sethos

Ah I see, you learn something new every day :) Thank you.

What's the latest in SLI Support, so much has happened since the original post. Should it work out of the box or are there still settings / options we should be aware of?

Those are excellent points but the key difference between PhysX and every other iteration of physics engine out there, proprietary or third party and PhysX is that PhysX can in fact be offloaded to a GPU with no performance hit, so I'm just asking whether BI will make that possible or are they completely disregarding CUDA and making it CPU bound for everyone. Because they seem very keen on optimization this time around and allowing Nvidia users a slight performance boost by offloading some CPU work to the GPU would be a good start. Sure we can be theoretical but PhysX calculations aren't cheap, even the basic stuff and what ArmA has currently is next to no physics, but I'd still prefer knowing I can get all the physX features for 'free', in terms of resource usage. Oh and just to be clear, I'm not advocating against the use of PhsyX whatsoever I'm just advocating for the option of Nvidia users being allowed to offload PhysX for a ( possible ) performance boost.

Already picked up an X79 Motherboard and a 3930k ( Maybe ArmA 3 will utilize 6 cores? Probably not :P ) - The 3770k performance figures and temperatures were really underwhelming, borderline a step back. So I'll wait until IB-E until my next big upgrade. But as I said, GPU overhead in my case will be huge but the VBS engine is also very reliant on CPU power. So I'm naturally concerned over anything that will tap into additional CPU cycles such as PhysX. I just remember in this or the previous thread, that the entire discussion was based off PhysX in ArmA would first be Nvidia proprietary, then concerns that CPU PhysX for AMD users would be a severe performance hog, then a mod / developer mentioned it'd be strictly CPU PhysX and everyone sighed in relief. Now I'm just curious whether it IS 'strictly CPU' or you can offload these PhysX calls to the CUDA cores with Nvidia, as the CUDA cores are there for the taking in the first place and not being used. Sure the impact would most likely be marginal ( 5FPS plus minus? ) but as a performance hungry man, 3-5FPS lost is a travesty :P However reading up on VBS2 updates, it mentioned CUDA could be used - So I'm just looking for some clarification on ArmA 3 - Strictly CPU or optional CUDA.

I have a GTX 680 4GB and on maps like Zargabad, you can look at a point where there's loads of buildings either in view or being rendered and it'll maintain 53 FPS. I can add AA, change 3D resolution ( Anything handled by the GPU ) and it'll still maintain 53 FPS. I can then overclock the CPU even further and it'll inch closer to the 60FPS. Obviously, when you have a large-scale warfare scenario with a good number of AIs, the CPU will also be a limiting factor. So it would be a shame for PhysX to eat up CPU cycles when you want to do large scale warfare that requires that extra CPU. My game is running 60FPS ( Vsync locked of course ) 95% of the time but Zargabad seems to be very CPU bound, a map I really play a lot. I currently have a second GTX 680 4GB for an upcoming build so I'll go SLI, meaning my upcoming CPU will probably be under the most pressure from here on out. So any additional CPU cycles used by PhysX will cost me FPS in the long run.¨ Also, has it been mentioned if it's possible to offload the CPU bound PhysX calculations to Nvidia's CUDA or does it need specific instructions before that will process it?

But PhysX, if CPU bound in this case could use resources that you'd otherwise use on rendering the game. Right now, with an i7 2600k I'm actually CPU limited in ArmA 2 with my settings ( On certain maps, certain situations ), as in it's using the available CPU cycles. Wouldn't any excess overhead needed for PhysX in such a situation lower the framerate to use cycles for PhysX instead? This is an honest question, I don't know. Maybe PhysX is using different threads or calls from the CPU that isn't allocated to the game itself. This obviously wasn't meant for the 'simulating everything' argument, was merely going at the core of PhysX = Lag ( Lower FPS? ) and the overhead.

The Alpha is going to be exactly like Carrier Command's Play & Contribute, wait and see.

Oh my god, based on everything I've seen so far this could possibly be the best map I've seen to date.

Are you comparing an 'Alpha' that was basically two helicopters crammed into another game with tweaked flight physics to a stand-alone game sequel alpha?

OH. MY. EFFING. GOD! I love you guys <3

It's just game downsampling. You can do that with every game, it provides a crisper look and a bit of pixel-density AA effects. It's just very, very few games that support it in-game, you mostly have to do it out of the game.

I WANT 2.6 SO BAD PLEASE GIVE IT TO ME I'LL HAVE YOUR BABIES AND DO YOUR LAUNDRY DAMMIT! ... What happened? Sorry. And excellent tracks SFG!

Hmmm, me and a friend were testing sounds tonight and everything sounded amazing except one plane, maybe it goes for all the super sonic jets. The Su-34 machinegun sound was awful - It sounded like a brief fart in the wind and then a 3-4 second burst of bullets with no sound. Any fix for it or something you can check into LJ :) ?

No problems here so far. SMAA provides better smoothing over FXAA on Ultra settings and even increases my FPS by around 5FPS compared to FXAA preset 6.

I don't like how every sound just cut out like that, no reverb, echo, no nothing and some seem to cut off very abruptly. - Besides that it all sounds promising :)

I believe it's a BIS problem, seen it as a requirement a fair few times now.

LJ, can't you have this playing in all towns?

I removed them, weapon still works fine and I got JSRS sounds.

Yeah, keep telling yourself that.

Thanks! First one is Brik2 and the second is Namalsk =D

That's how many sound sources it can play simultaneously, so with 32 it'll quickly cut out audio and might ruin the sound image. Especially sound-packs contain a lot of sound samples, even a single gunshot can contain a lot of samples. Increasing it can however have an effect on performance.

Can anyone tell me how this compares to Zeus AI, apart from the added features? Thinking movement, hearing, combat etc.

Yes, else they'd be conflicting.

Snow falls over ArmA II

I had to bring out a spare keyboard in the F5 war efforts.