An open letter to BIS Devs re: GTX 295 rigs.

[wazandy 10]

As you've no doubt read, there seems to be a major issue with some of the more high-end systems. Specifically those with i7 and GTX295 cards.

We're fully aware that all titles are future proofed, and nobody should expect perfect gameplay at point of release, however, the vast majority of people with mid range systems seem to be able to run this engine at a much faster FPS than us.

Can someone please hotfix or patch this - or at least give some advice to the many frustrated players with systems such as these. Many of us invested large sums of money SPECIFICALLY to play this title, so it's enormously disappointing to find that we're technologically singled out for very poor performance.

You've seen how we're trying to bugfix the source of the problem ourselves, please, you know this game better than anyone. Please let us know what you think is the problem.

Thanks in advance.....

Andy F

Intel CORE i7 920

Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme Heatsink + 1366 Bolt-thru Kit + 120mm Fan

Asus P6T X58 DDR3

Kingston 6GB 1333MHz DDR3 Triple Channel Kit

Vista Home Premium 64-Bit

Geforce GTX 295

Fatal1ty X-FI Platinum

Edited June 23, 2009 by wazandy

[EightSeven 10]

I second this motion. As an 8800GTX owner who has been seeing stellar performance in ArmA2, I would like to see a marked increase when I upgrade to a 295GTX.

[Philll 10]

Yeh, no point in buying high end machines if a card I had 2 years ago runs it better. I'm sure someone will pop in blaming it on nVidia instead, but like I've said before, BIS had something to work with (current or older drivers) whereas nVidia didn't.

Even with a hack to get SLI going the performance is still terrible. Completely lower everything to its minimum and it still has slow downs, massive FPS drops, crashes or choppy frame rates after fresh installs, installing many drivers etc.

[wazandy 10]

I agree, this is the only title I've bought that hasn't run like BUTTER with this rig.

I refuse to blame in on Nvida too, although they can definitely help with a patch update optimised for AA2.

The ball's in BIS's court, this is a highly unusual problem and even a basic answer would help people narrow down the problem and construct a workaround solution. The AA community is pretty PC advanced, so all we need is a pointer and I'm sure we can help you bugfix this!

[FraG_AU 10]

Might as well add me to this. I am a patient advanced PC user, and have tried all sorts of wild theories to get the game performing so much so my key is banned for reinstalls and I cant play the game.

If I was an average Jo, the game would have been in the bin and never dusted off again. Being a long time supporter of BIS, Ie Opflash, ARMA, ARMA Gold Edition, and now Arma 2, is the only thing that has kept my interest in this game.. KNOWING how good it could be, rather then actually being that good.

Anyway I hope its something that is addressed soon, one of the big things I was looking forward to is "multicore' support. EVEN if its not going to be done in the forthcoming weeks, PLEASE acknowladge the problem and say you are attempting to find a resolution to it. At least this way I have some hope it will run on my current PC and I won't have to wait 2 years to play it. I fully understand that there may be more critical bugs to fix first, and yes completely understand that you are running a business and sometimes you have to work on the issues that affect most rather the issues that affect the few, but either it would be nice to have it acknowledged.

I have added a pic with typical Arma 2 resource usage, this is during SP Campaign playing Razor Two (which is one that is really bad)

Click to view full size!

You will notice that my GPU is really not even oout of first gear, 99% of games will have 70+ C. Also you will notice that CPU never hits 100% on any core or the HT cores.

Edited June 23, 2009 by FraG_AU

[BigSlongsDaddy 10]

isnt this just a driver issue , there are no drivers out from nvida that support this game as yet maybe there are some to come , but in the read me of all the drivers there is nothing about arma2 support and sli , also nvida did not work with the arma2 team on the game because there is no nvida animation at the start up of the game ?

[nzjono 10]

Add me to the list i7 920@3.6GHz and GTX295, I had better fps on my old 8800 ultra and a standard 3GHZ duo core and less ram. :mad:

[Rasa-be 10]

nobody should expect perfect gameplay at point of release,

That's just sad.

