Another thing you need to do is to be sure your system is in top notch shape. Do you defrag often? Are your drivers all up to date (BIOS and Chipset are important too)? Yet another thing to do is close down all non essential background applications that hog CPU cycles. A neat little utility for doing this is FS Autostart. A Google search will get you there. Originaly developed for Flight Sims, this program shuts down many programs and services, as well as defrags your memory, and launches the game as well. All services and programs could be set to automaticly restart after exiting the game. I've been useing this for a while, and I could tell you it really helps!
