The Great Frame Rate Debate

rdawes · Post by **rdawes** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 1:59 pm

There have been several discussions on different forums within this community over the last several weeks regarding how to improve framerates and reduce the choppiness of MSTS. I decided to start a new topic to try and focus the topic away from activity and route issues. Hopefully Microsoft and Kuju will be listening.

There are a lot of things you can do short of dragging all of your settings sliders to the lowest levels. The consensus seems to be that not even a fast computer with lots of memory can solve this problem. We have discussed pre-loading sound files, reducing road traffic, adding hardware and other tweeks without success. The bottom line (my opinion) seems to be the hard drive and how MSTS loads tile information and sound files as you are driving.

With all of the changes I've made I have increased my FPS to the low 20's most of the time with drops to 10-12 in built up areas however my sim still stops when an AI train is approaching and stutters when loading tile information. I am currently achieving this with a PIII-600 CPU with 512Mb (PC100) RAM a PCI128 Sound Card and a Savage 32 Mb Video Card. I believe that my bottleneck is now my hard-drive interface and I can't fix that without a new motherboard however, I have a SCSI card installed for my scanners so I am going to buy a used Fast SCSI drive and move MSTS on to it to see what happens.

Has anyone else done this?

What other tweeks have you had success with?

Bob

60085 · Post by **60085** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 7:04 pm

No, no need now, but my old system was similar.
A Socket A Athlon 600 but with only 128mb SDRAM (single rate), 27Gb & 40Gb hard drives and a 32mb Creative GeForce 2 GTS.
If those are cab view fps your talking then i used to get about that, and your second figure looks about right to for built up areas and long panning external views.
However, as i said, my memory was less and i think it was 100mhz (may of been 133 at a push).
The Sounblaster 1024 should of had any impact, all i can think of is that what hdd space was being utilised/filled with files was setup, should it be required, as a swap file, and the hard drive was a 7,200rpm model.

I'd of expected my machine to be blown away by something with 512mb of RAM (if of course your 20fps are external views then indeed your machine would better my olde one), but that confuses me cos i though MSTS, as with MSFS, are RAM orientated.

Not so much tweaks as just carrying out the basics. Frequent defrags and scandisk sessions, setting the machine as a server and not a desktop in Windows, keeping the drivers & directx bang up to date, emptying temp folders, cookies and cache's, rebooting between games, applications, emptying task manager/tool bar of non essentials and clearing the desktop background.

60085 "MANNA".

alan2 · Post by **alan2** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 8:11 pm

I have noticed the change in System speed. But not MSTS speed.

What I have done is keep driver's up-to-date. Excluding Direct X9, Just downloading.

My system is a P4 2.0Ghz 1Gb Ram, Geforce3 64MB Ram, 1 HD @ 40Gb 5,000 Rpm (Roughly), and a new one @ 80Gb 7,200 Rpm. Sound is standard.

I have built my own route, found that sound does not effect the Frame Rate's. I have not got any Sound in my route yet. Am getting 15 Fps at point's of the Route. There is a lot of Scenery with un-visible Polygon's though.

Since i work in the Route Editor, I can get about 20Fps in the same area.

I think this is to do with Environment Setting's which exist in the Sim, IE. Wind, Rain, Snow, Winter, Summer .....

If a lot of ground textures are used, it increases the number of .ace file's to read.

Another thing I noted, It helped performance on my machine, If you have all .ace file's as UN-compressed it save's FPS, this is because the Sim does not have to un-compress the file's to read them.

It is also probably why I don't get a freeze on every AI train I see.

This way of doing thing's take's up 3 time's as much HD space though.

nickaxon · Post by **nickaxon** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 9:10 pm

Re the post from 60085 - Does changing the setting from "desktop" to "server" have much effect? And could someone please remind me where to find this setting on XP.

Regards, Nick.

rdawes · Post by **rdawes** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 9:33 pm

This is what works for Win98SE not sure about XP.

Right click My Computer on the desktop.

Open Properties and click on the Performance Tab

Click on the File System tab and select Network Server from the drop down list.

Bob

mikesimpson · Post by **mikesimpson** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 9:53 pm

alan2 wrote:

Another thing I noted, It helped performance on my machine, If you have all .ace file's as UN-compressed it save's FPS, this is because the Sim does not have to un-compress the file's to read them.

It is also probably why I don't get a freeze on every AI train I see.

This way of doing thing's take's up 3 time's as much HD space though.

Hi Alan,

I think this is more likely a feature of your having the 1 gig of ram though. If you compress the .ace files to say 50% of original size, then they load twice as quickly, but then the PC has to uncompress them. So the saving is minimal, however with 1 gig of RAM, they probably stay in memory a lot longer, so do not need to reload every time they are needed.

nickaxon · Post by **nickaxon** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 10:00 pm

Thanks Bob, but XP appears to be different. The annoying thing is I've come accross it in the past!

Nick.

johndibben · Post by **johndibben** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 10:09 pm

It appears there will never be a definitive set of rules to which everyone can adhere to increase frame rates.

A train simulator was always going to have problems in this area as opposed to a flight simulator.

Frame rates were poor on these until faster PC's could cope with the basics and can now cope with most things thrown at them.

No doubt the same will happen for train simulators.

