Road to 60FPS via VSync

[Repsol2k]

First off all this shouldnt be an advice to get a stutter and lag free ingame experience. This is only the way how i figured out how to get DCS with my specs Smooth. I also will explain my ways with my computer specs. So this is how it works if u would have the same rig as mine but we all know that this isnt the case so be aware of what u can use for yourself and what not.

 

Here are my Specs:

 

Intel i7 7700k @4.8 GhZ

ASUS Z270H Gaming Motherboard

Corsair DDR4 32GB 2666 C16

Asus Geforce GTX 1070 OC STRIX 8Gb

Windows 10

Resolution: 3440x1440

TrackIr 5

 

 

 

Lets start with the Base of the whole concept. And this should be figured out by how to know what is important. In this case i found out for myself that the performance given through Windows is important:

 

 

 

The Power:

U need to be sure that the power options are ready for performance. Therefore u need to give your CPU and your GPU the power which it needs. Put your power options to high performance. Little Hint. Take care that after u restarted your pc the power option can go back and u need to reset it to High performance.

 

 

 

The Correct Driver:

Not the newest driver is the correct driver for any game. U need to find out which driver works best with the rest of your system or the specific game. In this case i read some articles and found out that the Nvidia Driver 388.71 is one of the latest drivers which are working good with DCS.

 

Correct reinstallation of an Nvidia Driver:

If u want to test an older driver as your current u first need to clean deinstall your current driver. Therefore u can use the DDU tool.

 

DDU Tool:

http://www.guru3d.com/files-details/display-driver-uninstaller-download.html

 

After u deinstalled the driver and made a restart of your computer u can now clean install the driver version of your choice.

 

Nvidia 388.71 Driver:

http://www.nvidia.de/download/driverResults.aspx/128485/de

 

 

 

GPU Tweaking:

IMPORTANT. Do this only when u be aware of what youre doing. You do this on your own risk.

 

As the third base i found out that the performance also need to be in the correct way. Im not an Overclocking Guru. So i will recommend the following link where everything necessary should be explained.

 

https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?86398-Strix-GTX-1070-Overclocking-Guide

 

 

 

CPU Overclocking:

This should be really up to u if u want to overclock your CPU or not. In my opinion a good stable not overclocked CPU should handle DCS without problems when the rest of it like DRAM or GPU are good and also correct adjusted.

 

 

 

Again windows makes trouble :( :

Windows has a maybe handy function maybe not really handy function. Its called SuperFetch. This can maybe in many cases the bottleneck of everything. SuperFetch is a windows function which preloads certains App. But why is this not good? Because it loads stuff which u may not use during gaming which results into useless afford of your computer to help u but it wont.

 

 

 

Deactivate SuperFetch:

Windows Key + R - write services.msc - Search SuperFetch - RightClick - Deactivate/Stopp

 

Stop running unecessary programs. Try to close all programs which u dont need to play your Game. As example Adobe Cloud or so. Those programs are doing some stuff all the time but have no advantage for u so close them.

 

 

 

Nvidia Inspector/VSync:

 

Nvidia Inspector:

http://www.guru3d.com/files-details/nvidia-inspector-download.html

 

Now we may need to discuss the different between VSync and No Vsync. Why i need this buddy and what he can do for me ? In my case i have an UltraWide LG Curved Monitor with 60 Hertz. But what is this Hertz? No your Monitor doesnt have 60 Hearts :D Its the refreshrate in the electronic way and not like 60FPS in the IT way. But both of them have the same weight. 60 Hertz says that the little things inside your monitor are refreshing 60 times per second. In the IT or Gaming way 60FPS means that your other little things inside your computer are trying to refreshing the datas 60 times per second. And this should be our goal.

 

Ok i know u will getting tired to read this but its what we want to get a smooth moving picture. I also know that some of you arent taking care of VSync because they feel more comfortable with having 100-150 FPS and think hey to have more is better to have less. But youre treating your computer in the wrong way. You force your computer to do more what he needs to do. And what are you doing when your boss is trying to get more then he really needs? You suck and this your computer also do. You get stutters/lags because computer get angry about you and your way to treat. Its angry with you. So take care of him and force him only to do what he needs to do. So put VSync on. And now we also have the Base or Goal for our work: 60FPS

 

But there are more ways to turn on or turn off VSync. U can do it via your game or via your nvidia settings. Honestely i dont know were are the differents but for me it works best when i have Vsync activated via DCS and let nvidia settings at "Use the 3D application setting". I put my Vertical Sync Smooth AFR behaviour to "On" and Maximum pre-rerendered frames to"2". And the Triple buffering to "On". But Nvidia Inspector is sometimes a trial and try thing for me. And this is also the lognest part in the whole thing whats going on here. U need to find things with are bottlenecking you. Try to read some stuff about the functions, try to find out whats helping you and also take your time. But when u try out its necessary to have a base of your DCS InGame settings. so as example press the High predefiend settings and use only this as a performance check.

