I know this may seem a little off topic, but I'd like some feedback about internet/computer speed boosting programs. Some time ago, I downloaded a program called SpeederXP (obviously for Windows XP), and I found that every program I ran would be extremely fast, sometimes too fast for normal activity. For instance, I played Counter-Strike: Condition Zero with Speeder maxed out, and I experienced gameplay so fast that I could not even stop to shoot or aim, even on laggy internet servers. Now my question is: Do so-called speed boosters act the same way as overclocking a system? From my results, it seemed to be that way (except for the extremely increased gameplay speeds). In order to achieve results like that, wouldn't it have to do some sort of overclocking on the processor and ram? By the way, I was running an old Dell Dimension 4600 with a pitiful 512MB of DDR ram, an Intel Pentium 4 processor (clocked at 2.8GHZ), an NVIDIA GEFORCE 5200 graphics card (not sure how much ram on that, maybe something like 256MB?), and WindowsXP SP2. Any help would be appreciated!

I'm pretty sure that program has manipulated the timing function's (Hooking), making the game think time flies faster. This is not the same as overclocking.
All games (with exception of some very old games) are written to run at constant speed. On a more powerful machine games will run smoother (more frames per second) but something that is supposed to take one second will still happen in one second.

Even with increased time, wouldn't my system need to be tweaked to process the extra fast activities? If my game was super speeding, then my system would have to process all the extra frames inbetween, right? Or would those frames just get dropped, creating a giant lag that is pieced together smoothly so it looks like fluent motion (of course that's how all animation is done, but I'm talking more extreme, obviously)?

Quote: Original post by worldextermination
Even with increased time, wouldn't my system need to be tweaked to process the extra fast activities?

No, some game code might look like this:

x=x+v*dt;

x is some position v the velocity and dt the time passed since the last frame. Let's say normally dt was about 0.03 second and now it is 0.06 second; this modification has the same effect as doubling the velocity, making everything move faster.

Quote: Original post by worldextermination
If my game was super speeding, then my system would have to process all the extra frames inbetween, right? Or would those frames just get dropped, creating a giant lag that is pieced together smoothly so it looks like fluent motion (of course that's how all animation is done, but I'm talking more extreme, obviously)?

There aren't any extra frames, your PC can still render the same amount of frames per second as before. The same 30fps movie can show a ball that moves 1 meter or 10 meter in one second.

I understand the concept of increasing the velocity. It's just fascinating to me how such small speeder apps can hack into the code (well, compiled code) of such complex programs. Thanks a lot for your help! It seems like this shit works a lot easier than I thought though. Maybe I was expecting to get a different answer, a concept I've never heard of or something. Ha. Thanks again

Quote: Original post by worldextermination
I understand the concept of increasing the velocity. It's just fascinating to me how such small speeder apps can hack into the code (well, compiled code) of such complex programs. Thanks a lot for your help! It seems like this shit works a lot easier than I thought though. Maybe I was expecting to get a different answer, a concept I've never heard of or something. Ha. Thanks again

No, they don't "hack into the code". All they do is hook the QueryPerformanceCounter function (and all the other timer functions) in windows and make it return the wrong results. The program code is exactly the same.

So if you call QueryPerformanceCounter one frame and get 1000, then you call it again the next frame, instead of returning 1010 (the real amount of time that's elapsed) the "booster" will make it return 1020 - making the program think twice as much time has elapsed than what has actually elapsed.

Personally, I'm not sure what the point of it is, other than making it harder to play games..?

Well some programs will run faster (notably 3d rendering such as CAD programs) and it will make your start up times and launch times faster (much needed on my old junky Dell). But I understand more clearly now. What I meant when I said hacking the code is just altering speed or velocity variables or something along those lines. But as I said earlier, I now have a more clear understanding. Thanks!

But sometimes more efficient speeder programs are useful, as Windows puts limitations on a lot of things, hurting speed and ability.

Windows doesn't put "limitations" on anything. It would be totally disingenuous of Microsoft to artifically limit how fast programs can run.

Most "speed boosters" which actually do something (the vast majority of "speed boosters" are nothing more than snake oil - promising the world, and delivering nothing of value) work by reading your program files from disk before you actually use them. That way, the files already exist in Window's filesystem cache by the time you go to launch them - thus making them start faster.

It's basically how the ReadyBoost feature of Windows Vista works - but ReadyBoost has more thorough knowledge of your usage habits and also better knowledge of the filesystem cache and so can work more efficiently.

Dude, Windows, especially Vista, has poor memory allocation methods and will not allow you to get the full power from your computer. Linux, which I actually just stopped running the other day (Ubuntu, to be precise, a Debian Linux distribution) has much better ways of allocating your computer's memory, and therefore runs a lot smoother. But, being a hardcore gamer, I dropped it for Windows 7 (the 7100 64-bit RC version) which has awesome memory allocation and runs all of my games amazingly on my current HP laptop (6GB DDR2 RAM, INTEL QUAD CORE PROCESSOR EACH CLOCKED AT 2.00GHZ, ATI RADEON 4650 HD GRAPHICS CARD, HD SOUND WITH A BUILT-IN SUBWOOFER). Yeah, I love my laptop and Windows 7 :D