Game very slow to start after 2.8

[Dagobert666]

I can only confirm that. I have a super fast M.2 SSD
Before the 2.8 update, it only took a second or two after being seated in the helicopter for all textures of the cockpit and world to be loaded. Now I can watch how each individual element gets its texture.

[Dallas88B]

1 hour ago, Dagobert666 said:

super fast M.2 SSD

I have the same type of drive, dedicated to DCS. 

[Moxica]

The rendering time could be mission/ground-object specific, as It only happen consistently in one of two "test" missions I have created. (Sometimes randomly in other missions) The problematic mission is not target rich at all, but still has that render anomaly. (That started to appear after 2.8 update)
I will check (later today, I hope) if the "problematic" mission contain third party asset-pack objects.

Edited November 6, 2022 by Moxica

[Dallas88B]

10 minutes ago, Moxica said:

rendering time could be mission/ground-object specific

Yes very true....but not in what my OP post reported...I only used the basic DCS game missions ie: AH-64D Instant Action, Mission or Training. No special tailored missions, no mods.
Its not a game stopper IMHO, but its very noticeably slower than 2.7 (for reasons I cannot guess), I am not the only person experiencing it, and I thought it worth reporting. 

Edited November 6, 2022 by Dallas88B

[FalcoGer]

Same here. Loading times were pretty long before, now they're way worse. Framerate is 0 for a good minute or so before I then sit over an ocean and can see the ground and buildings load in ever so slowly. Even the map takes forever to load now. Also running DCS on an M.2 NVMe SSD, though the rest of my hardware is somewhat lacking.

[Moxica]

I've noticed that this initial slow rendering only happens when there are more slots in the mission. With only one aircraft as player/client it render (more) immediately.

[twistking]

have you tried putting your preload radius slider to a reasonable (read: low) value?
for some reason there are still folks who crank that thing up to max... when you have dcs on a fast ssd you should get away with minimal preload in fact.
if this helps with your excessive load times i don't know of course, but it is worth trying...

[cow_art]

On 11/7/2022 at 10:16 AM, Moxica said:

I've noticed that this initial slow rendering only happens when there are more slots in the mission. With only one aircraft as player/client it render (more) immediately.

I can confirm this. This seems to be somehow related to missions with multiple slots.  (and for me it's still present in the newest version DCS 2.8.0.33006 Open Beta)

[percivaldanvers]

Just jumped back into the Apache after a long time away and I am also experiencing ridiculously slow load times in any mission with it on Syria. No other module gives me this problem. Performance is fine when I actually get into the mission, it just takes an unbelievably long time to load.

Edited December 18, 2022 by percivaldanvers

[Floyd1212]

When you say "load", do you mean the progress bar before you are in the cockpit, or do you mean textures taking a while to load after you are in the aircraft?

I'm still noticing long texture loading times, but that has been with us for a few patches now.

[percivaldanvers]

6 hours ago, Floyd1212 said:

When you say "load", do you mean the progress bar before you are in the cockpit, or do you mean textures taking a while to load after you are in the aircraft?

I'm still noticing long texture loading times, but that has been with us for a few patches now.

Sorry I should be more specific. I get bizarrely long times with preload. It will be stuck on 1/60 for what feels like minutes. I'd think it has something to do with the terrain or something but if I start from the same place in a different helicopter it loads normally. Occasionally it won't get stuck like this but I haven't been able to figure out the pattern of it. 

[NineLine]

Is this all on MP? How does SP load for you. Realize that after an update loading into maps can take some extra time but should speed up.

Also as noted dropping the Preload Radius can help for MP.

[sirrah]

48 minutes ago, NineLine said:

Is this all on MP? How does SP load for you. Realize that after an update loading into maps can take some extra time but should speed up.

Also as noted dropping the Preload Radius can help for MP.

Can confirm that since 2 updates ago (iirc) the loading times increased significantly. As @percivaldanvers says, loading particularly is slow in the last "loading 1/60" part. I'm now waiting ~3, maybe 4 minutes for any mission to load, where it used to take less than 1 min. (have never touched preload radius setting, so this issue was introduced with an update.)

