next DCS game essentials....

[cadete2000]

The most important thing from future DCS games is the FRAME RATES,with Lock On I can get more than 150 frs,Arma2 about 80,Fs X around 70 all full,but in BS I can only get around 15 en battle,some times only single digits,flight along I get around 25.So for the next games I emphasize for the DCS team to concentrate on that problem,also make the game available worldwide(in Canada no store brought the game)also continue with the same security as BS,because no every body is connected to the internet,but I can install in another pc, same as BS.No every body can have a top of the line computer system,specially this days,so think I bit in the costumer .Thanks for the chance to express my ideas.:smartass:

[dooom]

Believe it or not, the frame rate the human eye can perceive is only around 14-16 frames per second; this is generally why motion pictures are captured at 30 frames per second; because that compensates for non-synchronizing to refreshing... 25 FPS should still appear smooth to you... unless of course you are cross bred with an american eagle.

 

people get pretty hung up on frame rates i find... and accordingly they compormise on looks to get high rates...but unless i am wrong, you should only get worried if she dips below that 16 threshold in big battles.

 

Quality before quantity for me :P

[GGTharos]

Actually 16 fps is not really adequate to maneuver the heli well.

[YorZor]

Believe it or not, the frame rate the human eye can perceive is only around 14-16 frames per second; this is generally why motion pictures are captured at 30 frames per second; because that compensates for non-synchronizing to refreshing... 25 FPS should still appear smooth to you... unless of course you are cross bred with an american eagle.

 

people get pretty hung up on frame rates i find... and accordingly they compormise on looks to get high rates...but unless i am wrong, you should only get worried if she dips below that 16 threshold in big battles.

 

Quality before quantity for me :P

 

 

18? Well you must have the slowest brain known to mankind then.

 

Please, if you think that like 25 is enough because movies are shown like that (or used to) you are dead wrong. Only thing why 25fps is enough in movies is that the whole screen is blurred. The difference ain't that great in the pictures so 25fps is ample. For games however it was first generally thought that 30fps would be enough. Few years later it gone up to 60. And yes it even went up after that, 72fps was the new "must have".

 

Then there was an test by the USAF that showed one picture different from all the others. And take a guess how many fps that was, 72? no wrong. 100 no wrong. It was 1 picture in 1/120 of a second. Realize what that means?

 

Yes you are correct. The human eye can detect way more that 100fps, the be honest no-one knows where the limit is, except for the lil grey guys from outer space :music_whistling:

[EtherealN]

Believe it or not, the frame rate the human eye can perceive is only around 14-16 frames per second;

 

Incorrect.

 

This site goes through some of the common misconceptions on the issue: http://www.100fps.com/how_many_frames_can_humans_see.htm

 

---

 

Cadete2000, if you can get 150fps in Lock On but only 15 in DCS:BS you need to investigate your computer a bit, because it sounds to me like something in your settings is wrong - not anything in DCS:BS itself. If you have mirrors on - turn them off. If you have water on high, go into the config file and set water to off (which is unfortunately inpossible in the settings screen). Especially the water should give you great boosts.

 

Finally it should be noted that all systems can be made to crawl with DCS:BS - all you need is enough units trying to kill each other. I don't care which system you have - if you place 5 thousands Vulcans on the map and all try to kill you at the same time. Now, most maps don't have such extreme situations, but the point is that some maps may be calm enough to be smooth on pretty much all systems, another map may be as smooth on almost all systems, a third may be having issues on half of common systems. The problem is that it is impossible to make all maps work equally well on all systems - that would cripple game design. It should also be noted that none of the other games you listed will be as computation-intensive as DCS:BS - and that DCS:BS is the way it is for a reason. The only way to avoid that is to not be as detailed in the simulation, and try to survive the angry mob that will arise if you try to tell ED to go that route here. :P

Edited November 23, 2009 by EtherealN

[JimMack]

