[REPORTED] Performance Issues

[imacken]

I thought the G-sync was supposed to prevent tearing.

 

Have a look here for some faqs.

https://blurbusters.com/gsync/gsync101-input-lag-tests-and-settings/15/

[statrekmike]

We are in Early Access, we have listed this as investigating, it may even require an adjustment to system specs as well. We are looking into it. Thanks.

 

 

To be honest, while I agree that the system requirements (across the board) need to be adjusted upward, I do not think that doing it just for the Supercarrier is the right move. I mean, I know that a GTX 1070 isn't exactly a top of the line card or anything but a 50% drop in framerate just from looking at the carrier's Superstructure (again, on a empty deck) seems excessive to say the least. If this were a CPU load issue, I would probably be more understanding but since this is a GPU issue, I suspect that there are graphical aspects that could be downscaled to increase performance SIGNIFICANTLY while not really impacting the overall user-experience.

 

If anything, it might be worth creating a alternate "skin" that can be enabled in the special options (or in the mission editor) that would cut some of the texture resolutions in half. Even that might make a dent in the framerate problem.

 

A lot of us are aware that DCS is a beast to optimize due to the aging engine it is built on top of. We get that it makes things difficult in terms of the performance/visuals balance but unless ED is willing to make a RTX 20 series card the minimum requirement for "high" settings (and any shadows at all), it might be a good idea to explore other ways to ease the burden on systems even if that means lowering some graphical details when possible/practical on the carrier itself (and perhaps even the deck crew and deck assets as well). DCS and its component modules should still run okay on a 10 series card. It isn't so old a card that it should already be entirely out of the picture DCS-wise.

[Minsky]

I know that the yesterday's hotfix ( 2.5.6.49718 ) wasn't supposed to help with this issue, but just for the record: it didn't help.

Edited May 26, 2020 by Minsky

[Minsky]

If anything, it might be worth creating a alternate "skin" that can be enabled in the special options (or in the mission editor) that would cut some of the texture resolutions in half. Even that might make a dent in the framerate problem.

 

This probably won't help.

I just spent half an hour manually resizing each and every Supercarrier texture (~200 files) into the oblivion (512x512 and lower).

No performance increase at all.

I mean, zero frames.

It now loads faster, but that's about it.

 

If anyone wants to try it, here's the OvGME-ready mod: Supercarrier Ultra Low-Res Textures v01.zip (8 Mb)

Edited May 26, 2020 by Minsky

[statrekmike]

This probably won't help.

I just spent half an hour manually resizing each and every Supercarrier texture (~200 files) into the oblivion (512x512 and lower).

No performance increase at all.

I mean, zero frames.

It now loads faster, but that's about it.

 

If anyone wants to try it, here's the OvGME-ready mod: Supercarrier Ultra Low-Res Textures v01.zip (8 Mb)

 

That is odd, you would think there would be some (even minor) performance impact.

[bad_turbulence]

This probably won't help.

I just spent half an hour manually resizing each and every Supercarrier texture (~200 files) into the oblivion (512x512 and lower).

No performance increase at all.

I mean, zero frames.

It now loads faster, but that's about it.

 

If anyone wants to try it, here's the OvGME-ready mod: Supercarrier Ultra Low-Res Textures v01.zip (8 Mb)

wow, thanks for sharing. Pretty significant test you ran. Also, after you looked over the bugs that were part of the most recent patch, can you share which of the changes are most significant? Apparently, as you are reporting, they didn't do a frame-rate change, which is understandable considering what they must have on their plates. I can't get supercarrier to show up in missions, so you're one step ahead of me. :( But I'm sure it's user-error and I'll get to muscling the repair utility again tonight. Thanks again for your efforts with the texture mod.

[squirrelmeister]

I think I've found the one thing that is causing these troubles on the Supercarrier. It could be that someone mentioned that before, so excuse me if this is something that is already known.

 

 

I think, after testing a few hours, that the big rotating antenna on top of the isle is the one thing, and it seems it is the only thing, that causes massive drops in frames and else.

 

 

How I came to this conclusion? (everyone should test this, or could testit)

 

 

I fiddled with my settings to see which settings would be the most FPS eater so to speak. Well as we all know the shadows seem to be the problem with the biggest hits on FPS. And as mentioned before, there is actually little to none change in FPS if you are using shadow settings of low or higher. So i made a mission just to test this and to see where the devil is to be found. I set my resolution to 1600 by 900. Why? Well with that resolution my frames on any settings wouldn't go below 65-70 FPS (all on high/ultra). Why is it important? So it is more obvious which setting and foremost which entity (static object, planes, ships, etc.) does the most to influence the FPS. And as I was looking from the F2 view, the isle wasn't in sight at all, i recognized a massive framedrop every second or so. I looked around and kept my focus on these regular stutters and framedrops. As I was looking at the isle, it was very obvious what caused these lags and framedrops. It was or better it is the big rotating antenna on top of the isle and the lag and stutter is happening at the exact moment when the rear of the antenna keeps coming into your view. I mean this is actually pretty obvious, when you are starting to think about it, since the back of the antenna has a lot of "solo" struts all around the place which I would assume also cast shadows. And as of my observation these struts do cast shadows. And the drop isn't that much obvious when you are having low FPS in general. But with FPS like above 100 the change in FPS is so obvious, I am speaking of at least 30-40 FPS! If the isle/antenna isn't in sight the framedrops are relatively small but as soon as you look at it the frames keep dropping from 30-40 FPS every time the back of that antenna is in your view.

