RECOMMENDED OPTIONS (March)

Hey! It's me, D.Va, the benchmarker of legends. Based on my 1920x1080 60 Hz Singleplayer benchmarks with RTX 2060 6GB (and GTX 1060 3GB), I've written graphics option recommendations for the community!

Activate the options that always should be on and then scroll to the theatre you're playing, check out my recommendations and customise your experience. I aim for an absolute minimum 60+ FPS.

First, always activate the following:

Textures HIGH

Terrain Textures HIGH

Civ. Traffic HIGH

Shadows HIGH

Heat Blur HIGH

Resolution X

Aspect Ratio X

Monitors X

Res. of Cockpit Displays 1024 EVERY FRAME

Depth of Field OFF

Lens Effects DIRT+FLARE

Clutter/Grass 1500

Preload Radius 150000

Chimney Smoke Density 0

Gamma 2

Rain Droplets ON

Disable Aero Interface OFF

Vsync OFF (Force this outside of DCS!)

Full Screen ON

Scale GUI OFF

The options above never affect performance and should always be maxed, as far as I know. Obviously, Shadows affect performance, but aren't worth deactivating.

Second, scroll to the scenario you wish to play and activate the graphics options I recommend.

A-10C in Caucasus:

Water HIGH

Visib Range EXTREME

MSAA 2X

Motion Blur OFF

SSAA X1.5

Trees Visibility 100%

Anisotropic Filtering X4

Terrain Object Shadows FLAT

Cockpit Global Illumination ON

I get about 75 FPS on average and it appears to never go under 60 FPS. In order to increase image quality or performance, change the options according to your personal preference and if you're uncertain of how a graphics option works, scroll to my graphics options guide.

A-10C in Vegas:

Water HIGH

Visib Range EXTREME

Shadows HIGH

MSAA 2X

Motion Blur OFF

SSAA X1.5

Trees Visibility 100%

Anisotropic Filtering X4

Terrain Object Shadows FLAT

Cockpit Global Illumination ON

I get about 75 FPS on average and it appears to never go under 60 FPS. In order to increase image quality or performance, change the options according to your personal preference and if you're uncertain of how a graphics option works, scroll to my graphics options guide.

A-10C in Vegas (GTX 1060 3GB):

Water MEDIUM

Visib Range ULTRA

Shadows HIGH

MSAA 2X

Motion Blur OFF

SSAA OFF

Trees Visibility 100%

Anisotropic Filtering X4

Terrain Object Shadows FLAT

Cockpit Global Illumination OFF

I got about 70 FPS, for interesting reference!

A-10C in Dubai:

Water MEDIUM

Visib Range HIGH

Shadows HIGH

MSAA 2X

Motion Blur OFF

SSAA X1.5

Trees Visibility 100%

Anisotropic Filtering X4

Terrain Object Shadows FLAT

Cockpit Global Illumination OFF

I get about 65 FPS on average and it appears to never go under 50 FPS. In order to increase image quality or performance, change the options according to your personal preference and if you're uncertain of how a graphics option works, scroll to my graphics options guide.

Here, I'll discuss how the graphics options work and how you can effectively customise your experience (performance data is based on A-10C Vegas benchmark):

Water:

MEDIUM (100% performance)

HIGH (90% performance)

My recommendation: MEDIUM doesn't affect performance significantly, but HIGH affects performance moderately and does so even when there's no water! Graphically, only the colour of water appears affected.

Visib. Range:

LOW (100% performance)

MEDIUM (95% performance)

HIGH (85% performance)

ULT (80% performance)

EXTREME (75% performance)

My recommendation: relatively proportional increase in quality and decrease in performance. Nothing to add here.

Shadows:

Terrain Shadows OFF and Shadows OFF (100% performance)

Terrain Shadows FLAT ONLY and Shadows HIGH (90% performance)

Terrain Shadows DEFAULT and Shadows LOW (90% performance)

Terrain Shadows DEFAULT and Shadows HIGH (80% performance)

My recommendation: I don't recommend using any options not literally included here! Terrain Shadows FLAT improves the environment and Shadows LOW improves the cockpit, but if Terrain Shadows are FLAT, then Shadows HIGH is completely free! If Terrain Shadows are DEFAULT, then Shadows HIGH makes buildings shadow other buildings, which is impressive but really costs performance.

