FPS drops and stutters

[doveman]

you will get drops, especially in multiplayer, buts thats part of DCS we have got used to :)

 

So unless you have OCD I would try not to worry to much :)

 

I do have mild OCD but it's more the case of wondering if there's something I haven't set right which would make everything run much better. Obviously annoying if you put up with something for ages and then find out you didn't need to if only you'd changed a couple of settings ;)

 

I think it's partly having the other helos in view but even as I pan left or right before they come into view it drops a chunk, then another few when they are in view, so perhaps it's more that the horizon is being rendered further than when looking ahead which is causing the drops.

 

Haven't even tried multiplayer yet. Got to learn to fly this thing first!

 

I tried Attack Insurgents and that was around 38 FPS, so it seems like it will be OK in combat. Then I tried 4xAA, HDR - Normal, Shadows - High (someone suggested High might even work better than Low) on Mozdok and after the helo to my right had taken off, I got (ahead-left-right) 38-21-31, so those settings seem a bit high for my system as before I got 60-40-46 in the same situation (or 53-29-42 if we compare to the third test instead of the fourth, perhaps there was a helo nearby I didn't notice).

[doveman]

I ran the test on Mozdok again, this time monitoring the CPU/GPU usage and found:

 

GPU 88%

CPU: 51%

core1 44.5%

core2 65%

core3 67%

core4 99%

 

So it seems that both the GPU and CPU could be better utilised.

 

I also did a shorter test (just looking left and right at the start) with HDR off and got 43-30-35, so changing AA from none to 4x and Shadows from Low to High hasn't made things worse (at that location anyway). For this test I also tried setting ["lights"] = 1 in options.lua as suggested by diveplane here as I thought that might have something to do with the drops when looking at the other helos but that didn't make any difference so I'll put that back to 2.

 

With those settings usage was:

 

GPU 73.9%

CPU: 46.6%

core1 61.3%

core2 63%

core3 40.6%

core4 87.1%

 

So it seems the drops aren't being caused by either the GPU or CPU being insufficient.

[diveplane]

I think I've finally got it working reasonably well :yay:

I'm not sure just yet exactly what did it as I moved the installation to a different HDD but also did a fresh install of the KA-50 module in case any of the mods I'd installed were causing problems and used Gamebooster to kill a load of stuff before loading DCS. I actually had DCS and a few other games on their own separate drive and now they're on a partition on my drive which contains Windows, the pagefile, etc but maybe the other drive was that much slower (it's connected by eSATA at the moment but that should be as fast as a SATA connection as far as I know). I'll test by copying the installation back to the other drive and see what happens.

 

I did try BS2 in XP but I couldn't even get it to finish loading and it kept getting stuck saying please wait, forcing me to hard reset (until I changed it to run windowed, it still wouldn't load but at least I could kill it), so I don't have any comparisons from that. I tried it in Win7 though (obviously it installed the x86 version under XP) and it loaded OK but still stuttered badly, even though the Scenes and Textures options maximum is Medium, compared to High in DCS World. I haven't tried running that from my main HDD yet though as I haven't got space to copy it but I can probably find some stuff to delete and try it.

 

Anyway, whilst the stuttering is almost eliminated, it still occurs in at least one situation, which is at the start of cold start in Mozdok, rotating the view with Num4/Num6 from straight ahead to left or right. It's strange as it seems to happen the first time I do it, then it will be OK if I repeat but then some time later after leaving it looking ahead I'll try again and it will stutter again, even though nothing's changed to my left (just the same helos sitting still next to me). It did stutter once when I was divebombing another helo but mostly flying around it's fine, which is great after all the trouble I've had.

 

I still have an issue with FPS drops though, which is related to having other craft in my view. I did some tests in Cold start in Mozdok as follows, rotating the view from straight ahead to my left (where there's several stationary helos) or right (where there's one, which powers up and taxis past me). The first three tests were done without my helo powered up at all.

