Low frame rates in Fulda Gap sce

[Timber Wolf]

Down loaded the Fulda Gap South sce this week and I have noticed my frame rates vary from 12-20. I have tried changing my video card settings to lower values, no improvement . I then switched to instant action where my frame rates where in the high 50's to low 60's. I next loaded the Danish 1 v1.3 sce and had frame rates in the 45-60 range. Just curious why the low frame rates in this particular scenario.

Pentium D 3.00 Ghz

2.00 GB ram

Video card : EVGA 8600 GTS

Current settings:

Aniosotropic filtering: 8x(tried 2x)

Antialiasing Gamma corr.: on

Antialiasing mode: enhance application

Antialiasing setting :4x( tried 2x)

antialiasing transparency :multisampling

Texture filtering quality: performance

Vertical sync: force on

Steel beast settings default

1024x768x32

terrain 50 50 10

zbuffer 24

vsync on

full screen(tried windowed)

[Ssnake]

Is there a lot of infantry in this scenario, or as many AFVs as the scenario name suggests?

While 3 GHz CPU speed is plenty, large numbers of combatants within their detection range will create a spike in processor load, so it's not the graphics card that is the bottleneck in such a situation.

There simply is no way around this - LOS calculations increase by faculty while CPU speeds are constant (or, if you look at technical progress, they grow "just" exponentially). No matter what, with LOS calculations you can easily ruin any PC's frame rate.

[Tacbat]

Built up areas and smoke tend to lower frame rates as well. Could these have been contributing factors?

[Timber Wolf]

When the scenario opens, I'm located at an M113/FO (external view) in a wooded area south or southwest of all the action (actually off the map) and my frame rate is 19-20. So I guess all the other units and action is dragging the frame rate down even though not much is happening where I'm located. If I jump to other vehicles that are engaged the frame rate drops to 12 + or -.

[cobrabase]

Might want to go into the mission editor and limit visibility.

Turning off vertical sync could help as well.

Sorry about the disappointment dude... I have a similar system and it moves fine without a bad slow down.

[Timber Wolf]

I was actually just curious as to what factors were involved in the frame rate or if I had something set wrong. Even though the frame rate was very low it still seemed playable. I'm sure I will die just as fast in this scenario as any other. I appreciate your hard work and also your advice.

[Ssnake]

It seems that many people have the ground clutter slider set to a pretty high level. It's just eye candy and eats away much of the frame rate in some situations. You may want to experiment with it (Alt+D while playing, Alt+F12 to display the frame rate).

[GH_Lieste]

I did have it pretty high for a while, and it does undoubtably look prettier that way, but I found it annoyingly and artificially difficult to see AI vehicles compared to their ability to see you, especially when the ground clutter is set very large (bushes in Fulda Gap or Dartmoor/reeds in the Southern Iraq Marshes etc). This is probably a bit better now that the AI doesn't have omniscience, but frame rates seem a hair lower in the Beta as well, so I haven't been tempted to raise the slider level from very low.