Anti-aliasing:

0X MSAA/0X SSAA (100% performance)

2X MSAA/0X SSAA (>90% performance)

4X MSAA/0X SSAA (90% performance)

2X MSAA/1.5X SSAA (70% performance)

4X MSAA/1.5X SSAA (50% performance)

4X MSAA/2X SSAA (33% performance)

My recomendation: I don't recommend using options not included here, such as 2X MSAA/2X SSAA (with identical performance to 4X MSAA/1.5 SSAA, but worse image quality).

Motion Blur:

OFF (100% performance)

ON (80% performance)

My recommendation: you don't want this if it affects performance.

Trees Visibility:

This is a slider running from 30% to 100% (65% in the middle). I recommend setting it to 100% and if your performance strongly degrades when flying over areas with a lot of trees, adjust it in the in-game options menu (without going out into the main menu).

Anisotropic Filtering:

OFF (100% performance)

2X (100% performance, difference probably to small to document)

4X (98.5% performance)

8X (95% performance)

16X (90% performance)

My recommendation: increases the sharpness of textures viewed at a shallow angle, such as the runway. Above 4X, the quality difference is almost invisible.

Cockpit Global Illumination:

OFF (100% performance)

ON (90% performance)

My recommendation: a significant performance decrease for no image quality improvement, which means I don't recommend it.

Special considerations:

In the NVIDIA Control Panel, I recommend resetting, then setting Vertical Sync to FAST, if you've got the option, if not, set to ADAPTIVE.

VRAM: always keep an eye on your VRAM. If it runs out, performance is strongly degraded. If you're flying the F-14B Tomcat in Dubai, you can even run out of 6GB VRAM and I strongly recommend setting Textures to MEDIUM.

Thank you :thumbup:

This is awesome. Thank you for taking the time to post such an informative thread! Looking forward to future posts!

Why do You use MSAA wit SSAA?

Its a FPS killer.

Use MSAA or SSAA.

Example:

0X MSAA/1.5X SSAA

Why do You use MSAA wit SSAA?

Its a FPS killer.

Use MSAA or SSAA.

 

Example:

0X MSAA/1.5X SSAA

I use MSAA x2 and SSAA x2. The quality is spot on and I'm locked at 60 FPS. If I use say MSAA x4 and SSAA x1.5 it definitely doesn't look as good, noticeably more shimmering.

The FPS killer for mine is MSAA x4 plus SSAA x2, drops to 52 FPS with that.

I think Wags was saying that SSAA was put in for people who use 1080p resolutions or lower. If you are at 1440p or above you shouldn't be using it. I certainly wouldn't do a combo of SSAA and MSAA.

I found 1.5 ssaa and 2x mssa to be a very effective combo to minimise shimmer when i ran 1080p .

I think Wags was saying that SSAA was put in for people who use 1080p resolutions or lower. If you are at 1440p or above you shouldn't be using it. I certainly wouldn't do a combo of SSAA and MSAA.

Ah fair one, I’m using 1080p so that’ll explain why it makes a difference...

Things changed over some updates and indeed MSAA & SSAA together do work and look great, but MSAA4x alone is great too.

You have to fly the same course over and over with all those settings and decide what you like best and what fps hit you are willing to accept.

I use Dubai downtown with all the buildings and windows as my testflight for that. there I clearly see if a mesh is OK or if it got messed up. fact is MSAA4x and SSAA2x look best..LoL..but my 1080ti no like it...10fps..waahhaaa

I think I fly MSAA2x as of now and enjoy real high fps again.

Bottom line, it works if your GPU can drive it.

Things changed over some updates and indeed MSAA & SSAA together do work and look great, but MSAA4x alone is great too.

 

You have to fly the same course over and over with all those settings and decide what you like best and what fps hit you are willing to accept.

