[SOLVED] Strangely low frame rates
m1st3rnutso
Brisbane Join Date: 2014-07-14 Member: 197420Members
Brisbane Join Date: 2014-07-14 Member: 197420Members
So I'm running an AMD FX-4170 @ 4.2ghz
with a HD 7970
And 16g ram @ 1600hz
Yet my frame rates range from 10 - 20fps, even on the lowest possible graphical settings @ native resolution. What's the problem here?
If you need any more information on my system, feel free to ask.
You can find my tech_support.zip attached.
with a HD 7970
And 16g ram @ 1600hz
Yet my frame rates range from 10 - 20fps, even on the lowest possible graphical settings @ native resolution. What's the problem here?
If you need any more information on my system, feel free to ask.
You can find my tech_support.zip attached.
Comments
And the FX 4170 performs almost half as well as the 8150 (single threaded) if I am seeing it right.
Edit: Looked at the wrong data. Single thread performance seems to be the same. Still, the point remains that your CPU is most likely your performance bottle-neck. You can rule out the graphic card, if you try playing on a lower resolution and with low details, and the problem remains.
I disagree with Cmdrkeen, respectfully.
Your CPU is on par with my own i7 920 (using the same resolution too) and you are also running over 4 Ghz. That should be way more than enough to never have 10 -20 fps since i on average hold ~100 give or take 30.
You'll get 15-20 fps more by disabling ambient occlusion (and better input delay) but that cannot alone be the cause.
Mind taking some screenshots (f12) with r_stats enabled in the console (~ key) when you have low fps?
I can't imagine what is causing that, to that degree.
I ran similar on a i7 930, which is barely better or worse depending on, from your amd cpu.
Do indeed NOT run ambient occlusion. I shall also advice to disable shadows.
I would still expect you to get closer to what CmdrKeen stated he had, 30-80 fps. Amd's current cpu's use an advanced, hardware based hyper threading solution. It has 4 integer cores, and 2 fpu cores. Ns2 uses up to 2.5 cores. I could guess, yes guess, that ns2 is using fpu cores of which you only have 2.
To really get to the bottom of the matter, I would do as ironhorse says, take some screenshots (f12) with r_stats enabled in the console (~ key) when you have low fps.
Although i have OC'd my 2.67 ghz to 4 ghz, (but u can get that 4170 to 4.8 ghz) it still doesn't explain the gap, like we both mentioned.
Please note that I first take a shot of the current graphical settings, and then shots from around Kodiak at those settings.
Note that even on absolute minimum settings, frame rates never exceeded 20.
Thanks guys.
Iron Horse will be able to tell you more hopefully.
How can I go about viewing my renderer thread in this case?
Then when you are recreating teh worst case scenario fps (like those screenshots) press the space bar to pause it.
Now use the bracket keys [ ] or arrow keys to select the worst performing frame at the bottom of the screen (it will be the tallest vertical bar)
Now with that selected, expand the horizontal purple bars on the left by clicking on them, starting with the longest one, until you have the worst section exposed.
Take a screenshot of that.
Be sure to scroll down once you are paused, to ensure you are selecting the worst horizontal purple bar. (it should be near the top if its the render thread that is handled by the CPU)
Something is most definitely very wrong here...
It seems my game is quite unstable, with several crashes during opening, and crashes when trying to use the profile command.
But after the pain, I've managed to review one of worst frames I could capture, without crashing the game.
If its not what you were looking for, let us know and I'll try again.
Edit - directx was also re-installed before this was done.
cpu-z reads clock speed of 4214 mhz during lowest fps.
note - same clock speed is reached when stress testing (ie prime95).
HWmonitor had a max temp reading of 59c from cpu during this testing with a max cpu fan speed of 6308 rpm.
Unfortunately these hot Brisbane days do not help my temps.
Use Process Explorer (from www.sysinternals.com yes you be redirected to MS)
Added that if your hardware, like harddisk, is quite busy and crap on chipsetdrivers it may cause many interrupts which take priority above normal cpu tasks, maxing cpu to 100% even though task manager shows pretty much nothing.
Second check your harddisk latency and queue. On the performance tab on task manager is a performance monitor button. Opening it gives you a new menu with a disk tab.
Under the disk tab are 3 sections. Each section has different columns.
In the middle section see how high your latency in ms is getting.
On the lower section see how big the queue on your disks is. Anything consistent above 0.9 is a real problem with disk queues.