The most important thing from future DCS games is the FRAME RATES,with Lock On I can get more than 150 frs,Arma2 about 80,Fs X around 70 all full,but in BS I can only get around 15 en battle,some times only single digits,flight along I get around 25.So for the next games I emphasize for the DCS team to concentrate on that problem,also make the game available worldwide(in Canada no store brought the game)also continue with the same security as BS,because no every body is connected to the internet,but I can install in another pc, same as BS.No every body can have a top of the line computer system,specially this days,so think I bit in the costumer .Thanks for the chance to express my ideas.:smartass:

 

The following stores in Canada bought Black Shark:-

AMAZONCOM.CA

Computech Computer Centre

Game Shack Inc

Philips Distribution

London Drugs

[Frederf]

Watching the DCS web page videos makes me yearn for a fancy USAF computer that can run DCS:BS that smoothly... would be so much easier!

[Paco]

You get 70 FPS on FSX with all sliders maxed? I want your computer. I get 70-80 on Black Shark, sometimes more and get 35-40 on FSX with my sliders halfway. Something is amiss.

 

i7 3.3ghz overclocked, 6 gig ram, gtx295 vist 64 bit.

Paco

[sobek]

The most important thing from future DCS games is the FRAME RATES,with Lock On I can get more than 150 frs,Arma2 about 80,Fs X around 70 all full,but in BS I can only get around 15 en battle,some times only single digits,flight along I get around 25.So for the next games I emphasize for the DCS team to concentrate on that problem,also make the game available worldwide(in Canada no store brought the game)also continue with the same security as BS,because no every body is connected to the internet,but I can install in another pc, same as BS.No every body can have a top of the line computer system,specially this days,so think I bit in the costumer .Thanks for the chance to express my ideas.:smartass:

 

WOW. This post really made me laugh. Yeah right, bad ED. Don't give people the freedom to tune the graphics engine themselves. Just make it so that every machine can run BS with 300 FPS with all of the 2 sliders maxed. Because everybody MUST be able to run EVERY game they want with all the settings maxxxxxxxxxxxxed to the maxxxxx. Totally makes sense. :lol:

[lawndartleo]

The day I could run FS9 locked at 60 FPS (new uber system at the time) was the day that I decided that 24 is enough was just a bunch of hooey. That is not to say that it isn't enough, because it is. But if you can get a game to run at the refresh rate of your monitor, something special happens visually and suspension of disbelief kicks in a few notches higher.

[dooom]

18? Well you must have the slowest brain known to mankind then.

 

Please, if you think that like 25 is enough because movies are shown like that (or used to) you are dead wrong. Only thing why 25fps is enough in movies is that the whole screen is blurred. The difference ain't that great in the pictures so 25fps is ample. For games however it was first generally thought that 30fps would be enough. Few years later it gone up to 60. And yes it even went up after that, 72fps was the new "must have".

 

Then there was an test by the USAF that showed one picture different from all the others. And take a guess how many fps that was, 72? no wrong. 100 no wrong. It was 1 picture in 1/120 of a second. Realize what that means?

 

Yes you are correct. The human eye can detect way more that 100fps, the be honest no-one knows where the limit is, except for the lil grey guys from outer space :music_whistling:

 

 

ooops - what i meant was the minimum frame rate the human eye perceives as smooth is 15-16... i kinda lost the point i was trying to make with that little error.. my bad - indeed if i could only percieve 15 fps then yes... i would be slow... very very slow indeed. i was trying to just say that once the eyes perceive "smooth" that the actual number doesnt really matter anymore.

no sources - just what i heard/ read... i could be wrong.

[dooom]

Incorrect.

 

This site goes through some of the common misconceptions on the issue: http://www.100fps.com/how_many_frames_can_humans_see.htm

 

---

 

very cool resource - good to know!

[Kuky]

You can run LockOn with 150FPS? *cough*Bull***t

[Sarge55]

Cadete 2000 - Don't know where you are in Canada but I just saw a box for sale at London Drugs here in BC, so they are still available.

