Video Card Recommendation

[GreenSmoke]

Hi All,

 

I'm finally building my new PC. I'm looking forward to playing 4.0 when it's complete (now I can only play smaller scenarios with 3.0). The only game I play is SB so I don't want to break the bank on a video card if I don't have to. Has anyone had any luck with the RX 580? The price is reasonable compared with the 1070 and 1080. The RX 580 will more than meet my other needs. Let me know your thoughts. 

 

Thanks,

 

Billl

[Bond_Villian]

I cant comment as to the RX 580, but you might find some useful info here;

Good luck, see you on the battlefield when your sorted

 

[TSe419E]

I use an RX 580 and it works fine as far as I can tell.  Only issue I have seen is when the FOB is littered with burning tanks.  There is a noticeable drop in frame rate then

[GreenSmoke]

Thanks for the info. Looking at the one benchmark for the r7 360 posted by tankenator the input from CavGunner it looks like I should be good to go. 

 

CavGunner - what CPU are you running with? I am curious if you think the bottleneck is with the CPU or RX 580? My current system is clearly CPU limited when the scenario gets larger. I ask because if it is GPU limited I might consider spending a little more...

 

Thanks,

 

Bill

[TSe419E]

CPU according to Esim.

[GreenSmoke]

Thanks again for the info. Card is on the way :-)

[inexus]

First, I love steel beasts and had it for 10+ years and spent hundreds of hours playing it. 

 

But...even with the latest version out now (4.023) the performance is atrocious. I run it on a I7-5820K@4.4ghz with an overclocked 1080TI. It uses my GPU with around 30-40% and on a single CPU core (so the other 5 are just mostly idle). I get around 25fps. The graphic details are very low compared to anything else being released these days. 

 

You do best in spending money on the highest clocked CPU you can find to run SBPro. 

 

The graphics engine is very, very old and no update from the company that it will ever happen as it is being considered a major task. 

 

[GreenSmoke]

16 minutes ago, inexus said:

First, I love steel beasts and had it for 10+ years and spent hundreds of hours playing it. 

 

But...even with the latest version out now (4.023) the performance is atrocious. I run it on a I7-5820K@4.4ghz with an overclocked 1080TI. It uses my GPU with around 30-40% and on a single CPU core (so the other 5 are just mostly idle). I get around 25fps. The graphic details are very low compared to anything else being released these days. 

 

You do best in spending money on the highest clocked CPU you can find to run SBPro. 

 

The graphics engine is very, very old and no update from the company that it will ever happen as it is being considered a major task. 

 

Thanks for the advice. I've been playing Steel Beasts since the original version so it's been a long time for me too :-) It is amazing to me how far the game has come even if it doesn't have as many FPS as others. I think it more than makes up with it with accuracy and realism. I just haven't been able to run the latest version because my current PC is a little long in the tooth. I have all of the parts (almost - I suspect that I'm getting a case and power supply from Santa ;-)) form my new PC and should get my system put together sometime next week. I'm looking forward to playing the latest version soon. My CPU will be an I7-7820X so I'm hoping it will do pretty well. I should be able to overclock it but i'll see how it performs before I go that route. I'm looking forward to the extra threads for the other stuff I do even though I know it won't help with SB.

[Ssnake]

inexus, I won't debate your observations (and yes, we too aren't happy with the current performance levels), but still I manage to squeeze better frame rates from an aging i7-4770K with a GTX 1080 than just 25. I can but recommend that you cut back on some details, pareticularly ground clutter. The next question is what the default visibility ranges are. Again there's room to cut back a bit with substantial FR gains.

Admittedly these are band-aid solutions to a more fundamental problem - a problem that we're working on, I might add - but at least there are ways to up the framerate. Maybe not with battalion scale battles, but there's fun to be had at reinforced company level missions as well, if done right.

[Furia]

I have an old system here but I have no problems running Steel Beasts Pro PE with high graphics settings and good visual quality.

Obviously you would not get the same visual candyeye you get in new sims but I think even a modest rig can get a good performance from Steel Beasts Pro PE.

 

I have an i5-2500K Overclocked to 4.9 Mgz and I have a GTX 770Ti. Not a high end system 

 

However in non congested scenarios I get 50 fps and when the scenario has a lot of trees and vegetation I get between 25 to 30 fluid fps in any case even during heavy combat.

 

Here are my settings in case  they could be of any help.

 

Its is Spanish but easy to understand since the layout of the pannel is the same despite the language

 

 

 

 

I run it at Full Screen  (Pantalla Completa)

 

And this is how I see the sim

 

 

 

 

 

For the old system I have I am quite happy with the performance of the sim.

 

 

 

[Mower]

Correct me if Im wrong but a major impediment for you updating the grafix is the corporate users needing to upgrade their extensive hardware eg the USA?

[Ssnake]

I have to correct you.

The primary obstacle is that the underlying architecture allows for no rapid changes of the image generation part. We're in the process of changing that, but it'll take a while because that job is f'in complicated, hard work. Also, we can't risk to destroy vital parts of the application in the process, so we have to operate rather carefully. Finally it's a matter of manpower. The annual turnover allows for hiring only so many programmers simultaneously. Also, programmers are "long lead" items, you can just hire the next best hobo with a sign "will code for food".

