Is the minimum hardware requirement for VR increased?

[BoundaryLayer]

Hi, my hardware: 9600K, 32GB RAM, 3060Ti 8GB, DCS installed on SSD, PICO 4 VR set.

I don't play VR quite often, but I clearly remember that a year ago, I could play in VR for medium graphics settings and crashes happened but not always.

Now, I must set all textures to low, and steam vr crashes everytime when I try to reload another mission.

I know that VRAM is an issue here, and I've noticed that after starting steam vr, 3GB VRAM is already consumed; and after starting DCS (main menu) another 3GB VRAM is consumed, that leaves only 2GB usable for the actual play. In the mission, all 8GB VRAM is consumed but it's fine, it's still playable (DLSS on, no super sampling from either steam vr or PICO set, I basically set everything to mininum), FPS is acceptable even though there is lagging in some scenario. However, after quiting the mission, the VRAM is only freed for hundreds of MB, so loading the next mission crashes steam vr, and this always happens now; and sometimes simply quiting the current mission crashes steam vr.

Does anyone has any thought on this, like what further settings or optimizations I should do .

[Qcumber]

5 minutes ago, BoundaryLayer said:

Hi, my hardware: 9600K, 32GB RAM, 3060Ti 8GB, DCS installed on SSD, PICO 4 VR set.

I don't play VR quite often, but I clearly remember that a year ago, I could play in VR for medium graphics settings and crashes happened but not always.

Now, I must set all textures to low, and steam vr crashes everytime when I try to reload another mission.

I know that VRAM is an issue here, and I've noticed that after starting steam vr, 3GB VRAM is already consumed; and after starting DCS (main menu) another 3GB VRAM is consumed, that leaves only 2GB usable for the actual play. In the mission, all 8GB VRAM is consumed but it's fine, it's still playable (DLSS on, no super sampling from either steam vr or PICO set, I basically set everything to mininum), FPS is acceptable even though there is lagging in some scenario. However, after quiting the mission, the VRAM is only freed for hundreds of MB, so loading the next mission crashes steam vr, and this always happens now; and sometimes simply quiting the current mission crashes steam vr.

Does anyone has any thought on this, like what further settings or optimizations I should do .

Have you tried using Quad Views Foveated Rendering in fixed mode? 

https://github.com/mbucchia/Quad-Views-Foveated

Also try using Virtual Desktop instead of Steam? It uses less VRAM.

[Mr_sukebe]

A few more things to try:

• Ensure that you're using OpenXR
• Disable the "home" for your Pico.  If it's anything like the Oculus "home", it'll eat a couple of GB of VRAM before you're even opened DCS
• Run a search for Empty VR Hangar.  When you first load into DCS in VR, you'll normally be sat next to a jet. Again, that eats VRAM and adds no real value.  The Empty VR hangar replaces that initial view with zilch
• Textures do tend to eat lots of VRAM.  Another that I found was the Preload Radius.  Mine is now set to around 45%.  Give that a try
• When you're in game, open the DCS FPS counter.  Open that twice and you get both the FPS count (small box) and a bigger box with more detail in it.  That now displays both the USED and RESERVED VRAM usage and is worth taking a scan at.  The most I've seen USED is up to around 12GB on loading a complex mission in the Chinook.  In most scenarios (single player) I'm typically using sub 6GB, which "should" fit into your GPU
• Go checkout the DLSS4 threads.  DLSS4 introduced an update to the upscaling and AA that is available to all RTX cards, including your 30 series.  There's a need to use an App (free to download) called NVPI (Nvidia Profile Inspector), but it's like Nvidia really has applied some magic to the results.  Use the latest DLSS profile and there's a definite improvement in frame rate/visuals

IMO, VR in DCS has improved in the last few months, but that's partly a result of the above settings

[draconus]

On 3/31/2025 at 12:31 PM, BoundaryLayer said:

steam vr crashes everytime when I try to reload another mission

You should've started here:

https://forum.dcs.world/forum/482-game-crash/

Upload your dcs.log. It's not normal for the DCS to just crash because of the low VRAM and it's not the hard requirement either.

Also do file integrity check for DCS in Steam - it's a common crashing reason.

Edited April 1 by draconus

[sleighzy]

Could be anything. Attach your DCS log file here after a crash occurs. C:\Users\username\Saved Games\DCS\Logs\dcs.log (or text document named "dcs" if Windows is hiding file extensions.) Don't restart the game until you've gotten the log as it's overwritten each time. If it's a complete crash then there may also be a dcs-log-<timestamp>.zip file so attach that.

