The problem is rF2, without a doubt, it is very poorly optimised at the moment. People who claim it is running fine have no idea what a good looking PC title should look like. Nvidia and ATI users alike are having major issues with FPS, myself included. It is far from the finished article. I have tried the 12.1 and 12.1a beta drivers, there is no difference. Unfortunatley I wont be testing this game anymore as it is unplayable for me, I dont like to play with xbox jaggy lines and fps going from 300 down to 100 with spikes and stuttering all the way around a track, no sir! So, when performance is better I shall return to play, until then.......
I dont mean to keep repeating myself, but if you use 4xAA with Super-sampling on, you won't get any jaggy lines at all, it will fix it, just as it did with RF1. Should you have to resort to this? No, and ISI need to look into it, but for now it's the only way. As for the frame rate issues, there are definitely problems there with my 6970, but i have confidence things will get better as the weeks pass by. Tried v-sync on yet? that should smooth things up if you are over 60fps constantly... A big problem here is that some people are going to moan there is stuttering and jitter without understanding that this WILL happen with v-sync off. If you didn't notice it so much in RF1, for example, it's probably because you were getting over 120fps (a multiple of 60), which greatly improves tearing effects when v-sync is disabled. So if you have v-sync off now, but can only get 60-90fps, it's going to tear and act up. Put it on and see how it goes. I'm not saying this is what's happening to you, just that this is something to think about in general.
My system has a bottleneck somewhere... because I have never been able to get it to perform very well. Is there a reliable benchmark tool to tell what is wrong? In the beta I run on medium settings and get about 35 FPS maximum but it will mostly run 15-20 FPS. How exactly do I get the most out of what I have?
i can't see GPU specs there so it's hard to tell. Have you thought of overclocking that CPU? bump it to 3.5ghz and that will certainly help.
Not confident doing it, so never tried. My machine really needs tweaked and cleaned by someone that knows what they are doing. how could I show you my GPU specs?
as Duvel mentions again, the "solution" so far is to use SSAA. Anything else makes RF2 look like OUTRUN. If you force driver AA or use ingame aa does not really make a big difference. ( I have however the impression that ingame AA looks sharper than driver, but that might only be a impression, don't kill on that one). SSAA gives however a massif performance drop at least on my card (5870). Best setting with compromise between quality and FR I found was ingame 2 AA with SSAA (HDR / VSYNC ON). With this I need however to reduce some quality settings. (most is on high, texture on ultra and the fancy stuff if off) I hope they will manage to debug this somehow.... now being more or less "happy" with the gfx... I'll see to get rid of the excessive wheel rattle in some situations. btw: I run 1920*1200)
I think it is very balanced combination, but for rF2 too "old". rF2 seems to eat a lot CPU, I have 2,5ghz quad like you and I would definitely need something over 3ghz to run this baby even close to the performance figures I got used with rF1. But I am not that concerned myself because the new features (graphical) doesn't interest me in the first place. Too bad tweaking them is difficult, and the overall optimization in this game lacks.
Edge detect is a performance hog in all scenarios and for little gains in image quality (if any). Definitely stay away from that one with RF2
I've got a Crossfire 2x6970 system and running an Eyefinity setup at 5916x1080 with all in-game graphics options maxed out, but just defaults in CCC, I get between 20-50 FPS, with some pretty big variations. It's not particularly smooth because of the variations, but it's definitely playable. Image quality didn't look that great to me at first, but then I set PostFX=1 in the Config.ini, and that seems to have improved it a bit. I've noticed since then though (perhaps it occurred before too, I'm not sure) that whenever I enter a shadow (e.g. from a grandstand overhang) my FPS drops by half.
smoothvision HD setting under filter. Make sure to have selected "use application settings". this disables anyway any choosen filter. ( as far as I know). if this doesn't help, install 12.1a driver, set everything to low in RF2, put all driver settings to default, choose a decent resolution... and start changing settings one by one. starting ingame.... maybe you'll find some specific stuff that hits FPS on your system. if FPS crap when all settings are really low, you might have another issue like sound card driver?
This is my graphics card spec http://www.asus.com/Graphics_Cards/AMD_Series/EAH57702DIS1GD5/ These are my clock settings
My statement is not a fable, nor is it false, I have been working in the 3d industry creating special effects for both standard TV and HD IMAX for over 15 years, your eyes, can see tracking differences if you have good vision, when we SFX for HD IMAX its done @ 45 fps, for NTSC its much lower, I am talking about the flicker fusion rate at which your eyes respond to, unless you a pidgeon ( as in the bird species) you will not detect flicker above 60 fps, hence 30-60 FPS should be acceptable by most, as I dont know too many pigeons who play racing sims, Once you get to my age, trust me you will not care when you are my age ( yes im old )if you are running 35 or 50 as your eyes will not see the difference. What you will see however is a massive frame rate spike, and the main reasons, you will be getting them is: 1) your pushing you hardware to much ( FPS ENVY) 2) you hardware is too old 3) RF2 is still in beta and hence the graphics are still being tweaked the solution is simple as already stated back the settings off a bit
Very helpfull thread guys, thx. I managed to get the game running smoothly (appart from replays) and the graphhics look ok-ish. abit rf1-like. Quick question as i am completely out of the hardware loop, is my Ati HD4800 too old by now?
I couldn't dream of using 4XSSAA, it destroys performance. Im running with no HDR and nothing set to yes or full. I use Level 1 in game and all ccc set to application. My dual 6970's are running at 930 core and 1400 memory. Performance is dire. I know fine well how to run a game without jaggys, 4XSSAA is what i use with, race 07, rf1 and richard burns... They run fine. Race07 looks almost real with 4XSSAA. V-Sync doesn't stop stuttering, it stops tearing of the image matching up the monitor refresh rate with fps. It has nothing to do with stuttering and jitters. Im getting 300+ at some points and down to 100 at others, to me its the reloading of textures that causes the pause, the fps doesn't drop just the entire game can pause for a split second, like its catching up.
Humans seeing 60fps max and computers rendering above is an old argument, computers rendering above 60 is not the same as you viewing real life, this has been argued many times. It is completely different.
