Hippo

For the slowdown that seems to happen with AI objects present, it does seem unlikely. Perhaps someone could ask Kate Perederko to comment on this specifically? It's precisely what I'm talking about, when I refer to my "empty world" f-18 mission. I disagree that it's inevitable - the possible leveraging of new hardware features can often allow better graphics at similar or better performance. I reckon there's been a decrease in performance of approx 10% - 20% because of these improvements. It's been "hidden" because of the disastrous AI object frame rate drops. But, in VR, where every bit of performance counts, it is not insignificant. From the quote above, it seems that we're going to have to live with it. Quite clearly, I disagree with this statement, and I back it up with the screenshots I have posted. I'll wait for you to do the same, before I take your statement seriously.

Performance notes 2.5.6.47224 Please see for reference: https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=4221938&postcount=73 https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=4270912&postcount=324 As others have observed, I also see serious issues in the ka-50 insurgents mission. I just flew on initial heading until I got shot at by ground forces. I was getting around 5 fps. Something is very wrong. Curiously, it was ok for the first few seconds in the mission, but after that the performance tanked. For my usual empty world f-18 mission, performance is worse than 2.5.5 but shows a sliver of an improvement over the previous 2.5.6. This can be seen in that ASW doesn't kick in until later. I'll just add the following: Finally! How refreshingly honest. So that's that. Fair enough. It's exasperating that this wasn't just stated in the first place from day 1. From my personal view, the water improvements I could live without if it meant a few more frames in VR. Could this not be offered as an option?

I was trying to help you, as it appears your system is not being used to best effect. Ideally, you want to have CPU AND GPU running close to but never quite reaching 100%. Whether you tweak your settings so that his happens at 40 / 80 fps is down to your personal preference of graphic quality vs frame rate. For 80 fps very low settings are necessary, unfortunately, and even then it's almost impossible. With DCS it appears that just one of the cores does almost all of the work. This core can be the limiting factor (if the GPU isn't). In practice, what the other cores are doing doesn't really matter. I would not recommend turning off ASW (unless you're testing). Constantly fluctuating frame rates are very uncomfortable. What sort of frame rate were you getting along with what you describe? I wouldn't know what helps the developers, but I would suggest that stating what sort of mission you were running, your DCS settings, screenshot(s) of your results, and your system specs could be useful. BTW, it's just occurred to me that with 2.5.6 and a mission with lots of other (AI? static?) objects, you will get issues with DCS performing very poorly - if this is what you're experiencing, then, yes, there does seem to be a major issue with 2.5.6. I've stopped bothering with those sorts of missions on 2.5.6, as something is clearly broken. What I stated above appears to be valid as long as you are running a mission with very little going on. https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=4237111&postcount=2

ASW? CPU - what are the individual cores doing? Sorry if I'm telling you what you already know, but it's impossible to ascertain someone's level of knowledge. Check the screenshot on my post: https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=4270912&postcount=324 With VR, and my Rift-S, I'm only going to run at 80 fps OR 40 fps (ASW). This means that I will get the corresponding % util according to those frame rates. See how my GPU util is initially just below 100% when I run at 80fps, and dips to around 60% intermittently, then stays there as I get closer to the aerodrome and the GPU needs to work harder (ASW kicks in and 40fps)? Also, see how it's CPU core 12 that I've selected to monitor? It's that core that does most of the work. You need to look at individiual cores and not overall CPU util, which will be an average. It could be that one of your cores is running high and that's the bottleneck. What's probably happening in your case, is that ASW is limiting your fps to 40, where your system would be capable of managing more. Your system doesn't require very high CPU/GPU util to maintain 40 fps, but cannot manage the performance to maintain 80 fps, so is capped by ASW to 40. Upshot: if EITHER the CPU (a specific core) or GPU approach 100% util (at 80 fps), ASW kicks in and util will drop by around 50%. (I use fps/ ASW as examples for my HMD - Rift S, they'll most likely be different if you're using another).

I personally can't believe that people say that for them DCS requires 12GB, but that 16GB isn't enough and they need 32GB instead. I've been running VR with 16GB for ages and have had no issues whatsoever (wrt memory).

