Another "Why do I get shitty FPS" thread

[Legacy (DayZ) 1091]

It's simple, I get shitty FPS usually and a lot of shitty FPS when looking at red/orange trees.

System Specs

• CPU: Intel Core2 Quad CPU q6600 @2.40GHZ

• GFX: Pegatron HD 6450 (Knock-off of ATI Radeon HD 6450. I suspect this is the issue)

• RAM: 8GB DDR3 RAM

Video Options

• Interface & 3D Resolution: 800x600

• Texture Detail: Low

• Video Memory: Default

• Anisotropic filtering: Normal (I didn't realize that this could be turned down more, I'll disable it later.)

• Anti Aliasing: Disabled

• Terrain Detail: Normal

• Objects Detail: Normal

• Shadow Detail: Normal

• HDR Quality: Normal (At night: Very High)

• Post Process Effects: Disabled

• Interface Size: Large

• Aspect Ratio: 16:10 Widescreen

• Vsync: Disabled

Programs I use to help optimize:

• CCleaner

• Glary Utilities

• Advanced System Care

• CleanMem

What I have done:

• Reformatted the entire PC. (I needed to anyways.)

• Kept my GPU drivers up to date.

• Done some CFG tweaks via Arma II guides.

Any ideas or tips that may increase performance?

[Gearbox (DayZ) 0]

There's only so much you can do. ARMA II is still one of the few games that will tax a new gaming computer extensively. In the link below you can see some benchmarks that show that the game still demands current-generation parts to achieve high quality graphics with high frame rates. All I'm saying is that with their test setup, they'll probably get higher frame rates with Battlefield 3, and we all know that game is prettier.

In your particular case, I would start reducing settings. HDR is pretty taxing; I would turn that off. I don't get how your aspect ratio is 16:10 when your 3D resolution is 800x600 which is a 4:3 ratio. That's weird, but that's probably not important. Shadows can probably be lowered (I don't consider shadows super essential). Then I would start dropping other visual quality settings until you achieve an acceptable FPS (30 or higher).

Link:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2012/05/10/nvidia-geforce-gtx-670-2gb-review/4

[Legacy (DayZ) 1091]

HDR is only on for night-time, otherwise I turn it off.

It's mainly the forest that bugs me and lags me to all hell at such a low quality, I have at the least 10 - 15 FPS with it being very slow to kill, I recently just died because I couldn't turn around fast enough in a forest and some player shot me in the head. Least I can use the excuse "Lag" now :V

[theziggypops@googlemail.com 0]

Thats really odd, my specs are nearly identical. Maybe look into 3rd party drivers (Guru3d, AtiTool).

[Kuro1n 1]

I get more lag the more I die and respawn, a complete system reboot fixes the problem most of the time though however your CPU is somewhat weak considering this game is very CPU heavy I've heard... Might be the issue.

[Legacy (DayZ) 1091]

You would think since a dual core is the minimum then a quadcore may be at the least somewhat better.

[ZogVarnoka 26]

I have the same cpu as you and probably same MB as well. You have 4gig more ram than me and I use ddr2 at that. My gpu is a 9800gt.

That said, I run with all settings at normal except hdr=off, shadows=low, video memory=high, and postprocess=off. I run at 1680x1050 interface/3d with interface size small. I rarely drop below 30fps and normally operate around 45-50.

Not sure what your problem is really. Could be your gpu is overheating a bit. I installed extra fans specifically to make sure my gpu is getting good airflow since it is an old model. Gpu fan speed set at 75% I maintain 70C with dips to 67 sometimes which is well within the safe operating range for my card. Cpu stays decently cool as well. Also could be that your gpu is a knockoff. *shrug*

Get a temp monitor like speedfan to see what's going on there. Its free and easy to use to check temps and fan speeds for just about everything. I use rivatuner for controlling my fan speeds separately.

Now I do run into some fps lag on certain servers, but this seems to be server specific as others I operate fine on. Not sure if this will help much, but wanted to let ya know that older systems can run this game fine even if things aren't quite as pretty as the new machines play it at.

[Legacy (DayZ) 1091]

I could care less about graphics as long as I can still tell whether I'm looking at an old mans ass or a player, if I can see it clearly and tell what it is? I don't care how shitty it looks.

I'll see what I can do with alternate drivers, checking the tempature, and probably turning up the video memory. (Knock-off card is probably making the video memory go down to low or something.) The damn room is a ice box so I fail to see how it could overheat, but there is always that chance.

[stiletto01 1]

Hey Legacy.

I've had the same exact model as yours, the Pegatron 6450. It was a lot cheaper than a normal ATI Radeon and promised the same exact performance.

Well, this is not true. I began to notice rather serious performance issues in games. Usually low FPS counts than what it should be and apparently mine caused massive VRAM leaks too.

