1 in 4 times DCS launches with half of the usual FPS

About a week ago I started noticing that occasionally (one in four times) my DCS produces very low FPS. Checking the Task Manager revealed that the sim is only using from 55 to 60% of the GPU power. Resetting the game doesn't help. When all is good the GPU temperatures never go above 78 degrees but when the DCS launches with half the usual FPS the temperature only sits at around 56 degrees. According to MSI Afterburner the GPU and Memory clocks are where they should be and it seems that the card is in full swing but the results are not there. So far, the only solution is to restart the PC. Has anybody had similar issues?

My specs:

- CPU: i7-7700K @4.2GHz

- RAM: 32GB @3200MHz

- GPU: Aorus GTX2080Ti 11GB (drivers 10/03/2020)

- SSD, Windows 10 64-bit

Do you have Vsync enabled? I have it disabled since it it would give me locked 30fps. Even though i can push well over 60fps. But i doubt u have the same problem :(

Thanks for your reply but no - my v-sync is off. I use g-sync from the nvidia panel.

Is there any effect if you cycle LAlt-Enter? I think that's the key combo for fullscreen/windowed fullscreen.

I can try to dig up related posts about it if needed.

If that doesn't work, you'll need someone much smarter than me to help.

^ Might be the case indeed. After reliable operation of "full screen" option in a couple of last DCS revisions, it became somewhat broken again in 2.5.6.

Belphe, try LAlt-Enter'ing to switch between borderless-windowed and fulscreen modes and observe what happens.

Roger! Will test tonight. I've noticed a 6-10 FPS gain when running the game in borderless-window mode and have been using it for years now. Won't hurt to switch to fullscreen! Thanks - I'll report back! :)

Fullscreen or borderless: no difference. I have to reset my PC for the frames to get back to normal. Perhaps its some "leftover trash" some other game I launched before DCS leaves..?

Quick update on my issue:

I disabled pretty much everything I could think of (Nvidia panel got a reset, Re-shade was turned off, DCS had all the fancy in-game filtering disabled) but the issue still exists. The only way for me to get good FPS is to restart my PC..

What's SUPER strange is the fact that when I enter the pit and the simulation is paused my FPS are normal and the GPU is heating up to the expected levels (~72 degrees) but when I unpause it the frames instantly go down to 14 - 18 and the GPU temperature drops as well! This means that activating the simulation actually tells the GPU to slow down and produce worse FPS.. Pausing it again makes the frames jump back up to normal and the card is fully loaded again.

Please, help!

About a week ago I started noticing that occasionally (one in four times) my DCS produces very low FPS. Checking the Task Manager revealed that the sim is only using from 55 to 60% of the GPU power. Resetting the game doesn't help. When all is good the GPU temperatures never go above 78 degrees but when the DCS launches with half the usual FPS the temperature only sits at around 56 degrees. According to MSI Afterburner the GPU and Memory clocks are where they should be and it seems that the card is in full swing but the results are not there. So far, the only solution is to restart the PC. Has anybody had similar issues?

 

My specs:

- CPU: i7-7700K @4.2GHz

- RAM: 32GB @3200MHz

- GPU: Aorus GTX2080Ti 11GB (drivers 10/03/2020)

- SSD, Windows 10 64-bit

I noticed it before, but I didn't pay much attention to that.

I think that DCS sometimes decomposed work on the false core, this has resulted in a decline of -5 fps.

Same happens to me. I was practicing take offs with the 109 and after some tries and restarts (using Shift + R keybind) the game suddenly lost a lot of FPS only recovered by going to the menu and loading again.

i have seen this a couple of times, crap frames, come out of dcs and back in all is OK, it was in VR, just not with the frequency you describe.

I tried playing with some settings on the GPU but no matter how OC'ed it is it does not influence the issue in any way.

DCS can start smooth with @ 60-80FPS as usual and then suddenly drop to 10! Pausing the sim brings back the FPS, unpausing sets them back again. Please see the screenshots below:

DCS is UNPAUSED:

DCS is PAUSED:

What's strange is that the GPU temperature drops along with the FPS which suggests that the card itself "decides" to slow down (?). In other words, it is not the case where DCS would overload the card and render poor performance - the temperature would remain high as the card would be working it's a** off to produce good performance. Instead, the card simply slows down, cools to 40 degrees (which is close to idle Desktop temperature) and drastically lowers the FPS in DCS.

I have not experienced this in any other game.