Secondly, @ DC_Darkling, find attached screencap with cpu load readouts from Process Explorer. Note - I had a good run around for a couple of minutes before taking this cap. Highest latency recorded in Disk Activity is 38 from a system image. And the cue on my disks is 0.00 mostly constantly, except for brief jumps up to about 0.01/2, and rarely up to 0.05 at the most.
Find attachments here.
Nonetheless, that looks fine on cpu usage. But did you also experience bad stuff during your run? I assume you did as you included a ingame shot.
If you did not mess up reading disk latency and disk queue then that indeed seems fine.
Which makes me wonder, what is slowing this down? Its unlikely in ns2 as I havent seen other similar recent reports. (but lets keep a open mind)
Possibilities / Follow ups:
* Make a plog capturing the problem. Type p_logall in console while gaming, experience the problem, quit game. In your ns2 user folder is a .plog file. (%appdata%\natural selection 2\)
Zip it and provide.
* Make a process monitor dump. Get it from systinternals, run it (run capture, its the looking glass icon. it STARTS capture right away), experience problem, stop capture, save as .pml file. (pick the option to save all)
Then zip it and provide.. (word of caution, it logs everything running on your computer during the capture, so anyone with process monitor can analyze the file and see what programs you run etc)
You can also analyze the dump (after capure) yourself. I would suggest the following filter:
- path 'contains' natural selection <include>
- duration 'more then' 0.5 <include> (in theory show all events lasting more then half a second.
if to much or nothing shows, adjust time. See if something lasts... long.
At the moment I suspect something like a antivirus perhaps scanning all the files you are preloading, actively slowing the process down.
Preloading textures is where things are breaking down and they should obviously not be taking that long. Can you run memtest86? It's an inconvenience, but testing your ram is the next logical step since it relates to Preloading those textures. We know there's nothing wrong with your CPU at least.
Also, have you ran any artifact tests on your video card to ensure it's not having issues?
Did you have a specific program in mind for artifact testing?
Just yesterday I was benchmarking on unigens Heaven, and did notice a few strange shadow projections which could have been artifacts. However I disregarded those as the final performance statistics seemed fine.
@Asraniel, I am running bitdefender 2011. I know it can be stubborn, but I have given ns2 another shot with all real time virus scanning off, and added ns2 to the scan white list. I did not perceive any noticeable change in performance, and frame rates were still the same.
Frame rate was at a constant 60 for the entirety of the test.
http://www.coderbag.com/programming-c/disable-cpu-core-parking-utility
Also that CPU is in theory only a semi quad core as its 4 cores share 2 modules.
I am running an i7 870 which is @ stock speed of 2.9ghz and I've never had low framerate dips like that. ever.
It completely obliterates a 4170 so where the on par with 920 came from I have no idea.
http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/321/AMD_FX-Series_FX-4170_vs_Intel_Core_i7_i7-870.html
Also there is a known issue running FX/Bulldozer cpu's on Windows 7 (presuming you're using win7)
https://support.microsoft.com/kb/2645594?wa=wsignin1.0
Try that hotfix and see what it does for you
cpu cores were all unparked, hotfix was installed, computer restarted.
No change in performance, unfortunately.
Shizzle man I'm at a loss at saying its nothing short of your CPU not being up to snuff, how does it perform in other games? Do you have any games that are CPU intensive aka MMO or RTS games?
The only thing I can think of that could cause problems would be if one or more files are missing and it tries to load them on every frame ... arguably, that should have a big glaring error message showing up. But they are only shown when in verbose mode...
Try turning on verbose by typing "verbose 1" in console when you have found a bad spot.
If it starts talking about missing files, verify your game cache.
Hmm... this may be the third time we run into problems due to hidden log errors. Time to https://trello.com/c/PJd0dti8
I play forged alliance, and have never experienced consistently low frame rates like this, even on 1000 unit setons clutch game.
I'm at a bit of a loss, I'd be willing to replace my cpu (and consequently my mobo) if I new for sure that this problem actually stemmed from my 4170. But I'm the sort of person who will only resort to purchasing new hardware only if all other options are exhausted.
Sounds like a plan, I'd hang tight for now and try out matso's suggestion, he is the guru of fixes, if you do decide to upgrade in the future, come over to the darkside, I used to run AMD all the time but just find they can't hack raw performance like an intel can, (not fanboying) I ended up spending more money in buying new AMD cpus than buying 1 expensive intel cpu in the long run
P.S. major steam sales are on at the moment, skyrim is going for mega cheap, you could sink a few hours into that while matso sorts out the trello business haha
No mention of missing files or anything, all that's showing up is server history stuff.
I'll go ahead and try verifying the cache.