I've been running a series of frame rate tests on the Test Server for the past two weeks with the assistance of the Guide Team in order to pinpoint and profile rendering performance issues and check out various potential optimizations.
Currently the Test Server is running a non-optimized baseline build with options to turn the rendering of various items on and off. I am using this build to gauge improvements in future tests and to determine with items most affect specific machines.
If you wish to participate in these tests, please follow these instructions:
1) Set the following settings:
- Windowed Mode On
- Antialiasing Off
- Texture Detail High
- Texture Filter Bilinear
- HDR Rendering On
- Transparency On
- Interaction On
- Reflection On
- Refraction On
- Rain Refraction On
- Soft Shadows Off
- Advanced Shadows Off
- Shadow Detail Very High (doesn’t matter really as shadows are all off)
- Player Shadows - Terrain Shadows all Off
- Depth of Field On
- Bloom On
- Building Mode Off
2) Choose and record your specific location.
3) Face North, East, South, West and record your frame rate in each direction.
- Zoom out as far as possible
- Keep your view angle at 0.50. Your view angle currently shows below the frame rate display in the upper left side of your screen.
- Record your frame rate with your mouse over the sky or ground (make sure no object or building part is selected). You can also drag your mouse cursor entirely off screen.
4) Check your frame rate with your mouse over a building part or object. Does it decrease or is it the same as with your mouse over the sky or ground?
5) Repeat the test with:
- Render Objects Off (all other render items on)
- Render Trees Off (all other render items on)
- Render Grass Off (all other render items on)
- Render Clouds Off (all other render items on)
- Render Sun Off (all other render items on)
- All render items off
Note: These settings are for testing purposes only.
6) Post your results here or if send them through the help desk Please include your system specs with your results.
I will leave the current build up for the next few days and will post again when I've switched on optimizations. So far I've improved frame rate for myself and other players by 10%-25% with improved occlusion and streamlining of various functions.
Note: There's no pressure at all to participate in these tests as I'm working with the Guides to get enough information. I'm posting here for those that are interested and would like to gather and share their own stats.
The Test Server is now running an optimized build.
The build has the following improvements:
- Corrected and optimized occlusion system.
- Streamlined array systems.
My personal tests show an average 25% (roughly 10 FPS) improvement with better performance gains in areas where a lot of objects can be culled from view, such as interiors of buildings.
Here are my test results, I did 2 locations my tribe and VR tribe
FPS scores dont really mean much without the PC specs
so Ive included those
CPU i7-2700k (3.5Ghz overclocked to 4.6Ghz)
Ram 16gigs
GFX Nvidia GTX 770 Sli (sli was not enabled for this test)
OS Win 10 64bit
Monitor res 2560x1600 @ 60hz 16:10 aspect
Although I play Xyson in a 1920x1440 @ 60hz 4:3 aspect window
Your instructions said "with mouse OVER a building"
I took this to meant Dont click/select an object just hover over it
so thats what i did, I only hovered the mouse over the ground and objects
and didnt select anything.
The results list the FPS with the loss in brackets shown as a minus number
so eg North 90 (-5) means there was a drop of 5 fps when the mouse was hovered
over an object
location z779 x1.01 z685.52
(center of my tribe with arch all around)
Shadows Off - all render on
north 95 (-2)
east 95 (-1)
south 96 (-5)
west 91 (-1)
Render Objects Off (all other render on)
(with objects off, it was hard to tell if there was any loss on hover cept for looking north
north 95 (+5)
east 95
south 95
west 95
Render Trees Off - (no trees visible in this spot)
north 95 (-1)
east 96 no drop
south 96 (-5)
west 94 (-1)
Render Grass Off
north 95 (-2)
east 94 no drop
south 95 (-5)
west 93 (-1)
Render Clouds Off - (this result was surprsing to say the least )
north 95 no drop
east 95 no drop
south 95 no drop
west 95 no drop
Render Sun Off
north 94 (-1)
east 95 no drop
south 96 (-1)
west 92 (-1)
All Render Items Off
north 95 no drop
east 95 no drop
south 96 (-1)
west 95 no drop
2nd Test at VR Tribe
coords z820 x937.08 z921.30
standing to just a few feet south of VR tribe on a bridge, (highest step of bridge)
So VR's arch was to the North of my locale
Shadows Off - all render on
north 41 (-4)
east 64 (-10)
south 82 (-12)
west 76 (-14)
Render Objects Off (all other render on)
(they was loss when mouse hovered over objects but hard to record)
north 56
east 71
south 71
west 73
Render Trees Off
north 41 (-5)
east 67 (-2)
south 82 (-12)
west 73 (-13)
Render Grass Off
north 40 (-4)
east 72 (-12)
south 87 (-17)
west 78 (-14)
Render Clouds Off
north 40 (-9)
east 73 (-13)
south 85 (-16)
west 81 (-16)
Render Sun Off
north 40 (-4)
east 71 (-11)
south 82 (-18)
west 77 (-8)
All Render Items Off
north 63 (-13)
east 86 (-23)
south 90 (-15)
west 94 (-32)
These scores look ok, but they are all with shadows off, my fps does have significant loss
when the shadows are enabled
Here are my results. I thought the best way to do it is to take pictures... that way you can see the fps and where my mouse pointer is yourself in the picture. You can download the folder of pictures from the following link:
2.5 Ghz Core2 quad
4 Gb RAM
1 Gb GT 430
Vista 64 bit
I have under half the frame rate chojinuk has, but my results aren't too different.
Two things give me the biggest frame loss, trees but it's mostly their shadows especially when there is way more of them than is natural, the other is huge amounts of buildings, arriving within draw distance can put me in slow motion and my ping usually goes through the roof.