D.Va

As other have pointed out, you don’t need more than, like, 6GB RAM for any video game and 8GB RAM is more than enough.

I haven't experimented with anti-aliasing outside of DCS, because as someone else mentioned, it currently anti-aliases the entire user interface, including text, as well. I use MSI Afterburner (works with any graphics card) to monitor my CPU and GPU usage and temperatures, as well as my RAM and VRAM, and with the RivaTuner Statistics Server add-on (which used to be a part of Afterburner, but I’ve had to download it individually recently) you can universally limit your framerate to 60 FPS in all games, which kills screen tearing.

A few more notes: I might also write a computer guide, since a lot of people are upgrading for DCS 2.5. As I probably mentioned, I benchmarked in the Warthog over Vegas, which I believe to be the most graphically challenging place in DCS 2.5. However, my runs probably didn't adequately benchmark all options, such as Water, which was never on-screen, and I will have to make more benchmarks with action and benchmarks in Caucasus and Normandy. I will have more time to test over the coming months; however, I'm not in any immediate hurry. DCS 2.5. is here to stay! Civ. Traffic: I've never had any performance problems with this at maximum. Water: probably not adequately benchmarked. Heat Blur: also probably not adequately benchmarked. Res. of Cockpit Displays: I've never had any performance problems with this. Lens DIRT+FLARE: isn't this an overlay that shouldn't affect performance at all? Deferred shading sucks performance, but for 2.5.0 I recommend keeping it ON in all circumstances until the vegetation is fixed when it is OFF. Vsync: in most games, Vsync locks your maximum framerate to 60 FPS, but a few (including DCS) will also limit it to 30 FPS, if your framerate falls under 60 FPS. That's why it should always be OFF in DCS. Did you try turning the Maverick off and on again?

Update 09-02-2018: I’ve completely re-written the entire guide! My guide is designed to be as aerodynamic as possible, omitting details. Also check out other guides: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=202092 (Sideslip's guide for 4K users, with a lot of screenshots and details) https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=200906 (Snacko's guide, with tweaks outside of DCS that may or may not work according to specification) https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=201196 (anti-aliasing guide by Repsol2k) Hey, DCS 2.5 is here and here’s my DCS 2.5 Optimisation Guide to go with it! My 5-year-old computer with a 1060 graphics card runs DCS 2.5 with almost all options at maximum while maintaining an absolute minimum 30 FPS. The aim with this guide is to give you a choice of 100%, 60%, 40%, or 20% performance, which corresponds to 150 FPS, 90 FPS, 60 FPS, or 30 FPS on my own 1920x1200 machine (a 10% margin in 1920x1080). I fly the Warthog over Vegas in my performance benchmarks as I believe it is one of the most graphically cumbersome scenarios in DCS. I’ve optimised all options and created four presets. Simply set all options to the Minimum preset first and upgrade to the Low, Medium, or High preset, depending on what performance you want. Download this guide as a PDF here: https://ufile.io/7r3ot Minimum preset: (100% performance: 167 FPS in 1920x1080, 150 FPS in 1920x1020) Textures HIGH Terrain Textures HIGH Civ. Traffic LOW Water LOW Visib. Range LOW Heat Blur OFF Shadows OFF Resolution PERSONAL PREFERENCE Aspect Ratio PERSONAL PREFERENCE Monitors PERSONAL PREFERENCE Res. of Cockpit Displays 1024 EVERY FRAME MSAA OFF Depth of Field OFF Lens Effects DIRT HDR OFF Deferred Shading ON Clutter/Grass 750 Trees Visibility 100% Preload Radius 100 Chimney Smoke Density PERSONAL PREFERENCE (Recommended: 0) Gamma PERSONAL PREFERENCE (Recommended: 2) Anisotropic Filtering OFF Terrain Object Shadows OFF Global Cockpit Illumination OFF Disable Aero Interface PERSONAL PREFERENCE (Recommended: OFF) Vsync OFF Full Screen ON Scale GUI PERSONAL PREFERENCE (Recommended: OFF) Low Preset: (60% performance: 100 FPS in 1920x1080, 90 FPS in 1920x1020) Minimum preset with the following changes: Civ. Traffic HIGH Heat Blur HIGH Shadows FLAT ONLY Lens Effects DIRT+FLARE Clutter/Grass 1500 Anisotropic Filtering X2 Terrain Object Shadows FLAT Medium preset: (40% performance: 67 FPS in 1920x1080, 60 FPS in 1920x1020) Minimum preset with the following changes: Water HIGH Visib. Range HIGH Shadows HIGH High preset: (27% performance: 44 FPS in 1920x1080, 40 FPS in 1920x1020) Minimum preset with the following changes: Water HIGH Visib. Range EXTREME Shadows HIGH MSAA X8 Anisotropic Filtering X4 Customisation Guide (for advanced players): A few points: The same ideas should apply to 4K/VR users in general, but 4K users won't want excessive anti-aliasing and VR users will want higher framerates. Players with a 1050, 960, 770, or equivalent cards with only 2GB VRAM may run out of VRAM in 1920x1020, which is something I've had difficulties benchmarking, but Textures, Terrain Textures, MSAA, Shadows, and Visib. Range are the options that you can probably decrease to minimize VRAM usage. I'm playing with 3GB VRAM and it works perfectly fine with 1.8-2.8GB VRAM depending on options. I haven't fully benchmarked Caucasus or Normandy yet. I haven't benchmarked action, with explosions and stuff. I haven't fully benchmarked Res. of Cockpit Displays and Heat Blur yet. I haven't fully benchmarked all minor options for the Low/Medium recommendations yet. I haven't experimented with 3rd party anti-aliasing methods yet. Activating MSAA X8 currently only activates MSAA X4 because of a glitch. Deferred Shading should always be ON, I recommend. If it's OFF, all data in this guide becomes very wildly inaccurate. I also recommend a Gamma of 2.0, but that depends on the brightness of your monitor. How to get the right brightness? If you have an iPhone, turn the volume off, then increase it again with the button four times bringing it to 25% (4/16), then enter the control centre and use the volume bar as a reference to set the brightness to 25% and hold it out in front of your monitor. Match the monitor brightness of white on white. This will be about the same brightness that is commonly recommended for office environments around the world and with that brightness, Gamma 2.0 looks just about right. Vsync is best enforced from outside of DCS.