Low GPU-load in game (one single-chipped videocard)

[Ish 11]

My point was I got only a 10 fps difference at best switching from 8800 to 5870. That said, i still had 60fps when nothing was going on with the 8800, mind you it was with the exactly same computer as i have in my specs, only GPU differed.

[moondawg 12]

You all appear to be largely ignoring what I believe is the most likely bottleneck; your CPU. Nobody has said anything more than "CPU is nowhere near 100%". If you read Suma's article that should be anticipated, ArmA is still largely dependent on a single core running the game's primary thread and rendering - this is to save on the overhead involved in transferring large amounts of data between threads. If you have a multi-core processor the utilisation of each core is highly relevant to this discussion, I think it likely you'll find that your QUAD at 33% has one core going hard out and a few secondary threads taking up not much around the others. If that is the case it is likely your GPU is under-utilised because you are CPU bound.

Actually, I can see all my four cores individually as I play, and they are usually equally around 40-70% So no 1 core struggling as the others hang around.

This leads me to believe the bottleneck is somewhere else. And as people are stating over and over again, that is most likely the HD.

[kklownboy 43]

Get 24Gb RAM and put the entire game on a RAM drive, should solve that problem :rolleyes:

My only real advice is too turn of the AA.. Everything else I can run on very high no problem, but the AA eats the FPS. And I have a proper gaming computer that is like 3 months old.

I doubt sporting a faster harddrive is gonna help the AA performance.

Well that the reason to own a 5870, its to use AA...or run it at 200% I cant stand jaggies or crawlling... which can happen even at 200% but it gone at 4X(normal) AA, Get another 5870 and then you will see the big differences for GPUs But a 4.0+ i7 will show alot of performance in this game, and it will push the GPU(s) all that much better.

Using two 4870x2s @ 4XAA all the time. 4870X2=5870 basically~

---------- Post added at 04:05 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:55 PM ----------

Actually, I can see all my four cores individually as I play, and they are usually equally around 40-70% So no 1 core struggling as the others hang around.

This leads me to believe the bottleneck is somewhere else. And as people are stating over and over again, that is most likely the HD.

with my setup on multigpu i have, i7; 89% 85% 59% 69% with many 92% on 1,2 and a few 47%, on 3,4. So different platforms different workloads...I use a crappy Gskill SSD (Jmicon), but it is faster than my 10000WD drives. If you had another 4890 you would reap the benefits of multicore on your platform for this game.Its in the drivers...

[Ish 11]

Well that the reason to own a 5870, its to use AA...or run it at 200% I cant stand jaggies or crawlling... which can happen even at 200% but it gone at 4X(normal) AA, Get another 5870 and then you will see the big differences for GPUs But a 4.0+ i7 will show alot of performance in this game, and it will push the GPU(s) all that much better.

Using two 4870x2s @ 4XAA all the time. 4870X2=5870 basically~

Well unfortunately ATI AA is shit. I think it's more ATI related than AA in general, because everything else i can set to very high and still get 60 fps.

I can run with high AA, but it doesn't feel as smooth.. And you can forget it during large scale op's.. :rolleyes:

<edit> You can't honestly believe that I can run 1920x1200@200% ? Man last time i tried it loaded the textures for 5 mines, then i got bored and closed the game via task manager. 150% is doable, but still pretty useless as i'll still have the edges. Also.. It's the flickering of textures that i want gone.

Edited December 4, 2009 by Ish

[jumpinghubert 49]

i got lot of performance increase in Arma2 overclocking my GTX280 on condition that AA on mid and AF @16x. Large scale ai combat limits performance to 25-30 fps independent on graphic settings. I think its the engine.

1680x1050@200% my textures loading fast but my performance is poor (10-18fps)

[McArcher 0]

Here are some evidence of my "investigation" :D

SETTINGS:level of detail=25 (default in Warfare BE), 4000m VD, 1680x1050 (100%), middle settings, high AA, very high AF, shadows&postprocessing=off; Playing in internet

HARDWARE: AMD Phenom II X3@3.50 GHz, Radeon HD4890@900/4400, 4GB DDRII800

SOFTWARE: WinXP_SP3_32bit (only 3.25GB RAM visible), Catalyst 9.11, latest BIOS for MB, latest patches for soundcard, MB, DirectX, and so on...

SCREENSHOT:

[Defunkt 431]

What framerates were you getting? As a matter of interest, have you disabled vsync?

[McArcher 0]

What framerates were you getting? As a matter of interest, have you disabled vsync?

i didnt measure fps that time, but i think it was as usual, about 30 fps (+-). vsync in driver is default on, if application doesn't decide to switch it off. (with vsync off, it is not comfortable to make fast movements, the picture is worse)

[jumpinghubert 49]

vsynch enabled..........:j: You have to disable vsynch if you want high gpu-load.......pfffff++

Edited December 5, 2009 by JumpingHubert

[jasonnoguchi 11]

^... vsync reduces GPU load????

[jumpinghubert 49]

^... vsync reduces GPU load????

yes. Unsurprising...

Edited December 5, 2009 by JumpingHubert

[jasonnoguchi 11]

I always thought additional functions should result in additional load.

