Improving game performance

sjain · July 19, 2016

Fixes that will improve your experience in GTA IV and LCPDFR!

This will take at least 20 to 30 minutes, depending on your computer skills.

#1 (Steam only) Screenshot spam bug.

What is it? If you noticed, launching GTA 4 from the Steam client and using an Xbox controller causes it to spam screenshots, killing FPS and filling up your hard drive unnecessarily.

Solution? (Retail users do this as well!): Create a shortcut.

How do I do that?

Step 1 - Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Grand Theft Auto IV\GTAIV for steam users, or C:\Program Files (x86)\Rockstar Games\Grand Theft Auto IV\GTAIV (If that folder exists) and right click on LaunchGTAIV.exe. Click on Create shortcut. It will either place a shortcut on the desktop or in the game folder.

Step 2 - Rename the shortcut to what you want. If the shortcut was placed in your GTA folder, be sure to move it desktop for easy access.

Step 3 - Right click on the shortcut. Click on Advanced, and make sure the red box areas match the screenshot below:

Spoiler

Click OK on the box on the right, then Apply then OK on the box on the left.

That's it! Now always launch the game from this shortcut!

Explanation: Just launching the game from Steam, despite having the overlay disabled, causes the screenshot spam bug, and means that you can't run the game as administrator, also meaning that sometimes scripts can't access the right resources.

I also recommend forcing your command line as launch options as well, for good measure.

Paste your command line into the 'Target' box like in the Shortcut properties box above. Be sure to paste it like in the blue box above, leaving a space after the ". Separate your commandline variables with a space in the shortcut only! This doesn't happen by default!

#2 Stream.ini editing

NOTE: For this to work, you must complete this guide first:

What is it? It's a file that tells the game how much RAM it is allowed to use, and editing this reduced texture loss for me.

Note: Editing the file just removes the limit, it doesn't force GTA IV to use all of your RAM. The game will usually use 2GB of RAM on the ground in a car.

How do I edit this?

Step 1 - Go to:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Grand Theft Auto IV\GTAIV\pc for steam users, or

C:\Program Files (x86)\Rockstar Games\Grand Theft Auto IV\GTAIV (If that folder exists)\pc

and find the file named "stream.ini". Right click on it, and select "Open with".

Then click on "Notepad" (I recommend ticking "always use this program to open these file types")

You will see this:

Spoiler

These numbers are the amount of RAM that GTA 4 uses.

Options:

1. The game can use up to 3GB of RAM, for vehicles, scripts and rendering. (Recommended if you have 4 to 6GB of RAM)

virtual       307200
physical    307200
virtual_optimised    307200
physical_optimised   307200

2. The game can use up to 4GB of RAM, for vehicles, scripts and rendering. (Recommended if you have 8GB of RAM)

virtual 409600
physical    409600
virtual_optimised    409600
physical_optimised   409600

3. The game can use up to 8GB of RAM, for vehicles, scripts and rendering. (I use this because I can, and my PC can handle it - example)

virtual 819200
physical    819200
virtual_optimised    819200
physical_optimised   819200

For all of the above, make sure you select everything in the spoiler and replace the full contents of stream.ini

Explanation: Improves memory usage of the game.

#3 ProcessTamer

(Pasted and edited from here - Credit to ObsessedWithGTA4 at gtaforums.com)

What is it? It's a program that forces the affinity of programs based on the user's rule - this means that GTA 4 can take full advantage of our computer's resources.

How do I do it?

Step 1 - Download Process Tamer - here
Step 2 - Install Process Tamer
Step 3 - Load Process Tamer
Step 4 - Go to Configuration and ENABLE "Start with Windows".
Step 5 - Go to Configuration and DISABLE "Tame applications based on CPU Usage".
Step 6 - Load GTA IV PC
Step 7 - After the game has loaded and is at the Main Menu press ALT+TAB minimizing the game.
Step 8 - Load up Process Tamer (There will be a icon near your clock)
Step 9 - You will now see a few things in the Processes section of Process Tamer:

GTAIV.exe
gta4Browser.exe
RSC.exe

Step 10 - Under the Priority section set GTAIV.exe to HIGH
Step 11 - Under the Explicit Rule set GTAIV.exe to FORCE HIGH
Step 12 - He (and I) also set gta4Browser.exe (loads GTA IV files while you are playing) and LaunchGTAIV.exe to the same settings as GTAIV.exe but it's probably not necessary.
Step 13 -Close the game and restart it. After the game has loaded to the Main Menu for the second time, ALT+TAB again.
Step 14 - At Windows desktop, right click on your start bar and select "Task Manager".
Step 15 - In the Windows Task Manager click on the Processes tab.
Step 16 - Locate GTAIV.exe and right click on it and select "Set Priority", it should now say HIGH.

Explanation: Allows GTA 4 to take full advantage of your computer's resources.

#3 SLI bits

(Nvidia SLI Users only)

(Idea from here - Credit to Kingping1 at forums.geforce.com)

What is it? It's a small driver modification for make GTA 4 use both of your graphics card the way they should.

How do I do it?

Step 1 - Download Nvdia inspector from here (Note - you will need a program to extract .rar files for this - I recommend 7Zip - download instructions - here)

Step 2 - Extract it somewhere. Guide here.

Step 3 - Run nvidiaInspector.exe as administrator as shown here.

Step 4 - Click on the settings icon as shown here

Step 5 - Change the SLI bits to 0x43500405 as shown here

Step 6 - Click Apply changes as shown here

Explanation: Allows GTA 4 to use all of your GPU power if you use SLI

#4 Nvidia control panel settings

(Nvidia users only)

(There is an AMD counterpart to this)

Credit to Original Light:

End

Hope this guide helped.