Arma 3 low FPS even after optimization (AMD)

[xorioz 10]

So...

I bought Arm 3 back when it was beta. it ran pretty bad with a max fps at about 15 - 20 even at lowest settings.

I thought to myself that it was a beta and it would be fixed by the time the game was finished.

Well the game came out and i tried it again same result.

I checked the minimum requirements and confirmed i should be able to run the game.

I then searched and searched the internet and found a multitude of fixes like disabling cpu parking and so on. no visible change. "perhaps plus 5 fps at lowest settings"

funny thing is this problem only seams to persist in multiplayer. "with or without mods"

Among other things i have tried reinstalling both the game and windows itself.

Have tried a multitude of gpu drivers, flashed my bios and the list goes on.

the more players on any given server the more the fps drops.

this is my setup.

16gb ram at 2214 MHz

amd FX-8120 at 3422 MHz

Nvidia 490.

4x ocz vertex 3 (raid)

gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD5 (rev. 1.x) motherboard.

I have before thought that my gpu might be the bottleneck but when testing arma only uses about 50% of the gpu speed/power.

I have gone through all the guides for optimization i could find here on this forum.

So does anyone have any idea if i can fix this problem or do i realy have to get a new pc to run this game at playable frames?

[RozekPoland 591]

I have the same issue. It's probably due to poor utilization of AMD processors by the engine.

[aussiebobby 1]

I have the same mobo with an FX8350 and 2xHD6850.I did have until last week a HD7950 ,but it died,so the 6850s came out of retirement.

Getting both of these cards to work above 30% has been a pain.

Try upping the sampling rate from 100% one step at a time in the video settings tab .At each step you should see the gpu usage go up and its takes a few secs to show this.I get 70% to 80% usage on both gpus using the Altis benchmark

I also changed my resolution from 1920x1080 to 1280x720

Iv also OCed the cpu to 4.4 MHz using AMDs Overdrive.

All I did was up the mutiplyer a step at a time(started at 4.2) used the apps stability test.runt Arma 3 benchmark.no crash,bumped it up a bit more etc.

Once you have a OC that you are happy with,next to the green button,preferences/settings/profie/save as and give it a name and save.This way you can load your OCd setting when you want to start gaming.

So here is my video settings

32fps isnt to bad for the cards.I get 50fps playing Breaking Point mod

http://i1368.photobucket.com/albums/ag194/Aussiebobby/arma3_videosetting2_zps0a0d3980.png (748 kB)

http://i1368.photobucket.com/albums/ag194/Aussiebobby/arma3_vodeosetting1_zps23a916e5.png (752 kB)

http://i1368.photobucket.com/albums/ag194/Aussiebobby/arma3_videosetting3_zps53c1216f.png (734 kB)

Edited March 15, 2014 by AussieBobby

[xorioz 10]

Ill try some of the overclocking again.

But i don't think it will help. tried before.

Guess ill have to go out and get an I7 and a better gpu.

Really sucks tho.

I hoped the Arma 3 engine would be step up from the Arma 2 engine.

Sorry to see a good game concept be ruined by bad programming.

Well i expect it's bad programming.

[Trippin 10]

I've run AMD System Monitor next to ARMA3, but i never got above 60% usage of my CPU or GPU. Other games take about 80/90% of both. My game is stuck at 25fps at low action, and drops to a whoppin 10fps if something tend to happen on screen. Turned everything to low at one point, but doesn't seem to help much.

System:

Phenom II X4 965 BE

Radeon 7870

8g ddr3 memory

win7 64 professional

[DrDeathO5 10]

So...

I bought Arm 3 back when it was beta. it ran pretty bad with a max fps at about 15 - 20 even at lowest settings.

I thought to myself that it was a beta and it would be fixed by the time the game was finished.

Well the game came out and i tried it again same result.

I checked the minimum requirements and confirmed i should be able to run the game.