[goldkid80 10]

goldkid80

Xtreme QX6850 @ 3.8 CPU

8 Gig MISKIN DDR 2 1066 5-5-5-8

EVGA GTX 295

ASUS P5K-E\ Premium

X-FI Titanium PRO

BEYERDYNAMIC Headphone

850 PWS

SAMSUNG HD103UJ hdd

SAMSUNG HD753LJ hdd

SAMSUNG 6230 FUll HD 100 Motion+ LCD 42"

bad FPS main menu min 32 max 78

scenario min 14 max 31

[Wonky 10]

Agreed the perf is a joke on my rig, although i heard from someone (cant rember who) that our perf is shit becasue Arma2 is not detecting both of the 295's gpu's.

My rig.

i7 920@3.5Ghz

6Gb of DDR3 1600Mhz RAM

GTX 295

1TB drive

Blu ray player

22" Samsung Monitor

Asus P6T Deluxe V2 mobo

Vista 64bit

Custom CPU cooler(cant rember which)

Antec three hundred case

890Watt PSU

[Ka-Oz 10]

ADD Me /CRy !!!

E6850 @3.6 Ghz

4 GB 800 Mhz 3-3-3-10

Mb: X48 DQ6 Gygabyte

Asus GTX 295

Vista 64 + 186.16

just a quick question i have read some peoples got theyr get banned for multiple reinstalations. does the 505 games retail box have DRM limited installs?

[Cobalt_UK 0]

Q6600 oc'd to 3.0Ghz - 4Gb DDR2 Ram - Asus P5Q-E Motherboard - 295Gtx oc'd to 620/1336/1150 - Windows Vista 32bit - Nvidia drivers 186.18 - 1TB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm 32MB Cach - Defragged HD - zero processes running in background - all windows vista junk switched off.

Ingame settings @ Resolution 1920 x 1200 - Fillrate 100% All settings on High except, Shaders, Object detail and Post Processing - set to Low.

Ingame fps in Single Player between 25 - 40fps - average around 32fps.

Multiplayer between 16fps and 30 - average around 23fps.

Unplayable on multiplayer. Clearly no SLI support ingame, even with the lame exe/-winxp supposed fix.

We need an offical statement from Bohemia regarding the problems everyone is experiencing with either the 295gtx, or i7/295gtx setup's, please.

[Maizel 10]

I don;t think it'slimited to the 295.

The entire 2xx series have crap performance.

[bushwacker 10]

Yep I too waited and bought a expensive i7 system with gtx295 card for this game release and feel very disapointed with the performance of this game, you want to see farcry2, FSX, there great so I have to keep telling myself its this game not my pc ! Please fix this BI asap.

[bangtail 0]

I don;t think it'slimited to the 295.

The entire 2xx series have crap performance.

The 9800 GX2 cemented my resolution NEVER to buy one of those 2 GPU solutions again. I have the game running perfectly now in Win 7 after having to switch off HT, remove the -winxp switch after 1.02 and resorting to the 182.50 drivers (thats with 3 x GTX 280).

I remember when FC2 came out we had to wait 3 months for working 9800GX2 drivers and it seems that even though it is happening with fewer games, the design of these "combo" cards is problematic because I can assure you that even though it took a lot of f**king about, SLI on Nvidia cards is absolutely A1.

Now, if only they would fix the broken campaign and stupid AI, we'd REALLY be in business.

Eth

[Maizel 10]

The funny thing is. on my 285 GTX. While standing on the same spot. The differenc ebetween everything maxed out, and everything set on lowest is only 5 fps.

There's something really wrong with this game.

[kklownboy 43]

Add me to the list i7 920@3.6GHz and GTX295, I had better fps on my old 8800 ultra and a standard 3GHZ duo core and less ram. :mad:

well your old ultra is better than one of your 260s in your 295...

it seems that SLi isnt doing it and as i have with my 4870x2's have to use renames and winxp flags, and you may be able to us nhancer( a great nvidia tool!) to fix this

---------- Post added at 09:17 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:14 AM ----------

... had to wait 3 months for working 9800GX2 drivers and it seems that even though it is happening with fewer games, ..

Eth

yeah i had that too with my 9800x2, was always two or three beta/drivers behind... your trisli is the way to go with X58 , not quad 295s, if you go quad go ati...