 

Start: 45 FPS, look left 30 FPS, look right 35 FPS

 

Helo to right starts engines: 41 FPS, look left 26 FPS, look right 31 FPS

 

Helo to right taxied to far left of runway, 53 FPS, look left 29 FPS, look right 42 FPS

 

My Helo ready: 45 FPS (with other helos passing in front 39 FPS), left 24 FPS, right (no helos in view) 43 FPS

 

No moving aircraft nearby or on runway (daylight fading) 60 FPS, left 40 FPS, right 46 FPS

 

As you can see, there's some quite substantial drops when I have other aircraft in my view, even if they're stationary and not powered up, which seems strange. I even thought it might be the labels that were the problem, so tried with them off but that didn't make much (if any) difference. The daylight was fading throughout the tests, which might have made a bit of difference.

 

From the second result, it seems just having another aircraft powerup near me drops the FPS a bit, which I suppose makes sense as the CPU has to start calculating information for that.

 

Once I took off and flew away from the airfield and other helos, I was getting anywhere from 45-70 FPS and when I flew back and got close to the airfield, it dropped down to around 35 FPS again.

 

I've still got the options on fairly low (no AA or HDR, low shadows) so I'm not sure if my results are reasonable for my system. It would be great if some other people could try Cold start in Mozdok and see if they get the same large drops when looking left or right at the start though and what sort of FPS they get, including their GPU/CPU details and graphics settings.

 

I don't think I've changed my settings from before but I can't upload my current options.lua as it says I've already uploaded that file, so I'll just post the graphic settings section:

 

        ["multiMonitorSetup"] = "1camera",
       ["color"] = "32",
       ["preloadRadius"] = 150000,
       ["heatBlr"] = 0,
       ["scenes"] = "high",
       ["water"] = 1,
       ["fullScreen"] = true,
       ["disableAero"] = false,
       ["visibRange"] = "High",
       ["treesVisibility"] = 6000,
       ["aspect"] = 1.6,
       ["haze"] = 1,
       ["HDR"] = 0,
       ["TranspSSAA"] = false,
       ["textures"] = 2,
       ["cockpitShadows"] = false,
       ["shadows"] = 0,
       ["effects"] = 3,
       ["MSAA"] = 0,
       ["height"] = 1200,
       ["sync"] = false,
       ["shadowTree"] = false,
       ["civTraffic"] = "",
       ["width"] = 1920,
       ["clutterMaxDistance"] = 0,
       ["lights"] = 2,

 

setting lights to 1 will boost frame rates up , but youll loose visuals on light beams.

[doveman]

setting lights to 1 will boost frame rates up , but youll loose visuals on light beams.

 

I thought it would in Mozdok as there's a few lights there but in my test it didn't make any difference. Maybe it does somewhere else.

[doveman]

Well I tried copying the clean DCS install back to the eSATA drive and running from that I got the stutters again, so it's clearly the drive rather than any mods/settings I was using previously.

 

As you can see from the attached screenshots, the 500GB eSATA drive is quite a bit slower than the 2TB one, so perhaps it just can't provide the data fast enough for DCS. I'm somewhat surprised as I think ArmaIIOA is supposed to be quite demanding in terms of streaming data and that works fine from this drive but perhaps it's not quite as demanding as DCS.

 

 

 

I don't think the dips mean much as they're probably caused by Windows accessing the drive, particularly for the 2GB as Windows and the pagefile are on it.

 

I think what I'll try next is running Windows from the 500GB HDD (I've already got a spare partition at the start I can use for this) and run DCS from the 2TB to see if that helps get rid of the remaining few stutters, which may be due to Windows/pagefile accessing the drive.

 

Then I'll start saving for that SSD (just heard prices are coming down 25%, so that'll help!)

[159th_Falcon]

Well, i got another suggestion to try and eliminate the stutters.

Settle for an overall lower but stable framerate.

