2 directories or 1

[Kobe008]

Is it recommended to run all my EQ accounts from 1 EQ directory or have seperate ones? I have 3 accounts but usually only play 2 at a time and it runs ok but would like to make it run even smoother if I can. I use seperate directories right now.

[Lax]

I've been meaning to put this in the FAQ, as it is currently one of the most frequently asked questions

Here's some quotes from a thread in the subscriber forums

I've got EQ installed on 3 physically seperate drives but zone times are still lagging one or sometimes two of the three out to the server select screen.

Lax:

You're probably actually hurting your zone times by using 3 drives. For one thing, no cache mechanism I'm aware of will be able to speed that up for you, whereas if the 3 were using the same folder then Windows and the hard drive both have caching to speed that up. Additionally, if these are IDE drives and you have a 2 IDE channel system (e.g. no RAID), two of those hard drives are competing for the same resources to get you potentially the same data. If the 3 drives are on 3 separate IDE or SATA channels, then you might get some performance, but again caches are hundreds of times faster than reading from a 7200rpm drive -- think milliseconds (9) vs nanoseconds. 9ms is a long time.

I would definitely try a single folder just to see if you find a difference one way or another. Also, if every luclin model is turned off, you should zone in a matter of a few seconds in most areas (probably not zones from the last 2 expansions or so).

Hey lax you said put all 3 chars in the same folder? Did you mean tath each account should be in the sme default EQ Folder? cause i've got each account in their won separate folders and even wiith WinEQ/EQPlayNice) I still take forever zoning even when ts one char at a time

Lax:

Yes, one folder. If you have them in separate folders, you may be hurting your performance as explained -- even more so if they are on the same hard drive. WinEQ allows you to use a separate eqclient.ini file per profile, and keeps separate eqlsplayerdata.ini automatically (that's what stores your last station name and server), so you get the only real benefits of mulitple folders plus the benefits of using a single folder.

I stand firmly behind 1 EQ directory, although it is a slim possibility that you could see improved performance by using one physically separate hard drive per account IF they are on separate IDE channels (or if they are SATA). However, as quoted above, if your system's cache mechanisms are allowed to work properly (e.g. by using one folder), performance should increase because it may take only a few nanoseconds to perform a task, rather than milliseconds for each session.