Multiplicity Extremely Slow on Vista Secondary

from Stardock Forums
I'm running the Multiplicity trial v1.10, and I would like to use my Windows XP machine as the primary, and my Vista Business machine as secondary. Both machines are networked through 54Mb wireless G cards. I have it set up that way, and the connection works fine, but when I move the mouse to the Vista secondary, mouse movement becomes extremely slow, erratic, and jerky. It's impossible to properly control the mouse because it lags so far behind and jumps around so much.

However, I know it's not the network, since they both report 'Excellent' signal strength, and I've set up the Vista box as primary and the XP box as secondary, and it works perfectly smooth without any hitches. But I can't keep it that way, because I need the good keyboard on the XO machine because it's running all the media apps, and the media keys and such don't work over multiplicity. So I really need this issue resolved, or I need to know what I'm doing wrong.

I've watched the connection with CPU and network monitors, and when the vista box is secondary and I move to that screen, the CPU jumps to about 10% and stays there until I leave, and the network usage stays at 0%. Is there anything I can do to fix this?

Thank you.
multiplicity
8,086 views 8 replies
Reply #1 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Multiplicity requires that the network has low latency.  If the network has high latency or tries to combine packets to improve overall throughput (very bad - but looks nice in benchmarks) then the MP cursor will lag badly and will appear to move in rapid bursts.

Given that it only happens one way, it sounds like the XP machine network drivers are not doing the correct thing.

What network card does the XP machine have?

Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
It's an Atheros AR5005G chipset, exactly the same as what's in the Vista machine. They're specifically Belkin F5D7000 cards, but I don't use the Belkin drivers on either machine. On the XP box, I used generic Atheros v4.2.0.82. For the Vista box, it found drivers for me automagically.
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Reply #3 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I think you should probably install the belkin drivers on XP.  It sounds very much like those generic drivers are causing this problem.
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
Well, I switched to the Belkin drivers, and my ping and loss rate both declined, but I'm still seeing the same problem with Multiplicity. I even tried setting the 'Power-Save Mode' in the driver options to 'Off' in hopes that might help, but it didn't. I'm not sure what else to try doing.
Reply #5 from WinCustomize Forums Top
If you ping the vista box from the XP box, what results do you get?
Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
usually a bit eratic, first ping tends to be around 40ms, then they can range anywhere, but usually around 100-150ms, which should still give a mostly-smooth operation I would think. Certainly not enough to explain multiple seconds of delay sometimes...

I'm going to plug the PC into a wired connection, and see how it works, maybe that will fix this issue. Thanks for your help so far though.
Reply #7 from WinCustomize Forums Top

As an example of what you should expect, my wireless network has an average ping time of 3ms.  This is via an 802.11b network card.

A ping of 100+ms is very high and would result in a laggy mouse.

Could there be another wireless network on the same channel as yours perhaps?

Reply #8 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Well, it's not the software, it's the connection. With a wired jack, everything is smooth as silk, 1-10ms ping times every time to the other wireless PC. In turn, the other wireless PC gets 1-10ms ping times to any computer on the wired network, and since both PC's are in the same room, I know it's not the wireless access point, or any interference (assuming so, although I do have an apartment above me).

It really comes down to the wireless card on the XP box. Windows reports an excellent connection, it reports a 54mb speed, but for some reason, it's dropping packets and going slow. I'll have to figure that one out on my own I guess.

Thanks a ton for taking the time to help me out. Multiplicity seems really nice, although I haven't used it enough yet to determine how much I need it. I'll see how things turn out with my wifi card before I make a purchase decision.

Cheers.