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So where is the bottleneck?


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Hey pilots, was hoping some of you hardware gurus could explain to me why Im getting low fps when my CPU and GPU are both below 60% utilization?

 

I have a NVIDIA 970, 16GB RAM, SSD, and CPU as shown.

 

 

attachment.php?attachmentid=166803&stc=1&d=1501716728

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Don't worry it's not your hardware - it is the software. DCS (Along with most games it seems) is not designed to fully utilise modern hardware. Certainly not designed to use the huge amount of cores CPU manufacturers insist we all need!

Not having a go at ED, as I believe no games actually use all the cores of modern CPU's currently?

 

Your best bet at the moment is as Demon suggested and try to get the highest raw cpu speed you can. Hopefully DCS 2.5 will better utilise current hardware - I can only imagine how awesome DCS would be if my system was used to the max, as it is now I tolerate the stuttering and poor performance as it is the only horse in the modern jet sim race, which I guess is great for ED.

 

Random things like setting shadows to high can have a beneficial effect as they are handled by the GPU so offloads the CPU slightly etc. Dunno if all that stuff is just placebo. I use VR so I found turning ground textures to low helped quite a bit with stuttering and makes no difference in VR anyway. I can only assume my M.2 drive wasn't being used fully to load textures either..

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...I use VR so I found turning ground textures to low helped quite a bit with stuttering and makes no difference in VR anyway...

Oh really? I didn't know that. I will definitely try this. Thanks!

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Hi, as VampireNZ said, with DCS 1.5, it's related with DCS's engine, or software.

DCS 1.5 has still this "low gpu usage" issue.

With DCS 2.1 Nttr (I can't tell with Normandie I don't have it) you don't have this issue : to observe a fps drop you have to reach the max load of gpu, using a screen or VR. In this version there is no "low gpu usage".

So no doubt when 2.5 is out you won't see this anymore on caucasus.

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Also have a look at the MSI afterburner utility it shows way more detail than taskmanager also indicates much more CPU usage than taskmanager (not sure how much of that is related to actually using Afterburner). However CPU usage in Afterburner is much higher with occasional 100% peaks in CPU usage.

Control is an illusion which usually shatters at the least expected moment.

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Its the software, its only using one core for the sim and another for audio ?

 

some modern games do saturate CPU cores eg Battlefield really hits your CPU and GPU pretty hard

But EA have a massive team working on it , ED doesn't have the man power to do the same sadly


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My system is similar to yours. I get 50~70 FPS. It goes to 90~120 FPS in very secluded missions or servers, but I don't use VR.

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#1: Set your TaskManager to show all cores instead of the unified CPU, that is madatory to read the things you wanna read.

 

#2: I can fully flood my 980GTX @ 1440p with 1.5.x release. Sure, 2.x does utilize it even better but 1.5 does it well too, given your GPU is even smaller it must be something else.

 

#3 Overclock it. I play at 1200MHz more when I flood my 980. 3.8GHz is in my personal belief below the magic number to rip it. 4.2-4.5 will yield better results.

 

Your 4-Thread CPU will utilize 1 core to the max = 25% CPU usage total, a 2nd core itself will run like 50%ish for sound and some other taks too among the other cores. My CPU is usually between 23-28% and my GPU at 99% with an 8-threaded i7, yours should then be 55-65% CPU usage

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you'll see one of your cores is at 100% and another will be at 15-25%, and the other two won't be used at all, your cpu is the bottleneck.

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Another screenshot 16fps. Using MSI afterburner as recommended - CPU and GPU usage about 50% and under. No core above 50%. Where is the bottleneck?

 

 

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Another screenshot 16fps. Using MSI afterburner as recommended - CPU and GPU usage about 50% and under. No core above 50%. Where is the bottleneck?

 

Precog,

 

Only two things I can think of: First, you're using version 1.5, and as someone else stated it sometimes doesn't allow you to make full use of your graphics card. Version 2.0/2.1 doesn't have this problem, but if you want to fly over the Caucasus map, you're stuck with version 1.5 for now. Sorry :) To get the Caucasus map with version 2.0 you'll have to wait until DCS 2.5 is ready for release. It should only be another few years.

 

Second, your GTX 970 is a 4 GB card. DCS can use a *lot* of video RAM, and when you use more than your card has, Windows starts swapping game assets (graphics textures etc.) to the system RAM, which can cause microstuttering and/or framerates taking a dump... but version 1.5 uses much less VRAM than 2.1 (Nevada/Normandy) so that might not be the problem. Change your MSI Afterburner settings so you can also see how much VRAM the sim is using and reduce graphics settings if needed to see if it helps (try reducing your Textures setting to Low and fly it again).

 

My best guess is that it's the former. Either buy one of the maps for 2.0 and fly that, or wait for DCS 2.5 to get released. I have a gut feeling it'll be a LONG time, since they announced it about a year ago or more and it's nowhere to be seen, not even teaser vids.

 

Peace and happy warfare

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Hey AD, Just checked and the memory usage is up around 3700MB and is flat lining the whole mission. Could this be the bottleneck ... the 4GB Memory on the video card?

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I have a 980GTX with also 4GB and do not have that bottleneck at 1440p res. Very fluent in all DCS releases. It's something else I am afraid.

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Okay what are your graphics settings?

 

I'm using Rift and finding Normandy and the Gazelle/Huey flying very well in SP at least. maybe you need to tune you Graphics settings to back some FPS,..

Control is an illusion which usually shatters at the least expected moment.

Gazelle Mini-gun version is endorphins with rotors. See above.

