KSP OS versions and Ram addressing

[SpecTRe-X]

I posted in a thread already but haven't flat out asked this so I figured the best place to do such was in a separate thread.

A friend of mine let me play her copy while I had her computer on the bench for an overhaul/upgrade. I didn't care much for it initially but then I found the mods and saw the realized potential, sort of. The problem I keep running into is a lack of memory addressing ability, or so I believe. It seems that regardless of her 16Gb of ram the game doesn't seem to use more than 3.9Gb without crashing even with the 64-bit exe.

In the thread I commented in someone suggested that running KSP with an opengl flag would save ram. My actual question however is this: Is there any version, on any OS, that uses more than 4Gb of Ram without crashing? It's not like I'd switch to MacOS but I'd be open to running a VM of Ubuntu to play this game modded out.

Thanks for your time and I look forward to your replies,

SpecTRe

[*Aqua*]

Running KSP in a VM? Forget about that.

Even if you are somehow able to get it working, performance will be awful.

[Robotengineer]

Won't get any more RAM with Mac, maxes out at 2.5ish GB.

[Yakky]

It is a much-discussed limitation of the game. It's possible to run a reasonable handful of your favorite/most important mods, but you can't load the boat up with everything or you'll get memory problems all the time. Just my two cents but most people have their own favorites, and you can get a lot of incremental enjoyment out of the game by adding surprisingly few mods, as long as they are the mods you care about most.

You probably know by now that the 64-bit version for Windows exists, but is still regarded as pretty unstable, although some people use it very happily to run a whole pile of mods. Your mileage may vary.

It's possible that once Version 5 of the Unity game engine around which KSP is built is released and stable, Squad will spend the time and resources to flesh out 64-bit versions of the game for more platforms. (Let me stress I have no special knowledge or insight here, but it makes sense they might put in the effort to do it at that point. If I were they, I wouldn't spend any resources on doing it before then.) The obvious question is when, or if, that will happen. Join all of us in hoping it does happen someday...

Edited October 16, 2014 by Yakky

[Red Iron Crown]

Windows 64-bit is a buggy mess at the moment from which modders are actively blocking their mods to keep support requests under control. There is no OS X 64-bit version. Your best bet would be Linux 64-bit. A VM is a bad idea for a GPU-intensive app like KSP, you would be better served by dual-booting, even if it's by a Linux live-cd or thumbdrive.

[NFUN]

You could try using Active Texture Management, that can help a lot with RAM issues.

[steve_v]

My actual question however is this: Is there any version, on any OS, that uses more than 4Gb of Ram without crashing?

Yup, but you're not gonna like it: GNU/Linux x86_64 *on bare metal* runs sweet. My KSP RAM usage is ~6.5GB with many mods, no ATM & no crashes. The Windows x86_64 build *should* be able to address more than ~3.5GB, but it's a horrible buggy mess at the moment so just don't go there.

Gaming in a VM will be disappointing as only rudimentary GPU acceleration is available, if any.

Edited October 16, 2014 by steve_v

[B787_300]

Steve_V working on it

[SpecTRe-X]

I've never used a mac before so I didn't know what the deal was with that, I just wanted to point out I wouldn't be switching to one regardless lol.

I did try using active management, or maybe it was the switcher, I don't recall, and it helped slightly but not enough. I know that to game inside a VM, which is to say linux running inside virtualbox running on win7, won't be epic but as long as the cpu can push the data I'd think it would be ok. I thought I read that ksp was more cpu bound than gfx bound anyway. I know that virtualbox has a cpu thread/core allocation slider and 3d acceleration but I don't recall if it had controls for VRam.

Can any of you say if running ksp in windows with the opengl flag helps with ram use or not, I'm just curious to know either way. I actually didn't have any issues with crashing on the 64bit build in Dxd mode aside from the ram crash at 3.9Gb. Sadly I finished up with my friends rig earlier today and am reluctant to ask to borrow her credentials to test on my own rig, hence all the questions.