 

 

So my personal conclussion is:

 

 

Find a way to deactivate the possibility of the rotating antenna to cast shadows.

Anybody knows a way achieving this? I did had a look at all the files associated with the supercarrier but I think this is something that as to be done within the model itself. Maybe I am wrong about this and there is a possibility to change that behaviour in a file...would be awesome, wouldn't it?

[eracer1111]

It was pretty clearly implied that you thought your frame rate should be at least 40fps.

 

"7. If your performance with the Supercarrier is smooth, it doesn't mean you are not affected: drops from 70-80 fps to 50-40 aren't always noticeable without using a FPS monitor."

[eracer1111]

Minsky I'm sorry to say your PC hardware is pretty dated and ya it's just not dated it was mid-range when it was new. Like you i5-6500 is only a 4core/4thred CPU. DCS takes alot of CPU horsepower now with everything that is going on around you. Also a GTX 960 4Gb is getting pretty dated too. I bet that GPU is running at 100% all the time. It is what it is. I was in the same boat as you before. I wanted my game to look pretty and also have like 80-100FPS so i had to invest in a Ryzen 9 3900X and a RTX 2080 Super. The more they develop this with newer improved textures the more taxing its going to be on your hardware

 

I've seen numerous people claim that DCS only uses a single core.

[squirrelmeister]

It was pretty clearly implied that you thought your frame rate should be at least 40fps.

 

"7. If your performance with the Supercarrier is smooth, it doesn't mean you are not affected: drops from 70-80 fps to 50-40 aren't always noticeable without using a FPS monitor."

 

 

Are you talking to me? And if so, can you clear up what exactly you mean with the quote?

 

 

Cheers

[bad_turbulence]

I think I've found the one thing that is causing these troubles on the Supercarrier. It could be that someone mentioned that before, so excuse me if this is something that is already known.

 

 

I think, after testing a few hours, that the big rotating antenna on top of the isle is the one thing, and it seems it is the only thing, that causes massive drops in frames and else.

 

 

How I came to this conclusion? (everyone should test this, or could testit)

 

 

I fiddled with my settings to see which settings would be the most FPS eater so to speak. Well as we all know the shadows seem to be the problem with the biggest hits on FPS. And as mentioned before, there is actually little to none change in FPS if you are using shadow settings of low or higher. So i made a mission just to test this and to see where the devil is to be found. I set my resolution to 1600 by 900. Why? Well with that resolution my frames on any settings wouldn't go below 65-70 FPS (all on high/ultra). Why is it important? So it is more obvious which setting and foremost which entity (static object, planes, ships, etc.) does the most to influence the FPS. And as I was looking from the F2 view, the isle wasn't in sight at all, i recognized a massive framedrop every second or so. I looked around and kept my focus on these regular stutters and framedrops. As I was looking at the isle, it was very obvious what caused these lags and framedrops. It was or better it is the big rotating antenna on top of the isle and the lag and stutter is happening at the exact moment when the rear of the antenna keeps coming into your view. I mean this is actually pretty obvious, when you are starting to think about it, since the back of the antenna has a lot of "solo" struts all around the place which I would assume also cast shadows. And as of my observation these struts do cast shadows. And the drop isn't that much obvious when you are having low FPS in general. But with FPS like above 100 the change in FPS is so obvious, I am speaking of at least 30-40 FPS! If the isle/antenna isn't in sight the framedrops are relatively small but as soon as you look at it the frames keep dropping from 30-40 FPS every time the back of that antenna is in your view.

 

 

So my personal conclussion is:

 

 

Find a way to deactivate the possibility of the rotating antenna to cast shadows.

Anybody knows a way achieving this? I did had a look at all the files associated with the supercarrier but I think this is something that as to be done within the model itself. Maybe I am wrong about this and there is a possibility to change that behaviour in a file...would be awesome, wouldn't it?

Great catch, but that rotating antenna is such a great part of the graphics of the supercarrier, I hope it is not eliminated. I realize you are just calling for the shadows to be removed, but that also adds immersion (to a degree). I would assume there would be other ways of re-writing the code for that feature, to make it much more efficient at it's motion render. Or no?

[squirrelmeister]

Great catch, but that rotating antenna is such a great part of the graphics of the supercarrier, I hope it is not eliminated. I realize you are just calling for the shadows to be removed, but that also adds immersion (to a degree). I would assume there would be other ways of re-writing the code for that feature, to make it much more efficient at it's motion render. Or no?

