FPS below 60 despite high end hardware

[MagicALCN]

Hi!

My specs : i7 12700k @ 5.0GHZ / 32Gb DDR4 3200MhZ / RTX 3080 Ti / DCS is running on a Crucial P2 1To NVMe SSD. I use a 1440p 144Hz Monitor

Back in 2.7 I had ~80 fps on high settings and now in 2.8 I'm in the 40-50, the game quality has improved but I wonder how to get an appropriate framerate around 80-100 without losing much quality ? Maybe I did something wrong I don't know, it just surprise me to have that kind of performance

As requested, a screenshot of my settings
null

Edited February 6, 2023 by MagicALCN
Added screenshot of settings

[trevoC]

I think if you want any decent answers or solutions (unless you are just griping which happens here often) you are going to have to at least post a screen shot of your graphics settings page. That would be a start.

I have quicker hardware than that and can make DCS do single digit fps if all the wrong settings are enabled. On the flip side I can get 80 fps in 4k VR with the right settings.

Post a screenshot and members will have a look.

[MagicALCN]

11 hours ago, trevoC said:

I think if you want any decent answers or solutions (unless you are just griping which happens here often) you are going to have to at least post a screen shot of your graphics settings page. That would be a start.

I have quicker hardware than that and can make DCS do single digit fps if all the wrong settings are enabled. On the flip side I can get 80 fps in 4k VR with the right settings.

Post a screenshot and members will have a look.

Thanks for the reply, I added a screenshot to the original post!

[twistking]

16 hours ago, MagicALCN said:

Hi!

My specs : i7 12700k @ 5.0GHZ / 32Gb DDR4 3200MhZ / RTX 3080 Ti / DCS is running on a Crucial P2 1To NVMe SSD. I use a 1440p 144Hz Monitor

Back in 2.7 I had ~80 fps on high settings and now in 2.8 I'm in the 40-50, the game quality has improved but I wonder how to get an appropriate framerate around 80-100 without losing much quality ? Maybe I did something wrong I don't know, it just surprise me to have that kind of performance

As requested, a screenshot of my settings
null

 

it appears to me that you are running at the wrong resolution for your monitor. too high and wrong aspect. also you're running ssaa, which quadrubles the load from the high resolution.
choose the correct resolution for your monitor, disable SSAA and enable MSAA to compensate.

[trevoC]

I would try the following:
 

Set your Monitor res properly (as suggested above)
SSAA: off
SSLR: off
SSAO: off
MSAA: 2x (you could probably do 4x if configured properly but start with 2)
Anistropic: 16x (this barely makes a hit on GPU I find, might as well crank it)

See how the above effects your FPS to start then:

Civ. Traffic: Decide how much you like this as it can take a large hit on your CPU (call draws which could prevent your CPU from sending enough info to your GPU)
Heat Blur: Do you really want this (I never cared for it much as I'm in cockpit 99.9% of the time )
Clouds: Ultra (ooooo those do look pretty but do eff with FPS)

Then
Shadows: Like clouds, they're pretty, but can make a large hit.

If you can find enough FPS improvement in above you can probably afford to start bumping things like scenery details and forest visibilty. Personaly (in VR) I bring Forest details down as lower poly trees look almost as nice as the full poly trees.

Hope that helps.

We haven't touched on other factors like do you have any software running in the background like discord or other tray apps that are eating CPU cycles.... Lots of guides on line. DCS will take some time (as will any flight sim) to help setup properly for your rig.

3 minutes ago, twistking said:

it appears to me that you are running at the wrong resolution for your monitor. too high and wrong aspect. also you're running ssaa, which quadrubles the load from the high resolution.
choose the correct resolution for your monitor, disable SSAA and enable MSAA to compensate.

We must have been replying at the same time... good catch, he said he had a 1440p monitor.

You are basically rendering wasted pixels... That alone should afford you big gains.

Edited February 6, 2023 by trevoC

[MagicALCN]

8 minutes ago, twistking said:

it appears to me that you are running at the wrong resolution for your monitor. too high and wrong aspect. also you're running ssaa, which quadrubles the load from the high resolution.
choose the correct resolution for your monitor, disable SSAA and enable MSAA to compensate.