[R0ckheadRumple 10]

I also get shitty performance from this game. Not what you expect after spending so much cash on these components

Intel Core I7 920 @ 3.2 GHz

6GB Corsair DDR3 1333MHz

ASUS P6T Deluxe x58

XFX GTX 295

Hanns G 28" Monitor 1920x1200

[neurojazz 10]

Fixed and flying - great portent for how this beast will run :)

http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1324488&postcount=14

There are 'gotchas' - like removing the cfg file after making the changes and the Sync off.

I'm in multiplayer and no crashes now after having a mare for 2 days :)

[private plowjoy 0]

C2D Wolfdale @ 3.16ghz

2GB DDR 1333

Nvidia 295 GTX

10k Raptor HDs

Running at 1920x1200 and it doesn't really seem to make any difference, what level the various graphics options are set to, except distance.

I'm getting so many different performance results, its making my eyes go funny. One minute its out-of-the-blue stuttering, which oddly seems to only come into effect around buildings. The next its textures not being displayed (white graphics). Then I get horribly warping graphics, which seem to 'pop' into full bloom, especially noticeable on buildings and trees.

The most recent one was that the entire game seemed to go into saturation overload. All colours were hugely pronounced, making it look like a console game. Even in full broad daylight, my BMP was so surrounded in dark shadows it make it very difficult to properly drive around.

Lack of AA makes the entire thing look 10 years old and every scene seems to 'shimmer'. Just a country mile away from what i've been used to with this beastly 295 card. There has to be something fundamentally wrong.

[Cobalt_UK 0]

The most recent one was that the entire game seemed to go into saturation overload. All colours were hugely pronounced, making it look like a console game.

I had this exact problem in a multiplayer match earlier. Happened when i entered one of the large cities. The further i proceeded into the city the more my fps went downhill - till it was right down into single figures. At that point the screen started turning into all different kinds of cartoony type saturated colours, followed by a CTD lol.

Oh what fun :eek:

[private plowjoy 0]

I had this exact problem in a multiplayer match earlier. Happened when i entered one of the large cities. The further i proceeded into the city the more my fps went downhill - till it was right down into single figures. At that point the screen started turning into all different kinds of cartoony type saturated colours, followed by a CTD lol.

Oh what fun :eek:

Well, I've just done exactly what this post, http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1324488&postcount=14, said.

Lo and behold, the game is now playable. Gone are all the odd artefacts, I get solid, fast, performance across the board and most of the problems I originally cited are now gone. Textures are solid and consistent and ive not had a single lack of texture load problem.

Lack of AA is still right in your face but i'm now actually able to play the game as a fluid experience. Thumbs up from me...so far....

[S!fkaIaC 10]

Maybe BIS needs to patch to make use of all features of the 2xx series (and all DirectX features) at all. Maybe they coded basic things of the graphics 2 years ago when 2xx samples were not available and they hence skipped implementation of certain features/functions.

Despite that, even my 8800GTX, which is "stoneold" does not work with ArmA 2, and to get it work with ArmA 1 was a looooong journey not just "plug and play", it was rather "fu*ck and pray".

[private plowjoy 0]

Well, I've just done exactly what this post, http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1324488&postcount=14, said.

Lo and behold, the game is now playable. Gone are all the odd artefacts, I get solid, fast, performance across the board and most of the problems I originally cited are now gone. Textures are solid and consistent and ive not had a single lack of texture load problem.

Lack of AA is still right in your face but i'm now actually able to play the game as a fluid experience. Thumbs up from me...so far....

Scratch that, just started to up the in-game graphics settings and almost straight away started to see my squad with white heads. Interestingly it was the video memory that I upped. I wonder if the 295 SLi isnt being utilized properly and as soon as you tip over that single-GPU memory cap, it starts to bug out?

Also got performance drops around cities, which I guess is to be expected to a degree, but it really does drag the frames right down and I still get texture/model 'popping' going on. Not as bad as previously but still there.

Such a shame too. I thought my PC would be able to easily run ArmA2 with aplomb. :(

[wazandy 10]

I'm presently using the Crysis64.exe workaround.. I've got 6gig of RAM, so how do I use '-maxmem=2047 -winxp' ? (And should I?)

Do I just add it after the .exe, or is it part of the .cfg file?

And does it help?