TF2Idle - An easier way to idle

[Reteeks]

Very much appreciated Stoofvlees, and RandomGamer342. Will give those a try.

[parmel]

[QUOTE=radek;39041920]there are a lot of big-time idlers here, including me, you can ask whatever you want here[/QUOTE]

Thought i would ask you since you are a big-time idler.

When do you upgrade your f2p accounts to premium, right away or until they have something of value in their backpacks?
I want to know if it is worth giving premium to my idle accounts for next week or if i should wait until they get something good.

[Stoofvlees]

[QUOTE=parmel;39047529]Thought i would ask you since you are a big-time idler.

When do you upgrade your f2p accounts to premium, right away or until they have something of value in their backpacks?
I want to know if it is worth giving premium to my idle accounts for next week or if i should wait until they get something good.[/QUOTE]

F2P only get normal drops no specials = only unique weapons.
I've updated all my accounts the day that I activated them.

Only special items I've had in the meantime is a hat and a paint

[RandomGamer342]

[QUOTE=parmel;39047529]Thought i would ask you since you are a big-time idler.

When do you upgrade your f2p accounts to premium, right away or until they have something of value in their backpacks?
I want to know if it is worth giving premium to my idle accounts for next week or if i should wait until they get something good.[/QUOTE]

F2P's get paints/tools/salvaged crates but not hats/miscs

IMHO it's a good idea to upgrade right away as you'll probably end up getting a couple extra hats that way(i wouldn't count on your accounts getting a salvaged crate before upgrading them to put it that way)

[parmel]

[QUOTE=RandomGamer342;39048445]F2P's get paints/tools/salvaged crates but not hats/miscs

IMHO it's a good idea to upgrade right away as you'll probably end up getting a couple extra hats that way(i wouldn't count on your accounts getting a salvaged crate before upgrading them to put it that way)[/QUOTE]

Hehe ok, I will upgrade some accounts then. I got a salvaged crate on my first week idling btw(this week) :wink:

The drop chance on paints/tools must be really low, haven't gotten a single one out of 24 accounts.

[editline]1st January 2013[/editline]

What the... I can't trade my main accounts with my idle accounts that are premium anymore.
It worked fine a day ago and earlier today but now it says i need to have had steamguard activated for 15 days.

[Stoofvlees]

parmel yes, I've got the same problem right now...
activated 2 new idle accounts today, could trade from them to my main but since midnight I couldn't trade them anymore.
scrap.tf and marketplace.tf have the problem too.

Would've been cool if they announced it first, although they never would.
So now I have 10 idle accounts farming items, but I'll have to wait a time before I can get them.
That'll be a lot of scrapping to do

[Steve Harvey]

So if I only want to do one account, I don't need sandboxie correct? All I need to do is fill in the account info, and the steam paths and hit "start idling"?

[Stoofvlees]

[QUOTE=Ponder;39049149]So if I only want to do one account, I don't need sandboxie correct? All I need to do is fill in the account info, and the steam paths and hit "start idling"?[/QUOTE]
Yes and no.

Yes if you close steam first. Because you can't run 2 steam.exe's on the same pc. That's why you need sandboxie, to run them hidden from eachother.

You could run the idleaccount a night for ~10 hours. so you aren't forced to wait.

[Steve Harvey]

Well I have no problem closing steam for tonight and let it run.

[editline]31st December 2012[/editline]

Nothing in an hour and 18 minutes, I feel that i didnt set this up correctly.

[Jaerin]

Well got my idling setup working with server + 32 concurrent accounts.

Running on an
i5-2500k OC@4.6Ghz
16gigs ram
ATI 7970 3GB

When I first kick off the server + all 32 clients I'm pushing the full 16Gigs of ram + 25-40% CPU, but I notice after about an hour or so of them idling the memory usage slowly drop down to about 4-5 gigs of ram and about 25% CPU after about an hour.

I do notice that my machine is not acting completely normally though. Running other apps and such doesn't always successfully launch the application. I notice that my taskbar has glitched out a bit as well. Below are my settings if anyone has any suggestions on other things to add/optimize let me know!

