'Simple' 2.5 Setup Guide.. Starting point to improve your FPS+

[Gliptal]

So is it enhance or override to get FXAA to work?

 

Also, screens may look different because due to the PP pass being applied later in the stack. Are you taking them through DCS?

[sedenion]

 

New Options.lua

 

ReBuild Shader Cache

 

ReBuild FXO Cache

 

I second that. On my side, reading your post, I simply deleted (renamed) the Saved Games\DCS.openbeta folder to force DCS to create a full new configuration set from scratch including FXO and sahder cache. Before the operation, i was getting something like 40-50 FPS with sometime huge drop to 20 FPS for unknow reason. After the operation, with same quality settings, I get 60-80 FPS and the random FPS drop disapeared.

 

I have to add some advices for people who don't have super-high-end graphic card (I have GTX 770), the Texture quality (both terrain and other) can have a huge impact on performance. My diagnostic is that huge textures forces drivers to store some data in the main RAM memory because the CG memory is completely full, and this has a huge impact on overall performances.

[Haukka81]

I second that. On my side, reading your post, I simply deleted (renamed) the Saved Games\DCS.openbeta folder to force DCS to create a full new configuration set from scratch including FXO and sahder cache. Before the operation, i was getting something like 40-50 FPS with sometime huge drop to 20 FPS for unknow reason. After the operation, with same quality settings, I get 60-80 FPS and the random FPS drop disapeared.

 

 

 

I have to add some advices for people who don't have super-high-end graphic card (I have GTX 770), the Texture quality (both terrain and other) can have a huge impact on performance. My diagnostic is that huge textures forces drivers to store some data in the main RAM memory because the CG memory is completely full, and this has a huge impact on overall performances.

 

 

 

Any screenshots with terrain texture high / low , is there big diffrence ?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[sedenion]

Any screenshots with terrain texture high / low , is there big diffrence ?

 

To be honnest, I have dificulties to see the difference, same between Textures Low/Medium :D However, with Textures to High, it seem a new shader pass is enabled, for enhenced specular and normal maps effects.

[sedenion]

Are you saying that I also should delete config file prior to setting fxaa?

 

 

Edit: Misreaded the question...

 

No, there is no link with FXAA... FXAA is a post-process added by Nvidia drivers... Here i speak about the topic origin, not about AA.

Edited February 5, 2018 by sedenion

[sedenion]

Ok then. I did that after updating to 2.5 but not before turning fxaa on.

 

There is no link with FXAA... No matter what you do after or before you enabled FXAA in Nvidia drivers... Personally I run with MSAA 2x and Anisotropy filter 8X ... FXAA give no real improprement (this is a dirty AA) with blurry text..

[Gliptal]

Put AF to 16X, any GPU after 2004 will handle it fine w.r.t. 8x

[PeaceSells]

I have to add some advices for people who don't have super-high-end graphic card (I have GTX 770), the Texture quality (both terrain and other) can have a huge impact on performance.

 

I was about to post the exact same thing and coincidentally I have a GTX 770 too. Reducing TEXTURE and TERRAIN TEXTURE from high to low/medium increased fps A LOT!

 

BUT...

 

The cockpit is unreadable in some aircraft with TEXTURES set to medium or low. Letters are blurry. Interestingly, the Ka-50 is perfectly readable with TEXTURE set to low. The Huey at low TEXTURE gets a part of the cockipit unreadable and another part perfectly readable. The A-10C has many parts unreadable even at medium TEXTURES. Other parts are perfectly readable. It seems there's something odd that probably needs fixing.

[Art-J]

Why would you take FXAA at ANY fps over 80 fps with MSAA. Take the MSAA quality graphics. Without the frame counter, you could never feel the difference in game between 80 fps and the 150 frames you're gettin with FXAA.

 

Because MSAA even on x2 induces microstuttering above 80 fps, while FXAA does not. At least on my machine.

[PeaceSells]

FXAA rocks so much.

 

Be very carefull with FXAA, cause it blurs stuff and makes enemies harder to spot in my experience. For example, with just FXAA 2x, the infamous 'black dots' that represent planes and missiles at certain distances get harder to spot. Without the FXAA, I can see if my missle is going for the target or going to miss, or see the enemy missles separating from from their planes at distances of 60 km (maybe more?). With FXAA 2x, I can't see that very well. Didn't even experiment with more FXAA.

 

Though, FXAA does remove that annoying sparkling in the world all around you due to the lack of AA, so it can be good for a video (considering it won't disappear in videos like in screenshots?)

[PeaceSells]

 

Thanks for that. I always had Visib Range at extreme or ultra, but thanks to this pic I've experimented with 'just' high and the gain in performance is stunning, while the shorter view seems to be still more than one would need...

[Art-J]

One has to be aware that FXAA doesn't fix the sparkly shimmering of building rooftops. It might reduce it just tiny a little bit below no-AA levels, but that's about it.

 

It is, however, mostly a problem affecting Las Vegas at low sun conditions (default P-51 takeoff mission comes to mind), other locations and maps don't suffer from the issue that much, so I can live with it if that's the price to pay for otherwise excellent performance. Your mileage may vary.

[PeaceSells]

^^ Yes, the only time I tested was in 2.5 with DS on. With FXAA 2x the difference in spotting the black dot is not that big, but the difference is clearly there. I sometimes even think of enabling FXAA 2x despite that, because of the benefits against the shimmering (at least in Caucasus). I haven't made my mind completely yet. Plus I didn't test yet the other FXAA options.

 

It would love to see other people also do spotting tests with their own eyes, to see if they come to the same conclusions than me.

