VR perf issue (not sure where to post this)

[RLSinCO]

Hello all,

I have been immensely enjoying the AH-64D in VR - talk about being made for each other!  However, up until today I had always been going into Instant Action and launching the Warm start on the runway in the Caucaus map.  Performance has been amazing.  My specs:

Win10, latest build, Intel I9-9900K 32GB RAM, EVGA 3080 FTW3 Ultra GPU, 2TB m.2 SSD, HP Reverb G2 running in Steam (graphics settings on high).

Today, I went to the range mission in Syria and the VR was almost frame by frame, even sitting there on the runway before takeoff - no changes on my end other than the location.  I went back to the Caucaus map and performance was great (just lacks the ground targets).

Anyone else?  I know there was a long VR thread, - I looked but couldn't find where it went.  Apologies if this is in the wrong section....

Edited March 23, 2022 by RLSinCO

[Dannyvandelft]

Hello all,
I have been immensely enjoying the AH-64D in VR - talk about being made for each other!  However, up until today I had always been going into Instant Action and launching the Warm start on the runway in the Caucaus map.  Performance has been amazing.  My specs:
Win10, latest build, Intel I9-9900K 32GB RAM, EVGA 3080 FTW3 Ultra GPU, 2TB m.2 SSD, HP Reverb G2 running in Steam (graphics settings on high).
Today, I went to the range mission in Syria and the VR was almost frame by frame, even sitting there on the runway before takeoff - no changes on my end other than the location.  I went back to the Caucaus map and performance was great (just lacks the ground targets).
Anyone else?  I know there was a long VR thread, - I looked but couldn't find where it went.  Apologies if this is in the wrong section....

Set your PD to 1.0 and your SteamVR to 50%. Load up the mission and see how it goes.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

[RLSinCO]

1 hour ago, Dannyvandelft said:

Set your PD to 1.0 and your SteamVR to 50%. Load up the mission and see how it goes.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk
 

Hi, thanks for your response.  Yes, those are my current settings.  As I mentioned, VR performance is great in Caucus, but abysmal in Syria.  I've now seen other posts from users stating the same thing.

[firefox121]

Try this, terrain shadows off, clouds to medium and msaa off... and see what happens, also disable cockpit light or something like else. 

I have also preload radius to half and using VRPERF to 0.80

With this settings even in syria I get smooth as butter (Marianas is off the grid now)

In Steam vr settings per in game app, I have DCS running to 80%, and in WMR retroprojection set in use "steam VR settings".

Also in game video DCS I have force  motion , It caps the sim to 45 fps but for me is enough , not blurr, etc, as I said smooth as silk

[ricktoberfest]

It’s your textures. Same was happening to me. Turn your textures to medium. Your GPU is running out of VRAM. 

[St4rgun]

It's becoming more and more funny how people with GPU monsters like 3080, 3080Ti and 3090 are struggling to lower their graphics settings to get a "decent" 45 fps in VR.

In 2022, 10 GB VRAM, and MEDIUM textures?! Come on...

I hope this will drastically change with Vulkan + Multicore because right now this VR performance is .... (ok, I censored myself) ... not satisfactory.

Edited March 24, 2022 by St4rgun

[5ephir0th]

3 hours ago, St4rgun said:

It's becoming more and more funny how people with GPU monsters like 3080, 3080Ti and 3090 are struggling to lower their graphics settings to get a "decent" 45 fps in VR.

In 2022, 10 GB VRAM, and MEDIUM textures?! Come on...

I hope this will drastically change with Vulkan + Multicore because right now this VR performance is .... (ok, I censored myself) ... not satisfactory.

DCS has something wrong with RAM and VRAM, looks like a leak or theres something they are doing wrong with the textures.

What i can´t explain myself is knowing (as they know) that there´s a problem about performance why they dont implement thecniques like DLSS or FSR, that many games implement so quickly but, instead, they implement things like SSLR that kills the performance.

Don´t get me wrong, i don´t want to blame ED, i think they did an awesome work the last two years about new content but, to me, there´s a problem of focus on core related things, performance is an historical problem, not only on VR, but we are on 2022, no multicore support, no Vulkan, no new graphics technologies that helps the performance (DLSS, FSR, TAA, etc) but we get new "effects" (that we need!) that kills performance like new clouds, sslr, new flir...

Edited March 24, 2022 by 5ephir0th

[Supmua]

I’ve noticed that my VRAM can get saturated up to 21 GB with the RTX 3090 since the last update.  Been flying the Apache mostly though.

[RLSinCO]

Hello everyone,

I appreciate the continued dialogue on this matter from everyone.  Couple things:

1. I made one small change (at least for my system and settings) that resulted in significantly better performance in VR, even in Syria: I changed my texture settings from high to medium.  As others have reported, this made a huge difference and now I can fly with steady and smooth fps.  I was worried I might notice a big degradation in the visual experience but to my surprise, I barely noticed.  I would suggest for anyone having performance issues to try this first.

2. I keep reminding myself that the AH-64D is an "early release" product, so of course it is going to need some optimizing and we need to realize and expect that.

Later today, I'm hoping to take screenshots of all my settings, from the Nvidia control panel to Steam VR to DCS settings and post them here in the hope it will help others...it's complex and doesn't help that it's not a one-stop shop where you make your initial settings, but rather have to go to different places to dial everything in.

Edited March 24, 2022 by RLSinCO

[Baldrick33]

3 hours ago, 5ephir0th said:

Don´t get me wrong, i don´t want to blame ED, i think they did an awesome work the last two years about new content but, to me, there´s a problem of focus on core related things, performance is an historical problem, not only on VR, but we are on 2022, no multicore support, no Vulkan, no new graphics technologies that helps the performance (DLSS, FSR, TAA, etc) but we get new "effects" (that we need!) that kills performance like new clouds, sslr, new flir...