Running srcds.exe dedicated server with the following:

D:\Valve\HLServer\orangebox\srcds.exe -console -game tf -hostport 27015 +maxplayers 32 +map achievement_idle +sv_lan 1

No server.cfg file in place.

I have a main copy of Steam with TF2 installed in D:\Steam
I have directories for every idler account in D:\Accountname that is an exact copy of D:\Steam except the steamapps is using a link to D:\Steam\steamapps

In Sandboxie I have a sandbox created for each idler account with Direct Access to D:\ and the option to Drop Rights unchecked.

In TF2Idle I have each account setup with the following:

+exec idle.cfg -heapsize 131072 -textmode -nosound -low -novid -nopreload -nohltv -nojoy -tvdisable -width 640 -height 480 +password 1234 +clientport 28000 +connect 192.168.1.10:27015 -port 29000

Where the -port and -clientport options are just incremented by 1 for each account.

+exec idle.cfg -heapsize 131072 -textmode -nosound -low -novid -nopreload -nohltv -nojoy -tvdisable -width 640 -height 480 +password 1234 +clientport 28001 +connect 192.168.1.10:27015 -port 29001

Then my idle.cfg

fps_max 30
r_rootlod 2
r_lod 2
mat_picmip 2
threadpool_affinity 0
mat_aaquality 0
mat_bumpmap 0
mat_antialias 0
mat_reducefillrate 1
mat_specular 0
r_shadowrendertotexture 0
r_waterforceexpensive 0
mat_hdr_level 0
mat_hdr_enabled 0
mat_hdr_level 0
mat_hdr_manual_tonemap_rate 0
mat_aaquality 0
mat_use_compressed_hdr_textures 0
mat_disable_bloom 1
mat_bloomscale 0

I start the accounts with a 20 second delay between accounts.

[editline]1st January 2013[/editline]

Oh also to anyone that fears that Valve or Steam will do something about this rest assured that they will not. I've had all 32 accounts locked because they were suspicious of how I paid for the accounts. I paid via Paypal accounts using Entropay virtual credit cards.

Initially they were not going to unlock the accounts, but upon appeal they realized that all the accounts were legit and unlocked them all. This is with my sending them a list of all the accounts that were locked in a single email. So it's not something where I unlocked them individually.

Idling is totally legit.

[Bandit99]

Hi guys, I'm new here but firstly I just wanted to say thanks for the App.

I've been reading this thread for a few weeks now and I have come across a problem that a few others have experienced as well and was just wondering if anyone had found a solution or could perhaps shed some light on the possible reason.

The problem is when I get to about 35 accounts running my desktop just pretty much goes bonkers, firstly I get the error message about not being able to use some font (in the TF2 window), the font name it gives changes sometimes it's not always the same, then if you close the copy and try again, the whole desktop kind of blacks out and the taskbar ends up on the top of the screen and the screen flickers and goes really weird. It's pretty much the same problem as a few others have mentioned. I'm only using about half my system ram so I know it's not that but i'm at a bit of a loss to what the problem is.

Some of you guys that are experts at this might be able to shed some light on what is going on.

Thanks.

[Jaerin]

[QUOTE=Bandit99;39050755]Hi guys, I'm new here but firstly I just wanted to say thanks for the App.

I've been reading this thread for a few weeks now and I have come across a problem that a few others have experienced as well and was just wondering if anyone had found a solution or could perhaps shed some light on the possible reason.

The problem is when I get to about 35 accounts running my desktop just pretty much goes bonkers, firstly I get the error message about not being able to use some font (in the TF2 window), the font name it gives changes sometimes it's not always the same, then if you close the copy and try again, the whole desktop kind of blacks out and the taskbar ends up on the top of the screen and the screen flickers and goes really weird. It's pretty much the same problem as a few others have mentioned. I'm only using about half my system ram so I know it's not that but i'm at a bit of a loss to what the problem is.

Some of you guys that are experts at this might be able to shed some light on what is going on.

