ArmA2 / OA (low) performance issues

[Rapala 10]

I posted earlier in this thread saying I was gonna switch to xp because performance was better. I guess I was looking at a scene where fps is runs better cos now that I'm playing in a built up area I'm averaging 25fps which just feels crap. I have spent too many hours reloading the OS's and this game and I am now sick of it. It's going back in the cupboard where it can't annoy me anymore.

[Leopoldo 10]

I posted earlier in this thread saying I was gonna switch to xp because performance was better. I guess I was looking at a scene where fps is runs better cos now that I'm playing in a built up area I'm averaging 25fps which just feels crap. I have spent too many hours reloading the OS's and this game and I am now sick of it. It's going back in the cupboard where it can't annoy me anymore.

i have the same feeling at the moment, it seems the more you try and tweak things to help this game the worse it gets.

My last attempt to fix performance, by putting the game on my SSD ended up in a spectacular fail. Nothing else had changed just removed the game from my VRaptors and put the game on my Intel SSD.

to begin with everything was great and i replayed a portion i had played many times before but this time all hell broke loose. I had the chopper on the Razor2 mission take me to the base you are given a waypoint to talk to someone, well when i was almost there there was some loading lag/freeze and then it got continually worse before the whole thing just crapped out, i had textures loading and unloading at different times, i had shadows appear over everything then disappearing, eventualy it go do bad the game just packed up and i crash to desktop.

Now here is the kicker and something that has never happened before i had a bunch of multi-colored pixels all over my desktop. I thought maybe one of my cards had finally died but when i restarted my machine and tried crysis, COD: MW2 and other games they all ran fine, I tried ARMA 2 again but the same exact thing happened around the same area.

I really am sick of this game now, i had gotten to a point where it was playable, smooth decent FPS (but not as much as i would expcet for my machine) but i had annoying crash to desktop (well it was not really a crash, there was no error messages but arma 2 would disappear off screen, booting me to desktop but was still running in Task Manager and using resources but there would be no way for me to get the game back except to End Task and restart the game) it seems trying to alleviate this problem and increase FPS just made things a whole lot worse, i am now worried this game might actually damage my machine.

[LupoUK 10]

A suggestion for addressing several graphical problems with ARMA (especially artifacts) - worked for me when nothing else did.

In the following order:

1/Go to your arma2 profile in your 'My Documents' folder (or My Documents\ArmA 2 Other Profiles if you are using different profile) & delete 'yourname.ArmA2Profile'.

2/ Go to 'My Documents'\ArmA 2 folder & delete 'ArmA2.cfg' file. (MOST important)

3/ Go the advanced settings for whatever GPU you are using & reset your GPU to default for all settings.

4/ Fire up ARMA2 & reset ALL video settings to default THEN Disable 'Postprocess Effects'. Save settings!

5/ DO turn up the fan speed on your GPU when playing ARMA2 - experiment to find the lowest stable setting.

The above process fixes lots of graphical issues that are largely created by updating drivers/GPU's/settings in the first place!

If this fixes the problem you can then work from here changing ingame video settings one at a time until you hit your pc configs sweetspot!

If you want to improve ingame performance there are numerous suggestions out there, however the common concensus would suggest that XP32 bit is best platform and that lag is mainly due to HDD read speed rather than CPU/GPU or RAM. Solid state drives would appear to be the way forward to solve this although I will personally be waiting 'till prices drop before going this route. (probably at least a year!)

In the meantime I use XP with a seperate hardware profile for ARMA2 which disables all unnecessary services & devices thus freeing up CPU time & RAM for the game engine - if you are not comfortable creating & testing a new/safe hardware profile then there is an excellent bit of software called 'gamebooster' that will achieve nearly as good results - just make sure you don't let it disable anything to do with ALG/firewall or your anti-virus if you are playing online.

Happy if any of the above helps anyone. Apologies if I have repeated some solutions that have already been posted but felt the need to put it all in one place. I run with all video settings on normal with a viewdistance of 3km on a modest spec. only experiencing lag when I fly over the biggest cities.

Specs: XP32bit/Q6600@2.4/generic SATA hdd/3GB generic RAM/XFS 4890-1GB@870Mhz (factory overclock)/750w PSU (pc world actually - but kicks the cr@p out of the 'top brand' one I had before!)

PS; Anyone else out there think the world has gone a bit overclock stupid?

Edited February 3, 2010 by LupoUK

[Bulldogs 10]

The first thing I usually suggest to people is to try removing an overclock. Arma 2 is temperamental to it, but many other game are as well. Most commonly I have people say "that's just stupid, it's not overheating"...well, heat isn't always the issue.