I don't really have an issue running linux Steve, I just don't care much for dual boots. I've used them before and always hated it, the switching is just so tedious. So if I can get away with a linux VM to run it on 4 threads and the only real thing I'll be worried about is the gfx performance with acceleration. I may just have to break down and ask my friend to lend me a copy. If I have to buy my own for testing, is it $30 for the game and you get to pick whatever version you want after or do you buy the OS specific version and that's it?

Also, what kind of driver* issues if any do I have to worry about if I go the dual-boot linux route?

Again this is all much appreciated.

Edited October 17, 2014 by SpecTRe-X
typo fix

[steve_v]

Purchasing through the KSP store gives access to the current + previous release, on all platforms. Dunno about steam.

Drive issues? not sure what you mean there, but a GNU/Linux install just needs a partition, preferably 3, on any disk that can be booted (and is large enough OFC). - there are some gotchas if you use UEFI/secure boot but google has you covered.

[Kamuchi]

Personally, 0.24 64x ran great and could cram 100 mods into it.

0.25 kept crashing and crashing and crashing.

Removing half the mods it was still a random crash galore.

32x and ATM not working required some more trimming and reducing textures to 1/8th, while still running out of memory after switching a few times

Just finished installing linux along side w7, and fixing windows loader...

Still need to see how it runs on ubuntu 64x, or if the amd drivers work to start with...

I keep seeing people state "just install linux", yeah.

First you need to edit the windows partition and hope it doesn`t craps out, if you know how to do it to start with.

Then you have to install linux, doing it the easy way by letting it create it`s own partitions, it will most likely whipe the windows partition (it`s even a confirmed "bug" again with the ubuntu installer).

Thankfully, hating installers I always do it the manual way and having some expirience with linux servers it wasn`t that hard, but if you have no idea how to create and setup partitions in windows, you will be .... out of luck in linux.

Creating "/", swap and home partitions I go to install it, great.

*error* installer received error 2 and aborted, redo several times and get sent to the bug report that has 500 entries and no one has a clue...

Try openSUSE, wich didn`t want to install, reburn my usb with ubunty and retry with more fails...

Back to windows to watch a movie while my brain tries to fart.

Half way the movie, a brainfart happend, "out of space" hmm...

root - 5gig

swap - 512mb

home - 10 gig

image - 981mb

Swap partition? that would be a first...

Redo the swap partition to 1.5gig and it installed fine, woohoo!

After reboot it booted straight into ubuntu, where is that boot menu?

Google, read through a couple of pages of bs and find a solution to fix the windows boot and add it to grub.

Couple of shell commands later and windows was running again (posting with it now)

So keep saying to people to just run linux next to their windows.

Most people know what a partition is, most will be clueless if you ask them how to create or edit one, let alone where to find the tool to do it.

Then ask them if they can do that in a less gui friendly way nd know how to setup the linux partitions (I bet you`ll laugh it they nuked their windows install if they managed to get this far).

Then when they complain that it nuked their windows boot, will you help them or just laugh with your brilliant advise of running dual boot or shut up?

Alot of pc`s come with oem windows, will you help them to install all their hardware drivers? will you even bother thinking of helping when it has to be installed from a shell??

Telling them to type commands to run their OS will put them off befor they even think it`s a viable solution for them to try.

I never used dual boot and always had a little server hidden in a corner to play with web stuff.

Running a game I would need my own pc hardware and with ksp being addictive at times with, an absolute FUBAR 64bit release forced me to attempt it due to the awsomeness of ksp in 64bit.

Now some will come on the defense that it supports alot of hardware and I agree, but with my old trusty Rampage 4 Extreme motherboard being out for quite awhile, it didn`t even find my soundcard...

Revert back to 0.24???

All I`ll say is: Steam

KSP faq:

I bought the game on Steam, but I want it on the KSP Store as well. Would you activate my account for download?

No, sorry, the migration will not work that way. If you bought the game on Steam, you will only have it on Steam. To get it in the KSP Store too, you will have to purchase it here. Do keep in mind that the Steam version is DRM free, so it can be played offline as well, so you're really not missing out on anything with the Steam version instead of the KSP Store one.

Grrr!

So there you have it, dual boot for most people here is simply impossible unless it`s done with some one sitting next to them in the same room helping and teaching them the basics.