I used some google-fu which wasn't too helpful at first. Stubbornly, I kept searching for a few hours and finally found some forums of a person that was complaining of the same issues I was having. There was one of the users there that explained on how notoriously bad and weak Pegatrons were. I mean, really -really- bad!

I remember that he gave a bunch of links of which I visited that advised people to keep away from knock-off cards.

I would gladly link you to that and those links, but I no longer have those bookmarks and I have no idea what I've searched to find it. It was quite awhile ago.

My solution was to purchase a real ATI card of which (at least for me) solved the performance issues I was having.

I hope this helps you.

My two cents.

[theziggypops@googlemail.com 0]

have you tried running with launch options too? you can force it to use 4 cores, it SHOULD do it automatically though. -cpuCount 4

[doonbugie 13]

Problem is the GPU and CPU. Sorry but you're going to have to upgrade.. Q6600 won't cut it anymore and a 6450 knockoff won't exactly be a performer in ArmA2.

CCleaner is a very bad tool to use and is known to corrupt registry, steer clear of "cleaner" tools.. they have negative impact on casual system performance because they usually remove caches and sometimes delete important registry entries.

I recommend 7770/Phenom II setup if you're on a budget.

[lockie1976 39]

Your CPU Hz are quite low.

ArmA like 3GHz or more, 2 cores is enough its just 2.4Ghz imo is not enough, if you clock it to 3GHz or higher you'll do much better.

[Angus (DayZ) 0]

I run a gtx 680 + i5 3570k and I generally sit at ~50fps, the arma2 engine is horrible for fps.

Comparatively speaking, I never go below the framerate cap of 91 in cod, and I almost always get 100+ fps running battlefield 3 on maxed out ultra settings....

[boneboys 7988]

I recently changed my processor, I had a e8400 dualcore2 @3.1ghz which I thought could handle anything I threw at it, then I moved on to one of those i5 2500k @3.3ghz.

What a difference it made, unbelievable like butter through a knife.

I know nothing of ATI/AMD cards.

What is your monitor ? 22", it is often recommended to run at native resoltion.

Might help, might not.

[Legacy (DayZ) 1091]

22" or 23" I forget.

Size is: 1680 x 1050

[zekez 4]

Does beta oa help with fps at all? I get a steady 60+ but when I get near or in elektra it drops to like 30

[Legacy (DayZ) 1091]

Beta OA makes no difference.

Now gentlemen I have another card which is lower in video memory but may be better then what I have, I ask any experts or someone who knows what the hell they're talking about to compare.

My PEGATRON HD 6450?

Or

My ASUS EAH4350 SILENT?

Or

My Nvidia 8600 GT? (I've tried it, and it runs like ass.)

[jimbo_and_ned 3]

None of those GPUs are really good. The pegatron is probably ass but still better than your other options. I have trouble with an HD4850 which I think trumps both of your alternatives. I'm assuming you also turned off FXAA and FSAA to 0 in your cfg? One of those will be on even if you've turned of anti-aliasing in the options. That was one boost for me.

One of the main problems of ARMA is the huge textures and how it needs to load them from the harddrive. If you have a fragmented drive, a lowend or outdated CPU or a slow harddrive in general, you're getting really bottlenecked performance regardless of your video setup. I'm guessing the Pegatron is probably not really helping, but I'd check what can be done about the data reading bottlenecks (ie. processor and harddrive). Defrag the drive ARMAOA is on if it's fragmented at all.

[Legacy (DayZ) 1091]

FSAA=0;
postFX=0;
GPU_MaxFramesAhead=1000;
GPU_DetectedFramesAhead=3;
HDRPrecision=8;
lastDeviceId="";
localVRAM=1057300480;
nonlocalVRAM=2147483647;
vsync=0;
AToC=0;
FXAA=0;

I'll see what I can do about fragmenting.

[css_god@yahoo.com 543]

Don't feel bad Legacy, I am running this system and my performance in this game is less than superb.

http://valid.canardpc.com/show_oc.php?id=2384444

[Legacy (DayZ) 1091]

Mainly any buildings I am going through end up 15 - 30 FPS.

Fields and large areas are 30 FPS.

Forests are 10 FPS.

Yet to fragment my drive. :l

[oldpainless 1]

I just think it's strange that I get 50+ FPS in one session and then maybe I drop to 20-30 in the next. I just log out when that happens, don't want to be at a disadvantage in pvp.

i5@4ghz

8gigs of ram

ATI Radeon 5850

Recently formated PC with all the latest drivers.

[Rob James 0]

Same here, I get massive fps drops from dieing and respawning. Only way to fix it is restarting arma.

Windows 7 (64 bit)

2666 Mhz

8 logical processors

4 physical processors

12g ram

560ti

Having to quit the game to improve performance doesn't seem like a logical solution. Does the shift + minus flush command work?

[vekien 84]

i think a lot of issues might be servers.

i have ati 7950, i5 2500 3.2ghz, and i can get a solid 50-60 fps on very high.