Thanks.[/QUOTE]

I don't think there is a solution. I think it ends up being a combination of being out of memory or windows running out of some other kind of resource behind the scenes (handles, threads, ect). I don't think there really is anything you can do to fix it other than perhaps maybe using VM's so you can run multiple copies of Windows.

Remember it only takes like 8-12 hours to complete your items drops so unless you are talking about trying to idle more than 32x7= 224 accounts per week. Even with that if you were efficient at switching the accounts over you could really get more like 448 accounts per week since it only takes max 12 hours. Then you'd probably just be better off getting a 2nd computer rather than trying to squeeze in a few more clients at a time.

It's already quite a chore to manage all the items from 32 accounts a week. With that many accounts you'd need some serious automation.

[Steve Harvey]

Nvm, just got 2 crates in the same minute..seems to work now. Great app.

[Bandit99]

Thanks for reply Jaerin.

I've already set up a VM copy of windows to test if that works but I havn't got it fully setup as of yet. I just tried with VMplayer (free) and got windows 7 installed, it seems a bit slow and power hungry. Not sure if that VM software is any good or not.

Would be nice if I could get them all running on one pc without VM.

[Pipchamp106]

[QUOTE=Bandit99;39050755]Hi guys, I'm new here but firstly I just wanted to say thanks for the App.

I've been reading this thread for a few weeks now and I have come across a problem that a few others have experienced as well and was just wondering if anyone had found a solution or could perhaps shed some light on the possible reason.

The problem is when I get to about 35 accounts running my desktop just pretty much goes bonkers, firstly I get the error message about not being able to use some font (in the TF2 window), the font name it gives changes sometimes it's not always the same, then if you close the copy and try again, the whole desktop kind of blacks out and the taskbar ends up on the top of the screen and the screen flickers and goes really weird. It's pretty much the same problem as a few others have mentioned. I'm only using about half my system ram so I know it's not that but i'm at a bit of a loss to what the problem is.

Some of you guys that are experts at this might be able to shed some light on what is going on.

Thanks.[/QUOTE]

Sound like Windows doesn't have enough memory to work with. Running 35 accounts (and 2 dedi servers) would take more than 16gb of ram. 24 is probably what you would want.

[Bandit99]

I'm running 32gb RAM and it uses about 16gb, so there is still plenty of RAM left. I run the dedicated servers on a different PC.

[Markers]

I was idling 20 hours per 2 week,not weekly,but my item drops were cut to half in last few sessions,is it possible valve removed 2 week drop cap thing?

[Pipchamp106]

nvm, I misunderstood your post at first

[RandomGamer342]

I just noticed something odd with the program

With the font "TF2Build", it appears like the previews:
[IMG]http://puu.sh/1I1zq[/IMG]

Without the font "TF2Build", it uses a default font(arial?):
[IMG]http://puu.sh/1I1Cb[/IMG]

Neither the program or this thread mentions this font being needed, which will probably lead to a lot of people using TF2Idle like the second image.

What i'd like to see is a way to select which font to use in the main window as well as the drop log(or at least an option between TF2Build and the fallback) as i prefer the second one and the only font you can select is the drop log's currently

[Markers]

[QUOTE=RandomGamer342;39053185]I just noticed something odd with the program

With the font "TF2Build", it appears like the previews:
[IMG]http://puu.sh/1I1zq[/IMG]

Without the font "TF2Build", it uses a default font(arial?):
[IMG]http://puu.sh/1I1Cb[/IMG]

Neither the program or this thread mentions this font being needed, which will probably lead to a lot of people using TF2Idle like the second image.

What i'd like to see is a way to select which font to use in the main window as well as the drop log(or at least an option between TF2Build and the fallback) as i prefer the second one and the only font you can select is the drop log's currently[/QUOTE]

cant you just delete the font?

