management.. just buy additional hd space as needed, and save yourself wasted time managing another resource.

To the OP: you'll notice that there have been NO responses at all to your question.. as I said originally, no one I know of at all runs a system with that little available HD space, unless you are in a crunch situation.

You need to file a trouble ticket with epic to find out how much is actually required on install. Someting else you should also consider. UT3 also uses the my games folder in the c: my documents folders for all the new content downloads off servers.. if you are planning on playing online, you'll find yourself running out of hd space every 2 or 3 days of online play, if you connect to servers that are pushing new content. You'll need to have at LEAST 2-3 gigs free at all times, in case you hit servers pushing lots of new content (and that's already happening at an ever accelerating pace now) JUST for UT3.. so your current available HD space on c: will be insufficient for online play on new content servers.

I played 6 new maps yesterday alone, and installed 3 new mods.

Anyway, I've provided as much info as possible, even if it's contrary to what you want to do... I'm un subbing from the thread, so good luck to you!

[CoffinDancer]

my C: is 20gig, and i like to keep at least 5gig free for this very reason.

you do realize you can move your "My Documents" folder to another drive through Winblows - at least in XP Pro - which frees up space on C:, and just coincidentally solves the problem with UT3 storing custom content in the My Docs\My Games\ folder?

just a thought..
CD

[T'PAU]

Yes I moved the "My Documents" folder to another partition, some weeks ago as I started playing Crysis. Also I read here something about the " -nohomedir" instruction, which can be added to the properties of the desktop-icon. Then, all content should be saved to the games main-installation folder (where it belongs imo). Somehow this seems not to work with the demo.

@Gareee
In the demo-department of this forum I read at least from 6 guys having trouble, installing the demo 'cause of 1gig or less free on C: !
So my hope was, that some of these guys bought the game... and ran into the same trouble, or not.