 

I use Dubai downtown with all the buildings and windows as my testflight for that. there I clearly see if a mesh is OK or if it got messed up. fact is MSAA4x and SSAA2x look best..LoL..but my 1080ti no like it...10fps..waahhaaa

 

I think I fly MSAA2x as of now and enjoy real high fps again.

 

Bottom line, it works if your GPU can drive it.

Yeah MSAA x4 and SSAA x2 definitely looks the best but it definitely has the biggest hit. Although if I turn shadows off I can run it ok at 60 until over built up areas or big areas of trees.

I think even a 2080ti wouldn’t be able to run it at that going by what I’ve read on here.

There is a better option if you want to eliminate jaggies -wich i don't like-, and it cost less than the built-in game SSAA (even less than MSAAx4) and look better: the Nvidia SuperSampling. Set it like this:

In game, MSAAx2, SSAA OFF

%5Bimg%5Dhttps%3A//i.ibb.co/3BpGBkm/Screen-190311-222046.jpg[/img]

then go in Nvidia Inspector, and:

-IMPORTANT- MFAA: ON

Transparency Supersampling: 2x Supersampling

%5Bimg%5Dhttps%3A//i.ibb.co/bFKgz0Y/Capture.jpg[/img]

Enjoy great visual with good performance. If you want to use x4 Transparency Supersampling, you have to choose MSAA x4 in-game.

There is a better option if you want to eliminate jaggies -wich i don't like-, and it cost less than the built-in game SSAA (even less than MSAAx4) and look better: the Nvidia SuperSampling. Set it like this:

 

In game, MSAAx2, SSAA OFF

 

%5Bimg%5Dhttps%3A//i.ibb.co/3BpGBkm/Screen-190311-222046.jpg[/img]

 

then go in Nvidia Inspector, and:

 

-IMPORTANT- MFAA: ON

Transparency Supersampling: 2x Supersampling

 

%5Bimg%5Dhttps%3A//i.ibb.co/bFKgz0Y/Capture.jpg[/img]

 

Enjoy great visual with good performance. If you want to use x4 Transparency Supersampling, you have to choose MSAA x4 in-game.

Interesting stuff, I’ll most definitely give this a try tomorrow and see what it’s like. Thanks for the tip...:thumbup:

Very nice (quality and performance on 1440) is MSAAx2 and SGSS x2 still:

Very nice (quality and performance on 1440) is MSAAx2 and SGSS x2 still:

 

 

I'm kind of thinking maybe I ought to be moving over to a 1440p monitor. The monitor i have currently is an Acer XB240H 144hz 1080p. Will i see much difference moving to 1440p? Will i get less shimmering textures? Basically is it worth shelling out £500? Advice needed! Thanks guys...

Tons of options.

Make your choice :)

Don't forget to actually fly & crash too :pilotfly:

Visib Range HIGH and SSAA x0 seems to be the best way to boost FPS when flying newer airplanes like the F-14 and F/A-18C on the newer maps. Still haven't tested Inspector.

The thing about anti-aliasing in DCS is that the game looks REALLY bad without SSAA when you're on the ground because apparently a lot of things (shadows, vegetation and more) aren't anti-aliased, but when you get into the air and you're flying around, SSAA x0 is perfectly fine.

Actually after spending some time on it last night I think it looks bang on as it is. Wouldn’t mind trying a 1440p monitor but I can’t imagine it’ll look much better than what it’s like now...

whats ur ram? we have the exact gpu.. and with my 16gb ram my loading time got super slow after the f14 release... one time it even gave me a bsod when trying to connect to a server.. stop code was : memory management

'

i do play on my hdd ;(

whats ur ram? we have the exact gpu.. and with my 16gb ram my loading time got super slow after the f14 release... one time it even gave me a bsod when trying to connect to a server.. stop code was : memory management

'

 

i do play on my hdd ;(

Not done the latest update yet mate but I will today and report back...