To clarify for the resolution : I'm using two 7 inches monitor as MFDs and as you can see on the page I'm using a script for the monitors. Inside that script the native resolution of the main screen is in fact 2560x1440. The rest of the resolution are just black canvas with MFD information on them

null

Edited February 6, 2023 by MagicALCN

[MagicALCN]

33 minutes ago, trevoC said:

I would try the following:
 

Set your Monitor res properly (as suggested above)
SSAA: off
SSLR: off
SSAO: off
MSAA: 2x (you could probably do 4x if configured properly but start with 2)
Anistropic: 16x (this barely makes a hit on GPU I find, might as well crank it)

See how the above effects your FPS to start then:

Civ. Traffic: Decide how much you like this as it can take a large hit on your CPU (call draws which could prevent your CPU from sending enough info to your GPU)
Heat Blur: Do you really want this (I never cared for it much as I'm in cockpit 99.9% of the time )
Clouds: Ultra (ooooo those do look pretty but do eff with FPS)

Then
Shadows: Like clouds, they're pretty, but can make a large hit.

If you can find enough FPS improvement in above you can probably afford to start bumping things like scenery details and forest visibilty. Personaly (in VR) I bring Forest details down as lower poly trees look almost as nice as the full poly trees.

Hope that helps.

We haven't touched on other factors like do you have any software running in the background like discord or other tray apps that are eating CPU cycles.... Lots of guides on line. DCS will take some time (as will any flight sim) to help setup properly for your rig.

We must have been replying at the same time... good catch, he said he had a 1440p monitor.

You are basically rendering wasted pixels... That alone should afford you big gains.

 

Thanks for that! Now I have 80-100fps on the group with populated airport and 150+fps above the clouds
It's just that my F-16 doesn't look good in external view, lines on the fuselage are weird and not clean, something to do with SSAA ? (And probably not a problem with DLSS in the future I suppose)

[twistking]

27 minutes ago, MagicALCN said:

Thanks for that! Now I have 80-100fps on the group with populated airport and 150+fps above the clouds
It's just that my F-16 doesn't look good in external view, lines on the fuselage are weird and not clean, something to do with SSAA ? (And probably not a problem with DLSS in the future I suppose)

yes, i fear that's a compromise you'll have to take. MSAA only works on aliasing from geometry and the rough lines on the F-16 are a texture problem i think. SSAA would smooth these out, but as you've experienced it comes with quite a performance hit. DLSS might indeed help in the future, but i think there is also a real issue with the textures on the 16 (i'm guessing missing mipmaps): I think it is already reported since many years, but it might be worth reporting it again.

*edit* while @trevoC has good setting recommendations in his answer, i'll advise to at least test with SSAO. It will tax the GPU, but in certain situations it makes the cockpit look much more natural. I think your GPU should be able to handle it if you don't use SSAA.

Edited February 6, 2023 by twistking

[jonsky7]

44 minutes ago, MagicALCN said:

Thanks for that! Now I have 80-100fps on the group with populated airport and 150+fps above the clouds
It's just that my F-16 doesn't look good in external view, lines on the fuselage are weird and not clean, something to do with SSAA ? (And probably not a problem with DLSS in the future I suppose)

There is currently a bug with banding in the shadows, might you be experiencing that?
 

 

[trevoC]

Glad you got some more frames.

By all means this was meant as a starting point to get you in a spot where you are achieving realistic or high in your case frame rates. At this point you need to do what I do.

Get in (I use the Huey as it stays close to the ground where performance is usually worse) an aircraft on marianas preferably (as all other maps with the exception of South Atlantic will be less demanding) and start flying a specific route. Pick a spot on the route to measure performance.

Decide what you want your minimum performance to be (in VR mine is 45 fps) and keep dialing up settings you want to have (more clouds etc..) until you hit that minimum fps on that map. This should ensure you are usually getting above that minimum and more. As an example, I average 55 fps near the ground and 70-90 in the air (4k VR) which was my acceptable limits.

It takes a lot of trial and error to find your exact balance. I like having further visibility, others prefer less of that and nicer clouds... etc... etc.. There is no one solution fits all.

When I first got the 3090 a few years ago I cranked all the settings (not efficient to run some of these together but I just wanted to see what it would do) at 4k (2d) and it really showed that even with top end hardware DCS (and flight sims in general) will really humble your setup.

Having flown flight sims for around 30 years now I guess that has never changed.