Stutters despite solid 45FPS

[Sr.]

11 hours ago, timcat said:

In the server ui, i just add the mission file I want to run. Hit the "run" button, then go to multiplayer menu, search for my server and Join. Choose a slot and enjoy. 

Now, of course you have to start the server first in order to run the mission. 

 

When i installed the server i didn't add any modules or anything like that. I just installed it and gave the server a name and password, unclicked public and made sure i ran it as administrator....and it worked. I don't have any paid campaigns so I don't know how to go about running those. I would think you just add the miz files to the list and run them sequentially? 

Tried this with the A-10C II Take off mission out Caucuses. Loads me in random spots around the airstrip, then there's a flashing pause symbol in the upper right corner. Is it thinking this is MP mission?

[VirusAM]

I had issues with the latesf steamvr beta....
Going back to stable solved my issues.
i had good fps but strange image doubling and stutters.
After a while of trial and error (initially I thought it was the nvidia drivers hotfix) i tried to go back to stable steamvr and that was indeed the issue.

[timcat]

10 hours ago, Sr. said:

Tried this with the A-10C II Take off mission out Caucuses. Loads me in random spots around the airstrip, then there's a flashing pause symbol in the upper right corner. Is it thinking this is MP mission?

So as far as I know if you run a mission through the server it is automatically a multiplayer mission. I don't know alot about multiplayer but it sounds like there is no client slot for you to join. Does it put you in a cockpit? Maybe edit the mission in mission editor and make sure that the A10 you want to fly is a client. I don't have the A10 but I will try the F18 ready on the ramp mission when i get home.

[Sr.]

6 hours ago, timcat said:

So as far as I know if you run a mission through the server it is automatically a multiplayer mission. I don't know alot about multiplayer but it sounds like there is no client slot for you to join. Does it put you in a cockpit? Maybe edit the mission in mission editor and make sure that the A10 you want to fly is a client. I don't have the A10 but I will try the F18 ready on the ramp mission when i get home.

Yes, it puts me in a cockpit. At one point it put me in an A10 literally under the wing of a nearby c130

 

Tried editing and making the plane client... now it's flyable and indestructible too.

Edited January 27, 2021 by Sr.

[timcat]

7 hours ago, Sr. said:

Yes, it puts me in a cockpit. At one point it put me in an A10 literally under the wing of a nearby c130

 

Tried editing and making the plane client... now it's flyable and indestructible too.

I tried the instant action mission "Ready on the Ramp" and it worked fine. I didn't have to edit file in ME. Not sure if I was indestructible or not.

Was performance any better for you? 

[Sr.]

1 hour ago, timcat said:

I tried the instant action mission "Ready on the Ramp" and it worked fine. I didn't have to edit file in ME. Not sure if I was indestructible or not.

Was performance any better for you? 

I think it actually was. I'll do some better testing if I ever get this update downloaded.

[unlikely_spider]

Ok, so I got fpsVR and am trying to interpret the results. What does it mean if my GPU shows constant orange graph while my CPU is all green? My frametimes are good (I think) - about 13ms for GPU and 9 for CPU. I seem locked at 45 fps in my G2 even though I've disabled motion smoothing in SteamVR and it is always 45 regardless of what I do it seems, even in Caucausus. But it shows like 3 or 4% reprojection rate which I think is ok.

 

This is on a 3080 along with Ryzen 5600x and 32gb ram.

Edited January 28, 2021 by unlikely_spider

[speed-of-heat]

Well if it’s a constant 45, motion smoothing is turned on somewhere.... the orange for gpu, shows you that is what is causing you to be in motion smoothing, you have to get both cpu and gpu below 11ms to be at 90fps..

 

[unlikely_spider]

1 hour ago, speed-of-heat said:

Well if it’s a constant 45, motion smoothing is turned on somewhere.... the orange for gpu, shows you that is what is causing you to be in motion smoothing, you have to get both cpu and gpu below 11ms to be at 90fps..

 

Ok, thanks. Is there somewhere else that would be enforcing that 45fps other than SteamVR? I have max frame rate in nVidia CP at 98 for my gSync monitors refresh rate, so it shouldn't be that.