I then searched and searched the internet and found a multitude of fixes like disabling cpu parking and so on. no visible change. "perhaps plus 5 fps at lowest settings"

funny thing is this problem only seams to persist in multiplayer. "with or without mods"

Among other things i have tried reinstalling both the game and windows itself.

Have tried a multitude of gpu drivers, flashed my bios and the list goes on.

the more players on any given server the more the fps drops.

this is my setup.

16gb ram at 2214 MHz

amd FX-8120 at 3422 MHz

Nvidia 490.

4x ocz vertex 3 (raid)

gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD5 (rev. 1.x) motherboard.

I have before thought that my gpu might be the bottleneck but when testing arma only uses about 50% of the gpu speed/power.

I have gone through all the guides for optimization i could find here on this forum.

So does anyone have any idea if i can fix this problem or do i realy have to get a new pc to run this game at playable frames?

This is because the server can't handle the calculations.

Server slow -> your comp is also slow. Upgrading your comp isn't gonna help in multiplayer. It's all server-dependend.

I would suggest to try different hosts and see which ones do work better for you

[pr0ph3tswe 1]

This is because the server can't handle the calculations.

Server slow -> your comp is also slow. Upgrading your comp isn't gonna help in multiplayer. It's all server-dependend.

I would suggest to try different hosts and see which ones do work better for you

while you're somewhat right you're also wrong, fx-8xxx vs i5 and i7 2/3/4 series the intel will perform better even on a shitty server even though performance will be lower than on a good server, i tried it in alpha when i still had my fx-8350 and a i5 2500k

[oldbear 390]

@ Trippin :

1° having a Radeon 7870 and setting video parameters to "Low" is a wrong move. Doing so you are telling the game that as your GPU is too weak to do all the graphic rendering, it must be shared with CPU and that's stressing your Phenom.

2° the Phenom II X4 965 BE is a well built CPU but with an average efficiency but you must be aware that all the AMD cpu released afterwards, the FX-**** and the APU as well are not doing much better, Arma3 wise. From various reports I am getting on forums I am active on, the FX-8350 seems to be the only one able to pull the game but at a high price and not so efficiently than an i5.

Have a look at this chart :

Source :"Intel Core i7-4770K et i5-4670K : Haswell en test" :

This chart must not be used as a proof of some "truth", it just shows the CPU hierarchy related to RV Engine.

3° as you are settings the "Video" parameters, I will suggest to :

- let the auto-detection do the job,

- low down "Visibility" a bit to 2000 m

- disable VSYNC

- use HardOCP recipe in AA&PP : "Therefore, best AA combo in this game, FXAA Ultra + 2X/4X or 8X FSAA and you will get the best texture quality, no blurring, crisp textures, and well anti-aliased objects and vegetation." Source : [H]ardOCP.

Note : I strongly advise you against setting "Sampling" over 100%

4° use Arma3Mark by Helo to have a more objective view of the overall results. Use it to set the "Visibility" level in order to get the better balance between view and FPS.

You can find Arma3Mark by Helo on the BI Forums .

[xorioz 10]

Well if it's the servers i have tried to play on then damn.

Is no one hosting proper servers then?

Tho i did some searching and it seams the problem is the bandwidth the servers require.

an insanely ludicrous 16Mbps out for 64 players.

That's 31,25 KB a sec per player.

if we convert this to vectors "3d position". 3 floats per vector. one float = 4 byte. giving 12 byte per vector.

That's about 2666 vectors a second. 2666!!!!!!!!!!!

Let me stress how wrong this is.

It's a given that some of this bandwidth will be used for other stuff but it's still way way to much data.

at any given time the server should only send you the positional information for stuff within reasonable distance from your current position and again this should only be the stuff that moved or changed orientation since the last tick.

i'm not far enough in my game programming lessons to know about synchronization and cheat prevention but i seriously doubt this should take up that kind of bandwidth.

[Trippin 10]

@oldbear

Thx for the info, will run those testbenches

[mamasan8 11]

Maybe there was 2600 bullets in the air as well =) Those have a vector...yeah, I'm being silly.