Poor VR, Aliasing, Quantization, Dithering in Quest 2, 1080TI

[Granny]

Can anyone help me with DCS VR?  I'm playing DCS MT 2.8 (non-Steam). Looks great on my monitor by when I strap on my Quest 2 (128) and go VR its pretty terrible. Even with pretty modest graphics settings I get lots of aliasing on straight edges and some qantization  (especially in clouds and building in the middle distance) and some dithering.  In general the entire scene looks like its in a fishbowl filled with water, very shimmery.  

I watched about 30hours of youtube videos and read a dozen articles over the the last 2 weeks telling me how to tweak every graphic setting in-game and in the Nvida Control panel.  I have tried adjusting resolution, refresh rate, pixel density and a variety of other settings in the Oculus App, SideQuest, Oculus Debug Tool, Oculus Tray Tool, even the OpenXR tool kit. Most of these had no noticeable effect or in some cases degraded my performance with no improvment in quality.  I slightly overclocked both my CPU (with Ryzen Master) and GPU (with Afterburner) to try to improve performance. Still no luck.   So far only increasing the MSAA or the Pixel Density in-game slightly improves the image, but doesn't fix it and it immediately introduces stutter and cuts my FPS from 72ish to some times as low as 35.

In-headset apps do seem much clearer than PC stuff over Quest Link. I have tried multiple USB cables and ports, but I'm getting 2.2Gb across them according to the Oculus App, and I have USB power power management disable, so that doesn't seem to be the issue.

I'm running a Win11 PC with a Ryzen 5 5500 CPU and MSI 1080TI GPU.  I know its not top end, but I've seen videos of players getting much better VR on similar systems. I am as a loss as to what to do.

I also use the Quest to play Star Wars Squadrons (with Steam).  My its not awesome, but its acceptable for the mid-to-lower tier hardware I have. Much better than what I see in DCS. 

So, iss my hardware the limfac, or is there key thing I'm missing. Please Help!

Here's my specs are:

OS Name    Microsoft Windows 11 Home
Version    10.0.22631 Build 22631
System Type    x64-based PC
Processor    AMD Ryzen 5 5500, 3600 Mhz, 6 Core(s), 12 Logical Processor(s)
BaseBoard Manufacturer    ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.
BaseBoard Product    TUF GAMING B550M-PLUS WIFI II
BaseBoard Version    Rev X.0x
Installed Physical Memory (RAM) Silicon Power Turbine 3200MHz CL-16 1.35V DDR 4 (2x16) = 32.0 GB
Total Physical Memory    31.8 GB
Available Physical Memory    27.4 GB
Total Virtual Memory    33.8 GB
Available Virtual Memory    27.5 GB
Page File Space    2.00 GB

NVMe SSD Western Digitall Black 2TB Gen4 PCIe, M.2 2280 up to 5150MB/s

GPU Nvidia Geforce GTX 1080TI

Headset Quest 2 128

My in-game settings are:

Textures - High

Terrain Texture - High

Civ Trafc - off

Water - Low

Vis Range - Low

Heat Blur - off

Shadows - Flat 

Flat shadow blur off

Sec Shad - off

Res 1280x768

Monitor - 1 scrn

Res of Cockpt Dis = 512

MSAA 2x

Depth of Fid off

Lens Eft - off

clouds - low

Moton Blur 1

SSAA, SSLR, SSAO, all off

Frst Vs 60%

Forst Detail - 0.7

Scen Detail - 0.7

Preload rad 150000

Chimney Smk 1

Gamma 1.4

External FOV 78

Anisotrop Flit - 8

Terrain Obj Shad - off

Cockpit Glb Ill - off

Msge font - 1

Scale GUI 1.5

Rain Drop - off

Vysnc off

VR Pix Density 1.0

Forced IPD 68

MSAA Mask 1.00

Nvidia Control panel setting all restored to default settings.

Oculus Head set refresh rate set to 72, pixel density at 1.0.

 

 

[Qcumber]

7 hours ago, Granny said:

So far only increasing the MSAA or the Pixel Density in-game slightly improves the image, but doesn't fix it and it immediately introduces stutter and cuts my FPS from 72ish to some times as low as 35.

Unfortunately I think this if the only way to reduce aliasing. DLSS/DLAA is much better at this but is not supported by your GPU. 

You could try Quad Views Foveated rendering (fixed) to reduce the peripheral resolution and boost performance which might let you push MSAA to x4. 

[MIghtymoo]

2 hours ago, Qcumber said:

Unfortunately I think this if the only way to reduce aliasing. DLSS/DLAA is much better at this but is not supported by your GPU. 

You could try Quad Views Foveated rendering (fixed) to reduce the peripheral resolution and boost performance which might let you push MSAA to x4. 

