~21 fps without AA on hd4780x2,phenom 9950

[REMOVED_ACCOUNT 10]

NOTE: I got both GPU's working, but another problem appeared. Since this topic went a bit far from original subject, I started a new one: http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?p=1338788 This thread can be locked.

Hi, I know there's quite a few posts from users who think their system should be able to get better FPS. However only major fix I found was for nvidia cards. It isn't very clear on what ARMA 2 supports and what it doesn't. So here's a few questions:

Does it support multiple cores on processors? Some say it only uses one core, some give advice to set cpuCount to 2 even on quad core processors.

Does it support dualcore graphic cards, such as hd4870x2? If not, is there any kind of fix for it available?

Does it support more than 2047mb of ram? They said 1.01 doesn't, but the game updated from that. Should it support more now, or is there any fan-made fix available?

My setup: hd4870x2, phenom 9950 @ 2,6 GHz, 4gb of dd2 @ 1066 GHz.'

I currently have 5000m draw, 1920x1200 resolutions and all settings @ very high, exept for the AA (that's completely disabled since it drops my FPS down to something around 10). Benchmark gives me average of 21 fps.

Sorry for making another "why my fps is low" thread, but actual answers are so cluttered around the internets and differ from each other. Someone should make a sticky about what kind of hardware ARMA 2 properly supports, what it doesn't and what kind of fixes are available.

Edited June 30, 2009 by Ezdaroth

[Hans Ludwig 0]

Does it support multiple cores on processors? Some say it only uses one core, some give advice to set cpuCount to 2 even on quad core processors.

One core is dedicated to AI.

Does it support more than 2047mb of ram? They said 1.01 doesn't, but the game updated from that. Should it support more now, or is there any fan-made fix available?

Massive multiplayer games like this will always use a lot of ram. I have heard there is a patch for the 8 gig guys, so I know more than 2 gigs is supported.

Edited June 30, 2009 by Hans Ludwig

[REMOVED_ACCOUNT 10]

One core is dedicated to AI.

Ok, so one for everything else and one for AI, is there any way to make use of the 2 other cores?

Massive multiplayer games like this will always use a lot of ram. I have heard there is a patch for the 8 gig guys, so I know more than 2 gigs is supported.

Couldn't find the patch. I'm not an expert, but this seems like it's limited to 2gb:

"-maxmem= Limit memory allocation (in MB). 2047 is hardcoded maximum at the moment (Arma2 1.01 final, anything higher falls back to 2047)."

It's from Bohemia Interactive Wiki.

Does anyone happen to know any program that allows monitoring of cpu/gpu and ram usage in games?

[Väinämöinen 0]

Task Manager to monitor CPU cores, RAM usage and Rivatuner to monitor GPU activity and temps.

If you need CPU temp monitoring you can use CoreTemp.

[REMOVED_ACCOUNT 10]

From what I tested I can tell ARMA 2 doesn't use the available resources properly. It only uses one GPU, that means the other one is useless and I think it can't even use the 1gb of memory dedicated to that other GPU. I think that's the main performance issue. Does anyone know any fix for that?

Also, as I thought ARMA 2 only uses 2gb of memory. That might have big impact on the performance too. Any way to make use of the other 2gb?

One bright side tho, it seems to use all 4 cpu cores. Couldn't actually see how many the process uses, but while playing all the 4 cores seemed to have lots of activity.

I have launch option -cpuCount=4 set, but haven't tried if it's able to use all the cores without manually setting the amount.

If someone is interested, here's a png of all the monitors open.

http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb71/Ezmundorf/arma2info.png

Edited June 30, 2009 by Ezdaroth

[Väinämöinen 0]

To enable second GPU put this in your Arma2 shortcut: rename arma2.exe to crysis.exe

-nosplash -winxp -maxmem=2048 -cpucount=4

[REMOVED_ACCOUNT 10]

Tried with crysis64.exe, since I'm using 64-bit os and read that's what you are supposed to use. However all it does is break steam launch (couldn't find a way to alter the path to exe). It shows up as crysis64.exe in processes if I launch it via shortcut, but it doesn't use the second GPU. From what I understood, that solution only works for nvidia SLI and maby for ati crossfire, but the thing is that the gpu's aren't really connected via crossfire. They are in the same card and are just linked together.

[Väinämöinen 0]

I got 4870x2 and second gpu kicks in after renaming crysis.exe and -winxp shortcut parameter.

[REMOVED_ACCOUNT 10]

For me it doesn't. I renamed the exe to crysis, target of shortcut is now

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\arma 2 demo\crysis.exe" -winxp, -maxmem=2047,-cpuCount=4,-nosplash

However I noticed that at least the nosplash option doesn't work. Could be just that it can't be disabled on demo. But both gpu's should still work in the demo too, right?

[Nutlink 10]

To enable second GPU put this in your Arma2 shortcut: rename arma2.exe to crysis.exe

-nosplash -winxp -maxmem=2048 -cpucount=4

Actually you want to set -maxmen=2047 because anything higher automatically returns the game to it's default setting, at least according to one of the dev posts here.

[Väinämöinen 0]

For me it doesn't. I renamed the exe to crysis, target of shortcut is now

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\arma 2 demo\crysis.exe" -winxp, -maxmem=2047,-cpuCount=4,-nosplash

-winxp, -maxmem=2047,-cpuCount=4,-nosplash

"," is wrong remove all entries and it should work.

-winxp -maxmem=2047 -cpuCount=4 -nosplash

[REMOVED_ACCOUNT 10]

That's true, but I have it correctly. However it isn't really the problem here.

What I want to do is to enable to other core of my graphics card in game. Also would like to know if there's any way to make the game use more ram than 2047.

Again, I'm no expert in this, but from what I remember WOW has the same thing with memory. It's limited to 2047 and one guy claimed he could fix it with a simple statement to enable large address awareness, but the rules don't allow such modifications. Well, this is something I really know nothing about, but I'm interested if it's actually so easy to let the software use more ram and if it is, why it hasn't been done.

EDIT: Oh, that's true and now the options seem to work. Both GPU's work, yey! However just one thing. Performance got much WORSE (about half the fps). Seriously, what's this? -.-"

EDIT2: Ok, hasty words. Didn't test for long before yelling. Now this is still extremely weird: First I got it to work, I simply went to editor and spawned myself in middle of nowhere. Had horrible fps, went to menu to check if the video settings were the same and yeah, they were the same. Then I came back to post about it. I alt-tabbed back to the game and everything was flickering.

I aborted the mission and spawned myself again. Now the performance was about the same as before, I already went to the benchmark and it seems it's about exactly the same as before.

I checked rivatuner for what happened and noticed something weird:

First spikes use 100% of the GPU, that's how it's supposed to be! But the performance was terrible. When the performance got back to normal, it used about 50% of both and that's about equal to one core. Now I'd really like some BI person to answer, if they are aware of what could be causing this. Is it just that arma 2 doesn't properly support multiple gpu's?

***NOTE*** Since the main problem got solved and this is going so far off, I started another topic about the new problem: http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?p=1338788

Edited June 30, 2009 by Ezdaroth