After that, try everything else....

Fresh Arma 2 install, different driver versions, startup switches, and as a last resort, fresh OS install.

But if you have a system that runs fine for someone else, then don't spend more money on your system.

I have had issues with Arma 2 on rare occasions, such as computer freezing, Arma 2 CTD (but process still running in the background), Slow Texture loading, slightly slow mouse response (enough to annoy me), but all of these problems I found fixes for, and rather fast too, but I never spent money to fix them, and if you have a system good enough then don't spend money trying to fix it.

That said, if you're an extremist, then getting a new CPU, Graphics card, etc, ain't a bad thing.. heck, even SSD's are good as they don't only improve texture loading in Arma 2 (other games are starting to love SSD's now days), just keep in mind that you're dealing with relatively new tech and while I don't often hear issues with it, there's always gonna be some issue somewhere.

[Leopoldo 10]

SSD didnt really help anything for me, there is a problem with the game and how it runs with the GTX 295.

If i turn everything to the lowest settings possible, instead of getting a FPS increase i just get lower GPU utilization (which i can monitor through EVGA's eleet). Its the same with increasing GPU frequency, instead of increasing FPS it just means the GPU is not utilized as much.

Something is not playing nice or is capping performance for my config that nothing is helping.

I am going to try some old drivers see if that helps but i am not going to remove one of my GTX 295's just to play ARMA 2. The latest Nvidia drivers are junk and have been ever since 195.xx really, supposedly the 191.xx series drivers could kill hardware that had the nForce 200 chip on it, atleast for EVGA Motherboards.

Edited February 3, 2010 by Leopoldo

[Rapala 10]

This might sound crazy, but when I first tried the game on XP I was using SP2 and I'm sure performance was pretty decent. I'm now using XP SP3 and performance seems as bad as windows 7. Am I imagining things or do you think I should try one last time by installing SP2?

---------- Post added at 05:09 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:59 PM ----------

Oh and thanks Lupo and Bulldog for the suggestions, I will give those a try

[rundll.exe 12]

Hi, I guess Ill jump on the bandwaggon here. For months I have been playing this game with joy on windows XP (SP3) and fairly decent performance for a low-range rig (ATI X1950Pro 512, 1,8Ghz c2d OC to 2Ghz, 2GB ram) , but since I upgraded to windows 7 32Bit, I cant play the game anymore.

After 1 minutes of fairly decent performance my harddisk goes crazy and textures start to load verrry slow and aiming gets impossible. When I stop for a second, the hdd finished reading and it all goes well until i start to move.

So I fired up the performance monitor and see that my RAM is indeed fully used, so I guess its swapping stuff to the hdd.

Does win 7 use that much more ram for the OS, so Arma has too less to work with? Or is there something seriously wrong with the RAM management or the windows 7 drivers?

Note: I had a dual boot XP/7 beta for a while and the difference was obvious. but I really dont want to install XP again (and thus 7 also) only for one game...

Any ideas what can be wrong? or is win7 that hungry.

[Bulldogs 10]

Windows 7 is less hungry than vista, but more than XP.

No offense with your system but it doesn't have that much going for it with a game like Arma 2, especially with the lack of resources, so I'm amazed you even had good performance with xp, but your system is sitting near minimum requirement so with the extra load from windows 7 I don't think there's that much you can do.

Leo, I'd suggest trying different drivers, and I'm not sure if nvidia has it but amd/ati has a list of best drivers to use for each type of card.

One other thing, if I recall correctly, Evga released a patch a while back that was meant to help with the 295 and sli performance with arma 2, and if you're not already I'd suggest using -winxp switch (not sure if it's still helpful but it used to help with sli performance)

[rundll.exe 12]

I agree that my system is outdated... But isnt it strange that the game goes from fine performance to plain unplayable?

I forgot to mwntion that setting all settings to lowest doesn't help much, the hdd still goes crazy, but it takes longer before it does that.

[kklownboy 43]

I agree that my system is outdated... But isnt it strange that the game goes from fine performance to plain unplayable?

I forgot to mention that setting all settings to lowest doesn't help much, the hdd still goes crazy, but it takes longer before it does that.

Defrag your HDD and get two more GB of RAM, turnoff some stuff your not using...

Are you using a CRT? or do you have a new LCD?

[Jaypricemann 10]

I concur with you guys. I'm having a lot of trouble, too.

I'm running an E8400, stock, because I bought a shit Intel board which doesn't support overclocking. I'm running four gigabytes of RAM. The real kicker is that I have the superclocked GTX285 (1GB, not 2GB) and I'm still running it mediocre at best. Is it possible that because I have dual monitors, the chip won't direct all its resources to my ArmA II monitor? Also, what about defrag/etc. that would speed up the fetching of resources from the HDD?

