fnmsnip
Thanks mate. I'm unsure of what preloading is..Is that when I just create a local server and then I can join other servers?
Yes. Just make sure to do it right after starting TF2. if you join a pub server, then disconnect, then attempt to preload it won't preload properly.
Yttrium's competitive viewmodels config also uses preloading. It goes a step further and puts a small map in your custom files and makes it automatically load when you start TF2 so you don't waste a couple of minutes loading and exiting a big map. The map also kicks you right after joining so you don't even have to disconnect manually.
If you want something similar:
In your autoexec.cfg put "map_background [map name]" where map name can be anything.
You can use Yttrium's preload_room map. it's a small file and kicks you automatically so it doesn't take up a lot of time to prelaod every time you restart TF2.
I usually do it manually by joining and disconnecting from tr_arena_rc2 with the command "map tr_arena_rc2" but any small map will do.
You can drop map files in tf > custom > maps (This should work. Haven't used this pathway in a while though so I might've missed a folder. probably is correct though)
I usually put them in tf > download > maps because then Lawena's recording tool doesn't complain about the size of my custom folder when i try to record things. There's no real difference between the 2 unless you use Lawena a lot