[Frederf]

I think the question "How many FPS can an eye see?" and "How many FPS does a rendering PC have to calculate before a human eye can detect an increase?" are two different questions.

 

I can certainly tell the difference between a 120FPS rendering an a 40FPS rendering when compared side-by-side.

[Feuerfalke]

:)

 

That's what I thought about the article.

 

Just by looking out of the window, can you tell which car goes 150 and which goes 250?

 

Yes, most likely.

 

Can you tell exactly which speed the car goes by looking out of the window?

 

I honestly doubt that- unless you are a professional racedriver.

 

 

 

Besides that, with PC games a different fact comes into play, which this article IIRC does not mention: Responsiveness.

You can't play a game with 16 FPS because you not only have 16 screens that are different stills, but because the PC does not recognize input for the larger portion of the time in between. And reaction time is a lot faster than the human eye. That combined with a high DPI or sensitive mouse renders you spinning and helpless with 16FPS, because you never know when the PC is sensing your motion and when not.

 

So, coming back to the car: It's not like you have 16 pictures per second to see where you are going, but also 16 times input of unknown magnitude.

While you can live with the first, the second will most likely lead to a crash even on slower speeds.

 

 

Back to the IP:

If you can run LO with 150 FPS and BS with 15 you've most likely chosen different settings. The graphics engine is largely the same and LO was already mode CPU than GPU demanding. Or are you by chance running a modded LO vs a vanilla BS?

[Zorg_DK]

But if you can get a game to run at the refresh rate of your monitor, something special happens visually and suspension of disbelief kicks in a few notches higher.

 

Spot on!:thumbup: The impression of 3d also becomes clearer.

[YorZor]

ooops - what i meant was the minimum frame rate the human eye perceives as smooth is 15-16... i kinda lost the point i was trying to make with that little error.. my bad - indeed if i could only percieve 15 fps then yes... i would be slow... very very slow indeed. i was trying to just say that once the eyes perceive "smooth" that the actual number doesnt really matter anymore.

no sources - just what i heard/ read... i could be wrong.

 

 

Well not exactly, your eyes can see the lack of fps but your brain tells you to smoothen it out of the frames are more or less the same. (read blurred)

 

And if it would be 20fps steady no change whatsoever, yes it would be good enough to game with, it would tire you faster then let's say 60fps because your brain is making up for the missing images :smartass:

[cadete2000]

my setting are set to minimum,but when I see in the tutorial attack that the helo stops in the air,and the next thing is a explosion,missing the shooting and a few more thing I know I got a game in which the engine is low.Any game today must be ready for any normal cp,where you can put any setting and be enable to see at least 40 fps in the heat of battle,but when you see the bullets coming out of the cannon ,that is another history.The game is very good,only the frames is the problem

[Boberro]

Believe it or not, the frame rate the human eye can perceive is only around 14-16 frames per second; this is generally why motion pictures are captured at 30 frames per second; because that compensates for non-synchronizing to refreshing... 25 FPS should still appear smooth to you... unless of course you are cross bred with an american eagle.

 

people get pretty hung up on frame rates i find... and accordingly they compormise on looks to get high rates...but unless i am wrong, you should only get worried if she dips below that 16 threshold in big battles.

 

Quality before quantity for me :P

 

:D

 

Believe me I've thought same as you some time ago. Now I know even 25 is not enough when first you've felt example 50 FPS ;]. I know human eye sees about 25 FPS, but you feel higer frames better than these mentioned 25.

 

You said you should worried if FPS drop below 16. Recently during battle and gunpod attack I've had 3-4 :D.

 

By the way DCS is really low in FPS even in hing-end computers.

 

I don't know how it is made in MSFS series but there I have also often 10 FPS and I don't feel it so painfully like in DCS.

