Huge drop of FPS

[Vibrant_Viper 0]

Don't know how old or new this topic is now, or how far the thread starter has come with his problem, but...

Yesterday I did notice that nvidia driver now include arma.exe and armademo.exe in their profiles.

It did quite a big diff for me and the whole game play is now much more stable plus that according to Fraps, I do never go below 60fps compared to earlier minimum 30ish.

Also, for those who can, arma.exe or armademo.exe now can be forced to run SLI mode without changing the arma.exe name to some other name in order to run SLI.

Don't know how new or old my "news"can be, but someone might have some use of it.

What driver is that?

[Mehmehmeh 0]

158.22_forceware_winxp_english_whql.exe

^^ This is what I did get from the official website.

[tomservo 0]

Here's an idea to fight vegetation lag:

When going prone, the grass view distance scales back the closer you get to ground. When actually being prone, the game should only draw one or two layers of grass, to avoid overdraw.

When being prone, the grass is already too much in my face to even see something useful, so it doesn't need lots of layers for the same effect.

[Drew77 0]

Yes the new patch I have lost about 20-30 fps and it really take to much out of the game and I cant even play. To bad it is just to bad.

[4 IN 1 0]

turn sheding to high or normal, it imporove my lag by a shit lot

[Marines 0]

It's somewhat remenisant of Gothic 3, and all of the inclusive preformance issues associated with that game.

For me, my X 1900XTX with 512 VRAM ran the game at a totally unacceptable level, and it wasn't until I downgraded to a 7900 GS OC (over-clocked), that my preformance skyrocketed. I find it unacceptable for a game, especially one that certainly doesn't contain much, if any "eye-candy" at all, to have such wide reaching and varied preformance problems. Oh sure, it looks amazing when compared to OFP, but most all followups and or sequels look better than their predecessors.

My US patch is currently at 65%, so, I spose we'll see how this latest one affects game playability.

I knew I should've keep my German version installed.

[frederf 0]

Here's an idea to fight vegetation lag:

When going prone, the grass view distance scales back the closer you get to ground. When actually being prone, the game should only draw one or two layers of grass, to avoid overdraw.

When being prone, the grass is already too much in my face to even see something useful, so it doesn't need lots of layers for the same effect.

That sounds like a workable idea, basically when there grass is thick and in your face render less of it.

As for the alpha-texture z-buffer not working overdraw issue. I'm not entirely schooled in the details but how do other programs deal with this? Is it a problem for everyone?

[TheReddog 0]

I know exactly what the OP is talking about, I have just installed ArmA 1.05 on my newly built system and am running into this issue.

Can run it easily with everything on high and it play smooth until I look at certain types of bush, not just any type but the dark, dense, waist height ones. Looking at one of those is instant 5fps, regardless of the details settings though low shaders makes it happen less frequently.

I didn't have this issue at all with my 6800GT or x1950 Pro.

New system;

E6600 C2D

2GB DDR2 800Mhz

MSI 965P

Gainward 8800 GTS 320 (running 158.12 Nvidia's)

Downloading patch 1.08, lets hope it fixes things.

Oh and also the system performs absolutely stellar in all other games ArmA just cuts it down at the knees through incompatibility or slip shod coding or both.

3D Mark '06 score 8935.

***EDIT***

Patching to 1.08 has alleviated the problem to a degree however it is still there. Just noticed too it isn't so much the fps dropping as the mouse lagging!

[mattxr 9]

Yeah there might be only so many models of trees but each one has been planted induvidually and they are not all the same way around. I belive Linda might of been used.

[celery 8]

So, is there any server side command to turn grass off as a default now?

[maddogx 13]

So, is there any server side command to turn grass off as a default now?

I thought setTerrainGrid did that?

[celery 8]

So, is there any server side command to turn grass off as a default now?

I thought setTerrainGrid did that?

That only does it in individual maps, but sadly most maps don't have any settings.

