DCS big FPS increase (vsync off ingame + vsync "Fast" in Nvidia ctrl panel)

[Glide]

I tried a "gaming" Gsync monitor today with 240hz.  However, it was far inferior to my 4k 60hz monitor (running at 2k).  No matter what combination of vsync, adaptive sync, or FAST sync, it was a shimmery mess.  The monitor plays a big part in making DCS smooth as silk. 

[Flappie]

5 hours ago, glide said:

The monitor plays a big part in making DCS smooth as silk. 

Then maybe we should create a thread listing graphics card/monitor couples that works well with DCS. Or on the contrary, couples that don't work well together. What is the reference of the crappy "gaming" monitor you've tried, by the way?

[Glide]

That would be a very long list!   It was the Samsung LC27RG50FQNXZA Curved 240 Gaming Monitor.  My Asus PB287Q is much better.

[Flappie]

Thank you for the new thread. I will soon move to a bigger flat and have a bigger monitor (yes, I love pancakes) and I just don't want to buy the wrong one.

[AstonMartinDBS]

Thank you so much for this hint @tagomago!

 

DCS runs absolutely smooth now. I observed no more stuttering since deactivating vSync in DCS and setting vSync to "Fast" in the nVidia control panel (all other settings are default):

 

Here are my DCS system settings:

Edited December 27, 2020 by AstonMartinDBS
Added screenshots

[Glide]

After getting DCS Vsync working, I have a good sense of what my card and monitor are capable of, and then I switched to FAST vsync with SSAA and the same great smoothness but with nicer edges.  Give my settings a try.  Note that my 1080Ti has 11GB of vram, and I'm running my monitor at half (2k) it's native resolution.  I'm going to try cutting the resolution in half to see if I can hit max settings.

[Glide]

It turns out that as you scale down the resolution, you can upscale the quality settings.  My monitor is a 16:9 ratio, so I went from 1920x1080 down to 1600x900, and I can crank up the quality and still get 60ish pfs with FAST.

[Glide]

And just to be sure I wasn't dreaming, I went dogfighting over Damascus.  Given that my 1080Ti has 11GB of VRAM, if I had a card with 6 or 8 GB of VRAM I would I would try these settings at 1440 x 900.  This resolution was also very nice on my "4k" monitor.  TLDR, start with the lowest resolution you can tolerate then scale up the quality settings until it starts to stutter.  If you can get to max settings with that resolution, bump up the resolution, and scale the quality settings again. 

Edited December 11, 2020 by glide
spelling

[Glide]

And happily for me, I took my resolution down to 1440x900 and by scaling back the amount of graphics, I could get the ultimate holy grail of all the DCS quality settings: SSLR.  So, if you have 6 or 8 GB of VRAM, try these settings at 1280x1024 or 1360x768.  If you have 4GB of VRAM, try the lowest three resolutions in DCS.  Happy flying.

[Glide]

With Nvidia Fast Sync and a little tweaking of the quality settings, and I am back to running smooth at 4k.  

 

Update: I switched to MSAA, and I discovered at 4k that Anisotropic Filtering is not noticeable.  I turned that off and tuned down my Preload Radius to be 3/5 of the range to match my Visib Range (High is the 3rd of 5 levels).  With my hardware I don't notice a change from Preload Radius, but that seems logical to me.  YMMV.

Edited December 20, 2020 by glide
updated settings

[Dav IRL]

I am using a 1440p 144 refresh rate monitor and I was flying over Beirut which is jam packed with trees and buildings. As it happened I was getting around 45 in the area and went to the forums this evening to see if there was any advice. I read this post and gave it a go and where I was at around 62 on the same mission on the runway I was now at 85. So I flew the F14 over Beirut in the merge with a group of hinds and I was getting 60 ish. So it made a big difference for me and I’m glad I came across it. When I flew above 27000 feet my frames were hitting 110+. I also noticed my pc was working very hard on a gtx 1080 i7700k with 24 gigs of ram. Thanks for sharing! I also use trackir and a second screen for my displays and there was no stuttering or interference. Average frames in a busy area were up by 15 and 30 elsewhere.


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[Glide]

So, after much investigation, it seems that FAST sync is not related to microstutters, it just makes them easier to see.  Adaptive Sync just hides the affect more.  It turns out that speeding up the time (Ctrl+z) shows the micro and macro stutters really well.  The only way I could get them to disappear was to drop my resolution down to 1440x900.  On the plus side, I can bump up the quality at that resolution.

Edited December 17, 2020 by glide

[Dav IRL]

So, after much investigation, it seems that FAST sync is not related to microstutters, it just makes them easier to see.  Adaptive Sync just hides the affect more.  It turns out that speeding up the time (Ctrl+z) shows the micro and macro stutters really well.  The only way I could get them to disappear was to drop my resolution down to 1440x900.  On the plus side, I can bump up the quality at that resolution.

I’ve tried this too ok the past and it does play super smooth at that resolution


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[Glide]

Yes, so after going up and down the resolution scale at 2x and 4x speeds, I do believe microstutters are shader cache related.  I disabled shader cache in NCP, and put my settings back up to 4k.  So far so good.