Edited November 24, 2009 by Boberro

[EtherealN]

my setting are set to minimum,but when I see in the tutorial attack that the helo stops in the air,and the next thing is a explosion,missing the shooting and a few more thing I know I got a game in which the engine is low.Any game today must be ready for any normal cp,where you can put any setting and be enable to see at least 40 fps in the heat of battle,but when you see the bullets coming out of the cannon ,that is another history.The game is very good,only the frames is the problem

 

What you are missing is the fact that in this simulator it is not graphics that is the main issue. It's CPU. Because whenever you make a simulation more detailed, the CPU workload increases. The only way to increase framerates in that case is to make the simulation less detailed - and I don't think you'll have any luck persuading people of the merits of that idea. ;)

 

And it should be noted that, from what I recall, the machine that the tutorial videos downloadable on the site was made on was a non-overclocked intel e6500 (or similar, Wags went and got himself a new machine recently and I'm not 100% positive on his old setup). Old hardware can indeed run this simulator with good framerates. Also, my old laptop which ran a 2GHz C2D mobile ran it reliably around 20-40 fps with really intense battles being the only exception. So I have first hand experience of the fact that old hardware can indeed run this simulator with acceptable framerates.

 

More details on your system would be needed to make a judgement call though, because as has been mentioned it might very well be an issue in your system specifically - not the simulator. Would need to know CPU, OS, graphics card, exact graphics settings, if you are forcing AA/AF, if your AA is supersampling and so on.

 

And again, as I mentioned earlier, if you search for "water=0" on the forum you will find a way to set the water detail below what the standard options interface allows, which can sometimes have phenomenal effect.

[beers]

I can easily believe that "old hardware can indeed run this simulator with acceptable framerates" where you find 20-40 fps acceptable. People here are asking why an average of 60 isn't the norm. (and from my experience, 20-40 average includes spikes in the low teens, single digits in moments of battle craziness). My single-core P4 350MHz would run DCS fine if it wasn't running Windows XP at the elementry school that I donated it to. That machine couldn't run FarCry very well let alone Crysis, ARMA2 (and wasn't all that smooth playing netflix), therefore that machine has lost it's right to be called "my gaming rig".

 

Seems to me that most spec's I've seen from DCS pilots include a multi-core rig. My q6600 does a fair job when I have water & shadows @ 0, I get averages from 20-40, but at moments there are single-digit fps, and those moments are the issue. That moment normally comes at the wrong time, ya know? FPS don't drop when people are shooting at you, FPS don't drop when a bunch of movers start advancing, FPS don't drop when the fight reaches that good old crecendo. (FPS DO drop when you get your wingie killed, but that's not quite the point, is it?)

 

So, ditto on the statement that a focus on FPS improvment is essential to keep my attention in future releases.

 

As i've wined before, multi-thread, multi-thread, multi-thread! 64-bit might help with this issue some, and I am hoping that our heros at ED know more about this than I do. Whatever the solution, the ONLY problem that I have with DCS is FPS.

 

IMHO, I don't think DCS needs bigger & more involved battlefields. I think it needs a battlefield that best simulates the experience of flying this (and future) warbirds, and I think the experience of FPS that NEVER drops below 20 is a very important part of the simulation experience.

[TheMoose]

Weird my Q6000, not even Over clocked, under Seven 64bit. Never dropped under 20FPS (so far that I’ve noticed). It averages out around 40FPS. Without any action, just flying, you’re looking around 50FPS. All at high settings, with 4xAA, 1920x1200. But I have 4 Gigs of good RAM, under a P35 Intel chipset plus my GTX280 does help. But I admit the game is more CPU demanding then GPU. (fairly old computer, had it for 4 years if I recall, besides the GPU upgrade that I've done)

 

But I recall under Xp you would be looking at 10FPS decrease for BlackShark under the same settings. Due mostly at the CPU threading fix that was introduce by the community and addressed in the latest patch for Vista users.

Edited November 25, 2009 by TheMoose

[EtherealN]

Seems to me that most spec's I've seen from DCS pilots include a multi-core rig.

