Pappy60 10 Posted October 17, 2009 (edited) First off I love this game, but BIS really has something wrong with their code.... I had a GTS250 card and was not very happy with it, had to run everything on low settings, tried every trick I could find to stop the stuttering and short range painting (bushes and trees changing from pixel blocks to detail as you fly up on them) I do a lot of low level helo flying and objects seem to get painted in detail as I approach them at roughly 100m, very annoying when flying fast and low, secondly I was getting stuttering every few seconds or whenever I fly over a town (FPS drops dramatically over towns). So I am thinking that the issues are because Arma 2 is just too intense for a GTS 250 GPU, so yesterday I bought an ATI 5870, the worlds fastest video card...still running settings on low or disabled and still getting stuttering, it is better but still there..... I don't have a weak machine and it is dedicated, the only game installed is ARMA II and Ventrilo, no other software. I did also down grade it to XP SP3 ASUS Intel Core 2 Quad 2.5 GHz 8gb DDR II Ram SATA 750gb ATI 5870 1GB Distance at 1600 (I can't go less and still fly effectively) AA off Shadowing off or normal (hate the off setting) all settings on low or normal 1600 x 1050 in both res and rend (lower than the native 1920 x 1280) Video mem set to very high (tried every setting and hard coding) I guess the next step is to create a ram drive and try loading Arma into a ram drive...However it pisses me off that I have to go to this extreme to get this game to play smoothly ...... C'mon BIS, fix this, it should not take a Cray Super Computer to play this game smoothly..... Anybody got some good settings for an ATI 5870 ? I am getting pretty good FPS, up to 60 in the country and down to the low 20's over towns...but I do get stuttering over towns and over detailed terrain...I am thinking it is due to hard drive access, hence the ram drive but I am certainly open to suggestions.... Stuttering resolved using a ramdrive for the more intense files....Thanks to LiquidPinky for the instructions ! See this post for instructions: http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?p=1467342#post1467342 Edited October 19, 2009 by Pappy60 Resolved Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
.kju 3245 Posted October 17, 2009 Read this post and you will understand: Here's how I got ARMA2 to perform smoothly (high fps, no stutter, no LOD trashing). In short, return your GPU and get yourself a 8 GB ram drive. Even a SSD might be help you more for a2. Understand the bottleneck of your system for the game and you will see improvements. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pappy60 10 Posted October 17, 2009 That is an excellent post, those guys are doing tremendous work on solving the painting and stuttering issue! I had heard about using a ram drive to solve the issues but was at a loss where to start, now there is a guide so I will be trying that today and posting my results....... ---------- Post added at 10:24 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:21 AM ---------- But I'm not returning the GPU...when I opened the box I could hear the angels sing and there was a glowing aura around it ....there is no way I can return this.....I just need to fix the bottlenecks that are preventing it from taking me to gaming nirvana ..... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
thales100 10 Posted October 17, 2009 when I opened the box I could hear the angels sing and there was a glowing aura around it ....there is no way I can return this..... lol :p, so keep the 5870 (excellent GPU anyaway) and try that RAM stuff, and please post some results. :) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TimRiceSE 10 Posted October 17, 2009 SSD will also give good results in regards to reducing/eliminating stuttering, though not close to a RAM drive... but a SSD will be cheaper and a lot more capacity. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pappy60 10 Posted October 17, 2009 Well sad to report ramdrive is an issue for me.....I have 8gb available, so I followed instructions from the post above to setup a ramdrive loading only the important Arma files because I don't have enough ram to load the entire addon folder... Here is the issue, you cannot hardlink files from the ramdrive to the addons folder on the C drive in XP, XP does not support hardlinking across different volumes. So now I am looking at purchasing more ram so I can load all of Arma 2 from the ramdrive but that means replacing all of my ram as I currently have 4 slots with 2gb each...and would need to replace them with 4gb chips...at a cost of about $800.......... The remaining option is to load Vista (please kill me first) which while is a terrible OS, does support symblic linking across volumes.....obviuosly Vista is way cheaper than new ram..... I am also going to try putting the paging file in the ram drive ....maybe some software disk caching there too.... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TimRiceSE 10 Posted October 17, 2009 (edited) Windows 7? Tbh, unless you literally have money to burn, a RAMDisk solution to this just isnt worth it... Edit: but wait... http://www.rekenwonder.com/linkmagic.htm http://schinagl.priv.at/nt/hardlinkshellext/hardlinkshellext.html check here for symlinks in xp... Edited October 17, 2009 by TimRiceSE Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