I'll look into it next time. I'm not using DCS under Steam. EDIT - it seems to only work with SteamVR, is that right? You are taking this discussion way off the point, btw. Are you saying that you see no difference when you use the mod? Perhaps you could point me to the results you have posted which demonstrate this?

Fine. There is only so much effort each of us is willing to put in as unpaid beta testers for ED. You can see from my screenshot that the GPU util is indisputably, measurably lower with the mod (around 20% -i.e. from around 90% to 72% at the start of the mission). Not perfect, but surely of more use than all the "it looks smoother to me" posts. P.S. If when I was able get an fps difference measurement in the recent past it equated to a certain GPU util difference, it is not unreasonable to assume a similar relationship today.

It used to be easier (hi again! :) ) I have to estimate it now (and as per your post - it is in practice indicative) using a mixture of: past experience, the frame rate count at the main menu before putting on the HMD, the measurable increase in GPU% util, turning off ASW w/ OTT. EDIT: I suppose I could say I get 40 fps in 2.5.6, and 80 fps in 2.5.6 w/ the mod, so 100% fps increase, but that would be naughty.

It's not a magic bullet, and it does introduce a number of glitches, certain effects don't look as good. It depends on what's most important to you. If it's high frame rates with AA, then it is very useful. I find I can get a 25% fps improvement, and it's not because I have a "low end system". As per Oculus's recommendations, games should be running (Rift S) at 80 fps for the optimal VR experience. ASW and 40 fps is a workaround and compromise. Yet I see many on here stating that they're very happy with the beautiful high graphics settings and getting 20 or 30 fps. As I say, it depends on personal taste (or more cynically, an ability for self-delusion). At the very least, I always try to achieve 80 fps when it's just my aircraft and nothing else, and accept that ASW will kick in when things get busier. Frame rates below 40 are unacceptable. Although ASW does a remarkable job, the artefacts introduced by it can at times be quite distracting. As to AA. I'm quite impressed that with it turned off things don't look as bad as they used to. Unfortunately, the jaggies from scenery objects like runways or buildings look dreadful. The cockpit surprisingly almost always looks acceptably good without AA - until you get shiny edges, when the shimmering jaggies look atrocious - this I just can't accept. Is there no way to (optionally) dial these effects down for the benefit of VR users? I suspect that it's the feature that applies AA to only a central portion of the screen that is responsible for most of the improvement from this mod (perhaps that alone could be implemented as an option by ED?) Before ED made the change to deferred rendering in the engine I could easily achieve 120 fps (equivalent) with similar settings on a 1070 and CV1. That change cut my frame rates in half. Decades (yes really) of my being an enthusiastic supporter of ED were flushed down the toilet when they took that decision. Since then, every engine improvement takes its toll. 2.5.5 - 2.5.6 has seen a decrease of 15 - 25 % (for me personally). ED have lost $100s of my custom since the DR change. I had in the past purchased aircraft that I have hardly flown, just to support them. If they want another penny from me, they are going to have improve the VR (w/ AA) fps considerably. P.S. Seriously, forget about a PD of 1.6. Try 1.2. P.P.S. Night is noticeably improved in 2.5.6. Night before the deferred rendering change was terrible (unusable). That's to be welcomed. All imho, of course.

Another suggestion to get some more fps is Kegetys's mod: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=215373 It does introduce some glitches, but can make a considerable difference. I had always used it since he released it, but hadn't been using it for the past few months because I've mostly been flying very simple missions, and was scraping by. It also involves a minor bit of installation effort, and it has to be reapplied for every update. Anyway, just applied it again, and tested. For me it means that for the test I described in my previous post, I can stay at 80 fps for the entire flight. Notice how GPU % always stays below (but close to) 100%, so ASW never needs to kick in.

Great advice already given. I'll just add: Set textures to High. Medium make the cockpit look terrible. Shadows are expensive. Try turning them off and see if you can live without them. When benchmarking CPU always look at the individual cores. There should be one that does most of the work. Maybe take a look at my post here (and the link within) and try to replicate what I do and see if you get similar results. I don't know how close a 2070 is to a 1080 ti, but I'm guessing pretty close. If the results are very different, then there might be an issue. Note what I'm doing with the nvidia settings - someone recommended this to me on here - it improves AA at less cost that going 4x in DCS. I use a PD of 1.2. Set it in DCS, and (at least for testing) don't use OTT at all. Unfortunately, getting decent frame rates in VR is getting harder and harder with each DCS main engine update. You should be able to get 40 fps easily, but settings have to be set fairly low.