[ericd 10]

i can t believe what we have to do for this game to works ,this is the bohemia interactive problem ,when i see how many players have problems its scared me a lot !! WHAT ARE You doing bohemia ?????? WAKE UP !!!1-2 - 3 -4 - 5 - patchs now and always problems with your game, how many patchs to find the way to make it works on all pc !!! :mad::mad:

don t you see all the people that have problems :mad:

how can your game not working on big pc that i see in this forum?? this is amazing ,and can t believe it

shame on you

Edited February 6, 2010 by ericd

[rundll.exe 12]

Defrag your HDD and get two more GB of RAM, turnoff some stuff your not using...

Are you using a CRT? or do you have a new LCD?

I think win 7 has a weekly defrag set, Ill have to check it when I get home, but Im sure thats not the problem.

Adding RAM seems the best option now, but I have to find the same type for dual channel mode I guess.

And im using a 19" LCD, but what does it have to do with performance?

[kklownboy 43]

I think win 7 has a weekly defrag set, Ill have to check it when I get home, but Im sure thats not the problem.

For Streaming, a fragmented HDD may give you slow loads/ popping trees ect, and stutter.Which shows a lower overall fps. I would get a free better than windows Defrag App, and use it when you install anything.

Adding RAM seems the best option now, but I have to find the same type for dual channel mode I guess.

shouldnt be a issue to get similar Cas and speed.

And im using a 19" LCD, but what does it have to do with performance?

That question is for Refresh rate, and Display size/resolution. But on the refreshrate at 60hz with Vsync on can really tank your fps to sub 20s, along with a stuttery HDD its unplayable. I prefer Vsync on but if your borderline what ever gets in the 30s

[Leopoldo 10]

This game is very strange, it plays better on lower end rigs than it does on high-end

for those saying you need more memory, faster hard drives i say you need a faster hard drive, i dont agree unless that person is running 1x2GB of DDR1 333 with an IDE drive.

My "spare parts" rig specs

Intel Q9450 2.66Ghz @ 2.66GHz

ASUS Maximus Extreme X38 Motherboard

2x2GB DDR3 1066 8-8-8-24 (thats some slow memory right there)

1x GTX 285 1GB @ stock clocks

Maxtor DiamondMax 10 hard drive (really slow HD even though its SATAII and not only do i run the game from this hard drive i also run the OS on it and my pagefile).

19" Monitor (1400x900)

I have the view setting jsut about maxed out and everything on Very high except AA, Post Processing, Anisotropic Filtering and Terrian detial? (the one that gets set to nromal with a high view distance).

i get around 30-40 FPS, no stuttering (aslong as you keep your HD defragged and add it to the exclusions list for your Anti-Virus so its not scanned/monitored during play you dont need to get yourself an SSD or set up an 8GB RAMDisk just to play this game).

Yet on my main rig i get around 15-25fps with the same settings and it seems to crash more, i have reinstalled many times, i use Windows 7 64 but so does my spare parts rig (i dont install carefully on that rig either). So it seems the lower specced rig that i dotn take as much care of when it comes to install etc will play better than a high-end rig that i have reinstalled about 30 times (i have reinstalled the OS twice).

Quad SLI may be an issue, the game doesnt seem to crash as much if i use a single card. Also i have noticed that performance is pretty much capped in this game and its got nothing to do with CPU speed or Hard Drive, 3.30Ghz gives the same performance as 3.70Ghz/4.0Ghz and if a Maxtor DiamondMax drive can allow this game to play smoothly anything can. If i lowe setting (quality/detial/resolution) instead of a FPS increase i basically get a lower utilization of my GPU's (which i can monitor with EVGA Eleet) so no matter what changes i make i get the same FPS due to the GPU utilization.

I am going to try turning off Hyper-Threading and see how that goes but if that doenst stop the game from crashing (textures go all white then he game slows down before it finally freezes, this usually happens if i zoom in whilst using the UAV or looking at a far away village through my binoculars or it can happen randomly, usually in a helicopter where again you can see more of the area around you) then i am probably just going to shelve the game, i have put too much time and effort into troubleshooting this game and in general nothing really makes any difference. Its either a game code issue, a problem with Nvidia Drivers (GTX 295/Quad SLI), the Operating System or a combination of some or all of those but thats down to BI to get sorted, they made the game, most other games play perfectly so they need to ind out whats causing these issue and if its to do with Nvidia drivers and/or the OS they need to start talking with Nvidia and Microsoft.

