Large Framerate Boost w/ Practically No Image Quality Loss

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Spinelli, Dec 4, 2014.

  1. Spinelli

    Spinelli Banned

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    Trying to run rFactor 2 with maxed-out graphics settings but just can't do it? Try the following:


    These settings (especially #2, #3, and #4) are "golden" and have transformed my gaming experience. They do not change the visual quality - to me - yet really boost my framerates, and therefore the overall experience, so much! Thanks to these settings, I can keep everything else absolutely maxed-out.

    1. Anti Aliasing (Nvidia) - 8xCSAA instead of 4xAA / 16xCSAA instead of 8xAA
    -
    Slightly better performance AND image quality. If setting from the Nvidia Control Panel or Nvidia Inspector, then make sure to also set "antialiasing mode" to "override application settings" instead of "application controlled", and make sure the antialiasing in the rF2 configure screen is set to "None". If using AA from rF2 itself, then I believe Lvl 2 = 4xAA, Lvl 3 = 8xCSAA, Lvl 4 = 8xAA, and Lvl 5 = 16xCSAA, but don't quote me on that, plus, it may be different with different GPUs (780 Ti, here).

    2. Shadows - "High" (4/5)
    - Visually speaking, you will hardly notice a difference between this setting and "Max". I don't notice it, I would need to do side by side comparisons to notice, but you sure do get better framerates (especially overall consistency around the track).

    3. Shadow Blur - "Fast" (2/4)
    - Of course not as nice as "Quality" (lvl 4/4), but it also helps very nice with framerate and is hardly noticeable when you're actually playing (unless you play from an exterior cam eg. chase cam). Oddly enough, Fast (2/4) actually looks slightly better than "Optimized" (3/4) according to previous tests (from a build or 2 back).

    4. Anisotropic Filtering - "8x" (5/6)
    - You almost certainly will not notice a visual quality difference between 8x and 16x (you will with 4x, though), and you also will most likely not get a framerate improvement when lapping on your own, but testing shows good framerate imrpovements when multiple cars are on screen (especially at the start, during the first couple laps, lots of cars on screen at once during a replay, etc.).

    Those settings are the difference between my framerate dropping and stuttering to as low as 45 fps/eye (total 90 fps - I use Nvidia 3D Vision 2), and having them at 60 fps/eye (total 120 fps). Maybe some rare drops to 58 fps/eye (116 total) or something, but hardly. That's a pretty massive gain for 3 settings that literally make no image quality difference to me, at all - and that's while using triple screens w/ multiview!


    If you still want to raise your framerates without lowering any in-game graphics then you have 2 more options (I recommend to everyone to do #5, regardless!).

    5. Pre-Rendered Frames - "1" - In the Nvidia Control Panel (or Nvidia Inspector, I recommend Inspector since it has more adjustments and settings) select your rF2 profile, then change the setting (don't forget to hit Apply/Save/O.K.). Apart from gained fps in rF2, this will also decrease input lag for most users

    6. In Nvidia Inspector set the following (I believe you can only adjust two of the following in the standard Nvidia Control Panel, however it may give the same result - fps-wise - but I'm not 100% certain, so I use Nvidia Inspector just to be safe):
    - Texture filtering - Anisotropic filter optimization: ON
    - Texture filtering - Anisotropic sample optimization: ON
    - Texture filtering - Quality: HIGH PERFORMANCE
    - Texture filtering - Trilinear optimization: ON


    Still want more framerates while hardly affecting image quality?

    7. Circuit Detail - "High" - May achieve a higher and more consistent framerate around the track or at specific points around the track where you may be experiencing framerate drops. You may notice some far-away trackside objects not showing anymore, but it is a very small amount of stuff, and usually far off into the distance rather than actual track-side stuff. It is a very, very small image quality decrease for the amount of potential framerate increase it may bring on certain PCs and certain tracks.

    8. Opponent Detail - "Medium" or "High" - May improve framerates when racing against other opponents, including possible large framerate improvements when racing against many opponents.


    These improvements will give you a very, very nice boost in rFactor 2 framerates without hardly affecting the image quality at all.

    Thanks for supporting rFactor 2 and ISI (Image Space Incorporated)! Happy racing! :)



    Examples of great results :)


    RFactor 2

    (I believe the three settings being referred to are #2, #3, and #4)
    source --> http://isiforums.net/f/showthread.p...ad-of-tripples?p=324489&viewfull=1#post324489

    Game Stock Car Extreme

    source --> http://www.racedepartment.com/threa...lly-no-image-quality-loss.97304/#post-1882250
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 21, 2015
  2. Prodigy

    Prodigy Registered

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    Nice tutorial.. Those kind of stuff should have it's own place on the forum, like sticky or something..
     
  3. hexagramme

    hexagramme Registered

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    Awesome stuff! I don't usually have fps problems running everything at near max, but a drop every now and again would be nice to get rid of. Thanks I will try out these settings. :)
     
  4. PRC Steve

    PRC Steve Registered

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    Quite a substantial improvement here with an old 550ti. Thanks Spinelli.
     
  5. Spinelli

    Spinelli Banned

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    These should fix all that for you while looking like you haven't reduced any of the graphics settings :), especially #s 2, 3, and 4 (and 5, but everyone should use 5, no matter how good their framerate is).
     