 

Because the framerate dropping from lets say 55 to 40 fps may seem as a stutter.

 

Given all the details you provided i think your system should be able to run whit 30 fps 90% of the time.

 

So, here's how to enforce a maximum fps of 30 in DCS.

Navigate to your root DCS folder

Config folder

open graphics.cfg

 

Look for the line "MaxFPS = 120;" and change the value to 30.

 

This will cause the game to run at no more then 30 fps, but at least it will be running there comfortably and without stutters most of the time.

(feel free to experiment whit higher/lower fps settings ofcourse)

 

Next thing to do is leave the fps counter off and enjoy the sim instead.

 

~S~

[doveman]

Well, i got another suggestion to try and eliminate the stutters.

Settle for an overall lower but stable framerate.

 

Because the framerate dropping from lets say 55 to 40 fps may seem as a stutter.

 

Given all the details you provided i think your system should be able to run whit 30 fps 90% of the time.

 

So, here's how to enforce a maximum fps of 30 in DCS.

Navigate to your root DCS folder

Config folder

open graphics.cfg

 

Look for the line "MaxFPS = 120;" and change the value to 30.

 

This will cause the game to run at no more then 30 fps, but at least it will be running there comfortably and without stutters most of the time.

(feel free to experiment whit higher/lower fps settings ofcourse)

 

Next thing to do is leave the fps counter off and enjoy the sim instead.

 

~S~

 

It's definitely stutter as the whole thing freezes momentarily and would be noticeable even without a FPS counter, although thankfully it happens rarely when running from the 2TB drive.

 

Thanks for the suggestion about limiting to 30FPS. I was thinking of doing that anyway but perhaps using softTH instead as I think I read that works better somehow (perhaps something to do with Vsync not working properly with MaxFPS?) and I'm planning to use it to put Helios on my other monitor anyway. I'd use RadeonPro, which can also force triple buffering (I think softTH might be able to do this too) but that isn't compatible with 64-bit games yet.

[OttoPus]

No matters what graphics settings and tweaks, campaign missions are stutter generators.

 

We should work hard trying to figure out what is causing this in first instance, (I suspect that without access to source code, it's simply not possible)

[159th_Falcon]

No matters what graphics settings and tweaks, campaign missions are stutter generators.

 

We should work hard trying to figure out what is causing this in first instance, (I suspect that without access to source code, it's simply not possible)

It is because DCS is one of few games that really tests your system, as a whole.

Not just the graphics card by using some fancy blinb bling generators.

 

Something that makes it even worse is that a lot of people use additonal stuff whit DCS that they don't use whit other games.

TeamSpeak

Multiple External controllers

Helios

TrackIR

and who knows what else.

 

@ doveman, im afraid the max fps setting won't be that beneficial to you then, but maybe it helps someone else.

[doveman]

It is because DCS is one of few games that really tests your system, as a whole.

Not just the graphics card by using some fancy blinb bling generators.

 

Something that makes it even worse is that a lot of people use additonal stuff whit DCS that they don't use whit other games.

TeamSpeak

Multiple External controllers

Helios

TrackIR

and who knows what else.

 

@ doveman, im afraid the max fps setting won't be that beneficial to you then, but maybe it helps someone else.

 

No, I think just eliminating the ups and downs by limiting it to 30 FPS will help make things smoother, even if I still get the occassional stutter. That's the impression I got from reading some threads about doing this anyway.

 

As for stressing the system, as you can see from the results I posted earlier, even with HDR on, the GPU only hit 88% and the CPU 51% (only core4 was fully loaded at 99%), so it seems there's a fair bit of optimisation that needs to be done to use all cores properly at least, particularly as a lot of slowdown appears to be caused by calculating non-graphical data for other nearby helos, which is obviously done by the CPU.

