Small freezes, RAM related?

[Flaming Ham]

When playing Battlefield 2, after about 3-4 minutes into each round, I start get small freezes. This only happens after loading a map (if I've been playing the same map for a few rounds, I have no problems though.) When the freezes start, they last anywhere from .5 to 2 seconds, and I stop getting them completely after a few minutes (until the next map loading at least). The hard drive activity light lights up each freeze. I was going to give up on this and not even ask here, but I happened to get Battlefield 2142 yesterday, and that got me thinking. I put all the settings in 2142 the same as I had in Battlefield 2 (all high at the same resolution) and I had no freezes, even after a few full rounds (until I got creamed by a walker, dirt flying everywhere, had to lower the resolution a bit). I tried lowering the resolution in BF2 as well, just to see if it'd help, but it didn't. Is 2142 less resource hungry than BF2?

My current specs:
AMD 4200+ X2 @2.7GHz
7900GT (using 162.22 drivers)
2GB RAM
Vista (32-Bit)

Would an extra gig of RAM help? If not, any ideas on the freezes?

(By the way, someone on another forum suggested I tried a clean boot and disabling Superfetch, but that didn't help.)

[Predators28]

Re: Small freezes, RAM related?

Well the first thing I would try is a good defrag of your HDD using Perfect disk

http://www.snapfiles.com/get/perfectdisk.html

post back if no thing changes

[Flaming Ham]

Re: Small freezes, RAM related?

I've been using a Diskeeper, and I defrag often (usually every time I close a game). I've tried with automatic defrag on and off, but no differences. = (

[Jimmy42000]

Re: Small freezes, RAM related?

You defrag everytime you close a game? Damn, thats a little extreme, lol.

Its weird your problem isnt on 2142 though so i doubt its a RAM problem. Have you tried a re-install of BF2? On a fresh system reboot does it still do it?

[Flaming Ham]

Re: Small freezes, RAM related?

Yeah, I know it's a bit extreme... it's just a habit I never got out of (I used to have a really slow computer, and at the time, it seemed like defraging all the time helped...) The perk, though, is that defraging usually takes a minute at most (sometimes less). = )

I'll try a reinstall (I'm really shocked I hadn't considered doing this before).

[Scinto]

Re: Small freezes, RAM related?

Is 2142 less resource hungry than BF2?

Vista is the one eating into your Ram

[Flaming Ham]

Re: Small freezes, RAM related?

Scinto:
Vista is the one eating into your Ram

I kind of figured it was Vista, which is why I tried a clean boot to free up any RAM I could, but that brings us back to my original question. Would an extra gig or RAM help?

Update:

Reinstalled and repatched. The freezes have turned into more of a stream of lag. The game doesn't completely freeze for a half second anymore, it's more like playing with an incredibly high ping now (I've tried different servers too, my ping usually ranges from 40-80 by the way). The hard drive light actively blinks during them now (opposed to before when it was either solid or off). Just for kicks, I put the game at all low settings, and the freezes are still happening. = (

Update, again:

Guess I wasn't paying enough attention when I was playing 2142, turns out it's now having the same little freezes too.

[Scinto]

Re: Small freezes, RAM related?

another gig probably wouldnt hurt, but that is all your limited to with the 32bit version of Vista,

[Flaming Ham]

Re: Small freezes, RAM related?

Well, I finally got around to getting another GB of RAM, and that did the trick. Both Battlefield 2 and 2142 run smooth again. ^_^

Thanks for the help guys.