My RAM is 16gb..

whats ur ram? we have the exact gpu.. and with my 16gb ram my loading time got super slow after the f14 release... one time it even gave me a bsod when trying to connect to a server.. stop code was : memory management

'

 

i do play on my hdd ;(

I've got 16GB RAM. I only play singleplayer and in the F-14 over the Persian Gulf in an instant action scenario, I use about 12-13GB RAM, I think. The only problem I have is extremely slow start-up, but hey, it's OpenBeta and we're probably going to get a flurry of patches in the coming few months. Also, it often crashes (empty screen) on exit.

I've benchmarked the A-10 flying over Dubai tonight!

I started with all options at minimum, obviously. The following options don't degrade performance by any significant amount individually and together they degrade it by only 2.5% and as such, I recommend always keeping them on. They are as follows:

Textures HIGH

Terrain Textures HIGH

Head Blur HIGH

Shadows HIGH

Res. of Cockpit Displays 1024 EVERY FRAME

Lens Effects DIRT+FLARE

Anisotropic Filering X2

Rain Droplets ON

Also, in order to maintain an acceptable level of image quality, I set the following options:

Visib Range HIGH

MSAA X4

SSAA X1.5

Terrain Shadows FLAT

I used the above options as a baseline. Then I set the following image quality enhancers:

Civilian Traffic HIGH

Water MEDIUM

Clutter/Grass 1500

Trees Visibility 100%

Anisotropic Filering X4

This degraded performance by 10%, which is acceptable and greatly increased image quality in my opinion.

Question is: what next?

The following options degrade performance slightly (~5%):

Anisotropic Filtering X8 (Small difference in quality, but also in performance)

Global Cockpit Illumination ON (Small difference in quality, but also in performance)

Together, these options give me a 20% performance degradation versus baseline... which is probably not worthwhile.

The following options degrade performance moderately (~10%):

Water HIGH (Water colour changes completely)

Visib Range ULTRA (Performance degradation is proportional to increase in quality)

Anisotropic Filtering X16 (Small difference from 8X, regarding performance and quality)

Together, these options AND Global Cockpit Illumination give me a 20% performance degradation versus baseline. Worthwhile?

The following options degrade performance heavily (~20%):

Visib Range EXTREME (Performance degradation is proportional to increase in quality)

Terrain Shadows DEFAULT (Small difference in quality at a great cost)

Motion Blur ON (Recommend off)

And finally, SSAA X2 degrades performance the most heavily (~33%).

I'm still working on recommended option sets based on the findings above. I already have the "always on" and "10%" degrade sets mentioned above.

My 10% degrade set matches my recommended options for the old maps, except Visib Range is HIGH instead of EXTREME and Anisotropic Filtering is X4 instead of X16. Persian Gulf needs optimisation!

Okay, here are my A-10 Dubai recommendations now:

Textures HIGH (MEDIUM if VRAM problems)

Terrain Textures HIGH

Civ. Traffic HIGH

Water HIGH

Visib Range ULTRA

Heat Blur HIGH

Shadows HIGH

Resolution X

Aspect Ratio X

Monitors X

Res. of Cockpit Displays 1024 EVERY FRAME

MSAA 4X

Depth of Field OFF

Lens Effects DIRT+FLARE

Motion Blur OFF

SSAA X1.5

Clutter/Grass 1500

Trees Visibility 100%

Preload Radius 150000

Chimney Smoke Density 0

Gamma 2

Anisotropic Filtering X4

Terrain Object Shadows FLAT

Cockpit Global Illumination ON

Rain Droplets ON

Disable Aero Interface OFF

Vsync OFF (Force this outside of DCS!)

Full Screen ON

Scale GUI OFF

This time, I've bolded stuff that's not "maxed".

This basically gives an identical image quality to maxing everything out, except Visib Range Ultra, which stops a few buildings from rendering far away. Also, Anisotropic Filtering 4X makes a small difference if you squint, but it's only barely visible, and obviously, SSAA X2 makes a slight difference. Water MEDIUM and Cockpit Global Illumination OFF can give a ~5% boost and only changes colouring.

Edit: also, if you run out of VRAM, set Textures to MEDIUM! If I fly the F-14 instead of A-10, I get 20% lower performance, but if Textures are HIGH, I run out of VRAM and get 40% lower performance!

