Large framerate fluctuations

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Large framerate fluctuations

wbrooks003
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Post by wbrooks003 » Sun Sep 20, 2020 8:38 pm

Apologies if a thread about this exists as I could not locate one specifically on this topic.

I was wondering what type of frame rate I should be getting out of the 1.6 upgrade assuming I have added all the patches, super backdrops, effects, dynamic cockpits, etc.

I am running a 2080Ti and also have a 10700k processor, so I would anticipate high frame rates assuming vsync is off. My frame rate might get as high as 165 in flight (which is capped at my monitors refresh rate), but then in combat or areas of more craft, etc, the frame rate will dip as low as 40. I was wondering if I am leaving performance on the table or if the large frame rate swings are consistent with the fact that I am playing a game on an old engine with a lot of enhancements and add-ons. Moreover I would imagine the engine was not optimized to be utilized on modern graphics cards and processors. I understand the original FPS was capped at 30.

The reason I ask the question is that none of my CPU cores are pegged and currently have low utilization, as does my graphics card. So I do not see any bottlenecks and wanted to know if this was normal or if I should try playing around with settings or removing any of the add-ons. What kind of frame rates are others getting with similar technology and are others also seeing a lot of large swings in frame rate?

Thanks.

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blue_max
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Post by blue_max » Mon Sep 21, 2020 5:28 am

First, make sure you've got "ProcessAffinityCore = 0" in your DDraw.cfg -- that allows the game to use multiple cores. It helps a little bit.

Second, bear in mind that this game was mostly written for a single core CPU. Most of the logic, AI and rendering is still done in one CPU thread -- even the final 3D to 2D conversion. So, if there are many ships visible on the screen, the performance of the game will suffer accordingly. The new effects do have an impact in performance, but it's relatively small. The main bottleneck is still the single threaded design of the game. Some of the newest ships have a lot of detail too, so that doesn't help (we're aware of this last detail and we're trying to improve the performance in this area).

So, the bottom line is: yes, unfortunately you'll see some swings in the framerate and there isn't much that can be done about it at the moment. You can also try Jeremy's ddraw to see what's the impact of the new effects, but you'll still see these swings. You can also see this thread to optimize the effects for performance:

https://www.xwaupgrade.com/phpBB3/viewt ... 36&t=12490

I think your performance is pretty good, though. One more thing, if your monitor's refresh rate is above 60Hz you may experience stutter in the hangar when taking off. If that happens, consider lowering your refresh rate to 60Hz. I've got it set up that way and still get ~40-100fps consistently without any screen tearing (I've got an i7 laptop with an nVidia 1060).

wbrooks003
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Post by wbrooks003 » Mon Sep 21, 2020 7:42 pm

Thank you for the thoughtful response. I am glad to know that my performance is consistent with the norm. Everything looks really great as well.

I did do a little testing with Jeremy's ddraw and I did see more constant higher frame rate performance. By swapping in Jeremy's ddraw, does that nullify aa of the effects added from your patch?

I also prefer your ddraw file because I like to use a controller and thus benefit from the joystick emulation option you added.

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blue_max
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Post by blue_max » Mon Sep 21, 2020 8:59 pm

Jeremy's ddraw supports AA, but not the other effects. I freely admit there's still *a lot* of room for improvement in my ddraw, so there's that too. My suggestion for people who need a lot of performance (like VR users) is to use the Deferred shader, that's probably the fastest mode that still supports most of the effects.

I believe Jeremy has published a more advanced joystick hook that lets you blend input from various USB devices, so you should check that out as well.

wbrooks003
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Post by wbrooks003 » Mon Sep 21, 2020 10:52 pm

Thanks. I appreciate all the help and great sharers and effects you've put out.

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