.kju 3245 Posted October 17, 2009 At least junctions work on XP32b across different drives. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
shataan 1 Posted October 17, 2009 I have ARMA 2 running sweetly maxed out @ 1680x1050x32. But imho the bottlenecks are in the bug fixes, and engine optimizations we are still waiting for. Flashpoint ran like azz for quite awhile after release, but eventually the patches came. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kklownboy 43 Posted October 17, 2009 try the beta 59210, and add this to your arma.cfg; GPU_DetectedFramesAhead=""; GPU_MaxFramesAhead=""; then set youe MaxFrames to 1 or 2. I found 1 to be great. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Alex72 1 Posted October 17, 2009 (edited) try the beta 59210, and add this to your arma.cfg;GPU_DetectedFramesAhead=""; GPU_MaxFramesAhead=""; What he said^^ And also test with "0" in both. Thats what i do and its super. My system isnt near yours though and it might be good for me only. But you got something to play with. Game is working nice on my PC except for some of those damn trees. Running specs (in sig spoiler) at 1280x1024, most to NORMAL except AA=HIGH, PPeffects=LOW. All looks good enough and runs good. Its playable with not too much stutter. With your system it SHOULD run to your satisfaction. Maybe not everything at VHIGH and millionXmillion screen res, but... you know. EDIT: Oh and after installing the beta you need 2 restarts of the game. For the quoted values above to appear into the CFG file. Just start the game, make some settings in-game and then exit. Head over to the ARMA.CFG and now you should have those 2 lines in there. Change and start the game again. Alex Edited October 17, 2009 by Alex72 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pappy60 10 Posted October 17, 2009 Windows 7? Tbh, unless you literally have money to burn, a RAMDisk solution to this just isnt worth it...Edit: but wait... http://www.rekenwonder.com/linkmagic.htm http://schinagl.priv.at/nt/hardlinkshellext/hardlinkshellext.html check here for symlinks in xp... Yes Junctions will work in XP but a junction would require an entire addons folder in the ramdrive and with 8gb of ram there would be not be enough ram left to run the system. Link Shell Extensions is limited to the same volume under XP ...thanks for the info but neither of these will solve the issue for me. ---------- Post added at 07:40 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:38 PM ---------- try the beta 59210, and add this to your arma.cfg;GPU_DetectedFramesAhead=""; GPU_MaxFramesAhead=""; then set youe MaxFrames to 1 or 2. I found 1 to be great. I would try this but I do a lot of clan play / MP with this beta would I have a mismatch and not be able to play on 1.04 MP games? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
.kju 3245 Posted October 17, 2009 Pappy60 just move some BI addons to a separate modfolder and make a junction to it. I can cross link junctions in XP32b between different drives. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
yanquis 10 Posted October 17, 2009 you can try the method linked in my sig as well, it takes 10 mins to set up. its really not complicated at all as liquidpinky already did all the legwork. ---------- Post added at 08:45 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:44 PM ---------- btw to the OP, do you neverthless notice a substantial difference with the 5870? im still aiming to get one ASAP. some other guy said arma 2 ran like silk after he upgraded... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pappy60 10 Posted October 17, 2009 you can try the method linked in my sig as well, it takes 10 mins to set up. its really not complicated at all as liquidpinky already did all the legwork.---------- Post added at 08:45 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:44 PM ---------- btw to the OP, do you neverthless notice a substantial difference with the 5870? im still aiming to get one ASAP. some other guy said arma 2 ran like silk after he upgraded... Yes that method will work with Vista, not XP.... ---------- Post added at 08:48 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:46 PM ---------- Pappy60 just move some BI addons to a separate modfolder and make a junction to it.I can cross link junctions in XP32b between different drives. I will try this..might work... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