[Maddmatt 1]

So, is there any server side command to turn grass off as a default now?

I thought setTerrainGrid did that?

That only does it in individual maps, but sadly most maps don't have any settings.

It's easy enough to edit the mission and add it though.

[celery 8]

So, is there any server side command to turn grass off as a default now?

I thought setTerrainGrid did that?

That only does it in individual maps, but sadly most maps don't have any settings.

It's easy enough to edit the mission and add it though.

Still I'd like to know the server command or profile setting that removes grass from all maps that don't specify otherwise. I can vaguely remember that such a feature was already promised for 1.04 or 1.05 but didn't work.

[memnoch 0]

I wonder what the poly count is on the grass and whether this could be reduced further? Or perhaps do away with polygons completely and go back to the quick and dirty methose used in much older games. It might look poor but it would a nice option to have if your system can't cope but you don't want to remove it completely.

[max power 21]

It's more than the polycount. It's the shading passes, the alpha calculations, the self-shadowing... The vegetation is very complicated!

[xnodunitx 0]

from what I saw comparing Far Cry to Armed Assault in terms of grass, far cry had more BUT, it did not have the normal and specular maps.

I think if we could somehow take these off the grass and have it still work, it may just up the performance a bit.

Damn plaintiff1 beat me

[-Puma- 2]

Also farcry uses smaller textures and less polygons for the trees... can't really be compared.

yeah, i guess, and i must agree on the above comment.

Linda is the program used for all trees in Armed Assault, it's incredible.

Every tree in ARMA is not iqual to any other in entire map. Each tree have their own "personality". Thats what also make it so unique.

ohara, are you able to update about this subject? It would be very appreciated

Well I'd rather have 5 to 10 different looking trees and cartoony grass, than having my FPS go to 14 in the forrest, or when proned on ground(even when im not zooming on the optics)

at this point north is nightmare, and wouldn't book a vacation there ever.

[stryker555 0]

Yep foliage and grass eats into your fps big time and helps the enemy AI more than they help you. I set my foliage/grass settings as follows..

Shading detail: Normal

Terrain detail: Very low

[-Puma- 2]

yep, but Its annying to play MP in north with grass on

[xnodunitx 0]

I believe there can be some huge optimizations done by getting rid of normal maps on tree's and various plants. Ingame I really didn't notice them on plants except for tree trunks and the bark.

However after using Pboview, I saw that virtually every plant had a normal map. For some things such as branches this is good but many of them had it without really needing to have it. If we coul somehow get the tree's to work without them then we could no doubt have a massive performance boost, not to mention resizing some things. For example, most of the grass textures are 1024x1024.

[-=seany=- 5]

One area on the map were I get fairly horrendous frame rate drop is the town of Yoro, between Paraiso and Somato. Every time I drive by this area my frame rate halves. If just this bush type could be changed/optimized then I would be happy as these bushes do appear in quite a few other places, but not nearly in such quantity as Yoro.

[max power 21]

Try setting shading detail to low. It makes a large difference.

[-=seany=- 5]

Try setting shading detail to low. It makes a large difference.

Its already low. The point is that 80 % of the map is perfectly playable, its just 20% has these bushes where it chops your frame rate. they need to be fixed. I know you have to compromise on gfx details in every game (so that all situations in the game run at a playable FPS), but I'm at the point with Arma where I don't want to have to turn the gfx down any more and don't feel I should have to.

7800gs 256mb / 2gb ram / Amd3500+

[super64 0]

This games graphics really baffle me. Im playing with an AMD 4800+, 2GB mem and an 8800GTX. I'll disabled AA and get very little, if any change in fps from when its on 8X. I'll INCREASE my in-game screen res and suddenly get a slightly better frame rate. Very odd! Post processing seems to be the only consistent variable, where the higher you go the lower the frame rate goes. Also i have noticed since using the 8800GTX, the fog is clearly back.

But as mentioned above, it just seems the textures could be better optimized to still look decent but provide for a better gaming experience.