Duke3d maxes out at ~250k DOSBox cycles on my e8300.

First of all, dosbox will only use 1 cpu core so maximum usage is 50% on a dual core system (25% on quad or 12,5% on HT i7 😉). Second, there is no correlation between cycles and cpu frequency. Some games can have higher cycles and use less host cpu % and vice versa. Best is to use max, this will use all available cpu (and not too much...)

Best is to use max, this will use all available cpu (and not too much...)

Using Max can cause stability issues with some poorly coded games. It should work most of the time but if you ever experience any problems it may be a good idea to used a fixed cycle rate.

SwissCM wrote:

Best is to use max, this will use all available cpu (and not too much...)

Using Max can cause stability issues with some poorly coded games.

I've had no problems using Max with Duke3D.

Okay max works good for duke3d but it breaks alot of my other games and applications running under Windows 3.1. Is there a way I can press a key and have Dosbox switch to max without editing Dosbox.conf? Or at the least a command to enter in to the command line to change CPU cycle settings?

config -set "cpu cycles=max"

or just
cycles max

Qbix wrote:

config -set "cpu cycles=max"

or just
cycles max

Thanks Qbix