I kind of knew what i was getting into with this game, infact due to the reviews i read i wasnt going to buy it (they pretty much stated the game was full of bugs and the performance was poor) but when i saw it reduced by about 75%, i got it for round £8.00, i thought i couldnt lose really. I like the gameplay/style but the execution of the game is poor.

Edited February 9, 2010 by Leopoldo

[kklownboy 43]

In all my CPU test with ATI hardware/drivers, OC to 3.8 or higher is big fps boost. My i7 965 @3.2 to 4.2 is 15fps...And my Quadfire is getting utilized. All the extra 4870x2 does is allow me to use a higher resolution with more filters. I always push my settings to only give best IQ(max settings good VD) and smooth game play, and for this game with Vsync on, ~35fps is fine in the worst offending areas(electovdsk, some huge tree areas). The game runs best with fraps off.

[Hker 10]

My fps low issue will happen while playing with hug of AI

So I think it was AI or MISSIONS code had low performance issue

not the 3D performance

i had 40 fps in the editor

But while start playing some missions or mp I only got 20fps half and lower, even tuning some low the 3D setting or lower the resolution, it isnt boost fps.

sorry for my eng

[EDcase 87]

Obviously on empty Utes your graphics card will be pumping out frames as fast as it can so the GPU would be the bottleneck.

When there are lots of AI the CPU will be working much harder and will slow down the GPU rendering so having a top end or SLI rig with slow CPU would not give much benefit.

SO in conclusion ARMA needs a good balance between CPU and GPU.

[goaz 11]

Hi all,

After several years i bought a new computer with a new brand hardware in it and to be more precisely an i5 quadcore, 2 x 5850 ati assembled in a crossfire x system, a raid0 of 2 wd re3 hardrives , 4 gigs corsair ram cl8 ,a good corsair psu 650w and a full hd monitor 1920x1080 etc etc

I bought my arma2 dvd installed it, set all the configurations to very high,resoluition at 19201080 and thought to play a smooth game....but it really sucks...!!!After a few mins of gameplay the graphs starts flickering and flashing as if i were at a RAve party with all the strobos and flashes going on and off continusoyl..

I have the last ati catalyst 10.1 instlalled, on a win7 64bit O.S...

Your advises would be higlhy appreciated as i'd love to play this game without problems..

Do you think that basis on my above mentioned specs can i play the game at the maximum configuration?' How many fps am i supposed to get from my sistem?

Thank you very much guys, i am waiting for your precious advises!

[hotel 10]

Put -winxp in your arma 2 shortcut.

Right click the arma 2 shortcut go to Properties

Click Shortcut Tab

at the end of this line ""C:\Program Files\Bohemia Interactive\ArmA 2\arma2.exe"" Put -winxp and apply it

[kklownboy 43]

...!

Set your VideoMemory to Default, i would advise against using -winxp,, Also VH on all settings is abit too much for your cards.

[=kct=blackmamba 44]

Hi all,

After several years i bought a new computer with a new brand hardware in it and to be more precisely an i5 quadcore, 2 x 5850 ati assembled in a crossfire x system, a raid0 of 2 wd re3 hardrives , 4 gigs corsair ram cl8 ,a good corsair psu 650w and a full hd monitor 1920x1080 etc etc

I bought my arma2 dvd installed it, set all the configurations to very high,resoluition at 19201080 and thought to play a smooth game....but it really sucks...!!!After a few mins of gameplay the graphs starts flickering and flashing as if i were at a RAve party with all the strobos and flashes going on and off continusoyl..

I have the last ati catalyst 10.1 instlalled, on a win7 64bit O.S...

Your advises would be higlhy appreciated as i'd love to play this game without problems..

Do you think that basis on my above mentioned specs can i play the game at the maximum configuration?' How many fps am i supposed to get from my sistem?

Thank you very much guys, i am waiting for your precious advises!

i think u should get a more powerfull PSU 650 for a crossfire system is not enough, ati would recommend atleast 750 watt if not 1000 watt to be safe...

[kklownboy 43]

i think u should get a more powerfull PSU 650 for a crossfire system is not enough, ati would recommend atleast 750 watt if not 1000 watt to be safe...

Actually his 650 is fine, the 5850s are less power usage than 4870s..., its not giving him lower fps or creating the CF strobe. But it really depends on the Amps, the 650w is more than enough.

[Bulldogs 10]

......

Install the 1.05 patch and disable Hyperthreading in BIOS.

[goaz 11]

Install the 1.05 patch and disable Hyperthreading in BIOS.

the patch is already installed, and HT is not for the i5 cpu but for the i7:)

And what the additional code -xp in the shortcust is supposed to do?Additional benefits of what?