[159th_Falcon]

As for stressing the system, as you can see from the results I posted earlier, even with HDR on, the GPU only hit 88% and the CPU 51% (only core4 was fully loaded at 99%), so it seems there's a fair bit of optimisation that needs to be done to use all cores properly at least, particularly as a lot of slowdown appears to be caused by calculating non-graphical data for other nearby helos, which is obviously done by the CPU.

Then i got good news for you. Assuming it is new to you since you joined the forum july this year.

 

ED is working on multicore support and the sound engine is already running in its own thread.

 

Its no easy task though and we won't have all our cores maxed out for a good while to come.

(hopefully they surprise us in this regard whit FC3, missile AFM in separate core maybe???)

[doveman]

Then i got good news for you. Assuming it is new to you since you joined the forum july this year.

 

ED is working on multicore support and the sound engine is already running in its own thread.

 

Its no easy task though and we won't have all our cores maxed out for a good while to come.

(hopefully they surprise us in this regard whit FC3, missile AFM in separate core maybe???)

 

That is encouraging news. I look forward to that :)

 

I found the thread I was thinking about regarding MaxFPS and SoftTH http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1397655&postcount=21

 

Looking at the first few posts in that thread, it seems we need to use MaxFPS=29 rather than 30 as DCS starts counting at 0, unless they've changed that recently as that's thread's about a year old and about DCS:A-10C.

[OttoPus]

Even in the middle of the battlefield (with explosions, smoke particles, water, avionics, shadows, moving objects, etc etc), the GPU is way below its full potential [data taken with GPU-Z during a campaign mission]:

 

        Date        , GPU Core Clock [MHz] , GPU Memory Clock [MHz] , GPU Temperature [°C] , Fan Speed (%) [%] , Fan Speed (RPM) [RPM] , Memory Used [MB] , GPU Load [%] , Memory Controller Load [%] , Video Engine Load [%] , Power Consumption [% TDP] , VDDC [V] ,
2012-09-11 15:21:01 ,             1110.5   ,               1502.3   ,               47.0   ,              41   ,                1320   ,           1298   ,         44   ,                       17   ,                   0   ,                    65.7   , 1.1750   ,

 

44% was the higher value recorded.

 

So, there is a lot of optimization needed in the GPU side too.

[doveman]

I tested the 500GB HDD on SATA rather than e-SATA and was surprised to see the Burst Rate was a lot higher.

 

 

However, I also checked the SMART data and found it's been having UDMA CRC Errors, which it suggests may be caused by a damaged cable.

 

 

I actually noticed this when it was on e-SATA and it was on 739 then, so the increase to 767 and then 773 has been since it's been connected by SATA, by a different cable obviously so I doubt the problem is actually a damaged cable. It may be that the two usb leads powering it aren't quite enough, although if that was the case I'd expect far more problems and not be able to run Windows or DCS from it.

 

Mind you, I just tried running DCS from it once more and my PC BSOD! Might have been a coincidence but I'll disconnect it for now until I can find the PSU for it and stick to running with just the 2TB.

[doveman]

Hmm, now DCS keeps crashing :mad:

 

I've been able to actually fly without any problems, it's just after exiting back to the menu (or when it closes before launching KA-50) I get an error message that DCS has crashed and clicking that tends to get me back in, only for it to crash for a second and final time when I click on Next or whatever the button is.

 

Then, as I was typing this it seems the GPU driver or Aero crashed as the taskbar lost transparency and checking showed that it had switched to Basic Colour and said there was problems with Aero/Transparency (although the troubleshooter couldn't identify what the problem might be). It fixed itself after about 30s though. I'm not sure that was a GPU driver crash as I think CCC generates a message to tell you when that's happened.

 

I haven't a clue why it's started doing this. All I've done is disconnect the other HDD and until that one BSOD I got just before doing that, I've been running DCS from either drive all day without any problems. I don't think I've installed anything significant in the last 24 hours. I edited the registry keys for DCS to make sure they're pointing to the current path (although it didn't seem to take much notice of them when I had it installed on two drives and I could run one or the other without changing the registry paths) and it's a Vanilla installation (I had edited options.lua just to add a custom res, but I've restored the backup of that already). I've even dialled the CPU overclock back a notch, although it's been stable for ages and the GPU's at stock clocks.