 

What I know, though, is that FXAA isn't "true AA", it's a post-processing effect - maybe that's why it doesn't show in screenshots.

[PeaceSells]

^^ Yes in NVIDIA control panel it does, take a look, those are some of the options I get, although it's in Portuguese:

[PeaceSells]

Lol, did you even look at the pics I posted? That's FXAA, it's written on it, lol. My card (GTX 770) came out before NVIDA's MFAA technology, it doesn't even have that option in the control panel.

[PeaceSells]

In that case, thank you! I'll notify NVIDIA right away that their control panel is wrong.

[Gliptal]

Piston85 is right, FXAA does not have leves. What you're seeing there is the enhanced setting out of order, possibly due to the localization.

[PeaceSells]

Piston85 is right, FXAA does not have leves. What you're seeing there is the enhanced setting out of order, possibly due to the localization.

 

Wait, are you guys saying it's not FXAA because it's set as "enhance the application setting"? What do you guys imagine it is if it's not FXAA?

[Gliptal]

Your dropdown with 2X, 4X, and CSAA refers to MSAA. FXAA is separate (as it is not technically true AA).

 

FXAA does not have "levels", it's either ON or OFF.

Edited February 6, 2018 by Gliptal

[=Pedro=]

Your dropdown with 2X, 4X, and CSAA refers to MSAA. FXAA is separate (as it not technically true AA).

 

FXAA does not have "levels", it's either ON or OFF.

 

^THIS^

[PeaceSells]

All right, I see now I've made a mistake. The field where you choose 2x, 4x, etc. in Nvidia's panel doesn't refer to FXAA, it refers to some other AA type from Nvidia, as you said. The field for FXAA only has two options: ON or OFF.

 

With this clarified, I was finally able to test ability to spot black dots in the sky. I've played the Su-27 instant action "Intercept" and saved the track. Then I replayed the track once for each AA setting, while recording via GeForce Experience.

 

Results in order from better spotting (black dot most visible) to worse spotting (black dot least visible):

 

1) No AA at all (black dot most visible)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOFXtNfyP5o

 

2) In-game MSAA 2x + Nvidia panel AA 2x "enhance app setting" (black dot still well visible)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4D42yrmzfw

 

3) In-game MSAA 2x + Nvidia panel AA 2x "enhance app setting" + Nvidia FXAA (black dot hard to see)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qObUrQNMX6w

 

4) Only Nvidia FXAA (black dot effectively invisible)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrLa43-MSTk

 

Youtube compression does make the difference harder to see, but to my surprise it's still well visible. You will need a good pair of eyes though. At my 10 o'clock you will see 2 missiles (2 black dots) - one mine and one from my wingman - heading from left to right on the screen towards 2 contrailing bandits heading from right to left on the screen (also black dots, but contrailing) until impact. To see each black dot, wait till you see explosion, rewind a little and you will see the black dot heading towards its respective impact. Except for the video with FXAA, in which you see no black dots.

Edited February 7, 2018 by PeaceSells

[sedenion]

All right, I see now I've made a mistake. The field where you choose 2x, 4x, etc. in Nvidia's panel doesn't refer to FXAA, it refers to some other AA type from Nvidia, as you said. The field for FXAA only has two options: ON or OFF.

 

the "other AA type from Nvidia" you mention is in fact MSAA setting intended to replace or enhance game setting. But with Deferred Shading this setting has no (or very little and unpredictable) effect due to how Deferred Shading rendering works. I reproduce here little shema to uderstand why:

 

 

Standard Rendering:
-------------------------------------------------------------
Geometry Render
  ||             <-- MSAA applyed by Nv settings [b]or render engine[/b] (it works)
  \/  
Final Frame Buffer 
  ||             <-- FXAA applyed by Nv settings (it works)
  \/             
Screen



Deferred Shading:
-------------------------------------------------------------
Geometry Render
  ||            <-- MSAA applyed by [b]render engine[/b] (DCS options)
  \/ 
G-Buffer textures 
  ||         \_ MSAA [u]recomputed/combined[/u] by [b]shaders[/b] (DCS options)
  \/         /
Lighting ∕ PBR passes
  ||            <-- MSAA applyed by Nv settings (no effect)
  \/
Final Frame Buffer 
  ||            <-- FXAA applyed by Nv settings (it works)
  \/          
Screen

 

Edited February 7, 2018 by sedenion

[Mr_sukebe]

Have been playing with settings today to see what the hotfix brought us.

Appears to have helped.

 

With Hf1 in place:

- My VRAM usage was down a little

- In VR, tested without and with MSAA (assuming deferred shading is in place). From Afterburner, showing a definite linear increase in requirements on my GPU when enabling, or increasing MSAA. Was running circa 65% with no MSAA. That increased to around 85% with MSAA @ x2 and was regularly peaking at 100% with MSAA at x4. That was easily spotted in game due to obvious frame drops

- CPU usage was pretty stable for me on my quad core i5, and seemed unaffected by the use or not of MSAA

- From initially firing up, there were still some frame drops, though as time went on, these decreased in number, which I'm assuming is due to the required textures have now been uploaded/converted or whatever the game engine needs to do.

 

So for me, solid improvement for the hotfix.

[PeaceSells]

^^ but did your fps increase?

[CoBlue]

Nothing else at all, I assure you that.

MSAA in game OFF, Nothing, 0, nyet.

Just FXAA ON in nvidia control panel.

 

When you say "Just FXAA ON in nvidia control panel" what are the other settings? Like texture filtering, tipple buffering, all antialiasing settings etc.?

 

Can you upload your Nvidia Control Panel settings, please?