ArmaHolic ArmA 2 Optimization

[kklownboy 43]

no matter what rez 800*600 or 1680*1050 low,normal or high alwayas the same27-28fps

turn off Vysnc and see if you geta lil bump, and what aera/mission are you testing?

[Raptor309 10]

The mission is Harvest Red , yes Vsync is forced off

[kklownboy 43]

The mission is Harvest Red , yes Vsync is forced off

nobody gets good fps on that. Its not indicative of the true perfomance in the game. Use the beta patch and some good mods for performance.

[Raptor309 10]

Ok thanks

[Masterfragg 10]

On a random note, not being happy with Arma 2's performance has brought be back into the scene enough to start playing Arma 1 again in Private Matching

[Karhis 10]

nobody gets good fps on that.

I can't help wondering why did they make campaign missions that nobody is able to run or require high end Core i7 processors. How did that pass beta testing?

I would guess that there are group of players (myself included) who consider the campaign as the best part of the game and are not that keen on multiplayer and community made missions. And for those players, this game in its current state is not very enjoyable (if not unplayable)

[shadowze 1]

I can't help wondering why did they make campaign missions that nobody is able to run or require high end Core i7 processors. How did that pass beta testing?

I would guess that there are group of players (myself included) who consider the campaign as the best part of the game and are not that keen on multiplayer and community made missions. And for those players, this game in its current state is not very enjoyable (if not unplayable)

Beta testing , apparently BIS treat that like santa claus , they dont believe in it

[markushaze 10]

well , i cant understand that..... People running this game, with the rigs posted, should have way better performance then 20 FPS, unless you guys ar using extreme Anti aliasing and AF mods.......

please try the following:

After -nosplash( for those using the beta builds ) add maxmem= ( your RAM here) to the target line

Non beta users, can simply add it to the end after the quotes " -maxmem=

i read that ARMA 2 engine, only can use up to 2 gb of ram, without this tweak it seams its using only 512 mb ...... that's why your HDDs are working theirs off.

since using this, my fps went from stuttering barely playable 20-30 up to absolutely smooth 30-40 FPS. and no more paging :-)

i use maxmem=4000.

That solved all performance issues:-)

ArmA 2 settings :

All Very High xcept Antialiasing and AF deactivated ( i am using Nhancer to force 4Xs AntiAliasing )

View distance 3890m

Postprocessing Off

did this setting help anyone?

did nhancer help anyone?

[eirulan 10]

I can't help wondering why did they make campaign missions that nobody is able to run or require high end Core i7 processors. How did that pass beta testing?

I would guess that there are group of players (myself included) who consider the campaign as the best part of the game and are not that keen on multiplayer and community made missions. And for those players, this game in its current state is not very enjoyable (if not unplayable)

Yes I agree.

I also use the editor and download user missions, so I can "compensate" the lack of polishness in the SP campaign.

All in all, I liked the campaign, very innovative, but very "PC resource eater". I generally ran it at 25-30 fps, especially "Manhattan Mission".

[Masterfragg 10]

Yes I agree.

I also use the editor and download user missions, so I can "compensate" the lack of polishness in the SP campaign.

All in all, I liked the campaign, very innovative, but very "PC resource eater". I generally ran it at 25-30 fps, especially "Manhattan Mission".

You know, it still bugs me that players say this game is "PC Resouce hungry" or a "PC Resource Eater"...Doesn't a game need to USE resources to be one of them!?

It's been awhile since my last post I've been playing other games such as Batman: Arkham Asylum (Reccomendation to all gamers this is my only 10/10 game this year lol)

But apart from that I've been waiting on another Arma II patch.

It sadly seems that this game is doomed for me as even with the new patch they haven't bothered optimizing FUCK all. 27FPS no matter what.

Message to BIS, DO NOT RELEASE YOUR EXPANSION PACK!!!

Start on a new engine we all know you can do it!

Yes it could take a year or two but using a modified OFP engine thats almost what...10 years old? is stupidity in it's greatest form!

I mean does everyone remember what Arma 1 was ment to be? a remake of sorts for OFP updating the engine etc...Updating the engine not a new engine...updating.

Thats all Arma II is...You can only update engines graphical richness before you have to optimize it and lets face it they haven't done so.

Come on BIS...Make a new game one that isn't "Epic Fail" worthy.

Of course I could be wrong and this could be the legendary "Game 2" engine...But if this is "Game 2's" engine then fuck me BIS are screwed lol

[hotel 10]

Hi masterfragg,

There needs to be an agency to quality control video games. There would be so many less problems and more polished products would be the goal instead of this make money fast goal. Video game companies are really doing whatever they want and this lack of regulations and rules has caused problems with a lot of games.

Video games are a form of entertainment and to me (not everyone) ArmA2 is like a Movie that hasnt been fully edited yet and you can still see the strings on the actors as there flying through the air in whatever heroic menuever there pulling.

[TechnoTerrorist303 10]

Video games are a form of entertainment and to me (not everyone) ArmA2 is like a Movie that hasnt been fully edited yet and you can still see the strings on the actors as there flying through the air in whatever heroic menuever there pulling.

I agree, however there are lots of films out there where you can see the strings and blatant cgi but are still classics.

[shataan 1]

Get this peeps.

Here is my system specs

Asus Crosshair III

BFG GTX 295

8 gbs Corsair Dominator @ 1600

AMD 955 BE @ 3400 mhz

2 X WD VelociRaptors in RAID 0

I did all the tweaks etc, and have the game running pretty sweet @ 1680x1050x32 winXP, all settings maxed, no AA/AF, 120 refresh. This rig is fairly new, and 1 of the tweaks I always usually do is turn off cpu and pcie Spread Spectrum.