[dogz 10]

@McArcher

Testing while online is not good logic you need to test SP then go online

what memory use does GPU-Z show it is not on your SS

It should be using nearly all of the cards mem as per your config file

also something is not right with your cpu usage

My setup uses all of my cards mem and the card gets very hot with fan at 100% speed

all four of my cpu cores run at around 80% with page file usage at close to 2Gig

game runs butter smooth on my setup with 803

Edited December 5, 2009 by dogz

[jumpinghubert 49]

@dogz

he enabled vsynch. The logical result is low gpu-load and low cpu-load. ...

Edited December 5, 2009 by JumpingHubert

[jasonnoguchi 11]

@dogz, did you have vsync off? noticed any problems with the graphics everything high with vsync off?

[dogz 10]

I have triple buffering on and Vsync forced on, Pre render 3 in Nvidia CP I dont run Post Proc

There does seem to be quite a difference in the way Nvidia and ATI work with this game... some on here say you must not run any AA with ATI.

I have never run fraps as I am only looking for smooth play as this is not a twitch type shooter.

803 actually shows quite a drop in Arma2mark but is way smoother than ever before

@ Hubert... you may be right but I am not convinced that is the issue, I would guess he has not gone enough tweaking, it took me a lot of testing to find the settings that work on my setup.

Edited December 5, 2009 by dogz

[jumpinghubert 49]

@dogz

why its so difficult to check the correlation between low gpu-load and v-synch on? You only need

a) a few minutes

b) a working computer

c) a game

d) gpu-z to log.

P.S. The thread title is "low gpu-load in game". Not: "how can i get smoother gameplay or higher performance".

Edited December 5, 2009 by JumpingHubert

[dogz 10]

Hubert you are missing the point I agreed with you...??? note I said "you may be right"...???

of course it take more horspower to run at higher fps with same screen...

But I think some ppl get the low gpu load and fps confused

High fps in this game is not always the answer and not the only thing that leads to increased gpu load.

But then I have the game running well with high gpu load and vsync forced on...so I guess I dont need to worry about tearing and such with a high fps and no vsync

edit on my rig it looks shite with no vsync ... lots of tearing

Edited December 5, 2009 by dogz

[jumpinghubert 49]

..but I am not convinced that is the issue..

My reply relates to this part of your posting. Its not a question of conviction. vsynch on is the most important factor for low gpu-load. That was the question of Archer in this thread. Thats all what I said. The only solution of his problem is to disable vsynch. In one point you are right: vsynch on eleminates tearing.

on my system:

vsynch on: 40% gpu-load

vsynch off: 99% gpu-load.

gnight & peace :)

[dogz 10]

Hubert I cant argue with your gpu load tests, but If I had 99% load vsync off and 40% on, I would turn it on reduce the load due to high fps and turn up all the other resolution/image related settings.

This would give me a much better image and still acceptable frame rates with the gpu load working for quality and not unused high frame rate.

[Ish 11]

I run the game with everything at highest @1920x1200, except I use 100% fillrate, and no Post Processing. The only thing that really messes with my FPS is AA and fillrate, but I can't stand edges etc, so AA was left on..

My tips (for ATI).

This is not to maximize FPS, but to make it look good, but still run good as well.

Turn your Mipmap to highest quality, and everything else to lowest, and put box as filter for the AA.

Max everything except PP and fillrate (3D res).

Gradually reduce AA until acceptable, if at all needed.

[McArcher 0]

VSync OFF hasn't helped...

I'm shocked with the result. It seems that no matter how you lower you game settings, it will show constant fps, just lowering GPU-load!......

:confused::confused::confused:

---------- Post added at 01:44 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:22 AM ----------

I thought, VSync in positon "off, unless app. switches it on" somehow swithced it on in Arma2, but even with VSync totally OFF,

I have 35-37% GPU-Load in Warfare BE. All settings in the picture:

[jumpinghubert 49]

@Archer

pls test it with vsynch off and without or with few AI. I bet you get high gpu-load near 100%. Warefare is very ai intense.

I tested it in warefare (singleplayermission number 6). I get 50% gpu-load in Warefaremission too.

The background is the following:

-lots of ai reduces cpu-load

-low cpu-load reduces gpu-load

-vsync on reduces gpu-load.

@dogz

I know what you mean. But in Arma2 i have regulary less than 60 fps (i play with most on veryhigh settings) so i have more stuttering when enabling vsynch. In IL2-Sturmovic for example I play vsynch activated with constant 60fps (for smooth gameplay you need more than 60fps if you are enabling vsynch).

[jumpinghubert 49]

@Archer

pls test it with vsynch off and without or with few AI. I bet you get high gpu-load near 100%. Warefare is very ai intense.

I tested it in warefare (singleplayermission number 6). I get 50% gpu-load in Warefaremission too.

The background is the following:

-lots of ai reduces cpu-load

-low cpu-load reduces gpu-load

-vsync on reduces gpu-load.

@dogz

I know what you mean. But in Arma2 i have regulary less than 60 fps (i play with most on veryhigh settings) so i have more stuttering when enabling vsynch. In IL2-Sturmovic for example I play vsynch activated with constant 60fps (for smooth gameplay you need more than 60fps if you are enabling vsynch).

edit:

@Archer

started a new thread? lol