Have you benchmarked with civilian traffic at medium or heat blur at medium? You really won't notice the difference. Looks like you already got it dialed in pretty well but it definitely takes some of the stress off the CPU. That should allow you to crank up the anisotropic filtering or the water effects, maybe even shadows. Looks much better to my eye. Anisotropic filtering affects the quality of textures at angles, you'll really notice it looking down the runway at takeoff. Usually doesn't use much horsepower either.

Good modules to benchmark are the P-51 and the F-86 Sabre. Two well optimized and stable releases along with the A-10.

For the F-14 I've been just turning mirrors off until I get away from the airfield or carrier and then turn them back on at altitude. Didn't have to turn down any settings doing that.

Have you benchmarked with civilian traffic at medium or heat blur at medium? You really won't notice the difference. Looks like you already got it dialed in pretty well but it definitely takes some of the stress off the CPU. That should allow you to crank up the anisotropic filtering or the water effects, maybe even shadows. Looks much better to my eye. Anisotropic filtering affects the quality of textures at angles, you'll really notice it looking down the runway at takeoff. Usually doesn't use much horsepower either.

 

Good modules to benchmark are the P-51 and the F-86 Sabre. Two well optimized and stable releases along with the A-10.

 

For the F-14 I've been just turning mirrors off until I get away from the airfield or carrier and then turn them back on at altitude. Didn't have to turn down any settings doing that.

Civilian Traffic OFF to HIGH makes only a small (4%) difference and Heat Blur OFF to HIGH makes no difference, but it's possible I'm not testing them in situations where they "activate".

Anisotropic filtering Off to 4X is a BIG difference in quality, but 4X to 16X is not really noticeable and DOES degrade performance by almost 10% according to both my new (2060) and old (1060) benchmarks, which is quite significant!

I always keep mirrors off. Maybe I should try turning them on at altitude like you.

Pan around and look over your shoulder in a jet with two engines sitting on the tarmac and or go to an external view. If you compare to real photos, the heat blur low looks closer to reality IMO. Wags mentioned in one of his videos that he thinks heatblur is overdone a bit on high, I agree. I think a few modules have some special heat blur eye candy effects on high though.

Mirrors are actually a cockpit display as far as DCS is concerned. You can see the resolution changes dramatically in mirrors from 1024, 512, 256, even in aircraft without any MFDs. With the settings you are pushing you could probably go 1440p if you had the monitor. It's kind of counterintuitive but the DCS engine seems to do higher resolution natively more efficiently than the anti-aliasing upscaling. Running 1440p with 2x MSAA might actually look better, YMMV of course.

I wish more users would objectively publish their benchmarks and results with their build details like you. None of the major Youtubers benchmark DCS and there are so many different configurations out there. Too many variables to speculate on.

Edit: I've updated the first post.

Wow, I was just flying the A-10C over Caucasus and was quite disappointed in my performance. At SSAA X0, I could max everything and at SSAA X2, I got about 45 FPS with everything else at minimum, which meant SSAA X1.5 was my starting point for performance benchmarking. Maxed, I got 52 FPS, but setting Water Medium, Anisotropic Filtering Off, Global Cockpit Illumination Off, and Terrain Shadows Flat resulted in 65 FPS… the only other options that affected performance were Visib Distance (small difference, apparently this only affects buildings today!) and Trees Visibility (moderate difference, but what’s a forest without trees?)… then I REMEMBERED! I had completely forgotten about MSAA and while there’s no performance difference between X0 and X2, the difference between X2 and X4 is big!

If I max out, then set MSAA X2, I get 65 FPS. In other words, setting (only) MSAA X2 made the same difference as setting (all following) Water Medium, Anisotropic Filtering Off, Global Cockpit Illumination Off, and Terrain Shadows Flat. If they’re set together, I get 77 FPS. For absolute reference, 52 to 65 FPS is a 25% increase and 77 FPS is a 20% increase over 65 FPS and a 50% increase over 52 FPS. This was certainly interesting!

MSAA X2 doesn’t make a super big difference in image quality and I’m going to test it out in different airplanes on different maps. I might have to update my recommendations shortly!