[RandomGamer342]

The group menu also needs a bit of an overhaul to look more like the normal window

Using it with a lot of groups makes it feel claustrophobic

It should be something like this:

[IMG]http://puu.sh/1I20L[/IMG]

And automatically scale to include as many groups as possible(in the same way the main window does)

[editline]1st January 2013[/editline]

[QUOTE=Markers;39053307]cant you just delete the font?[/QUOTE]

I didn't install it for the fun of it, i actually need to use it now or then

[sp]Broke my automerge[/sp]

[ric20007]

[QUOTE=Jaerin;39050391]Where the -port and -clientport options are just incremented by 1 for each account.[/QUOTE]

I hope you did not edit each and every account to have a different port, that would be unnecessary.
And you don't need to assign the client port, you just need to put in the general settings something like

-port 23000

THe hl2.exe does the incrementing automatically, you just need to assign the port to something different than 290XX and it will work fine.

[ArsonBoy5996]

I tired trading between a few of my idle accounts, but this message comes up when doing so:
[img]http://i.imgur.com/uY3In.png[/img]
What gives, does this mean my idle accounts are forfeit until I cough up more cash?

[RandomGamer342]

[QUOTE=ArsonBoy5996;39054905]I tired trading between a few of my idle accounts, but this message comes up when doing so:
[img]http://i.imgur.com/uY3In.png[/img]
What gives, does this mean my idle accounts are forfeit until I cough up more cash?[/QUOTE]

You need to trade from an account that has spent money on steam.

If an account has 0 games and TF2 premium through a premium gift, it doesn't count(It's supposed to; but it doesn't)

Trade from your main or another account you've spent money on directly

[Markers]

I was idling 20 hours per 2 week,not weekly,but my item drops were cut to half in last few sessions,is it possible valve removed 2 week drop cap thing?

[Satangel]

[QUOTE=radek;39041920]there are a lot of big-time idlers here, including me, you can ask whatever you want here[/QUOTE]

K then.

- How do you manage all the weapons that drop and turn them into metal?
- Do some idlers just leave those weapons and only scavenge the valuable items out of an idle account? They can't be arsed to melt the weapons?
- How in hell do you make all that metal into keys? Got sellers or ?

Thanks for your time

[deqa]

[QUOTE=Markers;39055138]I was idling 20 hours per 2 week,not weekly,but my item drops were cut to half in last few sessions,is it possible valve removed 2 week drop cap thing?[/QUOTE]

I don't have an answer, but a lot of people's issues with drops may be a result of them not being aware of their clients disconnecting. I'm always having 4 or less accounts disconnecting during idling; disconnecting due to a simple 'account has disconnected' message or 'STEAMAUTH: Client accountname received failure code 1'. With a STEAMAUTH message on your clients, the accounts don't even disconnect and instead are prevented from receiving drops until terminated and relaunched.

[QUOTE=Satangel;39055553]K then.

- How do you manage all the weapons that drop and turn them into metal?
- Do some idlers just leave those weapons and only scavenge the valuable items out of an idle account? They can't be arsed to melt the weapons?
- How in hell do you make all that metal into keys? Got sellers or ?

Thanks for your time[/QUOTE]

I wait until the backpacks are full on the accounts, and then hit 'start TF2' for one group of accounts. While they all launch, I open the TF2 window on the accounts that have launched and sort their inventories by class, go to custom blueprint, and craft the class weapons into scrap and delete the crates of little value. The metal is traded over to a main account to purchase keys with afterwards on "some trading site".

[radek]

[QUOTE=Satangel;39055553]K then.

- How do you manage all the weapons that drop and turn them into metal?
- Do some idlers just leave those weapons and only scavenge the valuable items out of an idle account? They can't be arsed to melt the weapons?
- How in hell do you make all that metal into keys? Got sellers or ?

Thanks for your time[/QUOTE]

I just trade all the stuff excluding crates from idle alts into a middleman account, autocraft all those weapons into metal, trade metal onto my main and buy keys on outpost

[Stoofvlees]

-snip-

[puddlesheep]

The program itself is working great thanks!

But when I close TF2idle it does not save my settings, meaning I have to readd 6 accounts in one by one which is getting rather annoying. The .exe is just placed in a file on my desktop and is not compressed.

Any help?