2.9 fixes way over my head

[CBStu]

6-8 months ago I thought my 4 yr old Alienware was needing some upgrades. I used to notice in a few missions w/ a lot of planes moving around on carrier or airfield or w/ a bunch flying, I'd get some lags/stutters. But it usually went away a few minutes after takeoff. Then 2.9 stable effed dang near everything. I have a mission Battle for the Docks where the only thing moving other than my plane is a few cars on the airfield perimeter road. And I get stutters and actual 2-3-4 second pauses taxiing to the runway. I have done a few of the fixes, turned down or off some graphics settings recommended in a thread by BigNewey, dropped max fps to 120. Dropped from the medium to the low graphics setting. DCS is somewhat better now but sure wish I hadn't gone to 2.9. So a few Qs to try to see if some internal desktop upgrade might help.

1- I see mentions of flying in either MT or ST. I guess MT is multi threading? IDK. Several posters say MT sucks while all is well in ST but I have no idea where I can choose one or the other.

2- No way to spend $2500 on a new PC and I have seen some comments indicating that newer higher performance PCs than mine are having similar problems anyway so....

3- How do I get real time #s on graphics and main processor (and whatever else is important) performance? Maybe I need to upgrade one or the other or?

4- A couple of weeks ago I saw my PC has 16 of ram so bought another 16 stick only to find out my 16 is actually two 8s so I need to buy another 16 stick. Due to my lack of experience I bought Dell guaranteed to be compatible ram at $130 for the 16 and of course now I see I could have gotten two 16s from Crucial for <$100. Should I buy another Dell 16 or shelve the one I have and buy Crucial? I have seen quite a few people mention their PC specs in a thread and now I am thinking maybe extra ram won't really do me much good?

5- I have seen threads about turning off a processor core and then turning it back on? In the bios? That is way beyond my ability and I don't think I should have to do things like that to play DCS when my PC works just fine for everything else. I think DCS should fix whatever is causing so many people to have the same problem. I understand DCS could have a tough time making something work on 1000s of different PCs but mine is a pretty run of the mill standard machine from a mainstream manufacturer so whatever testing they did certainly seems nowhere near enough to me. I understand that like all electronics, things need to upgrade periodically  so I understand and am willing to do some things. If I saw some big improvements w/ 2.9 but my PC is old enough to not be able to take advantage of some of them fine. But I see NOTHING OTHER THAN PROBLEMS and I am far from the only one experiencing these problems. I  hope they will figure out a fix.

Thanks in advance for any help you provide and now that it is typed out I realize #5 is a rant. Sorry for that but dang I used to love DCS.

[silverdevil]

45 minutes ago, CBStu said:

6-8 months ago I thought my 4 yr old Alienware was needing some upgrades. I used to notice in a few missions w/ a lot of planes moving around on carrier or airfield or w/ a bunch flying, I'd get some lags/stutters. But it usually went away a few minutes after takeoff. Then 2.9 stable effed dang near everything. I have a mission Battle for the Docks where the only thing moving other than my plane is a few cars on the airfield perimeter road. And I get stutters and actual 2-3-4 second pauses taxiing to the runway. I have done a few of the fixes, turned down or off some graphics settings recommended in a thread by BigNewey, dropped max fps to 120. Dropped from the medium to the low graphics setting. DCS is somewhat better now but sure wish I hadn't gone to 2.9. So a few Qs to try to see if some internal desktop upgrade might help.

hello. post the suspect mission. others can try it to see and share their results.

45 minutes ago, CBStu said:

1- I see mentions of flying in either MT or ST. I guess MT is multi threading? IDK. Several posters say MT sucks while all is well in ST but I have no idea where I can choose one or the other.

MT will eventually be the only version. so i suggest using it and posting problems you encounter. thanks @rob10 for typo!

45 minutes ago, CBStu said:

2- No way to spend $2500 on a new PC and I have seen some comments indicating that newer higher performance PCs than mine are having similar problems anyway so....

post your current specs. we can see if anything is amiss as far as below system requirements for DCS.

45 minutes ago, CBStu said:

3- How do I get real time #s on graphics and main processor (and whatever else is important) performance? Maybe I need to upgrade one or the other or?

see answer for 2.

45 minutes ago, CBStu said:

4- A couple of weeks ago I saw my PC has 16 of ram so bought another 16 stick only to find out my 16 is actually two 8s so I need to buy another 16 stick. Due to my lack of experience I bought Dell guaranteed to be compatible ram at $130 for the 16 and of course now I see I could have gotten two 16s from Crucial for <$100. Should I buy another Dell 16 or shelve the one I have and buy Crucial? I have seen quite a few people mention their PC specs in a thread and now I am thinking maybe extra ram won't really do me much good?

generally, in my experience, it is best to get two exact matches of DIMMS / SODIMMS. so two compatible dell or crucial that are the same. RAM does do good. the more the better. i have an alienware from early 2021. i bit the bullet and got 128 GB. i do not have memory related issues. of course i could have went with overkill. but i had the money. i also have 32 GB pagefile.