And to reduce GPU frame times, that is mostly resolution? I am at like 75% in SteamVR.

 

Edit - and my GPU memory states 9.8 out of 10gb. Is that all textures? Terrain textures at low in DCS looks bad so I have them at High, but main textures set to Medium.

Edited January 29, 2021 by unlikely_spider

[speed-of-heat]

It’s mostly terrain textures that eats vram,I honestly can’t tell the difference most of the time, try setting them on low and see if it makes a difference to FPS... 

 

There are four places you can forces you can force it on

- steam.vrsettings

- OpenVR Settings in the GUI 

- Steam VR Settings (Forced)

- Steam VR Settings - > DCS forced

 

you might also be able to force it on via OPen XR developer settings as well ...

 

[otavio]

 

1 hour ago, speed-of-heat said:

It’s mostly terrain textures that eats vram,I honestly can’t tell the difference most of the time, try setting them on low and see if it makes a difference to FPS... 

 

 

There are four places you can forces you can force it on

- steam.vrsettings

- OpenVR Settings in the GUI 

- Steam VR Settings (Forced)

- Steam VR Settings - > DCS forced

 

you might also be able to force it on via OPen XR developer settings as well ...

 

 

Doesn't work.

 

It's been 2 months since people are reporting issues with the latest videocards by Nvidia and AMD. I'm running an RX 6800 but there are identical reports of people running RX 6800 XT's. RX 6900's and 3000 series RTX cards. I've tried every single released driver so far and the problem still persists. I have also done a full fresh Windows 10 20H2 reinstall and DDU'ed every single driver change. Tried both Beta and Non-Beta versions of WMR for SteamVR and SteamVR.

Issue 1: If you force MotionVector to ON in WMR settings, it locks the framerate to 30fps instead of 45 even though frametimes are as low as 15ms. There are occasions that instead of 30fps, motion reprojection instead locks itself to 60fps when set to AUTO. Both scenarios cause terrible stutters/judder. While that happens, SteamVR's graph bounces between GREEN and RED GPU frametime lines.

Issue 2: There's major performance degradation and stutters if the game window has focus. SteamVR's graph keeps bouncing between GREEN and RED GPU graphs. CPU frametimes are constant and have no issues. Whenever you alt-tab the stutters stop and reprojection goes back to 45fps.

These issues happened in all games that I have tested, including: Elite Dangerous, DCS World, IL-2 Sturmovik Battle of Stalingrad and Star Wars Squadrons.

[speed-of-heat]

8 minutes ago, otavio said:

 

 

Doesn't work.

 

It's been 2 months since people are reporting issues with the latest videocards by Nvidia and AMD. I'm running an RX 6800 but there are identical reports of people running RX 6800 XT's. RX 6900's and 3000 series RTX cards. I've tried every single released driver so far and the problem still persists. I have also done a full fresh Windows 10 20H2 reinstall and DDU'ed every single driver change. Tried both Beta and Non-Beta versions of WMR for SteamVR and SteamVR.

Issue 1: If you force MotionVector to ON in WMR settings, it locks the framerate to 30fps instead of 45 even though frametimes are as low as 15ms. There are occasions that instead of 30fps, motion reprojection instead locks itself to 60fps when set to AUTO. Both scenarios cause terrible stutters/judder. While that happens, SteamVR's graph bounces between GREEN and RED GPU frametime lines.

Issue 2: There's major performance degradation and stutters if the game window has focus. SteamVR's graph keeps bouncing between GREEN and RED GPU graphs. CPU frametimes are constant and have no issues. Whenever you alt-tab the stutters stop and reprojection goes back to 45fps.

These issues happened in all games that I have tested, including: Elite Dangerous, DCS World, IL-2 Sturmovik Battle of Stalingrad and Star Wars Squadrons.

 

let me be super clear, i am not saying that "YOU" are not having these problems, simply that i am not on my 30 series card (and on a number of other users in that camp that i speak to frequently), in all games, and i suspect many users are not that does not mean its not happening, its just its not "normal" and its not everyone, which means its hard to diagnose.