 

Just as I thought I had it sorted as well :joystick: I guess there's nothing to lose by uninstalling and reinstalling, as I haven't really changed anything yet (I'll make a note of my settings before deleting the user files). I'll try without GameBooster as well, just in case that's shutting down something DCS needs (although I've been using it all this time and haven't changed what it's set to kill.

 

Looking through the Event log, it seems there were a couple of crashes of the ATI Fuel service in hour before DCS crashed

 

Faulting application name: Fuel.Service.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x4f7e4d8c
Faulting module name: Device.dll, version: 4.1.0.0, time stamp: 0x4f55e10b
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x00000000000033c1
Faulting process id: 0x640
Faulting application start time: 0x01cd907d49eb34be
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files\ATI Technologies\ATI.ACE\Fuel\Fuel.Service.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Program Files\ATI Technologies\ATI.ACE\Fuel\Device.dll
Report Id: 96928874-fc70-11e1-b854-8c89a563ffda

 

and then DCS itself

 

Faulting application name: dcs.exe, version: 1.2.0.3205, time stamp: 0x4ff3450d
Faulting module name: atiumd64.dll, version: 7.14.10.903, time stamp: 0x4f7e458c
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x000000000049e1ff
Faulting process id: 0xe60
Faulting application start time: 0x01cd9080c43d1a0e
Faulting application path: D:\Games\DCS World2\bin\dcs.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\system32\atiumd64.dll
Report Id: 06c09d41-fc74-11e1-a9c6-8c89a563ffda

[doveman]

Turns out one of my 4GB Corsair Vengeance sticks has just died suddenly, which was causing the crashes and BSOD. Individually tested, one stick passes memtest and the other throws up errors immediately.

[airea]

I have a fairly decent system, which was able to run DCS A-10 with very good frame rates at 3840*1440 resolution on two monitors.

 

I haven't played A-10 for some months and I have uninstalled everything related to ED and reinstalled DCS World along with P-51. Now, even I try to run the game with 1280 resoultion, it is like a slide show no matter what I do.

 

My system is as follow:

 

Intel i7 2600k processor (no OC).

MSI gtx 580 video card

8 gb Ram

128 gb SSD disk (game and windows running on the SSD)

Win 7

TM Warthog

MS Sidewinder FF stick

 

What can be the problem ad the solution? Any ideas?

[AtaliaA1]

Interesting

 

I have a fairly decent system, which was able to run DCS A-10 with very good frame rates at 3840*1440 resolution on two monitors.

 

I haven't played A-10 for some months and I have uninstalled everything related to ED and reinstalled DCS World along with P-51. Now, even I try to run the game with 1280 resoultion, it is like a slide show no matter what I do.

 

My system is as follow:

 

Intel i7 2600k processor (no OC).

MSI gtx 580 video card

8 gb Ram

128 gb SSD disk (game and windows running on the SSD)

 

 

 

Wow now that says alot for the issues that DCS World is having.

 

Install the 1.1 ver of A-10, the 1.2 ver is for DCS World and it is having issues at the moment.

 

You have only the SSD? no other HDD in your system?

[airea]

I have 4 HDD's on my system (other than the SSD) but I only use them as storages.

No game is installed on any of the HDDs.

[GriffonBR]

Guys, don´t loose your temper because of DCS World.

 

DCS World is the problem. Today I made a fresh installation, I made the tweaks that Devastator gave in this topic once again, and at the first moment, the game worked perfect with 60 FPS (Ground Attack mission with Su25T).