 

 

Yeah, it is a shame that these shadows causing so much trouble (at least it seems to be the problem)! And I am on your side with the immersion. I won't play without shadows....okay, for now I am more or less forced to just having shadows inside of the cockpit, at least on the carrier. Without shadows your subconciousness just can tell immediately that it's fake (more than it is in itself as a sim) which is a great bummer espacially in VR.

 

 

 

 

My solution for this problem would be to have an option for the structural complexity of the supercarrier. Maybe it would be enough if one would simply change the antenna model to a model which is flat on both sides. And maybe it would be enough if the antenna itself can't cast shadows on itself, in that way it still cast shadows on other objects like the carrier itself.

 

 

 

 

For now I will post in the mods section in this forum and see if I can find someone who can do what I am asking for.

 

 

 

 

Cheers

[Etirion]

Unfortunately this problem still persists with the newest hotfix. 2.5.6.49798

In 2D its 90-120fps with shadows off

70-90 with flat, and

30-40 with shadows on low.

Haven't measured different settings in VR but with shadows on low its 15-21fps.

 

Don't want to turn shadows off as its completely immersion breaking for me, especially in VR which is what I fly exclusively.

[statrekmike]

I really do think that ED should take a very close look at where they can reduce shadow complexity on the superstructure specifically. If anything, if it does turn out that they can get it to run well on anything less than a 1080ti or a 2080+, they should find a way to provide a option for those with GPU's that "only" have 8 gigs or RAM or so.

[Minsky]

2.5.6.49798 - nothing has changed, performance is still terrible.

[Proteuswave]

Can confirm on my system nothing different in terms of performance with the SC after today's update.

[Nealius]

Same here. Must turn off all shadows to get any decent performance. Oddly, MSAA x2 doesn't cost any performance at all, compared to the shadows that totally eat my system.

[statrekmike]

Great catch, but that rotating antenna is such a great part of the graphics of the supercarrier, I hope it is not eliminated. I realize you are just calling for the shadows to be removed, but that also adds immersion (to a degree). I would assume there would be other ways of re-writing the code for that feature, to make it much more efficient at it's motion render. Or no?

 

 

To be blunt, it is indeed the antenna and its particular way of casting shadows that is causing the 50%+ drop in overall performance (regardless of how playable it is for various systems after such a hit), it really needs to be changed so that it still looks okay but isn't as taxing. It would be such a small, nearly insignificant cost compared to the performance that we would get in return.

 

To be even more blunt, even if I were in the subset of players that has a 1080ti or a 2070+ GPU, I would still be hammering on this issue as hard as I have been. Maybe it would help if ED (or ED's community managers) could help us understand what exactly it is that is happening under the hood that is creating such a sudden, massive performance drop because as thing stand, it looks like this is a graphics issue and it is probably one that can be fixed (or at least mostly fixed) by adjusting some aspects of the superstructure model.

 

Losing 50% of one's performance just by looking at the Superstructure doesn't seem intentional. Raising the system requirements doesn't really seem like a solution and it doesn't really acknowledge the reality that a good chunk of your playerbase now has to turn off important graphics settings just to get decent performance on one of your most anticipated modules.

 

Again. I don't like being this harsh. I really do always try to see things from ED's perspective and tend not to react harshly to bugs and such. It is just that this one really is a big one and while some (those with high-end GPU's) may not notice the hit very much, it exists none the less and measures should aggressively be taken to mitigate that impact as much as possible for those that easily fall into the recommended requirements for "high" graphics settings.

[lobo]

For me if it's a choice of acceptable FPS or rotating antenna... buh bye antenna.

[statrekmike]

Assuming it is indeed the antenna that is causing the problem, I don't think they will need to get rid of it. Perhaps they need only tweak it so that it doesn't create such a nonproportional hit on performance.

[petsild]

I'm against the previous beta +6 fps, no big miracle, but I'm glad.

[statrekmike]

I'm against the previous beta +6 fps, no big miracle, but I'm glad.

 

 

What do you mean?

[Lange_666]

2.5.6.49798 - nothing has changed, performance is still terrible.

It got even worse for me, doing a landing in VR and the FPS just drops to below being playable the moment the carrier's wake becomes visible. I did not had that problem before the update.

[Wizard_03]

2070 with 2D and shadows at flat here.

 

 

Performance is a little smoother for me. No more wild FPS fluctuations. Can really only get the frames to dip while panning with external view. Inside the cockpit its solid right up to limiter everywhere I go even while looking at the island. Gonna test traps at different times of day to see if the LOD changes cause any problems in close like they used too.

 

 

 

Also Static hornets seem to hurt a lot less. I loaded a supercarrier with 3 squadrons worth and it didn't phase my frames.

Edited May 27, 2020 by Wizard_03

[wilbur81]

Just tested with the all the same graphics settings (Shadows "flat" and "high"). No noticeable improvement on the "Cold Start" persian gulf mission in the Hornet. I play in full 4K, though.