 

45 minutes ago, CBStu said:

5- I have seen threads about turning off a processor core and then turning it back on? In the bios? That is way beyond my ability and I don't think I should have to do things like that to play DCS when my PC works just fine for everything else. I think DCS should fix whatever is causing so many people to have the same problem. I understand DCS could have a tough time making something work on 1000s of different PCs but mine is a pretty run of the mill standard machine from a mainstream manufacturer so whatever testing they did certainly seems nowhere near enough to me. I understand that like all electronics, things need to upgrade periodically  so I understand and am willing to do some things. If I saw some big improvements w/ 2.9 but my PC is old enough to not be able to take advantage of some of them fine. But I see NOTHING OTHER THAN PROBLEMS and I am far from the only one experiencing these problems. I  hope they will figure out a fix.

for the rant  see answer 2. and also add exceptions to your AV software. there is lots of other tidbits but lets go slow.

see this post

  

2 hours ago, Hartsblade said:

So a friend of mine recently sent me a video by Spudknocker that proposes a simple fix for stutter in DCS 2.9 related to Windows Defender. I'll link it below. Just for the record I have tried what he suggests and there appears to be improvements in game/stutter.

The TLDR for the video is to make some scan exemptions for Windows Defender related to DCS. I also included an exception for my Steam folder because I have an Index and wanted to include SteamVR in his solution. As always YMMV.

 

 

 

45 minutes ago, CBStu said:

Thanks in advance for any help you provide and now that it is typed out I realize #5 is a rant. Sorry for that but dang I used to love DCS.

always come back for help. i surely will if i can. if you keep at it you will love DCS again.

good luck.

Edited February 20 by silverdevil
ST to MT doh.

[CBStu]

Silverdevil thx so much. I had dropped McAffee and started using Defender a month or so ago. I did exclude dcs but now I realize just part of it. OS c user, name ,saved games, dcs. So I followed the video rec exactly and changed that to all of saved games vs just dcs. Also added all his other exclusions except simple radio which I don't have. Unfortunately I will have to wait until tonight to try flying. BTW, my PC = Aurora R9, Core I7-9700k @ 3.6Ghz, Geforce RTX 2080Super, 16 ram. running an Alienware 27 monitor at 1920x1080. I have learned a bit about Alienware  Command Center how to crank up the CPU cooler fan before starting dcs. Haven't learned about overclocking yet though. I will keep working through this and thank you again for all your help.

[Lange_666]

On 2/20/2024 at 6:07 PM, CBStu said:

1- I see mentions of flying in either MT or ST. I guess MT is multi threading? IDK. Several posters say MT sucks while all is well in ST but I have no idea where I can choose one or the other.

For what I read, it seems that when starting DCS from the regular DCS desktop icon it now starts the MT version versus starting ST like it did before.
(I use SkateZilla's updater/launcher where I have the option to launch either in ST or MT).
To be sure you launch ST, just go to your DCS install location, in there you have a directory called bin and another bin-mt.
The bin is ST, the bin-mt the MT version.
Both contain a DCS.exe. Just go into each and create a shortcut from DCS.exe and put these on your desktop. Rename one DCS-ST and the other DCS-MT.
This way you can launch either ST or MT and see the difference between the two.

 

On 2/20/2024 at 6:07 PM, CBStu said:

4- A couple of weeks ago I saw my PC has 16 of ram so bought another 16 stick only to find out my 16 is actually two 8s so I need to buy another 16 stick. Due to my lack of experience I bought Dell guaranteed to be compatible ram at $130 for the 16 and of course now I see I could have gotten two 16s from Crucial for <$100. Should I buy another Dell 16 or shelve the one I have and buy Crucial? I have seen quite a few people mention their PC specs in a thread and now I am thinking maybe extra ram won't really do me much good?

As Silverdevil says, the best thing to do if you want to use your old RAM, is to get exact the same specs (brand + RAM timings) as you have installed already. If you mix brands or use add a set with different timings you can easily run into problems. If you can't get them anymore, replace your old rams with new ones.
Also, be sure how many RAM slots you have. RAM always comes in 2 pieces. If you only have a motherboard with 2 slots, you can only replace with new RAM.

16GB is on the edge these days for DCS. With settings too high I go over 16GB Ram on a simple mission, in VR multiplayer it uses even over 32GB.
 

[CBStu]

Silverdevil, you da MAN! Setting all the exclusions in Defender per that video did the trick. I flew the single player mission Battle for the Docks where I used to get stutters just taxiing and it is now perfect. Then I flew Shootin Putin where there are 4 flights of 4 friendlies and about 20 red planes. It ran PERFECTLY. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you.