 

the fact that it is happening for you in all games points to something outside of  DCS, likely in windows (or its config) or in the applications that run in the background genuinely don't know what that might be, because i wrote down all the stuff i know how to do...  I'm really sorry my pointers have been unhelpful to you, and i do wish you the best in diagnosing the problem on your system and or hardware. 

[dburne]

2 hours ago, speed-of-heat said:

 

let me be super clear, i am not saying that "YOU" are not having these problems, simply that i am not on my 30 series card (and on a number of other users in that camp that i speak to frequently), in all games, and i suspect many users are not that does not mean its not happening, its just its not "normal" and its not everyone, which means its hard to diagnose.

 

the fact that it is happening for you in all games points to something outside of  DCS, likely in windows (or its config) or in the applications that run in the background genuinely don't know what that might be, because i wrote down all the stuff i know how to do...  I'm really sorry my pointers have been unhelpful to you, and i do wish you the best in diagnosing the problem on your system and or hardware. 

 

I would agree, I am not seeing those issue either. Very strange.

[Rogue Trooper]

On 1/25/2021 at 5:42 PM, L8Knight said:

Hi,

I think they are going to Vulcan, heard that from an insider that that's the upcoming engine change.

Oh I do hope so.

If Vulcan can manage a 10 fps increase I will be very happy.

[westr]

I’ve found with the last couple of updates I get best performance setting tray tool to auto with the asw for oculus. Traditionally this has always been best set to off. 

[neok]

Looks like Im having the exact same issue here. Banking and looking out to the sides with constant stutter. I have tried everything the couple of last weeks. My fps are good, stable 70 on high settings, but ONLY with DCS in VR with G2 this is happening, even if I dial down everything in DCS and steamVR SS to 20% I get the same stutters. 

 

@Jacks @PicklePicklePickle, do you guys found any solution?

 

[captainHelmet]

I have this as well and have just had to learn to live with it.   I have not found a setting that has an impact on it regardless of fps or reprojection settings.

 

3900x, rtx 2070, 64 Gigs.

[PicklePicklePickle]

9 hours ago, neok said:

Looks like Im having the exact same issue here. Banking and looking out to the sides with constant stutter. I have tried everything the couple of last weeks. My fps are good, stable 70 on high settings, but ONLY with DCS in VR with G2 this is happening, even if I dial down everything in DCS and steamVR SS to 20% I get the same stutters. 

 

@Jacks @PicklePicklePickle, do you guys found any solution?

 

 

Just an update after a lot of testing and building a PC just for DCS. I hope it doesn't turn into a rant.

 

I think this is a DCS problem and not so much a headset A vs headset B issue. I'm not going to list everything I have done, but let's just say that excluding modding DCS(texture mods, etc), I have everything applied and then some. I went as far as disabling every single service in Windows that is not critical for running DCS.

 

The biggest improvement came from just building a 'maxxed' out machine(in signature) and overclocking it. Since DCS only uses 1-2 threads, I disabled half of the cores and am running 5 cores at 5.4Ghz. With this configuration, I am able to get smooth performance about 50% of the time, the other 50% it just stutters and doubles as usual. And all this is not with mind-blowing DCS settings either, and I'm mostly running an Index (G2 is at HP) which has inherently lower resolution.

 

Before building this machine, I was using a laptop albeit a really beefy one with an external RTX3090 and DCS would never go past 45fps. Once I got the gaming machine it was very clear that this being stuck <45 was a bottleneck in the laptop/eGPU system, because if I set all minimum settings(PD=0.5, etc) the laptop would still not max out the headset frame rate, while the gaming PC does hit the maximum headset framerate.

 

Every time I fly DCS and it gets smooth or it starts stuttering, part of my mind is distracted thinking about what is it about the condition that is helping or hurting performance. The other day I was flying the F-16 over Caucasus mountains on the 162nd training server and it got perfectly smooth 90hz for a few minutes. Was it the absence of water? Was it the absence of buildings? Was I not close enough to other aircraft? Did someone sacrifice a cow to Eagle Dynamics? Who knows but it was great for a couple of minutes.