  6. hexagramme

    hexagramme Registered

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    Great. :)

    I've been at this sim for a year and a half now and always meant to do some testing of graphics settings, fps versus image quality kind of stuff. I just don't have the time even though I have been very curious regarding how much of a difference these is between the settings you mentioned.

    I'd much much rather be racing that doing tedious testing, so it's very cool to have a couple of very concrete things to check out.
     
  7. johnsclander

    johnsclander Registered

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    Thanks!!. Rf2 runs perfect on my PC with those settings. (Windows 7, FX6300 (no OC), 8gb ram, 650 ti boost)
     
  8. Golanv

    Golanv Registered

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    ...and if you use triple screens, arrange your rig for rf2 and rf2 only, or go play something else.
    Seriously, where the hell is the triple tools ISI?
     
  9. Spinelli

    Spinelli Banned

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    I play RF2, RF1, GSC, FT, IR, AC, etc. all absolutely perfect on my system. I don't even use the triple screen calculator in IR or AC, I just do the same as I do in ISI based sims, I simply manually set the FOV (and to the same for every game, obviously), and that's it, done! They all look fine to me; the dash looks straight, no distortion - everything looks good.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 4, 2014
  10. DurgeDriven

    DurgeDriven Banned

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    I remember when I quote identical settings 1 to 4, donkeys ago, in a thread about quality vs fps.


    Ari told me no uncertain terms,

    " Nobody wants to buy your low res low quality blurry low latency 60Hz" .......................Louis.


    bahahahaha lool


    "Louis" ............. line from Trading Places. :p
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 4, 2014
  11. coops

    coops Banned

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    Its a WIP is all you will here or its not important enough at this stage to spend time on it. BUGGER!!!!!
     
  12. Spinelli

    Spinelli Banned

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    Great results :).....
    I believe the three settings oHOWEo is referring to are #2, #3, and #4. Also note, the improved framerates are with the GPU underclocked VS the old, lower framerates which had the GPU overclocked :)
     
  13. DrR1pper

    DrR1pper Registered

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    Nice one Spinelli.
     
  14. Spinelli

    Spinelli Banned

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    Ya disable all that crap. I put my Win in total basic mode. In the Windows performance/image quality options, I disable all the check boxes except one or two of them. That, combined with the basic, non-Aero mode (possibly called "Classic"?) ensures the absolute best performance. At the very least you can set Aero to be disabled only while playing a game. If you right-click a game's exe, or exe-shortcut, then select "properties"; there should be an option to disable Aero. Then Aero will automatically re-enable once you quit the game.
     
  15. Spinelli

    Spinelli Banned

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    Ya, aero will probably give you the most gain though. I noticed a touch more general desktop snappiness by disabling everything, but I think you really just need to disable Aero. The rest are probably extremely minor, maybe even un-detectable, but I just go in the habit of doing it from 7 or 8 years back when I had a real slow PC. It's just a habit to eek out every 0.01 of performance which probably makes literally no detectable difference nowadays, lol.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 6, 2014
  16. Emery

    Emery Registered

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    Are y'all running in windowed mode? Or does disabling Aero help in full-screen mode, too?

    [After the fact, remembered that Aero is only used for menu bar in Win 8.1]
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 7, 2014
  17. Daytona 675

    Daytona 675 Registered

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    Thanks Spinelli, I spent the night trying settings, to me it has helped me a lot, but I found that on my system set the AA and AF from the game give me better quality. From the nvidia control panel better FPS, but little variation and worse with jaggies.

    In short:

    1. AA itself from RF2: Lvl 3
    2. Shadows= high.
    3. Shadow blur= fast
    4. AF= 8x
    5. pre-rendered frames (Nvidia Control Panel)= 1
    6. Texture filtering (Nvidia Control Panel):
    -Quality: high performance
    -Anisotropic sample optimization : ON
    -Trilinear optimization: ON

    I donĀ“t change opponent detail and circuit detail , I leave full, I make my own points 7 and 8:

    7. special effects: medium
    8. soft particles: low

    But I think I can raise these settings, I need more testing.

    Also I read that disable aero can give some improvement and I've tried. So:

    9. turn off aero, right click on RF2 launcher, properties, disable desktop composition.

    My "FPS" are more consistent and higher minimum.
    I can maintain almost constant 90 FPS during a race in Tiger Moth R3 with URD T5 mod , 22 IA's, 20 visible cars.

    Thanks again.
    Greetings.

    P.D. I forgot everything else on full ;) and important set "Single Display Peformance Mode" if you only use one monitor on Nvidia Control Panel.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 7, 2014
  18. Spinelli

    Spinelli Banned

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    Ya, I set AF from in-game too. I think circuit detail from full to high, and opponentes from full to medium will make more of a difference if you take into effect how little you can see those visual changes, where as soft particles to low and special effects to medium, you can notice those changes much more from what I remember. But hey, whatever works for you.
     
  19. buddhatree

    buddhatree Registered

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    What about AF? If you set it to 8x in-game and you set it 8x in the CP or Inspector are you doubling up or doesn't it work like that?
     
  20. Spinelli

    Spinelli Banned

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    It won't look better of you set it i'n both, no. There's a chance performance may drop, but I'm not 100% sure. Quality wise, I'm not even sure which one looks better, they're too close to call for me. Set 8x AF in the game and forget it :)
     

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