I was in the bios looking around for stuff I may have forgotten to tweak, and there the Spread Spectrums are, on Auto.

So on Disabled they go. And I head into ARMA 2. Much to my surprise, ARMA 2 totally smoothed out, and the A.I. which had seemingly gone soft after the 1.04 update patch, got alot livelier/aggressive.

Now as always ymmv, but disabling my Spread Spectrums..... did more for my game than all the other tweaks together. Just to make sure I wasn`t seeing things, I restarted the game 4 times. I use the sp scenario WarWelcome, cause with all the popup hints totally stopping the game in its tracks, it is a good indicator for me how the game is running smoothnesswise.

Hopefully this helps someone else. Good luck. Worked for me.

Edited October 18, 2009 by Shataan

[Fox '09 14]

My setup hasn't gone under 37 FPS recently, And I don't use any optimization tweaks. maybe new drivers?

[TomBabmo 10]

i use maxmem=4000.

That solved all performance issues:-)

Well that must be placebo for you, then.

What I read HERE I get the picture that Arma2 can already use 2047MB of RAM without parameters and can't use any more even if you put 4000. That parameter is only for limiting arma2 ram usage below 2 gigs.

[Leon86 13]

For me maxmem doesn't seem to do anything. the game always uses about 1GB of memory, doesn't matter if I put it on 1500, 700, 500 or 0.

[Meldric 10]

I have tried every single tweak (yes, I am stupid enough and still trying!!!). No matter what I do, I get unplayable 17-20 frames and lots of frustration. Don't even ask my specs, it doesn't matter!!! Whatever I do (high res, low res, Settings to high, settings to low) doesn't seem to change ANYTHING!

I am really pissed (again)! I have been reading 55 pages of this thread and many others and achieved nothing. IT SHOULDN'T BE NECESSARY TO READ ALL THIS AND TWEAK AROUND FOR WEEKS!!!

I read so many people here guessing into the blue, telling us that this and that made the breakthrough for them... it doesn't make any difference for anyone else. Guys, we are completly running through the fog!!!

But I NEVER EVER read anyone of BIS telling us if this is even true or not! There is only one reason: They do not fucking know themselves!

I am major disappointed by OPFP2-DR (noone could be pleased by this crap!) and still am disapointed by ARMA2 BIG TIME! I bought BOTH games for good money and any coin of it was wasted!

I think I will just forget about it and play ARMA again, because after a 1000 patches and with a rig doubling the recommended specs it runs half way satisfying...

I am off-topic... maybe I get on-topic again by asking if there is a proper collection of tweaks somewhere and maybe someone who knows for sure how to increase framerates instead of guessing and "for me it worked (but not for me)"-stuff?

Please?

Edited October 21, 2009 by Meldric

[yanquis 10]

so wait a freakin second, if id seen this thread (i never notice stickies ironically) THIS gets a2 running right, just by matching the render to the res? am ireading this right (its mostly greek to me). the render was slightly off, i matched them and unless its my imagination its running totally smooth (again) and looks better. its not like there is an objective result because according to fraps i am still upper teens to upper twenties in fps @ the russian mission in the city on my settings. yet it felt like a consistent 40+ fps. i dont get it.

this is so frustrating and a relief at the same time, but what i dont know is what will happen next time i open a2 (or a thread here). it seems the game just does whatever the heck it wants. thank god i sorta enjoy this kind of stuff.

[TomBabmo 10]

Yes, I noticed it also that I got worse performance when I had interface res set to native 1440x900 and 3d-res lower + extreme blurriness and I thought it was because my TFT-monitor was downsizing the image. After I lowered interface res too and synced it with 3d-res I got almost +10fps boost with my crappy rig and image is crisp.

Few more tweaks and perhaps I don't have to upgrade anything after all... :-)

Edited October 22, 2009 by TomBabmo

[killakaze 10]

I recommend using ramdisk its improved my game alot.

Thanks liquidpinky

[frequence 1]

RAMdisk solved my problems aswell.

[ChiefBoatsRet 10]

I run a Q6600, 4 gb of 800mz ddr2, HD4670 in crossfire using the latest ATI drivers. I run this game on high settings (1920x1024) with 0 problems. It wasnt always this way believe me I chased my butt like all of you trying to optimize this game. My fix will certainly not be an option for most of you but I read where this game isnt bottle necked by cpu or gpu... this game chews up your hdd. I bought a 64gb solid state drive ($149) and installed my operating system and this game on that and put everything else on the regular hdd. Yes ssd's are still expensive compared to regular hdd, I told you this wasnt for everyone. Everything loads so fast and this game runs smooth as silk and looks beautiful. I have read in here where people have bought the newest video cards and cpu's with no better results so perhaps my fix was actually cheaper. You framerate counters will never like this game I dont run fraps anymore,I go by how the game feels and looks to me.

[SASrecon 0]

My setup hasn't gone under 37 FPS recently, And I don't use any optimization tweaks. maybe new drivers?

Yep the latest 191. drivers give a nice performance boost to ARMA2, am i right in saying Nvidia claim at least a 10% boost?

[TomBabmo 10]

Up to 12% they said in driver highlights...

Depends what your video card is I guess. If there's some "power in reserve" then 12% boost can be very possible. I got exactly 0% boost with my crappy 8600GT.

[stealth7d 10]

Make sure your CPU and GPU temperatures are ok, after doing this i found out my CPU was running at 98c under load. So i opended her up, replaced the thermal paste, removed all the dust and voila temperature went down to 35c. FPS increased by 50.