Heavy stuttering related to trees

[Bucic]

EDIT:

Relative performance regression, compared to the latest 1.2.x release.

 

EDIT 2:

Added:

What I tried

Test case +MSI telemetry sshot + NVCPL sshot

DXDIAG information

 

 

0. DCS in fullscreen mode (LAlt+ENTER) ; shadow setting: HIGH

1. Start a mission

2. Ctrl+F11

3. Quickly find a patch of trees

4. Position the camera so that most or all of the vieport shows a small terrain area with trees

 

Expected result:

Performance better than the average in-mission performance.

 

Actual result:

Heavy performance hit. Not in average FPS (which drop by only ~10%) but in a form of stuttering. Bonus info: Stuttering much more pronounced when using the mouse to pan the camera.

 

What I tried (made no significant difference, combined or separate):

Confirming I do not use any frame rate limiters (in MSIA/Riva Tuner or the DCS built-in one) - I don't

Disabling trees and tree shadows - see post #3.

Disabling all shadows (OFF setting)

Disabling VSYNC

shader cache off

 

Test case:

Daytime takeoff from Vaziani.

Put camera at 1000 m of altitude.

Pan the camera around using numpad keys.

Result:

HDG ~270-330 / 60 FPS, stuttering (looks like non-stuttering 15 FPS)

HDG ~335-265 / 150 FPS, smooth

I've done 3 revolutions, and you can 3 low FPS regions in MSIA telemetry I've added to the linked OneDrive folder. No other parameter varies corresponding to the noted FPS drops.

 

Tested with Su-25, FW-190 and TF-51 modules. For my final testing I used the Ctrl+F11 camera but I usually saw the issue from the cockpit.

 

Windows 7 x64, no AV software running

AMD FX-6300

GeForce 660 Ti 2 GB GDDR5 https://www.msi.com/Graphics-card/N660Ti_PE_2GD5OC.html#hero-specification

8 GB Kingston HyperX 2x4GB DDR3-1600

Gigabyte GA-78LMT-USB3 (rev. 5.0)

1080p 22" http://www.iiyama.com/gb_en/products/prolite-e2283hs-1/

ASUS Xonar DGX PCI-E

 

 

 

Attachments here

http://1drv.ms/1LkNMx1

logs

track

mission

screenshots

system information

 

Possibly related:

The bug on mouse stuttering //addlink

Tree Shadows Shimmering - ED Forums http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=150914&highlight=shadows

Edited March 21, 2016 by Bucic

[Bucic]

I was able to record vaguely similar conditions. The stuttering is more pronounced when using mouse due to the mouse stuttering bug so I took advantage of it to highlight the moments when the stuttering I am talking about is most severe.

The showcase begins at 3:00.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/lu3mvinn3y42dv3/Digital_Combat_Simulator__Black_Shark_2016.03.17_-_22.46.55.03.DVR.mp4

[Bucic]

Hi guys,

 

This might be a workaroundmor than a solution, but I found that disabling forest tree shadows and putting tree visibility to 0 helps a good deal with keeping the fps up.

 

Disable Tree Shadows

 

To set the tree visibility to 0 in 1.5.3 go to "..\Users\..\Saved Games\DCS.openbeta\Config\options.lua" and edit the following line:

["treesVisibility"] = [b]0[/b],

 

Flying around in a Mirage 2000 at 3000+ ft I don't really care about the lack of trees and I feel more immersed by the higher FPS. There are also terrain mods that make up for it by restoring some of the forest terrain shading, see Starway Northern Europe 3.2

 

P.S: I have a late 2015 retina iMac with 24Gb Ram, 4Ghz CPU, R9 M395X 4Gb. I'm running it at 1440p and having an enjoyable experience.

I've just tried both of the workarounds. No perceivable difference. Also:

1. The forest trees are still there if you move the camera close enough. 10 meters or so.

2. The trees bundled with structures (in the cities) are still there all the time.

 

Please feel free to rename the topic.

[BlackSharkAce]

Yeah this is only for the forest trees. The city trees can't be changed.

 

And yes the trees are still there when you're really close, but there's less trees to render and no associated shadows. I got a nice fps gain with my machine.

 

Other than that I got the following settings:

Textures high 
Civ traffic off
Water high
Visib range high
Heat blur low
Shadows medium
Red 2560x1440
Monitor 1 screen
Red of cockpit displays 1024
Msaa 4x
HDR on
Depth of field off
Lens effect off
Cutter/bushes 0
Trees viability 0
Preload radius 15000
Anisotropic filtering 16x
Flat terrain shadows on
Disable aero checked
Vsync unchecked
Full screen checked
Auto detect oculus rift unchecked

Edited March 20, 2016 by BlackSharkAce

[Jacks]

Same issue here, I try to avoid flying over forests!