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=94178

 

At the Dogfight mission, the FPS drops to 25/30:mad:

 

Before anyone starts to telling something about my rig, this is my configuration at the moment.

i5 2500k @ 4.3ghz

8GB Vengeance 1600Mhz

500 GB Western Digital Blue only for OS.

500 GB Western Digital Blue dedicated only for games. DCS World, FC2 and a lot of other games inside.

MSI GTX 660 Ti Power Edition OC.

OCZ Modxstream 700w

Dell S2230MX monitor

More than enough to play this game, huh?

 

So guys, no matter what we do and no matter how many SSD you have in your computer, it´s not our configuration, it´s something in DCS World.

 

That´s sad, I´ll not be able to play Flaming Cliffs 3. I refuse to invest a penny in this problematic engine.

Edited September 20, 2012 by GriffonBR

[macedk]

Guys, don´t loose your temper because of DCS World.

 

DCS World is the problem. Today I made a fresh installation, I made the tweaks that Devastator gave in this topic once again, and at the first moment, the game worked perfect with 60 FPS (Ground Attack mission with Su25T).

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=94178

 

At the Dogfight mission, the FPS drops to 25/30:mad:

 

Before anyone starts to telling something about my rig, this is my configuration at the moment.

i5 2500k @ 4.3ghz

8GB Vengeance 1600Mhz

500 GB Western Digital Blue only for OS.

500 GB Western Digital Blue dedicated only for games. DCS World, FC2 and a lot of other games inside.

MSI GTX 660 Ti Power Edition OC.

OCZ Modxstream 700w

Dell S2230MX monitor

More than enough to play this game, huh?

 

So guys, no matter what we do and no matter how many SSD you have in your computer, it´s not our configuration, it´s something in DCS World.

 

That´s sad, I´ll not be able to play Flaming Cliffs 3. I refuse to invest a penny in this problematic engine.

 

Looks like you have a point but just for the fun of it, try with your cpu at standard clock please

[TZeer]

Check out this thread.

 

Will probably solve some of your issue. Made my game a lot more enjoyable.

 

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=91184

[GriffonBR]

Thanks you guys. I´ll test both options. I'll try first the TZeer´s tip, sounds more promissing.

 

:thumbup:

[GriffonBR]

Well, guys, I´ve tryed every single tips that you gave to me, nothing worked. DCS World have a lot of issues and some people here prefers to suck ED Balls saying that my system is the problem.

 

Sometimes I got 60 FPS and some times, in the same mission, after a refly or even after a reboot the FPS drops to 25-30, and I gonna to say again, ONLY WITH DCS WORLD. Flaming Cliffs 2 with a lot of mods runs beautiful at high settings with locked 60 FPS´s.

 

I´m giving up about DCS World and unfortunately my hope to play Flaming Cliffs 3 is gone, unless ED starts to pay more attention to your customers.

 

Thanks one more time for the help, guys. I´ll stick with Flaming Cliffs 2.

[doveman]

Well, guys, I´ve tryed every single tips that you gave to me, nothing worked. DCS World have a lot of issues and some people here prefers to suck ED Balls saying that my system is the problem.

 

Sometimes I got 60 FPS and some times, in the same mission, after a refly or even after a reboot the FPS drops to 25-30, and I gonna to say again, ONLY WITH DCS WORLD. Flaming Cliffs 2 with a lot of mods runs beautiful at high settings with locked 60 FPS´s.

 

I´m giving up about DCS World and unfortunately my hope to play Flaming Cliffs 3 is gone, unless ED starts to pay more attention to your customers.

 

Thanks one more time for the help, guys. I´ll stick with Flaming Cliffs 2.

 

I feel your pain bro. Unfortunately it's the same with my other favorite game, ArmAIIOA. On some terrains I can stay in the 70FPS+ range whilst on others (Bystirica for instance) it drops to 28 FPS when I zoom in and this is with no AI, just me in the editor! I've taken to locking it to 30 FPS now, as even on Utes it ranges from 40-80 FPS, so I can't sync it at 60 FPS.

 

I've got DCS BS2 locked to 30 FPS now as well, for the same reason.