Frame drop when players are nearby

Cmdr_Prussian

C
Hey guys,

when playing in VR I experience frame drops below 45 in player-populated areas, doesnt matter if in SC, in a system or on a planet. 1 player seems to be no problem, but more than that my frames drop below 45 resulting in bad playability.

I guess that the bottleneck is the CPU, so I'd like to know which settings I can tweak in order to free up some CPU ressources.

My system:
One of the better i5s
OS and game on a SSD
16 GB RAM
GTX 1070

Game runs very well on High, usually with 1,5 pixel density.

Switched to VR High, which made planet terrain look gross and didn't help with the problem. So I'm guessing the GPU is not the bottleneck.

Thanks for your help!
 

Gortron

Gortron
My i5 struggles sometimes too but not as badly as it used to. I'm not sure what, if anything, can be done to reduce the problem short of making sure you avoid multitasking. Make sure your AV isn't doing scans and Oculus isn't updating in the background (that can use a fair bit of CPU I discovered). If you want to confirm it is your CPU turn off ASW using ctrl+ numpad 1. Turn on whatever OSD you have to see GPU use and CPU use and look for CPU use at 100% and GPU use <100%.

I don't think your problem is all that uncommon in VR on an i5 unfortunately. There needs to be a few players around for it to happen to me but it does happen.
 

Cmdr_Prussian

C
Thanks for your answers! Basically I'm trying to profit from your experience and find out which graphics options have most impact on CPU. Using a tool to measure that is a great idea! The problem is that I can't reliably create a testing situation with players around. As such I'll have to make a super educated guess and see in the long term if it works.

I will measure the CPU from lowering certain settings and optimize - CPU stress vs. graphical fidelity. Sometimes theres just one option that eats away 80% CPU power, thats why im asking.
 

Gortron

Gortron
I know it's not on planets but I see the same effect in busy star ports sometimes, even when I can't physically see the other players ships. Sat on a pad at a Community goal station might be a good place to test. Other than that you could try one of the crashed alien ship sites near Maia or a nearby Alien base near to Maia. Probably lots of CMDRs around. Jameson memorial is always busy if you have a permit.

Good luck, hope you find a solution... post back if you do!
 
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dape

dape
very hard to verify when and what causes this. I have the same happening with my i5. sometimes it just takes three other cmdrs in the same instance sometimes ten are no problem. FPS drop even though CPU has not reached 100% load. Dont know if a i7 has any advantage in this situation. I believe it is related to ping and how good the instance is.
 

HeavyGroovez

HeavyGroovez
Yeah drives me nuts, any network latency causes all sorts of rendering drama.

Community goals are often a juddering mess at peak times.

Lowering settings doesn't help much in my experience.
 

xondk

X
Cmdr_Prussian said:
Hey guys,

when playing in VR I experience frame drops below 45 in player-populated areas, doesnt matter if in SC, in a system or on a planet. 1 player seems to be no problem, but more than that my frames drop below 45 resulting in bad playability.

I guess that the bottleneck is the CPU, so I'd like to know which settings I can tweak in order to free up some CPU ressources.

My system:
One of the better i5s
OS and game on a SSD
16 GB RAM
GTX 1070

Game runs very well on High, usually with 1,5 pixel density.

Switched to VR High, which made planet terrain look gross and didn't help with the problem. So I'm guessing the GPU is not the bottleneck.

Thanks for your help!
Click to expand...

This should generally be only some people, the issue seems to be that your computer is waiting on their network information and it is prioritised higher then drawing graphics. So yeah, should only be near players with poor connections, and really needs fixing frame drawing should take priority.
 

Gortron

Gortron
xondk said:
This should generally be only some people, the issue seems to be that your computer is waiting on their network information and it is prioritised higher then drawing graphics. So yeah, should only be near players with poor connections, and really needs fixing frame drawing should take priority.
Click to expand...

Very interesting. The would certainly explain why I've never been able to pin point the exact cause.

I thought brute force with an i7 might solve it but perhaps not.
 

TorTorden_VR

T
Gortron said:
Very interesting. The would certainly explain why I've never been able to pin point the exact cause.

I thought brute force with an i7 might solve it but perhaps not.
Click to expand...

Hasn't for me, not even after the 1080ti. But it has 'helped'.
I am therefore postponing a new build, I have spent enough money, at least until the intel 8 series is out and settled.
But I'm mostly convinced the only true solution is that FD should fix the game. :\
 

Gortron

Gortron
TorTorden said:
Hasn't for me, not even after the 1080ti. But it has 'helped'.
I am therefore postponing a new build, I have spent enough money, at least until the intel 8 series is out and settled.
But I'm mostly convinced the only true solution is that FD should fix the game. :\
Click to expand...

I'm keeping an eye on the i7 8700k. If it's good I might build a new system around that. It sounds like a significant upgrade on the current i7.

It's a shame it doesn't sound like it will definitely fix it though. I'd not even considered it was iffy code bit it sure makes sense.
 

Orvidius

Orvidius
I was noticing some frame drops last night. Normally with my settings, I can at least get 45 fps with ASW in most places. But driving around in Dav's Hope with a friend, I was losing frames noticeably, whenever I had both the settlement and his SRV within view. If I faced the other way, it returned to normal. Strange.

For reference, I run a GTX 1070, with an i7-7700k at stock speed (4.2-4.5 GHz variable, if I recall).
 

vic

V
I notice fps loss even when ship docked at station with no change in view and hmd no movement . FPS could be fine for like 10 seconds straight and all of a sudden the fps dips to 45 for a while. So if there has been no change whatsoever in scenery, the dips MUST be either traffic or server! This fps dip only happens when I play ED, so don't think it's my pc.
 

Gortron

Gortron
ZenBones said:
I was noticing some frame drops last night. Normally with my settings, I can at least get 45 fps with ASW in most places. But driving around in Dav's Hope with a friend, I was losing frames noticeably, whenever I had both the settlement and his SRV within view. If I faced the other way, it returned to normal. Strange.

For reference, I run a GTX 1070, with an i7-7700k at stock speed (4.2-4.5 GHz variable, if I recall).
Click to expand...

That one is more likely your GPU. There is something funny about some of the surface ports. There is one I've visit regularly that I get a soild FPS on unless my ship is on one particular side and I look at the main towers. Then my fps plunges. I've taken the HMD off and pointed it at the towers and back a head and it plunges then returns to 90 fps as I look back and forth. The GPU load goes up with it. I've seen other people say they get FPS drops looking at surface port towers too, so there must be something particularly demanding to render.
 

canis

C
xondk said:
This should generally be only some people, the issue seems to be that your computer is waiting on their network information and it is prioritised higher then drawing graphics. So yeah, should only be near players with poor connections, and really needs fixing frame drawing should take priority.
Click to expand...


I agree, al lot of issue due to poor network code. Frontier should fix it.
 
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