[Bucic]

As per post #3, I don't know anymore what the issue is. I give up. It was buttery smooth in pre 1.5.3. I have a good comparison because all I ever flew were the same two missions over and over. FW-190 IA takeoof and dogfight with some roaming within 10 km radius occasionally.

[Theskyline35]

And in few hours some people will come and tell you "Add MOOORE RAM", "You need 16Go of RAM", "Put DCS on SSD !" or even better in your case "It's caused by your AMD CPU"

 

It's a know issue that a lot of people are complaining about since 1.5.3 but for the moment developers didn't react, for me it's just killing the game, stutter simulator 2016, whereas everything was running smoothly under 1.5.2

 

For now the only way to reduce stutters was to reduce visiliy to low, reduce rendering distance and use "flat only" shadow, the game still running as edited (it feels laggy) but it's better.

Edited March 20, 2016 by BIGNEWY
1.1 profanity

[Bucic]

And in few hours some people will come and tell you "Add MOOORE RAM", "You need 16Go of RAM", "Put DCS on SSD !" or even better in your case "It's caused by your AMD CPU"

 

It's a know issue that a lot of people are complaining about since 1.5.3 but for the moment developers didn't react, for me it's just killing the game, stutter simulator 2016, whereas everything was running smoothly under 1.5.2

 

For now the only way to reduce stutters was to reduce visiliy to low, reduce rendering distance and use "flat only" shadow, the game still running as edited (it feels laggy) but it's better.

Keeping in mind that I don't have a clue what's going on, I'd always give it at least one patch release period before complaining that ED didn't react. As it is now, it may even be that all hands are on the 2.0 leap project.

 

As for "add more RAM" blokes. **Always state that the performance regression appeared only after recent update and that you're speaking about relative performance drop** so no such "advices" apply. If you did state that, their posts are useless. Clearly state so (they might be unaware of that) and carry on ;)

 

** I failed to do so :)

Edited March 20, 2016 by BIGNEWY
removed profanity from quote

[Theskyline35]

We have this problem for more than a month as you can see with other topics related.

 

And I 100% agree with you about RAM, however just do a tour of other topics, you will see that a lot of ED Tester keep saying "add more ram" whereas, clearly, they changed something in DCS 1.5.3 that destroyed our framerate for many of us.

[Bucic]

We have this problem for more than a month as you can see with other topics related.

 

And I 100% agree with you about RAM, however just do a tour of other topics, you will see that a lot of ED Tester keep saying "add more ram" whereas, clearly, they changed something in DCS 1.5.3 that destroyed our framerate for many of us.

If a tester says this, you can only point out again that this is a regression.

 

BTW, if the regression is more of a stuttering rather than average frame rate drop this should be most useful

frametime analysis with MSI afterburner??

http://www.overclock.net/t/1555192/frametime-analysis-with-msi-afterburner

[Enduro14]

No regression it is a progression, the visual fidelity is greatly enhanced with 1.5.3 and beyond that. Yes the forest with their shadows their is no hardware fix other than getting rid of shadows for them then it won't stutter anymore. But draw distance and object count increasing your system ram and also vram is a very good suggestion.

[BIGNEWY]

We have this problem for more than a month as you can see with other topics related.

 

And I 100% agree with you about RAM, however just do a tour of other topics, you will see that a lot of ED Tester keep saying "add more ram" whereas, clearly, they changed something in DCS 1.5.3 that destroyed our framerate for many of us.

 

Lets not blame the testers for saying "add more RAM"

 

if you are using 8GB you are using the minimum recommended for DCS, yes some users are getting stuttering, some are not. The minimum and recommended specification are very clear, DCS recommends 16gb. Users who have upgraded have noticed a difference, so it is not like the testers are giving bad advice.

 

Personally I do not get stutters so I am unable to replicate what you are seeing, but ED are aware of the problems some users are having, they are always looking to optimise, so don't think nothing is getting done.

Edited March 20, 2016 by BIGNEWY

[Bucic]

No regression it is a progression, the visual fidelity is greatly enhanced with 1.5.3 and beyond that. Yes the forest with their shadows their is no hardware fix other than getting rid of shadows for them then it won't stutter anymore. But draw distance and object count increasing your system ram and also vram is a very good suggestion.

I meant "performance regression" obviously. Please read #3 again.

I've seen you mentioning it in the other thread, I think. Please consider we're attempting a troubleshooting here. To me the information is a rumor until confirmed. Confirmed but not documented => not really useful. I'm not being grumpy here. While I believe I've seen a tester confirming this information, I don't think I've seen it documented.

 

Lets not blame the testers for saying "add more RAM"

 

if you are using 8GB you are using the minimum recommended for DCS, yes some users are getting stuttering, some are not. The minimum and recommended specification are very clear, DCS recommends 16gb. Users who have upgraded have noticed a difference, so it is not like the testers are giving bad advice.

