How Long should VaM take to open?

leviathan0999

leviathan0999

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leviathan0999
I've been a very happy VaM user for well over a year. I use it in VR through a Pico 4 headset and Virtual Desktop. I generally get great, even breathtaking results. But something I've noticed seems weirder and weirder the more I think about it.

I slap on my headset, open Virtual Desktop, click the little system-tray icon, and then select "Open Game" and go to the .bat file for opening VaM in OpenVR mode...

The screen goes black, and I sit there in the dark for literally TEN MINUTES before VaM opens.

My PC is a pretty beefy gaming PC, and once the program is running, I get beautiful results.

Here's my hardware setup:

Processor : AMD Ryzen 5 2600 Six-Core Processor 3.40 GHz
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 060
Installed RAM: 32.0 GB
System type : 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor

Should this really be grinding away for a full ( clocked it out this morning to be sure) 10 minutes before opening VaM?
 
You didn't specify what your storage is. An M.2 SSD does make load times shorter. The size and location of the cache is also important. Flush the cache once in a while. You'll suffer one long load time right after doing that, but it should be faster after the first one. Try a fresh install in another folder to see if it's the bloated packages folder in your main install. The only cure for being bloated with too many packages is pruning shears...
 
I think your issue is too many Var packages. When I upgraded to the latest version I did a fresh install and my load time dropped from a few minutes to about 30 seconds.

If you have saves that you made on your current install and don't know all of the var's that you need to reproduce them, you could pack the scene into a var yourself and drag it into a fresh install. That will give you a list if the var's needed and you can just re-download them all at once, cutting out all of the stuff you are not actively using.

hub.virtamate.com

Guides - How to create a Var File

This is a quick and dirty guide on how to create a .var file in Virt-A-Mate. I created this information for a friend, decided to post it on the hub. Thought It could be helpful for others. Use the red numbers below for locational reference. When...
hub.virtamate.com hub.virtamate.com
 
Six core 2600 is not "beefy", sorry. On the other hand, 10 minutes is way too long, especially with an SSD. I'd say the same: cache or vars.
 
M2 really costs like nothing right now. Get a 1TB Samsung with 5000MB+ read speed and job done. 10x faster than SATA.
 
12,000 vars... 15-20 seconds to load.. Running NVME SSD, 64GB RAM, AMD Ryzen 9 7900x3d... RTX 2080 Super.... Quest2 airlink with Dlink VR Air Bridge and of course... JayJayWon's BrowserAssist
1691180588996.png
 
would you say using browserassist speeds up the load times? Or is it more for just navigating the program.
 
That's not too far from the 'usual' to expect out of VAM if you have a lot of .VARs and/or don't manage your Cache.

The main culprit though (and is well known) is too many .VARs. However, there's not much you can actually do about it if you simply have the reflex (or habit) to just accumulate .VARs and don't get rid of the ones you'd know you don't need (past maybe 1 or 2 tries, you'd know if you'd want to keep this or that Scene, or Asset, or Clothing item or whatever is included in the .VAR, if it's outside of an actual Dependency you can just get rid of things help alleviate the problem that way).

The 'ideal' scenario to deal with this problem with VAM 1.x is unfortunately not very efficient and not realistic to expect out of most Users. Ideally, we'd all have to keep our installation of VAM in a relative 'fresh' state with a minimal amount of extra added content to it. So in a scenario where you'd have say... 500+, or 1000+, or 5000+ .VARs you'd then have to filter through the whole thing yourself, separate them by "themes" maybe, and then create separate VAM installations, each one having a specific theme of installed content, but with a much smaller total installation size, which would dramatically boost Startup times AND would also help with actual in-VAM performance as well.

Because, yes, if you have too many .VARs installed, and if your VAM takes multiple minutes to open up then that - in and of itself - is already a sign that your installation is 'bloated' (by VAM's standard and capabilities mind you). My personal "limit" is about 1500 to 2000 .VARs, within that range. Beyond that I'm waiting 3+ minutes for VAM to open up and my performances are taking hits in most scenes (by comparison to a fresh, or very light-weight installation).

But... obviously, not everyone would endure the headache of filtering through their .VARs (specially past the point of already having hundreds or thousands of them) and figuring out what they should separate from the rest in order to create another VAM installation. As I said, it's not "efficient" nor is it realistic to expect VAM Users to do it, but it IS what should be done to truly 'fight' this problem of degrading performance (and program Startup times).

So outside of doing the 'Multiple VAM Installations' thing... you only have few options to help alleviate the problem a little bit:

1) Clean your Cache.
2) Delete unnecessary .VARs (stuff you know you don't use or go back to, or if it's not an actual Dependency Asset, just get rid of it).
3) Make sure you don't have Duplicated .VARs (happens much more easily then you might think). Check your Error Log when you start up VAM in the main menu, and see which files are listed as Duplicates and remove those right away, you don't want to have Duplicates, it takes up space for no reason and bloats up the installation for no good reasons either.

And... that's about what you can do. Sure, the whole SSD thing can help a bit but believe me, you WILL wait minutes even on the fastest M2 drive if all you keep doing is accumulating content and not 'cleaning' up your installation once in a while. I'm also on a good Samsung SATA SSD and my original 'big bloated' installation was 360 GB+, with 5500+ .VARs and took me about 4:50 to maybe 5:10 minutes to open up; and that's on an AMD 7900X3D with 6000Mhz 32GB high quality RAM on an SSD. Doesn't really matter if you got a PC that's not even out yet from the future. VAM is notorious for this problem, all we can do is manage through it.
 
There is definitely something wrong, my VaM is between 250 to 300gb. It takes less then 10 minutes for me to boot up VaM and even load a scene.

And I'm just using a Ryzen 7 1800x, 16gb of ram and a GTX 1080. I have VaM on a external USB C SSD.

My computer is now atleast almost 6 years old and I'm still gaming on it. I always took care of my pc's. Clean the inside from dust, heat management, I even re-install my computer once per 2 to 3 months.

I'm not saying that you don't take care your of computer :D but there is definitely something wrong. It could also be caused by drivers or other software related issue's.

It could also be storage related. If you have a m.2 slot on your mainboard, use that one. Like others already said, m.2 SSD's aren't expensive anymore. You can even get a Samung, Intel or Western Digital (the only brands I use) below 300 bucks for 2tb with a writing and reading speed above 5000+ mbps..
 
My VAM Addons directory is now 902GB and 17200 vars. It takes 35 seconds to start with var-browser from HDD :)
 
kretos said:
My VAM Addons directory is now 902GB and 17200 vars. It takes 35 seconds to start with var-browser from HDD :)
Click to expand...
Only 38GB/1100 files here, VAM needs 18 seconds to be ready for use (Desktop that is)
 
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