Edited October 16, 2014 by Kamuchi

[micha]

Purchasing through the KSP store gives access to the current + previous release, on all platforms. Dunno about steam.

Just to answer the question about the Steam version: yes, if you buy it on Steam you get access to the current version on all platforms. I haven't seen a way to access older versions through Steam though.

Having said that, you can simply archive up a newly downloaded version of KSP and install it wherever you want - no DRM, yayy. So I have a complete history of all KSP versions since I bought the game.

In my experience so far, KSP runs better (less issues, not necessarily better performance) on Linux than Windows.

EDIT: You can go back one version using Steam.

Edited October 16, 2014 by micha

[steve_v]

I keep seeing people state "just install linux", yeah.

And If the situation were reversed, 'just install windows' would be a less dodgy proposition to someone who had never used it before?

if you have no idea how to create and setup partitions in windows, you will be .... out of luck in linux.

Partitioning is much the same whatever OS you run & Gparted is every bit as 'noob friendly' as Windows disk management.

I bet you`ll laugh it they nuked their windows install if they managed to get this far.

No, but I *will* laugh if they didn't do a backup before mucking about with the primary hard disk layout.

Partitioning is just one of those things that can nuke your disk, regardless of what OS you do it from, the warnings on pretty much every partitioning tool under the sun make this very clear.

it`s even a confirmed "bug" again with the ubuntu installer

Bugs happen, it sucks. I've given up on MS fixing the 'bug' that only allows installing on the first disk in the system and nukes the MBR without asking

At least the *buntu installer makes _some_ effort to play nice with other OSes on the system, even if it is broken at the moment.

"out of space" hmm..

Yeah, really-stupid-defaults strikes again. Also, 5GB for / on a desktop is probably asking for trouble...

Alot of pc`s come with oem windows, will you help them to install all their hardware drivers? will you even bother thinking of helping when it has to be installed from a shell?

I've been doing exactly that just recently & on this very forum.

IME setting up a non-oem Windows install & getting all the drivers installed is _more_ work than setting up a non-oem Linux/BSD/Solaris etc. install. The issue is preconfiguration not OS type, so complain to your hardware vendor.

If you're willing to put in the time & effort to learn KSP, installing an OS shouldn't be all that hard.

So there you have it, dual boot for most people here is simply impossible unless it`s done with some one sitting next to them in the same room helping and teaching them the basics.

Then I guess I have grossly misjudged the average competency of 'most people here' - you managed it did you not?

Seriously, we're all running a game that is *still in alpha*. Having to do a little work to dodge bugs and get to the awesome is to be expected - installing a different OS is just a larger-than-average workaround.

[steve_v]

In my experience so far, KSP runs better (less issues, not necessarily better performance) on Linux than Windows.

I actually get *slightly* better framerates in Windows - I put this down to mono on GNU/Linux being somewhat slower than .NET, at least according to all the benchmarks I have seen.

I haven't seen a way to access older versions through Steam

Bugger. I'll add it to my personal list of 'reasons to resist installing steam'

EDIT: One version back, same as the KSP store then .

[Crzyrndm]

I haven't seen a way to access older versions through Steam though.

Check the beta's tab in the game properties, it has a "previous stable release" branch (which if it is kept updated would be 0.24.2)

[steve_v]

I know that virtualbox has a cpu thread/core allocation slider and 3d acceleration but I don't recall if it had controls for VRam.

VirtualBox has OpenGL, but VRAM is limited to <=128MB, so uh, that's probably not going to work so well.

Not sure what the deal is in VMware, anyone care to try it?

[*Aqua*]

Once again: If you somehow manage to get KSP going in a VM, it will be horribly slow. Expect way less than 5 fps and major graphical glitches.

Consumer hardware does not provide features for VM speed ups and gpu pass-through. Only expensive server hardware can do that but I don't think you'll want to pay the price of a car for that.

[steve_v]

We keep sayin' it, and people keep refusing to believe... 'cause dual booting is just way too hard.

Interesting that there is actually some GPU passthrough on the big iron, wonder when it'll make it to consumer stuff... I don't get to play with toys that expensive

KSP actually runs in VirtualBox, I get.... wait for it - 3FPS, yes 3. Don't try this at home folks, it's just not playable.