 

Currently rolling with a Asus Z390 Prime, 9600K, 32GB RAM, SSD, 2080Ti and Windows 10Pro, Rift CV1. bu0836x and Scratch Built Pedals, Collective and Cyclic.

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Hey AD, Just checked and the memory usage is up around 3700MB and is flat lining the whole mission. Could this be the bottleneck ... the 4GB Memory on the video card?

 

It's entirely possible. I've heard that while the 970 does have 4GB, if you use more than 3.5, the remainder is slow. Why this would be a problem I'm not sure, but DCS 1.5 had it's quirks and 2.0 is supposed to be much better with regards to vram/system ram management and general rendering performance.

 

Do you also fly 2.0? How is that one? Without trying both, it's hard to guess where the problem is. I consider version 1.5 to be obsolete, but people are hanging on to it because 2.0 doesn't have the Caucasus map yet. Utimately the only good advice I can give you is to wait for the new Caucasus map to be released as DCS 2.5. How long that's will be, well... they announced it over a year ago and it's nowhere to be seen. Might be another 6 months, might be another 2, 3 or 4 years.

 

Just for the record I have the same CPU as you and also 16GB RAM, that's not the issue since 1.5 is pretty easy on system resources compared to 2.0 and I've always had the best of luck running 2.0. If you know someone with a hefty video card, you ask them to try it out on your system.

 

Best of luck

AD

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B550 Aorus Elite AX V2, Ryzen 7 5800X w/ Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE, 2 x 16GB Kingston Fury DDR4 @3600MHz C16, Gigabyte RTX 3070 Windforce 8GB, EVGA SuperNova 750 G2 PSU, HP Omen 32" 2560x1440, Thrustmaster Cougar HOTAS fitted with Leo Bodnar's BU0836A controller.

--Flying is the art of throwing yourself at the ground, and having all the rules and regulations get in the way!

If man was meant to fly, he would have been born with a lot more money!

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Precog, you are CPU bottlenecking hard. I know it only looks like you're using 50% on each of 4 cores, but the reality is it's using 100% on 1 core all the time but bouncing around the 4 cores constantly. This is causing all the cores to average a little under 50% during the update period MSI afterburner uses. What gives it away is the overall CPU usage at 36% and the fact that DCS only uses 2 cores anyways. If you want confirmation, you can set the CPU affinity of DCS to just 2 cores, you'll see no change in performance but 1 core will be 100% and the second at around 30% with the other 2 at 0% or close to it. Sadly, in DCS 1.5 there isn't much you can do about that except not fly in that particular area.

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OK. Kind of makes sense. Would be nice if msi afterburner gave a better display of what is really going on. That would explain in missions with heaps of AI the frame rates are dropping and are pretty inconsistent. Also, I think there is a performance bug reported for 1.5.7 so it explains the poor frames.

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Install Open Hardware Monitor

http://openhardwaremonitor.org/

 

It will reveal very well many informations needed.

 

Then install Microsoft own Process Explorer that is more detailed than their default Process Manager:

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/process-explorer

 

And then check the CPU level individually. The Windows own doesn't really reveal anything as it can show the CPU is 20% per core, while in reality it can be 100% per core. The reason is long to explain but it just is there.

 

Then get your hands somehow to the GPU and CPU voltage graphics so you can check its change in time period as it is affecting as well to the performance of those two and can appear to be problem in some games.

 

VDROOP is one of the problems that computers can have with some of the games as they will jump around a processing power that is causing CPU / GPU throttling and it means voltages will vary and it means it affects same time through whole system and causes serious FPS drops. Then adjusting a LLC (Load Line Calibration) on motherboard (if it supports to adjust it) so it wouldn't be so... Correct. It is something that Over Clockers need to work with, but affects as well those who don't OC.

 

Example look at this:

 

YdSXSeb.png

 

There you can see what happened for a GPU when a CPU VDROOP happened. The CPU consumption peaked, it dropped then the voltage and then throttling did its job and suddenly the CPU couldn't process data anymore fast enough, so GPU didn't get the data and its processing dropped, and then its voltage dropped as well and it went to CPU. So about every couple minutes, a 10 second FPS drop from 100 dropped to 18. Even if everything would have been set to minimal it happened as there was something that triggered it in the DCS.

 

And it was difficult to pinpoint. Adjusting LLC it was totally different gameplay:

 

bvd91MP.png

 

Now you can see only a single peak in VDROOP for GPU when I have alt-tabbed from DCS to monitor to check it out. Otherwise CPU voltage stay up, so does GPU and all the stutter and FPS drops stopped right there.

 

You can as well notice that GPU is far more hitting 100% (and even going past as it is in Over Clocking mode), the GPU temperature is as well lower!

 

What got me to investigate this was that many recommended a Power Supply Unit (PSU) replacement as "It isn't enough" and people has got problem fixed by it, but not most people. So many has gone and bought example 850W PSU, while even a 1080Ti with new CPU doesn't need more than about 450-500W but it needs to be good quality so it can feed the voltage steady without own droppage. So having 600W or higher good PSU is enough for majority of cases.

 

https://outervision.com/power-supply-calculator

 

That tool you can use to calculate the estimation for needed PSU unit.


Edited by Fri13

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Where is the bottleneck?

 

3-where-is-the-bottleneck-2-728.jpg?cb=1240070864

 

You're welcome :thumbup:

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I think you are CPU bound there, right click the CPU graph in task manager, and select logical could display. I think you'll see one of the cores pegged at 100%.

From my experience, turning off all the shadows helps a lot.

 

Have a look here

https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=189873

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