You can not expect to much with Granny’s PC specs. No way to manage MSAAx4!
 

Try the following:

• DLSS Quality (Edit: Not supported on 1080ti)
• Reprojection with 45 fps!
• All graphics settings on lowest settings
• Adjust resolution to something giving OK result.
• Use OXRTK and enable foveated rendering. You can also try Quadview foveated rendering, but harder on CPU.

When you are happy with the performance, only then start increasing any graphics settings…

Good luck.

 

 

Edited January 10 by MIghtymoo

[Qcumber]

32 minutes ago, MIghtymoo said:

DLSS Quality

Unfortunately, I don't think the 1080ti supports DLSS. Otherwise, yes these are the settings to go for. Maybe even 72/36 fps. A ryzen 5500 should be OK with QVFR so would be worth trying. 

[diamond26]

I'm using as a backup a laptop with RTX 2060 6Gb and I was able to enjoy Q2 with some limitations. First you have to reduce Textures and Terrain textures. MSAA 2x is taxing on old systems but if you can't use DLAA then you have to bear the cost. You can also try the OpenXR toolkit options for upscaling (NIS, FSR) to reduce the total pixel load.

You can also try reducing FoV setting in ODT or OTT if you use that. A figure of 0.75 will help a lot without sacrificing too much of actual view.

In any case don't expect high FPS when you aim for clarity. The max I got with the laptop is 50-55 FPS in multiplayer using Quad Views and Quest Pro. Normal figures are around 30-35 FPS

[fab.13]

Hello,

i run DCS on a corei5 10600k ( 6 cores ) and a 1080ti and Quest2 

i ´ll share to you in few hours my settings that i’m very happy with ( fps and quality balance ) and external tools ( ODT, NvCP, windows tunings )

 

[fab.13]

Hello @Granny

Here my settings from various stack, i'll update it...

BIOS settings:
- XMP and DDR RAM with low latency
- no virtualization
- enable virtual threads ( 6 physical cores -> 12 threads )
- i don't remember everything

Windows 10:
- you need the more RAM & VRAM free and low CPU :
     - check with Windows Task Manager, CPU should be under 3 or 4 % ( 1%-2% on my rig ), so disable some services and auto started application you don't need
     - check free physical memory while playing DCS ( some mission or mutiplayer server ask nearly 28-30 go RAM )
- disable windows auto update ( it take CPU and Network )
- disable HAGS
- disable XBOX GameBar
- disable memory compression
- disable some MS assistant
- exclude DCS directory from antivirus ( and "saved games\DCS* " too )
- power managment to maximum performances
- disable usb devices power saving
- stop every tool about performance : it take CPU !
- you get a clean windows and nothing more and with CPU load in background and RAM free...

Nvidia Control Panel:
- Specific DCS settings with Power Maximum Performances, textures quality performance, ultra low latency, 1 pre-rendered frame, no msaa, no fxaa ( max perf )
- i don't remember my nvidia driver version

Occulus Debug Tool:
- Specific DCS settings with "low resolution mirror" to 800 * 600, PD to 1.0, fov 0.9 x 0.9 ( depend about your Quest 2 mask )
- Quest Link : Low curvature, enable Dynamic BitRate

Occulus HOME:
- quest setting resolution to 1.2
- check cable link speed ( i get 2.5 gb with a standard usb-c cable )

DCS:
- DCS OpenBeta stock with no mods
- start with "VR Settings" :  every textures low, no effects, no msaa , no asitropic , no shadow etc... ( max perf ), PD to 1.0
- disable HotPlugIn
 

1) start ODT first and check setting
2) start occulus home
3) connect your quest 2 and check resolution settings and everything ok in the occulus world ( smooth )
4) Start DCS MT version
5) check in a free flight in caucasus with no weather effect : on my rig a get a smooth experience 72 fps , no stutter and no blurry
6) check on aerobatic server : a get smooth experience 72 fps, sometime some stutter when a new arcraft appears ( depend about the livery ! ) 
7) change settings one by one ( Occulus Resolution or DCS : AA settings , Shadow, and Textures Resolution need more resources than other ... )

In my experience, windows 10 or 11 tuning is the most important step,
I cannot get a good experience without freeing ressources at maximum and permanently ( CPU & RAM background reduced as much as possible )
( DCS would need a real-time OS or DOS ...: dedicated ressources )

When checking performances while playing DCS MT in VR  : CPU is about 80% and GPU about 90% and VRAM Full ...

Good Luck !

 

Edited January 12 by fab.13

[Granny]

Thanks all,   there are several tips in this thread that I had not tried.  I've got things much better now.  Still not perfect, but it will never be with until I get around to upgrading.  But DCS is playable now.