EDIT: 3 FPS *on the menu screen* ingame is more like 1.

Edited October 16, 2014 by steve_v

[*Aqua*]

I'm not sure if gpu pass-through really exists but it makes sense for gpu clusters for number crunching.

3 fps on the menu! Congratulations!

[steve_v]

Hmm, intriguing... A bit of poking around the 'net indicates that Xen (with patches) Qemu and VMware are capable of GPU passthrough on hardware supporting IOMMU - surprisingly common in consumer grade CPUs.

It also looks like a complete bear to set up, one I'm not all that interested in tackling right now.

[*Aqua*]

Afaik is gpu passthrough still an experimental technology in VMware products. XenServer seems to have at lot of problem, too. Hm... it should be working with KVM but I won't touch that again in the near future. I still remember the nights spend bypassing a bug in the network code. *~*

[Red Iron Crown]

As I understand it, GPU (or other IO) passthrough to a VM requires the VT-d instruction set to be present in the processor, it's there for most AMD processors but Intel is hit or miss. It's usually used to pass through a RAID controller to a file server VM and that application is well supported; passing through a GPU is much less well documented and supported but technically possible. It is likely to take a large amount of fiddling to get working properly.

[SpecTRe-X]

Purchasing through the KSP store gives access to the current + previous release, on all platforms. Dunno about steam.

Drive issues? not sure what you mean there, but a GNU/Linux install just needs a partition, preferably 3, on any disk that can be booted (and is large enough OFC). - there are some gotchas if you use UEFI/secure boot but google has you covered.

Sorry, I meant to type driver and not drive. I'll go back and fix that now. I Do have a UEFI bios but haven't fooled around with the secure boot option yet so that's not a big concern.

Kamuchi, I actually installed ubuntu 14.04 inside virtualbox earlier today quite painlessly while I was waiting for my mobo waterblocks to arrive. I build my own rigs and rigs for a certain segment of others so I know how to at least format and partition drives in windows . That being said I have a small drive I can blank and install ubuntu on if I absolutely need to dual boot. I'd also cut all my other drive connections, both networked and local, before doing so, as I usually do, just to be safe. I also don't run multiple partitions on the same drive so that takes care of that.

Just to answer the question about the Steam version: yes, if you buy it on Steam you get access to the current version on all platforms. I haven't seen a way to access older versions through Steam though.

Having said that, you can simply archive up a newly downloaded version of KSP and install it wherever you want - no DRM, yayy. So I have a complete history of all KSP versions since I bought the game.

In my experience so far, KSP runs better (less issues, not necessarily better performance) on Linux than Windows.

EDIT: You can go back one version using Steam.

I'm fairly anti-steam so I'd go through the KSP store. It's my experience that games bought through steam need steam running/installed to work which makes steam the drm. I don't know if that's the case with KSP but having access to only one version seems silly anyway.

VirtualBox has OpenGL, but VRAM is limited to <=128MB, so uh, that's probably not going to work so well.

Not sure what the deal is in VMware, anyone care to try it?

I found that out earlier today myself. I hadn't had a chance to look for a bypass to that though as I had my main rig apart to install some new waterblocks. I haven't worked with VMware in a while but if I recall correctly it didn't have 3d acceleration, or at least it wasn't user-toggled.

Once again: If you somehow manage to get KSP going in a VM, it will be horribly slow. Expect way less than 5 fps and major graphical glitches.

Consumer hardware does not provide features for VM speed ups and gpu pass-through. Only expensive server hardware can do that but I don't think you'll want to pay the price of a car for that.

Actually radeon/amd consumer graphics cards do allow for VM passthrough provided you can make it work via Xen or KVM and Qemu. Nvidia consumer cards don't have this option/feature however. As far as Quadro cards, which do allow passthrough, you're only looking at spending $5,000 on something like the K6000. That's not even a motorcycle so you are exaggerating just a bit lol.

Hmm, intriguing... A bit of poking around the 'net indicates that Xen (with patches) Qemu and VMware are capable of GPU passthrough on hardware supporting IOMMU - surprisingly common in consumer grade CPUs.