A general question though. I understand that, while DCS is loading it must go online as it checks for updates, but is something going on online while I am playing in single player? I ask because I think I understand that Defender is looking at protecting the PC from crap coming in from the web. So why were all the exclusions affecting how it flys if I am playing within my PC?

Lange 666, I will order another 16 stick from Dell. It is too expensive but, at my PC skill level, I think that is my safest way to go. I have 4 ram slots and the existing ones are in the 2 white slots so I will place the new 16s in the whites. Would there be any way to use the old 8s by placing them in the black slots? I will also look into the ST/MT thing. Not sure I need to but will try ST just to see.  

BTW I am not sure what I did in Alienware Command Center but I had been manually setting it to performance which cranked up the cpu fan constantly until I changed it back. But the other day I changed something so now the fan cranks up automatically when I launch DCS. That is a nice function so I will figure out how I did that.

[Lange_666]

If your new RAM sticks are of the same specs as the old ones (speed and timings, size doesn't matter) you can use the old ones together with the new ones giving a total of old + new.
Mixing RAM sticks with different speeds and timings is not a good idea.

[MadKreator]

1 hour ago, CBStu said:

Silverdevil, you da MAN! Setting all the exclusions in Defender per that video did the trick. I flew the single player mission Battle for the Docks where I used to get stutters just taxiing and it is now perfect. Then I flew Shootin Putin where there are 4 flights of 4 friendlies and about 20 red planes. It ran PERFECTLY. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you.

I have a pretty high end system and still had the stutters, albeit not terrible. After doing all of the windows defender exclusions, dcs is smooth as glass as well as track IR. Memory upgrade will help. I’d go at minimum to 32 gigs. 64 if your mobo supports it and of course if the price is right. I would also look into doing the 32 gig pagefile thing too. I have 64 gigs and dcs will eat well into the 50’s on a big mission. DCS will use what it needs based on what you have.  

[silverdevil]

2 hours ago, CBStu said:

A general question though. I understand that, while DCS is loading it must go online as it checks for updates, but is something going on online while I am playing in single player? I ask because I think I understand that Defender is looking at protecting the PC from crap coming in from the web. So why were all the exclusions affecting how it flys if I am playing within my PC?

DCS will only update when you run the shortcut. So no updates per se while flying. However DCS may, for example, compile a shader that you do not already have compiled. Depending on system and how many shaders, it may take a moment. Those exceptions stop the security software from scanning those folders. The idea is the security software will check the file, go online to check a database of known badness, and then continue. It could be other things but this explains why the exceptions make it faster and no stuttering.

[CBStu]

Thanks guys. I ordered another grossly overpriced Dell ram stick. So I will check the old one to see if they match the new ones. Supposedly what I bought is compatible w/ my PC but I am not sure that means they exactly match the original ones.

[silverdevil]

3 minutes ago, CBStu said:

Thanks guys. I ordered another grossly overpriced Dell ram stick. So I will check the old one to see if they match the new ones. Supposedly what I bought is compatible w/ my PC but I am not sure that means they exactly match the original ones.

did you provide them with your service tag? if so you should be good. they can look up the inventory of what they sent you and provide a compatible DIMM. and if it is wrong they will take it back.

[CBStu]

Yes they had the svc tag for both purchases and I double checked that the part number on the first one I bought matches the one I just now ordered. 

[CBStu]

I wanted to come back to say that now, after quite a few more flights ,DCS is back to the way it used to be. I have flown several missions w/ 16 to 20 planes flying at the same time and got a tiny stutter twice when I moved my head real fast. So all of  the planes kept flying and it was just my TIR5 view that had a slight hiccup. This is wonderful. I can't thank all of you enough. I made some changes recommended in this thread but the video from Hartsblade posted by Silverdevil on Feb20 is the fix for me. It does make me wonder though. All the testing done by ED prior to releasing 2.9 and no one was running a PC w/ Win Defender on it? That is kind of hard to believe. OH well, I am a happy guy loving DCS again.

[BIGNEWY]

15 minutes ago, CBStu said:

I wanted to come back to say that now, after quite a few more flights ,DCS is back to the way it used to be. I have flown several missions w/ 16 to 20 planes flying at the same time and got a tiny stutter twice when I moved my head real fast. So all of  the planes kept flying and it was just my TIR5 view that had a slight hiccup. This is wonderful. I can't thank all of you enough. I made some changes recommended in this thread but the video from Hartsblade posted by Silverdevil on Feb20 is the fix for me. It does make me wonder though. All the testing done by ED prior to releasing 2.9 and no one was running a PC w/ Win Defender on it? That is kind of hard to believe. OH well, I am a happy guy loving DCS again.

Glad you are seeing better results, there is never a one fix for all option when it come to performance tweaking, often when people see issues it is system specific, and to make things worse I have even seen same systems behave differently. 

thanks