 

Second guessing but we know that in parallel to teams working on the new effects (which we want) are teams working on the graphics engine (which we also want). Throwing more bodies from one team into another doesn't necessarily speed things up, so assuming the work being done with new effects will plug into the changes to the graphics engine then I see no reason not to continue in parallel.

Diverting attention from the graphics engine team to look into emerging technologies as quick wins is debatable. My only experience of a game that has migrated its engine to Vulkan is such a massive gain in performance that full steam ahead with its deployment would seem preferable. If someone outside the team with the capability and time to look into implementing and supporting other technologies then great but seems unlikely.

[5ephir0th]

3 minutes ago, Baldrick33 said:

Diverting attention from the graphics engine team to look into emerging technologies as quick wins is debatable. 

DLSS was released three years ago, more than 150 games support it right now, i can´t call it "emerging technologies" to be honest but they may think that multicore cpu, that the first cpu was launch like 15 years ago, it´s an emerging technology too.

The thing is not to adopt every new technology that come around but, we don´t need things like raytracing, but looking a the performance problems, a technology that has been proved to work very well, supported by many games, looks easy to implement and works for 2D and VR? It´s a win win

[St4rgun]

In last year's January newsletter they hoped that Vulkan + Multicore will be ready by the end of Q3 2021. Maybe that was too optimistic, but according to the one and only "Multicore development report" which published on 15th October 2021. the progress is going well. Since then we did not see any detailed status report like that one. In October I assumed that Vulkan + Multicore can be ready in half a year soonest, but realistically a whole year should be neccessary (so maybe we can aim for the fall of this year).

In fact no one from ED ever wanted to reply on any assumption according to deployment date which is normal, but that project goes on for 4-5 years by now.

In the first week of 2022 when newsletter was not posted they started a topic where us, the users were able to write about the most anticipated features for this year. Vulkan + Multicore won in conjuction with AH-64D. The Apache hype can now settle down, meanwhile the core programming team is still working hard on the engine (at least I hope so).

In the following months the VR performance issues should get the maximum focus, because buying new GPU hardware is a big NO GO until I see what should I need for the new engine. Right now the 3090s are even "basic" for good performing VR with high resolution headsets, which is pathetic.

Edited March 24, 2022 by St4rgun

[RLSinCO]

OK, as I mentioned earlier, here are all my settings, from the Nivida panel to Steam VR to within DCS.  A few items first.

My config basics: 

Intel I9-9900K (not hard overclocked, but set to burst automatically), Win10 latest build, 32GB ram, 2TB nvme m.2 HD, EVGA 3080 FTW3 Ultra, HP Reverb G2 VR, Thrustmaster Warthog HOTAS.

I play DCS in VR exclusively, and pretty much have never run into a performance issue until the AH-64D, but again this is an "Early Access" release and will sure to receive further optimizations.  Otherwise, everything runs great in VR and just recently, I dropped the DCS texture setting from High to Medium and that has resulted in smooth VR gameplay again!

My global graphics settings as follows for Nvidia Control Panel (note these are the specific application settings for DCS), Steam VR and DCS.  I hope these settings help someone out there with their VR performance issues - the Apache in VR is next level!!!  (NOTE: some of these settings are unique to the HP Reverb G2)

 

 

 

Edited March 24, 2022 by RLSinCO

[draconus]

@RLSinCO MSAA 4x + SSAA x1.5... wow, but then you run it on 50% in SteamVR. Did you try to ditch the MSAA and SSAA and use only higher sampling in SteamVR or DCS PD?

[RLSinCO]

3 hours ago, draconus said:

@RLSinCO MSAA 4x + SSAA x1.5... wow, but then you run it on 50% in SteamVR. Did you try to ditch the MSAA and SSAA and use only higher sampling in SteamVR or DCS PD?

I have not, but when I had MSAA 4x + SSAA x1.5 AND Steam VR at 100 it was a slide show.  This seems to have resulted in a blended setting that produces excellent results in every module with excellent clarity.

 

[Munkwolf]

We're not too different on specs. I have a worse cpu with a 9700kf, but a ROG Strix 3090 and 64GB. Have been really happy with VR performance on all maps lately, even Marianas.

I'd recommend moving clouds setting down from ultra (i run standard). Cockpit global illumination off. Visibility range to a max of High for sure. Clutter/Grass to 0 (I edited a lua to set it to -150000 per some post mentioning not everything gets removed at 0). Also try with forest/scenery details factor settings turned down (I do 0.1).

If you mouseover the settings they have a tooltip mentioning CPU and/or GPU impact. Imo, you're asking too much of your CPU. Turn down anything that mentions CPU. Also try SSAA Off, MSAA 2x, and try moving your SteamVR SS up (not to 100% though.. tip.. the higher res you run, the tougher spotting is.. imo, need a balance there between clarity and spotting). I run general SteamVR SS at 150%, then per-application for DCS of 60%, for 2996 x 2928 resolution. Also in DCS per-application setting motion smoothing to force always on.

Based on reports about how hungry DCS can be for VRAM, might be good trying your terrain textures at medium too.

Also, if you can deal with the slight flicker, try the G2 at 60hz, with motion smoothing forced on to lock it at 30hz. A smooth 30 is better than a stuttery attempt at 45. This made a huge difference for me and reprojection rate.

 

 

 

 

Edited March 25, 2022 by Munkwolf
adding images

[5ephir0th]

SSAA dont work on VR, it apply to destop mirror and you get the performance penalty but it won´t apply to VR