 

However, I can confirm that during the periods where it is running smoothly there is no stuttering and no doubling of features when banking. It is buttery smooth, and i'm convinced that if DCS where written with modern techniques it could run this smoothly all the time. However, I know how difficult it is to continue developing legacy code, and this might require a huge rewrite and might be very challenging, but I am hopeful. I hope it is just a matter of something like splitting off I/O to another thread, adding the multicore processing, or something like that.

 

It was sort of a rant.

[Burt]

On 2/5/2021 at 3:48 PM, westr said:

I’ve found with the last couple of updates I get best performance setting tray tool to auto with the asw for oculus. Traditionally this has always been best set to off. 

I have the G2 running on my humble rig. For the last 3 days including tonight I have set WMR to auto, Steamvr to auto and have the video DCS multiplier at 54%  I’m new to VR and I honestly can’t explain why but the Clarity, and smooth 45fps and steady too has improved. But anything over 60% I start to stutter. I found something my rig likes.

 

Edited March 12, 2021 by Burt

[GunSlingerAUS]

Wow, so much misinformation posted in this topic. What you're experiencing is the result of reprojection - when the game's FPS can't match the refresh rate of the HMD, WMR or Steam or whatever VR API in use artificially creates a second frame to make up the difference. So if you have a native fps of 45, every second frame is artificially created to match the HMD's 90Hz, and the result is massive stuttering and ghosting. Reprojection was designed by makers of VR APIs to kick in only in the rarest of moments when performance issues arose briefly - it's not meant to be used 100% of the time as it is in DCS. Every other VR game on the market will run at an FPS that matches the HMD's refresh rate, for this reason.

 

Now, some people apparently don't notice this at all. That's why many VR players say 45fps is absolutely perfectly smooth.

 

I am not one of these people, as I absolutely do notice reprojection artefacts, and it's the reason why I will not use my G2 with my RTX 3090, as 45fps leads to reprojection, which ruins the experience for me. The only solution, if you're someone who notices this, is to get the game to run at the same fps as the HMD's refresh rate. If you have a G2, you can drop the refresh rate to 60Hz, and then try to get DCS to run at a minimum of 60fps... good luck! I personally find that also looks bad, as it's both very hard to maintain 60fps, and the lower refresh rate leads to more screen "flicker". 

 

I've written at length about the subject here: Asynchronous Reprojection explained aka ghosting, stuttering, etc - Virtual Reality - ED Forums (eagle.ru)

 

The solution for me is to wait until I can get DCS VR to run at 90fps - sadly my RTX 3090 with 9700K isn't powerful enough for that. I think it'll be at least 3 to 4 years before I'll be able to achieve that goal, and enjoy VR, though I'm hoping the new 11900K CPUs will prove me wrong, provided highly binned versions can overclock to 5.5 to 6GHz. I'll let you know in a month or two!

Edited March 12, 2021 by GunSlingerAUS

[dburne]

4 hours ago, GunSlingerAUS said:

Wow, so much misinformation posted in this topic. What you're experiencing is the result of reprojection - when the game's FPS can't match the refresh rate of the HMD, WMR or Steam or whatever VR API in use artificially creates a second frame to make up the difference. So if you have a native fps of 45, every second frame is artificially created to match the HMD's 90Hz, and the result is massive stuttering and ghosting. Reprojection was designed by makers of VR APIs to kick in only in the rarest of moments when performance issues arose briefly - it's not meant to be used 100% of the time as it is in DCS. Every other VR game on the market will run at an FPS that matches the HMD's refresh rate, for this reason.

 

Now, some people apparently don't notice this at all. That's why many VR players say 45fps is absolutely perfectly smooth.

 

 

I actual run with Motion Smoothing forced on at 45 fps in Steam VR for my Reverb G2. And this with the G2 running 100% Steam VR resolution (3172x3100) per eye) and high GFX settings in the game.

I get very smooth gameplay out of it with no noticeable stutters on my end. 

 

Yes there are the occasional graphical artifacts due to reprojection but they are not bad at all to me and I hardly notice them most times. 

I have been running it around 3-5 hours a day for the last few weeks and having an absolute blast.