 

Yup, and there is a reason here:

 

OS: Windows Vista for launching in fullscreen mode; CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E6850+' date=' AMD Phenom 9850+; RAM: 2+ GB; Graphics: 512+ MB ATI HD 2900+ or nVidia 8800+; Sound card; 4+ GB of free space on HDD; Copy protected, requires internet activation; Joystick.[/quote']

 

Note how ED recommends a 3GHz dualcore processor.

 

The "Minimal system requirements" don't, but you should realize that that really is a "minimal" system requirement. Not "this will give you 60fps constantly". ;)

 

As i've wined before, multi-thread, multi-thread, multi-thread!

 

I assume you are volunteering your time and expertise to convert TFCSE into a multithreaded process, and that you will finance the Q/A effort required?

 

64-bit might help with this issue some, and I am hoping that our heros at ED know more about this than I do.

 

They know how big of a job 64-bit conversion is, and they know how big of a job multithreading conversion is. For this reason, they have selected the option that gives the best bang for the buck. Converting a single-thread engine to be multithreaded is not something you do over a weekend - especially not when you are a small independent developer that serves a niche market.

 

So as has been noted many times - ED know very well that multithreading would be awesome. They also know how much it would cost them to do it. They don't necessarily know how many added sales it would give (though they have probably done some research, I dunno since I'm not in the loop on that).

 

I know I might come across as a bit terse there but backseat coders are akin to backseat drivers. ;)

 

IMHO, I don't think DCS needs bigger & more involved battlefields. I think it needs a battlefield that best simulates the experience of flying this (and future) warbirds

 

Note that DCS stands for "Digital Combat Simulator". :)

 

and I think the experience of FPS that NEVER drops below 20 is a very important part of the simulation experience.

 

I agree, but the important point is the question of never dropping below 20 for who? My system gives flawless performance in all missions I've run online and offline unless it encounters a bug - but I can easily design a mission that will make it crawl. Is that a problem in the simulator or me as a mission designer? (I've actually done that once for fun. The amount of perforation I was given by that rediculous amount of Vulcans was interesting...)

 

Also, you should note that the 3GHz processor listed in the recommendation will, in most cases, give you the performance you are asking for. And that's a processor that isn't even on the market anymore.

 

For comparison, here's some relevant bits of the system requirements for HAWX:

Minimum System Requirements

OS: Windows XP SP 3/Vista SP 1

Processor: Pentium 4 @ 2 GHz/AMD Athlon 2000+

Memory:1 GB on Windows XP/ 2 GB on Windows Vista

Video Memory: 128 MB – Shader Model 2.0*

 

Recommended System Requirements

Windows XP SP 3/Vista SP 1

Intel Core 2 DUO 6320/AMD Athlon X2 4000+

1 GB on Windows XP/ 2 GB on Windows Vista

Video Memory: 256 MB – Shader Model 3.0*

Sound Card: DirectX Compatible

 

Note how that game, which doesn't even bother trying to be a simulator, has no significantly smaller requirements of the processor than DCS. Now consider that DCS performs accurate simulations of airflow across all helicopter surfaces, the electronics, hydraulics, the avionics, laser physics, realistic ballistics and so on and so forth.

 

ED has squeezed all those things into almost the same requirement profile as Ubisoft, with all it's money, did on an arcade shooter. AND they did it on a singlethread. If that says anything, it is that what ED did there was very very impressive. ;)

Edited November 25, 2009 by EtherealN

[beers]

I'm a back-seat programmer for the software company i work for, so I might have been grace-less in my statements... we are going thru the same thing, 3 programmers and a massive program that needs to be converted to multi-thread and we've been laying the groundwork for it for the last 3 years and hope to actually do it next year... so yea, when i nudge for multi-threading, i'm not hoping to see it next year, i'm just hoping to see it. i'll shut up on the topic for a few months :) And i can also say that now that i've got a nice cooler and can raise the voltage and get a stable 3.2Ghz out of my q6600 things are running VERY much better!