The current scene of DCS ceases to fully utilize the GPU therefore bad fps. You can complement the settings of graphic details and track file.

The current scene of DCS ceases to fully utilize the GPU therefore bad fps. You can complement the settings of graphic details and track file.

Please, elaborate. Could you explain this more to me? I am desperate :/ Are you saying I'm not pushing my GPU enough and that is why it is not performing? Nonsense..

Video card scaling frequency according to utilization.

Problem can occur when a slow cpu, which is inadequate for feeding graphics.

You can publish the whole pc assembly.

Thanks. The specs are:

- CPU: i7-7700K @4.2GHz

- RAM: 32GB @3200MHz

- GPU: Aorus GTX2080Ti 11GB (drivers 10/03/2020)

- SSD, Windows 10 64-bit

Is this CPU not powerful enough? It was more than enough to run DCS for the last 18 months in 4k. I have recently switched to super ultra-wide (5120 x 1440) which is lower overall pixel count than the 4k I was using before.

In your case the cpu won't be a problem, how the gpu behaves in other games?

In your case the cpu won't be a problem, how the gpu behaves in other games?

DCS is the only game I have noticed these issues in :(

It was fine prior 2.5.6 but I have not checked with STABLE as I have no SSD space :(

Belphe my understanding of your 2 pictures is that in certain missions/circumstances the cpu get overloaded for a reason.

Here in pic 1, (10 fps), objects count is 2301, 5.5million triangles, 41% cpu lua usage, frametime 61.3 ms (cpu calculation is overloaded ! for comparison low level Heli above big city shows 480 objects count on my side, you have 2300 !) - in this case your cpu can't feed GPU with more than 10 frames/sec to render, and GPU is underutilized.

On picture 2, 244 objects count, half triangles, 1% cpu lua usage and 12ms frametime all that allow to go up to 82fps and load the GPU to output these frames.

I see no issue from your hardware but more probably a mission with too many objects (or objects that for exemple (IDK) bug and ask to calculate all contained objects while external model may usually be the only calculated/rendered object as long as integer ?)

I'm sure if I try your mission I'll have the same 10 fps.

Belphe my understanding of your 2 pictures is that in certain missions/circumstances the cpu get overloaded for a reason.

 

Here in pic 1, (10 fps), objects count is 2301, 5.5million triangles, 41% cpu lua usage, frametime 61.3 ms (cpu calculation is overloaded ! for comparison low level Heli above big city shows 480 objects count on my side, you have 2300 !) - in this case your cpu can't feed GPU with more than 10 frames/sec to render, and GPU is underutilized.

 

On picture 2, 244 objects count, half triangles, 1% cpu lua usage and 12ms frametime all that allow to go up to 82fps and load the GPU to output these frames.

 

I see no issue from your hardware but more probably a mission with too many objects (or objects that for exemple (IDK) bug and ask to calculate all contained objects while external model may usually be the only calculated/rendered object as long as integer ?)

 

I'm sure if I try your mission I'll have the same 10 fps.

Copy! You are not wrong there. Started a clean mission and no FPS problems... My preload radius is all the way to the right too.. I suppose it's either a new CPU or these settings need to go down.. :cry:

Same problem! :pazzo:

I thought that this can be "fixed" by lowering my graphics quality but I learnt that bringing the in-game options to low settings gives no results! When DCS starts "correctly" I get a constant 120 fps with medium settings but when it launches "incorrectly" I get 10 - 16 fps no matter what!

So my next step was overclocking the CPU. I'm not sure if this is considered a poor result but my i7 7700K @4.2GHz is now stable at 4.7GHz. Guess what - same thing!

I am really saddened with all this performance loss as there is no way to tackle it.. Lowering your image quality doesn't help, nor does overclocking your CPU. I suppose that if I spent a grand on a new motherboard and i9 9900K I would probably see a difference but this is currently not an option for me :(

The "good" thing is that more and more people are reporting this (https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=266642, https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=235558&page=2, https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=267342, https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=263428) so perhaps it will be addressed by ED. Unless this is not a bug but rather a 2.5.6 feature...

I get this sometimes when swapping aircraft or reloading the cockpit. It is literally half the frames, but in VR, we are half your frames of 2D so it's a big issue. Restarting the game usually fixes it, although sometimes getting into a fresh cockpit works. I haven't worked out why, I just assume something didnt initialise correctly or some memory was exceeded or texture memory or something.

I have the same problem occasionally.