It also looks like a complete bear to set up, one I'm not all that interested in tackling right now.

Ya I saw a thread or two while looking for virtualbox that had people talking about that kind of setup. Turns out very few actually manage to get the passthrough working and that's after a boat load of DOS style command line editing of config files and troubleshooting/bypassing code bugs and glitches. Something I'm not willing (or able as I'm running 3 nvidia gtx 470s) to do.

Anyway, I'm a tinkerer so I'll be trying KSP in virtualbox anyway just so I can see the results myself. It's a character quirk so don't take it personally . I will have to see about a vram workaround though since I think that's the bulk of the issue in a VM environment. My friend was also kind enough to lend me her account so I'll be able to test all this shortly

[xtoro]

Kamuchi, I actually installed ubuntu 14.04 inside virtualbox earlier today quite painlessly while I was waiting for my mobo waterblocks to arrive. I build my own rigs and rigs for a certain segment of others so I know how to at least format and partition drives in windows . That being said I have a small drive I can blank and install ubuntu on if I absolutely need to dual boot.

Just finished installing linux along side w7, and fixing windows loader...

Still need to see how it runs on ubuntu 64x, or if the amd drivers work to start with...

I keep seeing people state "just install linux", yeah.

First you need to edit the windows partition and hope it doesn`t craps out, if you know how to do it to start with.

Then you have to install linux, doing it the easy way by letting it create it`s own partitions, it will most likely whipe the windows partition (it`s even a confirmed "bug" again with the ubuntu installer).

Thankfully, hating installers I always do it the manual way and having some expirience with linux servers it wasn`t that hard, but if you have no idea how to create and setup partitions in windows, you will be .... out of luck in linux.

First, a few things to reply to both here is that partitioning during a Linux install is dead simple and it does it for you. All you need to tell it is how much space you want Linux to have, and it shrinks your windows partition down and creates the linux ones automagically. Gone are the early days of Linux where everything you wanted to do was command-line, and compiling programs yourself etc...

Then you have to install linux, doing it the easy way by letting it create it`s own partitions, it will most likely whipe the windows partition (it`s even a confirmed "bug" again with the ubuntu installer).

Funny, I've been using Linux for 20 years and I've never had it wipe the windows partition unless I purposely did it myself. Can't confirm for sure that it's a false statement about Ubuntu because I use Kubuntu. But Kubuntu is pretty much the same as Ubuntu at the core of it, but it uses a GUI that I like much better. IMO Kubuntu using the KDE gui is more like Windows and Ubuntu using the Gnome gui is more like a Mac. I prefer the former.

[SpecTRe-X]

So after a bit of experimenting this is what I've come up with

1. Running KSP in a VM linux resulted in usual CPU usage across 4 available cores, usual gfx card usage, good ram usage, and poor overall fps performance. I attribute the above to the low amount of ram that VirtualBox allows you to allocate for 3d acceleration.
   
2. Running KSP in 64bit mod with the OpenGL command line flag resulted in usual fps and good ram usage though vehicles behaved erratically. Often times clipping into the launchpad/runway.
   
3. Running KSP in 32bit mode with the OpenGL command line flag had similar results without as many clipping incidents. Ram usage was more saturating with KSP using around 34% (~5.4Gb) of available ram (16Gb) the system consumed ~22% - KSP. Played for 5 hours straight with no crashes or major glitches.
   

I wanted to test with VMWare too but the program set you need to run a Guest on Host with virtualized passthrough (something they call vSGA) requires View which comes bundled with Horizon which would set one back just under $4,000 USD.

All in all it was rather enlightening, though I'm not entirely sure KSP is worth the $30 investment at the moment even with the mods. Between the bugs and glitches I've seen combined with the lack of proper scaling and the maze of intermod compatibility one would need to sort through it's just a bit more than I'm ready to undertake just now.

Perhaps if this game is ever finished and I'm still around I'll dust it off and see what's new. Until then I'll reset A:\ and scrub these loaned KSP files from my rig.

If anyone has questions I'd be glad to answer, otherwise I'll see you on the other side,

SpecTRe