If we were to start from scratch we'd do a lot of things differently (and would make fresh, new mistakes in the process, no doubt). But rewriting Steel Beasts from scratch, while possible in principle, incurs a ton of other risks that we would discover only very late in the process. We have therefore rejected that option as less desirable.

[MDF]

19 hours ago, Ssnake said:

...

If we were to start from scratch we'd do a lot of things differently (and would make fresh, new mistakes in the process, no doubt). But rewriting Steel Beasts from scratch, while possible in principle, incurs a ton of other risks that we would discover only very late in the process. We have therefore rejected that option as less desirable.

Because I sometimes fantasize that I win the lottery and am in a position to fund such an endeavor . . . . how much do you think it would cost for a complete ground-up rewrite of SB?  

Edited January 12, 2018 by MDF

[Ssnake]

Well, I guess I would assemble a second team of five programmers, given about four years to complete the framework by utilizing a maximum of third party middleware like render engines etc. (which then would also cost extra money, of course). 20 man years plus 30%, so the question is how cheap the programmers come. You don't want to pay peanuts because that tends to attract monkeys, so, let's say between 3 and 4 million USD to reach a point where the actual conversion of existing artwork could start (for which you'd then either utilize the old artwork, or you need a small army of artists to create everything from scratch again, for which you need to set up a bigger QA department, for which you need to find qualified people; expereinced (pure) game developers aren's suitable, you need someone with an eye for detail and knowledge about military vehicles).

 

Note however that the prime reason not to do it is that the risks of that development path are higher, and that you learn about failure only at a point when most of the costs have been sunk already. Also, after five to six years you end up with something like what we already have, just at higher frame rates and with better growth potential. Now, the question is whether we can't redesign the existing code base within those five years to get better frame rates, too, and skip the redevelopment of the artwork etc.

And incidentally, that's what we're doing.

[Captain_Colossus]

i'll admit as highly as i regarded the first steel beasts at the time, towards the end of its shelf life the graphics were getting stale,  the low resolution and bland environmental effects (smoke, fire, ambient meteorological conditions) were getting a little tired, and that time i started switching over to games like battlefield 2 for for awhile until steel beasts 2.0.

 

we're at the point now though the graphics still are interesting for me at this development rate, even as improvements are incrementally added over years i really think for the subject matter that steel beasts delivers, the graphics still nicely pair with the gameplay- i've seen some incredible looking games out there, but the relatively shallow gameplay offsets that a bit, so usually it's a case of never really getting to have your cake and eat it too for anyone- bigger developers with millions of dollars worth or resources to throw into graphics typically aren't delivering high fidelity simulators either, on the other hand, the esims and whatnot don't have the same kinds of backing as they do, but what they're doing is maximizing the advantages and playing the  cards they do hold quite well. this is really what everyone is doing or should be doing, if you're say, you're not the biggest and most intimidating, play on your other strengths- be funny and charming if you're those things, if you're not funny and charming, say less and be mysterious or whatever.

 

it's not so much a new graphics engine per se, i would however like to see just see procedural developments like they've been doing- for instance, my next major wishlist item are wind effects on the trees, grasses and bushes, vehicles having an effect on them not that they simply flatten when run over but branches push out of the way and snap back when objects pass through them- to what extent that would be considered a 'new engine' or major work on an existing one is somewhat semantic, but it doesn't per se mean a new engine like steel beasts 2 is a new engine compared to steel beasts 1 in the sense i mean it.

[MDF]

On ‎12‎/‎22‎/‎2017 at 8:10 PM, inexus said:

But...even with the latest version out now (4.023) the performance is atrocious. I run it on a I7-5820K@4.4ghz with an overclocked 1080TI. It uses my GPU with around 30-40% and on a single CPU core (so the other 5 are just mostly idle). I get around 25fps. The graphic details are very low compared to anything else being released these days. 

 

You do best in spending money on the highest clocked CPU you can find to run SBPro. 

 

I just built a powerful gaming PC: i7-8700K @ 4.8GHz, GeForce 1080 Ti, 32GB DDR4-3200 RAM, 2 x Samsung 960 EVO SSD.

 

Running SB in 1440p, fullscreen mode, terrain detail sliders set to 80, graphics settings set to default values.

 

Testing using the detailed Fulda map, which can run very slow in places.

 

In commander's unbuttoned view, get between 40-60+ FPS.  Roughly the same in GPS day sight view with narrow FOV when looking at cluttered terrain.  Drops to 30-40 FPS when looking at same terrain in day sight/wide FOV.  Using GPS FLIR channel/narrow FOV in same terrain, drops to 25-35 FPS, and drops to 20-30 FPS in FLIR/wide FOV. 

 

However, I will say that in unbuttoned or F8 view, the terrain definitely looks a bit nicer in 1440p than it did in 1080.

Edited January 14, 2018 by MDF

[Stun]

Is the visibility setting broken? When I try to select it from the in game menu or press Alt-V nothing happens. Is this by design or a bug? I assume this will let you select the maximum visibility range for a mission. Is there any other way to reduce the view distances in game other than adding fog or rain?

Edited January 14, 2018 by Stun
fix typo

[Ssnake]

Alt+V doesn't do anything (by default).

Generally, this is not something to set at runtime/to your likings as it will have a substantial effect on tactical results/engagement distances (...and framerates, yes). So it is something to be controlled via Weather options in the Mission Editor.