 

I also put Anisotropic filtering back to 16x.  This wraps the textures around the models and gives things depth.  I also flipped back to MSAA 4x because without all those stutters I can afford more quality.

Edited December 20, 2020 by glide

[Glide]

Just an update on this.  I took the Jug for a ride over the Channel today, and I got some very high frame rates.  I have vsync turned off completely with shader cache disabled AND track file writing disabled in my autoexec.cfg.  I absolutely crush 120 fps over Damascus on the Syria map.  I sure hope the VR users get their performance issues sorted because there's no doubt in my mind that DCS can pump out fps. 

[silverdevil]

i know this topic is a bit old. i wanted to let you know what i found and if anyone saw the same thing. before i saw this topic i tried to turn on vsync in game settings to see how it affects performance. when i did, the FPS as registered by CAM is less than what i was seeing before the change. yet very stable and not as much jittering. at least i think so. however in Nvidia control panel i have this set to "use the 3d application setting". i did not have time to check as stated in this topic yet. is this what others are seeing too?

[Glide]

On 2/16/2021 at 4:30 AM, silverdevil said:

i know this topic is a bit old. i wanted to let you know what i found and if anyone saw the same thing. before i saw this topic i tried to turn on vsync in game settings to see how it affects performance. when i did, the FPS as registered by CAM is less than what i was seeing before the change. yet very stable and not as much jittering. at least i think so. however in Nvidia control panel i have this set to "use the 3d application setting". i did not have time to check as stated in this topic yet. is this what others are seeing too?

This makes sense.  Vsync smooths out the framerates, so they will be lower than the peaks you see without Vsync.  You set Vsync in DCS or NCP, not both.  Some have reported good results with Vsync = FAST in NCP.  If your card is new enough, you can turn off Vsync and let your card run as fast as it can.  I don't use Vsync anymore with my 1080Ti because it can keep me around 60fps with all settings cranked up.

Edited February 17, 2021 by glide

[silverdevil]

@glide - hi. i messed around with just vsync settings yesterday. just a simple mission of AC hot start in Beirut. i take off and fly around the city. impressive by the way. when it is on, in DCS or in NCP, i noticed that the FPS is roughly half of what it is when it is off. it may be because i am old and old eyes but, i do not see any difference in quality really. the NCP has several different options.

 

honestly, until recently, i have not delved into these settings.

[Glide]

31 minutes ago, silverdevil said:

i have not delved into these settings

The rate depends on the monitor because the card is trying to sync it's rate with the monitor refresh rate.  My older monitor requires a display port cable to achieve the higher rates.  I would also enable displayport compression 1.2 or 1.4 if your monitor has it.  ON and FAST are the two most common settings I have seen here.  If your card delivers 60fps or more consistently, you can turn off vysnc entirely. 

[silverdevil]

@glide - hi again. i have a dell AW3420DW monitor. it is capable of 3440x1440 120 hz. i have been playing games on PC since late 80s and have always heard any refresh rate above 60 hz or so is unneeded because the human eye does not pickup much above that. is that still the case? touting FPS was always sort of a bragging right trophy for forum denizens. i have a 1080 card and i use the cable that came with the monitor. in fact the monitor would not even display the max resolution using the previous cable. it was displaying 19x10 in a letter box. of course, which is common for me, the only game that has any sort of frame rate troubles is DCS. i play another flight sim that rocks and all is crystal clear. trying to get the most of my current card because of the petaQ bitcoiners hogging the new cards. thanks for the advice.

[Glide]

@silverdevil Right.  Movies are 30fps because that's considered full motion video.  So 60fps is guaranteed to be more than enough.  The VR guys need 45fps per eye or they get seasick. 

 

That's a nice monitor.  You can easily get 120fps with that monitor and card.  I have the Asus PB287Q which is 3480x2160 and claims 133khz and 60hz.  I could get higher fps but I always lean for quality over performance. 

 

If you start your own thread and post your settings, we can get you all tuned up.

[Fakum]

"If you start your own thread and post your settings, we can get you all tuned up."

 

I'm gonna take you up on that! Ive been frustrated for years trying to dial things in. Ive read thru this thread and im still really not sure what I should set to, not to mention the other 100 threads i read over the years. I would love to plug in my info and get a print out of what settings would be best. 3840 x 1600 res, stuttering, trackIR impacts etc

[jib]

On 12/17/2020 at 8:04 PM, Dav IRL said:

I’ve tried this too ok the past and it does play super smooth at that resolution


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1440x900 is only 1.3 Million pixels 

3840x2160 is 8.3 Million pixels.

So at 4K the GPU is having to pump out 6.3x as many pixels, so it is no surprise that it runs better at a lower resolution.

[AstonMartinDBS]

On 12/23/2020 at 8:32 PM, glide said:

I have vsync turned off completely with shader cache disabled AND track file writing disabled in my autoexec.cfg.

What do I have to add to my autoexec.cfg to disable track file recording?

[Baz000]

i’m really curious if this works in VR so far all you guys have only been talking about 2D