 

Now our computer feels warm but gets hungry. Therefore we need to put the nvidia settings at : Texture filtering - Quality to "High performance" and at Multi-display/mixed-GPU acceleration to "Single display performance mode".

 

 

 

The InGame Settings thing though:

 

This is the part were u let your computer his base working. Try to work step by step. Its the same like with the inspector. Try to edit the settings one by one and see how it affect your PC.

 

But for example: MSAA, Shadows, Terrain Object Shadows, Depth of Field, Clutter/Grass, Trees visibility and Preload Radius are the most frame Killer. To see the differences i build myself a quick mission inside the normandy. Put myself into an airstart point. Then i started the mission. I flew downwards at a low level height and followed the terrain. Afterwards i saved thge replay as a standard test base. Everytime when i edited settings i used the replay to see the differences.

 

MSAA:

My tip is to use it at "2". Its really hard to handle because u dont get really and advantage to have this on "4" but u receive a huge disedvantage in your frames.

 

Shadows:

Try to start both shadow options at "Flat". Try this only in the latest stage of your adjustings.

 

Preload radius:

Maybe start here with 50-60000. U can adjust this later when everything is stable

 

Depth of Field:

I personally dont need this because it may give u sometimes a not good and clear picture to your enemies.

 

HDR/Deferred Shading:

I use the HDR because i like the way how it looks and my rig also let it play smooth. There u need to find out what is the best. if u like the way how HDR looks then use this as your base. If not then turn it off and try to set up the rest.

 

 

 

 

Now its up to you how this helps u or not. Its not a really guide or something which u can print out and say this is now my new bible. Its only a short report how i made my way to the stable 60FPS. But the most important info which u should take with u is to have a stable and good working base.

I would appreciate it when some of u also can give some experiences with these steps or things so may i can improve the tasks above a bit. Or if there are anythings which u not really understand then let me know and i will explain it more better. And sry for my bad english i tried to write it in a understandable manner

Edited January 28, 2018 by Repsol2k

[Spectrum Legacy]

Overall good guide I think!

Depth of field, that thing is something I outright despise in games, along with chromatic aberration. It's there maybe just for a couple of artistic screenshots, but that's it. Whenever I see some dcs video with external views that got DoF enabled, it's like supermyopia and rather cringey.

 

Superfetch and prefetch are to be disabled on systems running on ssd too. I went ahead and disabled a lot of nonsense that is being run by OS, like user experience scans, telemetrics and other crap. At least W7 allows you to terminate those processes. Something little that helps on some systems is also disabling windows aero (or desktop composition features).

Texture filtering on the other hand never gave me any good performance boost, usually 2-3 fps difference.

 

P.s. I used to work for Repsol for a good couple of years. Those were the days! :P

[=Pedro=]

+1 for the effort :thumbup:

[Cavemanhead]

Great post. Thanks so much for taking the time to document your findings. Appreciated!

[Repsol2k]

Tahnks guys i will also try to keep this up to date when i see some improvements for myself which maybe helps u also because this process will never end and with the upcoming 2.5 i think there will be also some changes in the graphic configuration.

[Art-J]

It's not a big deal to get stable 60 with deferred shading off and flat shadows, even medium-grade PCs can do it in 2.2.

 

The image quality is so bad, though, that most of us fly with DS + any shadows and THIS is where real challenge/struggle begins :D.

[Repsol2k]

The other question is which kind of resolution u run ? Dont think that most of us are using 3440x1440 resolution. And this resolution is a „Bit“ higher then for example 1920x1080. The thread should be some help for those who have problems and its also not a guide how to . As me i searched a lot and i only wrote down what i‘ve found.

 

HDR or deferred Shading. Yeah i think this is really a Personal thing. Some may like more HDR some may like deferred shading. But nebertheless u also can adjust your system like i did when u use deferred shading.

 

Its not that i will promise u get 60FPS without problems because every System is individually

Edited January 30, 2018 by Repsol2k