 

I only tested with single player Apache missions. So yes @NineLine, this also happens for SP.

 

Not the end of the world, but definitely loading times increased for me as well.

[admiki]

1 hour ago, NineLine said:

Is this all on MP? How does SP load for you. Realize that after an update loading into maps can take some extra time but should speed up.

Also as noted dropping the Preload Radius can help for MP.

As sirrah said, this got introduced with DCS 2.8. Both SP and MP. All modules are affected but the worst ones are Apache and Hind.

[corbu1]

vor 1 Stunde schrieb admiki:

As sirrah said, this got introduced with DCS 2.8. Both SP and MP. 

I can confirm as well.

[cow_art]

Another confirm from me. Loading times have gone up significantly in the last phase (where it counts up from 1/60). Single player.

[Fercyful]

Can confirm the "1/60" part of the loading is now (latest two open beta patches) several minutes (Syria + Apache)   Even going out of the mission and back with "fly again" is like the thing load all over again... Before flying again were seconds of waiting. 32 GB RAM and SSD. Tried different preload radius without any difference.

[percivaldanvers]

10 hours ago, NineLine said:

Is this all on MP? How does SP load for you. Realize that after an update loading into maps can take some extra time but should speed up.

Also as noted dropping the Preload Radius can help for MP.

This has been in single player loading into free flight missions for the AH-64. That said I've also had it happen with the Mi-24 free flight now too so I'm no longer so sure how specific it is to the AH-64. 

[backspace340]

17 hours ago, NineLine said:

Is this all on MP? How does SP load for you. Realize that after an update loading into maps can take some extra time but should speed up.

Also as noted dropping the Preload Radius can help for MP.

As others have mentioned, it's SP too but seems to only happen in missions with multiple slots. I can't add tracks, but it reproduces every time for me when running the hunting grounds mission so should be easy to see if you just spawn into any Ah64 hotstart slot on this: https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3321127/

 

Worth flagging - it sounds like there's two different issues being discussed. One is long loading before the mission starts, the other is that after clicking fly and entering the cockpit it takes 60-90s to load all textures (even with an M2 SSD). I'm specifically talking about the latter - after loading into a hot start slot on hunting grounds the mfds are blank, the external ground textures are missing (I. E. The ground is see through) and external model textures are missing (I. E. Bits of the chopper are missing) if you go to F2. If you zoom out you can see the textures popping in in chunks. 

Edited December 20, 2022 by backspace340

[macedk]

56 minutes ago, backspace340 said:

As others have mentioned, it's SP too but seems to only happen in missions with multiple slots. I can't add tracks, but it reproduces every time for me when running the hunting grounds mission so should be easy to see if you just spawn into any Ah64 hotstart slot on this: https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3321127/

 

Worth flagging - it sounds like there's two different issues being discussed. One is long loading before the mission starts, the other is that after clicking fly and entering the cockpit it takes 60-90s to load all textures (even with an M2 SSD). I'm specifically talking about the latter - after loading into a hot start slot on hunting grounds the mfds are blank, the external ground textures are missing (I. E. The ground is see through) and external model textures are missing (I. E. Bits of the chopper are missing) if you go to F2. If you zoom out you can see the textures popping in in chunks. 

 

Same

[Floyd1212]

Just for comparison, I loaded up the Syria hot start Instant Action mission and timed it.  The progress bar was on "World Preload : 1/60" for 25 seconds, with a total load time before seeing the world behind the mission briefing of 1m 25s.

That in itself is not very helpful, since everyone's hardware specs are a little different, but it is to say that this issue is not effecting everyone across the board.  So now the question is what setting or mod is causing the issue?

[Dallas88B]

On 12/20/2022 at 3:43 AM, NineLine said:

Is this all on MP? How does SP load for you.

Thanks for your response.

For me its SP.

I don't do MP in DCS (yet)