It's not a bug, it's a feature. (Possibly.)

Indeed. Thanks for reply. What sort of performance can you get on the Rift S? I own the other civil aviation product - their VR implementation leaves a lot to be desired, although I can manage 40 (ASW) / 80 keeping settings very low + decent AA (which I really can't do without).

I don't own that particular product myself but would be interested to know what sort of fps gains people are seeing, expressed as a percentage.

Sorry to presume, but I assume he means the Restore button. If so, it would be useful to know which parameters were not set to defaults. Either that, or when reinstalling / updating drivers, you get an (from memory) express or custom option. The custom option option allows you to return all settings to defaults, again iirc. I haven't used the custom option for years, and always use express - I've never had an issue. Certainly worth a try if you're having serious performance issues. But also worth asking the OP, is there now any difference between 2.5.5 and 2.5.6 performance. Was there previously? In my case, I have both 2.5.5 and 2.5.6 on my PC and can switch between them in seconds for testing, I get around 15% performance loss going to 2.5.6. On missions with lots of AI / statics, the performance drop can be severe (~80%) - the only change made is the DCS version.

2.5.6.45915 performance remains worse than 2.5.5 Cf. https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=4221938&postcount=73 I estimate that the GPU is having to do around 15% more work. The difference in FPS on the main menu screen is around 20%. N.B. This is in a mission with no other AI or static objects. I've given up on testing with those, as there is a clear issue there.

That's also what I do. But there's an unused analogue wheel on my throttle that I would much prefer to use for this. There isn't actually a problem here. This is a wish list forum, and the request is for a feature that should've been in place from day one, and which would be easy to implement. Easier and much more useful than putting in a fruit machine for 1st April.

To OP. You should find this is now ok with the latest update. DCS 2.5.6.45317 Open Beta Refer to end of change log: https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=4251208&postcount=91

I don't even have shadows turned on. In my experience, it's always been a considerable performance hit. My aim for VR is 80 fps, with MSAA, with not much going on. This is almost impossible anyway - but it means I have to turn almost everything else off. The 2.5.6 updates have made it even harder - I now have to lose MSAA for equivalent performance. For missions with the AI issue - forget it!

Sorry, yes I did get that, but couldn't resist twisting your words to make my point. ;) I actually flew the Familiarisation F-18 mission last night, and was able to fly it without issue. With my (very) low settings I was able to start up, taxi and takeoff. Frame rates were mostly 40 fps (ASW), with some dips to 25 fps - not ideal but perfectly usable. I was down to a constant 5 fps (totally unusable) with the previous version. For reference, once away from Nelllis, it's 80 fps throughout.

I'm not sure how simple it was for poor old Maple Flag to have rework, test, etc many of their campaigns. Hopefully, it wasn't too much of an effort. Still, the simple fact that the effort was made suggests that this puppy's going into stable with whatever the issue is.

I was having serious issues with missions in the F-18 Aggressors campaign. This has thankfully now been fixed: But, and it's a huge but, it appears to have been fixed by having to make considerable changes to all of the missions. Thoughts / inferences: Would they really have gone to all this trouble, if it was an engine issue which was going to be fixed imminently? The previous versions of the missions would still tank the frame rate (I tried to test this but those missions wouldn't run for me in the new version). This latest version of the engine will be going to stable, and many missions, etc, will have to be reworked to avoid the issue, whatever it is. It really would help if ED would just explain what's going on. I reckon something's inadvertently been broken and only been discovered at a very late stage. Now it's so much effort to go back and lose all the work, and they're trying to kludge it. Very, very concerning.

I only did a very quick test - jump in and out of the first (fam flight) mission. Sitting in the cockpit, there were no longer frame rate issues. I was down to 5 fps previously, now mostly 40, with some ASW dips to 25 (VR - Rift S). EDIT: Flew the entire FAM flight mission last night. I was able to fly the entire mission without issue.

:) May I humbly suggest, Sir, that you might be taking things a bit too seriously?