4090, 9900K, G2, Open XR help

[DavidE]

Have finally bit the Bullitt and purchased a MSI 4090 Suprim  X, was going to go for a cheaper card but found a very good price on Box UK. Used them before and have found them very reliable and often cheaper than the main two UK suppliers.

The timing of the MT release made the difference to me in going ahead. Based on initial testing I am finding that with MT the 9900K is not such a bottleneck with my G2 as I thought (don't play multi player servers at present.  With modified high settings I can now get circa 60 - 70 FPS with the GPU still being often the higher frame time. Yet to overclock the 4090 which may gain a bit.

Question 1

With FPS well above 45, is there any benefit to turning on motion reprojection in OpenXR toolkit? Initial thoughts are leave it off.

Question 2

If I use MSAA at 2x, do I still need Aniso at 16 as well. From what I can understand, MSAA is pre and Aniso post processing so I think the answer is Yes. Does the MSAA mask size setting make much difference? I am assuming that SSAA, SSLR and SSAO are still relatively  pointless options, if so maybe ED should remove them to simplify life.

Question 3

In OpenXR do users recommend using NIS,FSR or CAS, if so at what settings. My initial thoughts is that if you do then what you gain in frame time you will give back by having to set MSAA higher in DCS. My understanding of this is very limited at present.

Question 4

Now we have MT, the DCS notes say we should ensure Hyper Threading is enabled, thoughts on this, made an improvement in Time spy in initial tests.

Overall

To run through all the combinations will take days when I could be playing with the new toy so I would be happy to take advice. Apologies if this has been covered before.

The 4090 has been a revelation and with the timing of MT has really made DCS a different sim from using it with my 3080ti. Thanks to ED for this, they well enable me to divert future funds from a new PC towards the Pimax Crystal or similar.

 

[DirtyMike0330]

49 minutes ago, DavidE said:

Have finally bit the Bullitt and purchased a MSI 4090 Suprim  X, was going to go for a cheaper card but found a very good price on Box UK. Used them before and have found them very reliable and often cheaper than the main two UK suppliers.

The timing of the MT release made the difference to me in going ahead. Based on initial testing I am finding that with MT the 9900K is not such a bottleneck with my G2 as I thought (don't play multi player servers at present.  With modified high settings I can now get circa 60 - 70 FPS with the GPU still being often the higher frame time. Yet to overclock the 4090 which may gain a bit.

Question 1

With FPS well above 45, is there any benefit to turning on motion reprojection in OpenXR toolkit? Initial thoughts are leave it off.

Question 2

If I use MSAA at 2x, do I still need Aniso at 16 as well. From what I can understand, MSAA is pre and Aniso post processing so I think the answer is Yes. Does the MSAA mask size setting make much difference? I am assuming that SSAA, SSLR and SSAO are still relatively  pointless options, if so maybe ED should remove them to simplify life.

Question 3

In OpenXR do users recommend using NIS,FSR or CAS, if so at what settings. My initial thoughts is that if you do then what you gain in frame time you will give back by having to set MSAA higher in DCS. My understanding of this is very limited at present.

Question 4

Now we have MT, the DCS notes say we should ensure Hyper Threading is enabled, thoughts on this, made an improvement in Time spy in initial tests.

Overall

To run through all the combinations will take days when I could be playing with the new toy so I would be happy to take advice. Apologies if this has been covered before.

The 4090 has been a revelation and with the timing of MT has really made DCS a different sim from using it with my 3080ti. Thanks to ED for this, they well enable me to divert future funds from a new PC towards the Pimax Crystal or similar.

 

1. This is subjective. Many (myself included) find anything less than 90 fps to be a stutter fest and an unpleasant experience so we stick with motion reprojection. If you can stomach it, then that is your call! I prefer unlocked motion reprojection via OpenXR toolkit at the moment because it allows me to have all other settings at high/ultra and remains smooth throughout game play. 

2. AF 8x to 16x is a marginal performance cost IIRC, so whatever looks better to you. 

3. Again, it boils down to which sharpening you prefer the look of. Some like FSR better than NIS. 

4. Someone can correct me if I am wrong, but I don't think the SMT ON vs OFF subject is really a big deal anymore. Seemed to be more of an issue having it ON in the past, but I don't think that is going to make much of a difference either way with your specs. I have the same GPU and a 7950x3D and we are both going to be pretty much GPU bound until DLSS or Vulkan. 

A lot of your questions will just come down to what you prefer tbh. I currently run DCS 2 ways with my G2:

1. All settings high/ultra, unlocked motion reprojection, nothing else going in in OpenXR toolkit. I can even bump MSAA up to 4x in this situation to be honest. 

2. Following this user's settings at 

I haven't decided yet which one I prefer but both options have good performance with high hardware specs. A lot of your questions will kinda just boil down to what you like the look of better. Congrats on the 4090. 

 

 

[DavidE]

Been doing a lot of testing tonight. Using the spitfire Atlantic wall start up as a base, I am still clearly GPU limited even with only a 9900K.

using the high preset as a base,

visibility to med, (big hit)

civ traffic off,

water medium,

cockpit res 512, 

shadows flat

terrain shadows flat

Aniso x16

open X-RAY fov rendering on performance, wide

getting close to 90FPS, the CPU timings are about 3 ms less than the GPU.

Haven't tried out the setting in anger yet but see no need for a new CPU at present. Turning on HT and EMC in the bios helped a lot.
Got distracted trying out Alyx at 150%, amazing clarity.

So pleased with the 4090 and that I don’t need a new CPU at present. About double the FPS of the 3080ti although I didn’t get the settings so dialled in for that. Of all the settings, visibility was one of the most critical. 
I may see how I go sacrificing about 5FPS for MSAA at 4.

I know my testing is very basic compared to many of you but I now have a totally transformed experience. Tomorrow will look at my racing sims.