[BoundaryLayer]

On 3/31/2025 at 6:39 PM, Qcumber said:

Also try using Virtual Desktop instead of Steam? It uses less VRAM.

I was told about VD before, but my Pico was retailed in China that unfortunately does not support VD. So I have been using the default PICO Connect, and indeed people say that it is worse than VD regarding to performance.

 

On 3/31/2025 at 6:39 PM, Qcumber said:

Have you tried using Quad Views Foveated Rendering in fixed mode? 

I will have a look at this this weekend, but I'm afraid that its eye-tracking feature won't work with Pico though.

[Canada_Moose]

6 minutes ago, BoundaryLayer said:

I was told about VD before, but my Pico was retailed in China that unfortunately does not support VD. So I have been using the default PICO Connect, and indeed people say that it is worse than VD regarding to performance.

 

I will have a look at this this weekend, but I'm afraid that its eye-tracking feature won't work with Pico though.

Thats why you use it in 'fixed' mode.

[BoundaryLayer]

On 3/31/2025 at 7:17 PM, Mr_sukebe said:

Ensure that you're using OpenXR

I tried this, but I don't know if I was doing it properly. On starting DCS I choose "start DCS with OpenXR", but eventually Steam VR starts and immediately 3GB VRAM is then taken.

I'm not sure if OpenXR only works with VD, while my Pico does not support VD.

On 3/31/2025 at 7:17 PM, Mr_sukebe said:

Disable the "home" for your Pico

Steam home has always been turned off (but still steam vr consumes large VRAM), and Pico does not have a "home" as far as I know.

On 3/31/2025 at 7:17 PM, Mr_sukebe said:

Run a search for Empty VR Hangar

Ok.. this is insane. How could they let the hangar stay in the VRAM all the time. I will try to remove it this weekend.

On 3/31/2025 at 7:17 PM, Mr_sukebe said:

Preload Radius

I thought this is realted to RAM only, so I've always been setting it to 100%, and the visual range as well. I will test it this weekend too.

On 3/31/2025 at 7:17 PM, Mr_sukebe said:

When you're in game, open the DCS FPS counter.  Open that twice and you get both the FPS count (small box) and a bigger box with more detail in it.  That now displays both the USED and RESERVED VRAM usage and is worth taking a scan at.  The most I've seen USED is up to around 12GB on loading a complex mission in the Chinook.  In most scenarios (single player) I'm typically using sub 6GB, which "should" fit into your GPU

Will do. I also noticed the difference in usage of VRAM for different aircraft (F-16, A-10II and Su-25T), but that is only in hundreds of MB, compared to 3GB by steam vr and 3GB by the hangar...

On 3/31/2025 at 7:17 PM, Mr_sukebe said:

NVPI (Nvidia Profile Inspector)

Nice, will test this too.

 

Thank you Mr Sukebe for your advices!

Edited April 3 by BoundaryLayer

[BoundaryLayer]

On 4/1/2025 at 8:25 PM, draconus said:

You should've started here:

https://forum.dcs.world/forum/482-game-crash/

Upload your dcs.log. It's not normal for the DCS to just crash because of the low VRAM and it's not the hard requirement either.

Also do file integrity check for DCS in Steam - it's a common crashing reason.

On 4/2/2025 at 7:16 AM, sleighzy said:

Could be anything. Attach your DCS log file here after a crash occurs. C:\Users\username\Saved Games\DCS\Logs\dcs.log (or text document named "dcs" if Windows is hiding file extensions.) Don't restart the game until you've gotten the log as it's overwritten each time. If it's a complete crash then there may also be a dcs-log-<timestamp>.zip file so attach that.

I actually think it's more like a steam vr issue, because it's always the steam vr that crashes first, while DCS still palys the sound. Then force restarting steam vr exits DCS, so bascally DCS itself does not crash in this case.

34 minutes ago, Canada_Moose said:

Thats why you use it in 'fixed' mode.

Ah, I see. I somehow ignored this phrase in the reply. Thanks! I will try it.

 

Edited April 3 by BoundaryLayer

[Dogmanbird]

Hi @BoundaryLayer

is it possible the last time you used VR in DCS, it was still single threaded?   When it moved to MT, it introduced stutters for me that required 'turbo mode' to be enabled in openxr toolkit. I still require it to this day.