 

Personally I do not get stutters so I am unable to replicate what you are seeing, but ED are aware of the problems some users are having, they are always looking to optimise, so don't think nothing is getting done.

 

I think you misunderstood. Please read post #8 again.

As I said before I'm willing to wait. Especially that:

a) I have no reason to think ED is sitting there idle,

b) I don't know what I could additionally test to supplement the report.*

[Windsortheater]

I've found success in achieving very high settings, 4K resolution and 60FPS (displayed) in almost all scenarios (online and single player) on my modest I7 4.2ghz / 970 GTX / 8GB.

 

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=2716142&postcount=45

 

Yes I know... it's cheating.. and latency is increased... but I'm super happy with the results!

[BIGNEWY]

You have done a good post bucic, with plenty of info, I was replying more to post #9 than anything else, I should have quoted it.

 

edited post to add quote

Edited March 20, 2016 by BIGNEWY

[Bucic]

You have done a good post bucic, with plenty of info, I was replying more to post #9 than anything else, I should have quoted it.

 

edited post to add quote

Ah. No problemo!

 

While we have you here, two questions:

1. Why don't you guys ask anyone for graphics card control panel settings. Do you see it in the logs or is it that it doesn't matter?

OPEN BETA - How to report a bug (FAQ & Guide) - ED Forums

2. There are several variables that in my view could obscure investigating such issues. My top ones would be:

VSYNC

frame rate limiters (in-game and in MSIA/Riva Tuner)

and combinations of both.

What would be your main suspects?

[BIGNEWY]

Ah. No problemo!

 

While we have you here, two questions:

1. Why don't you guys ask anyone for graphics card control panel settings. Do you see it in the logs or is it that it doesn't matter?

OPEN BETA - How to report a bug (FAQ & Guide) - ED Forums

2. There are several variables that in my view could obscure investigating such issues. My top ones would be:

VSYNC

frame rate limiters (in-game and in MSIA/Riva Tuner)

and combinations of both.

What would be your main suspects?

 

1. It depends on the problem, often we do not need them but when a user gives us a full dxdiag report it is easier to help or spot hardware / driver issues.

2. any of those, also power management of gpu and cpu settings, which often contributes to fps issues

[Bucic]

1. It depends on the problem, often we do not need them but when a user gives us a full dxdiag report it is easier to help or spot hardware / driver issues.

2. any of those, also power management of gpu and cpu settings, which often contributes to fps issues

I see. Thank you.

 

I've just added a lot of new information to the OP.

[secret1962]

Lets not blame the testers for saying "add more RAM"

 

if you are using 8GB you are using the minimum recommended for DCS, yes some users are getting stuttering, some are not. The minimum and recommended specification are very clear, DCS recommends 16gb. Users who have upgraded have noticed a difference, so it is not like the testers are giving bad advice.

 

Personally I do not get stutters so I am unable to replicate what you are seeing, but ED are aware of the problems some users are having, they are always looking to optimise, so don't think nothing is getting done.

 

Yet no one wants to explain why DCS is now taking more than double the RAM it needed before. We're not in such an advanced stage. Definitely.

[Theskyline35]

Yet no one wants to explain why DCS is now taking more than double the RAM it needed before. We're not in such an advanced stage. Definitely.

 

Some of 2.0 things came on 1.5.3, and definitly had a huge impact.

 

The major question is : Is it fixable ? Maybe upgrading hardware help, it's obvious, but does developers could improve DCS 1.5 ?

 

I'm not sure, but I have the feeling that shadows now have a big impact on framerate, jumping between flat only to low is terrible.

 

I can't even play DCS in multiplayer for now...

[BIGNEWY]

Yet no one wants to explain why DCS is now taking more than double the RAM it needed before. We're not in such an advanced stage. Definitely.

 

I do not have an answer for you, I am not a dev, I know using 16gb of RAM will give you a better experience, especially if you are in multiplayer. I know it is not what you want to hear, you have made that very clear, but it is what it is.

[Boris]

I have 16gb RAM and still have stuttering. Sure it might improve performance somewhat, but it's not the cure to stutters.

[BIGNEWY]

I have 16gb RAM and still have stuttering. Sure it might improve performance somewhat, but it's not the cure to stutters.

 

Never said it was a cure for the stutters some users are seeing, I dont get them, but for a busy multiplayer session 16gb is a must

[Bucic]

Update!

A single flip of a setting seems to be rectifying/working around the problem. Namely switching Visibility range from HIGH to MEDIUM. If you need any specific info, please state so. I won't be digging into it any further. Too little time.

[secret1962]

Update!

A single flip of a setting seems to be rectifying/working around the problem. Namely switching Visibility range from HIGH to MEDIUM. If you need any specific info, please state so. I won't be digging into it any further. Too little time.

 

That's due to the latest (v1.5.3) update. But it didn't solve the problem for me. I'll report back when I get 16 gb of RAM (which won't happen soon)