yanquis 10 Posted October 17, 2009 I do a lot of low level helo flying and objects seem to get painted in detail as I approach them at roughly 100m, very annoying when flying fast and low, well shit. i havent tested extensively but this seemed to still happening to me even though the textures load up within about a second (in chernagosk or whatever i would have to spin around 5 times upon loading and wait about 15 seconds before i felt like i could move or get bearings). when flying a chopper i noticed that while the trees might be there they didnt fully render until i got very close, which is distracting & ugly. i assumed that was because i didnt have the power of the 5870. really sucks if thats not the case. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pappy60 10 Posted October 17, 2009 Pappy60 just move some BI addons to a separate modfolder and make a junction to it.I can cross link junctions in XP32b between different drives. okay tried this and it did function...loads up a bit faster but still get stuttering when flying over towns....no joy...... so this is telling me I have a bottleneck that is not the hd ...not good...either a cpu or bus bottleneck...... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Dogtags 0 Posted October 17, 2009 Guys all you need is an average or just above average system. See my signature for my system specs and I only have 2GB RAM and run all settings high to very high at 1680x1050 on my 22 inch display and the game runs very smoothe for me. Now there was a time for about 5 weeks where I had all the issues you are all talking about until I did one simple thing. I bought a 1TB hard drive, installed windows 7, installed ARMA2 with patches and all performace issues went away totally. Now the game is fun and the issues have not returned in over 2 months. I recommend you guys start thinking down this line. An unpolluted windows 7 on a fresh HD (whatever size) does magic. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Sniperdoc 0 Posted October 18, 2009 First off I love this game, but BIS really has something wrong with their code.... [...]Anybody got some good settings for an ATI 5870 ? I am getting pretty good FPS, up to 60 in the country and down to the low 20's over towns...but I do get stuttering over towns and over detailed terrain...I am thinking it is due to hard drive access, hence the ram drive but I am certainly open to suggestions.... I would suggest you up your CPU speed. That 2.5 is probably severely limiting your GPU. Not that it's going to matter much since even a 4GHz CPU can't make this game shine (http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=88585). This game has severe texture loading issues and still has LOD problems that have persisted since Arma 1. Can't believe people still defend it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Defunkt 431 Posted October 18, 2009 Can't believe people still defend it. Can't believe you don't just go away and play that other much better game. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
-=JackHorner=- 10 Posted October 18, 2009 First off I love this game, but BIS really has something wrong with their code....I had a GTS250 card and was not very happy with it, had to run everything on low settings, tried every trick I could find to stop the stuttering and short range painting (bushes and trees changing from pixel blocks to detail as you fly up on them) I do a lot of low level helo flying and objects seem to get painted in detail as I approach them at roughly 100m, very annoying when flying fast and low, secondly I was getting stuttering every few seconds or whenever I fly over a town (FPS drops dramatically over towns). So I am thinking that the issues are because Arma 2 is just too intense for a GTS 250 GPU, so yesterday I bought an ATI 5870, the worlds fastest video card...still running settings on low or disabled and still getting stuttering, it is better but still there..... I don't have a weak machine and it is dedicated, the only game installed is ARMA II and Ventrilo, no other software. I did also down grade it to XP SP3 ASUS Intel Core 2 Quad 2.5 GHz 8gb DDR II Ram SATA 750gb ATI 5870 1GB Distance at 1600 (I can't go less and still fly effectively) AA off Shadowing off or normal (hate the off setting) all settings on low or normal 1600 x 1050 in both res and rend (lower than the native 1920 x 1280) Video mem set to very high (tried every setting and hard coding) I guess the next step is to create a ram drive and try loading Arma into a ram drive...However it pisses me off that I have to go to this extreme to get this game to play smoothly ...... C'mon BIS, fix this, it should not take a Cray Super Computer to play this game smoothly..... Anybody got some good settings for an ATI 5870 ? I am getting pretty good FPS, up to 60 in the country and down to the low 20's over towns...but I do get stuttering over towns and over detailed terrain...I am thinking it is due to hard drive access, hence the ram drive but I am certainly open to suggestions.... The number one thing that will stop your game from stuttering is this.... an SSD hard drive. I have one and my game never stutters. Ever. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pappy60 10 Posted October 18, 2009 The number one thing that will stop your game from stuttering is this.... an SSD hard drive. I have one and my game never stutters. Ever. A ram drive is far faster than ssd and if a ram drive still produces stuttering then ssd is not going to help... The reality is that I am in denial and the game is flawed, with my specs I should be able to run in normal settings and get a relatively smooth game and it is simply not possible. At this point I need to give up and simply play the game as is until BIS provides an update that resolves the issues. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Horus 83 Posted October 18, 2009 First off I love this game, but BIS really has something wrong with their code....I had a GTS250 card and was not very happy with it, had to run everything on low settings, tried every trick I could find to stop the stuttering and short range painting (bushes and trees changing from pixel blocks to detail as you fly up on them) I do a lot of low level helo flying and objects seem to get painted in detail as I approach them at roughly 100m, very annoying when flying fast and low, secondly I was getting stuttering every few seconds or whenever I fly over a town (FPS drops dramatically over towns). So I am thinking that the issues are because Arma 2 is just too intense for a GTS 250 GPU, so yesterday I bought an ATI 5870, the worlds fastest video card...still running settings on low or disabled and still getting stuttering, it is better but still there..... I don't have a weak machine and it is dedicated, the only game installed is ARMA II and Ventrilo, no other software. I did also down grade it to XP SP3 ASUS Intel Core 2 Quad 2.5 GHz 8gb DDR II Ram SATA 750gb ATI 5870 1GB Distance at 1600 (I can't go less and still fly effectively) AA off Shadowing off or normal (hate the off setting) all settings on low or normal 1600 x 1050 in both res and rend (lower than the native 1920 x 1280) Video mem set to very high (tried every setting and hard coding) I guess the next step is to create a ram drive and try loading Arma into a ram drive...However it pisses me off that I have to go to this extreme to get this game to play smoothly ...... C'mon BIS, fix this, it should not take a Cray Super Computer to play this game smoothly..... Anybody got some good settings for an ATI 5870 ? I am getting pretty good FPS, up to 60 in the country and down to the low 20's over towns...but I do get stuttering over towns and over detailed terrain...I am thinking it is due to hard drive access, hence the ram drive but I am certainly open to suggestions.... 1) The first problem is that you don't have drivers for XP. You must go with Vista or Win 7. 2) Your CPU on that speed is bottleneck for that card. OC to 3GHz or more. 3) Distance at 1600 (I can't go less and still fly effectively) --> OK AA off --> x2 Shadowing off or normal (hate the off setting) --> Very High all settings on low or normal --> Very High 1600 x 1050 in both res and rend (lower than the native 1920 x 1280) --> use your native res Video mem set to very high (tried every setting and hard coding) --> Default Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
yanquis 10 Posted October 18, 2009 i noticed yesterday that arma 2 never uses more than 50% cpu on my quad. so someone with a 2.5 ghz quad like the OP is getting hosed by the game, basically. obviously a 2.4x4cpu system should be faster than a 3.2.x2. sadly this is not the case because arma 2 will not take advantage of all cores. if you have more than one core, all the game will care about is clockspeed, not # of cores. this is a real shame, as lots of people are in the boat of the OP, with a quad but lower clockspeed. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pappy60 10 Posted October 19, 2009 Stuttering resolved using a ramdrive for the more intense files....Thanks to LiquidPinky for the instructions ! See this post for instructions: http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?p=1467342#post1467342 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