It's still early days yet after all

LucaZone · Post by **LucaZone** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 10:31 pm

rdawes - Stop with the nonesense. This isnt a thread about what the real problem with low fps is, its simply another reason for someone who is unhappy with their pc's performance in MSTS to complain and get others to put them right.

heres ur problem :: I am currently achieving this with a PIII-600 CPU with 512Mb (PC100) RAM a PCI128 Sound Card and a Savage 32 Mb Video Card.

We have members running systems 4 times faster and only just reaching the max FPS. Ur system is too slow at processing the information ur asking it to. Its nothing to do with ur HDD. Ur CPU & RAM are too slow.

My system spec ::
Case : Juno P3 MidTower
Mobo : A7V333
Processor : XP2000+ @1.67GHz
RAM : 512Mb DDR (pc2100)
Hard Disks : 40Gb Samsung ATA100 | 80Gb Fujitsu ATA100
Graphics : GeForce 3 Ti500 64Mb
Sound : Soundblaster Live 5.1 | Creative 5300 5.1 Surround Sound Speakers
Extra's : WinTV Theatre (Video/Audio Capture)
Network : 3com 100/10 NIC | Alcatel 512Kb ADSL Modem
Drives : 12x DVD | 50x CD | 24x CD-RW
Monitor : 21"
Other : Intelli Mouse | HP5400c Scanner | HP1000 Photo Printer | FujiFilm S602 DigiCam | Sony High8 VideoCam | HeadSet (Voice Coms)

That gets me an average of 40fps, but runs easily upto 59, and on highly detailed areas down to low 20's.

60085 · Post by **60085** » Tue Jan 07, 2003 10:33 pm

Yeah, the option really shouldn't be in XP as it's a Network based OS from the start, unlike 98 SE.

If i remember rightly Win Nt4.0 didn't have it either, with that again being a networking sytem.

I maybe wrong if my memory serves me incorrectly... highly likely.

60085 "MANNA".

ogwilliam · Post by **ogwilliam** » Wed Jan 08, 2003 11:45 am

me being "in the trade" as it were (I run a big network for a living), maybe a quick review of old postings in order - quick check reveals magnum opus my me back in October - have a look at http://forums.atomic-systems.com/viewto ... ght=#78437 all sorts of useful info there in speeding up the dog of a game engine that is MSTS.
'Nuff said methinks.

stevesherratt · Post by **stevesherratt** » Wed Jan 08, 2003 11:51 am

Hi Dudes

I am presently ( if anyone cares ) working on AI class 76 multiple working electric locos and would like to produce the heighest frame rates for every one.

OK so what should an A1 should look like!

I have just changed a lot of my thoughts on this what do you think.

Dont read thoughts 1 2 or 3 if your easily shocked !

1. wheels DONT need to rotate ( you cant see them moving beyond a small distance away locos in pics only have half wheels)

2. ONLY 1x256x256 texture for entire AI Loco ( ive tried this but a little blurry close up ) locos in pics have 3x256x256 textures and are 1920 polys each . 500 polys are added by the roof boxes horns and connection hoses. Do you think they are needed on AI`s ( without them 1420 polys total )

3. ABSOLUTLY no transparency anywhere on loco , inside cab only visable close up anyway.

4. AT least 4 distance levels ( chop the polys we cant see )

Feed Back Please

thanks

steve in ozz

saddletank · Post by **saddletank** » Wed Jan 08, 2003 11:53 am

What on earth is going on on that aircraft carrier?

ogwilliam · Post by **ogwilliam** » Wed Jan 08, 2003 12:04 pm

saddletank wrote:What on earth is going on on that aircraft carrier?

aha! you noticed my own cute anti-terrorist and sea-monster deterrent cats then...
The monster is actually called "nohands" and is the most famous kitten in all the world. He has been up to much recently - have a look at http://www.bakesnake.com/b3ta/nohands/gallery.php. Busy little feline!

Ahem, back to the topic methink, enough kitten frivolity

RobindeJones · Post by **RobindeJones** » Wed Jan 08, 2003 11:48 pm

Lucazone,

Some of us are getting VERY BORED of you telling us how bad our computers are, ie re graphics cards etc
Lets clarify:
I) Not all of us are computer gamers
II) NOt all of us have the budgets to buy new computers
III) Not all of us are that intersted in computers
IV) Some of us use our computers as work machines, ie essays, dissertations
V)
Considering these and the million variables in this list this is the most interesting fps thread we have yet - why?

a) It does not consist of people saying my computers better than yours
b) It attempts to find ways that people may upgrade their hardware or indeed maximise their software potential.

I used to have a AMD 500Mhz, with 256 pC 100 ram, and a internal Trident Blade 8MB job. Average FPS 5-9. In the old days I thought it was great - and great enjoyment it gave me.

Present system - Intel Cerilon 1300Mhz 256Mb Pc 133, INtel internal graphis job - about to be replaced by a Nvidia GEforce4 job
Fps - 25 in sparse areas, average 15, low 5-6.
Directx9 gained me 3-5 fps, in built up areas thats a lot.
Also play with the options that gains you fps.

Guys this is about driving trains and enjoyoing it - not whose got the biggest fps?! People can love this on a 333Mhz everything turned down and at an average of 5fps. And if they enjoy it - lets encourage them not tell them how . they are?

RDE