Alright you drunks, help me fix my rig!

[Rainshine]

Okay, so...I've got a decent rig. Not the best, but not bad either. Specs as follows;

CPU: AMD FX-8320 8-Core @ 3.5GHz
RAM: 16GB
GFX Card: AMD Sapphire Tri R9 290 w/ 4GB video ram
HDD: 2x 2TB drives
SDD: 128GB, only for SC(got my priorities right!)

Now, on Very Low(!) I can run smoothly, most of the time, in hangar at 60 FPS. That's also with some custom command line trash that makes the game look like utter...fucking...shit. I'll also only maintain that 60 fps if I don't turn the camera too fast, otherwise it drops to around 25 for a few seconds.

In AC, it gets SO much worse. I average 45 standing still, targeting something drops me to 15 for a few seconds, looking at the planet or the core drops me to around 15 while I'm looking at it. When any enemy scythe gets near me(i.e. in render view), I drop to around 20 fps.

Now, I know my rig isn't that bad, I'm wondering what I might have, configuration wise, that would explain the shit performance I'm getting. I can run just about any other game on Ultra and run smooth at 60. Remember Me is probably the most graphics intensive game I have, on highest I run at ~70 fps constant, no stutter.

Is it the game? Or do you think I have something wrong with my configuration? Does CPU have anything to do with framerate? Honestly, I think that's my only weak point is CPU, but even then it's not bad.

Thanks for the help, TESTies!

 

[Annitias]

CPU would need an overclock to keep up for SC. I would say go to 4.2ghz for a 8320. What memory do you have? That plays a large roll. Please link that as well as your motherboard.

 

[Rainshine]

CPU would need an overclock to keep up for SC. I would say go to 4.2ghz for a 8320. What memory do you have? That plays a large roll. Please link that as well as your motherboard.

Memory is standard DDR3 1600mhz I believe. I'm not 100% sure on mobo specifics(downloading a profiler now), but it was a high end AMD board circa mid-2013. It does have two PCIe 16x slots.

Would a slower CPU really have that much effect on in-game FPS? I was under the impression that GPU was the primary constraint.

 

[CitizenX]

Im not so sure I buy into the overclocking

Proc: AMD 965 BE @3.4ghz
MOBO: Gigabyte 970a UD3
Ram: 16gb Corsair Vengeance 1600
HDD: 128gb Crucial SSD
HDD: Seagate Hybrid Drive 500mb / 4gb SSD
Video: Sapphire 2gb 6950

The game runs flawlessly on this older configuration.. no overvoltages or overclocking.

 

[Annitias]

My reason there, the 965 IPC is higher than the 8320 IPC. So clock for clock on each core, the 8320 is slower. As it is, SC can not use all 8 cores yet.

I do see a change on rigs I have built when overclocking.

 

[Rainshine]

Well, I went ahead and overclocked the CPU via CCC, played a few rounds in AC and noticed only marginal improvement. Could have been psychosomatic as well, not sure.

I just feel my system SHOULD be running SC perfectly, stutterless, on Very Low, I've been racking my brain trying to figure out why that is NOT the case...Getting ready to do a full system refresh, see if that helps :P

 

[D3Mark]

You don't need to overclock, that's a lie. I'm running on a hex core at 3.3ghz and it's fine. Try running i on medium/high, it might be optimized backwards (not going to go into explaining this). Also, make sure you're running it in admin mode because allocation of resources is important because of that.

 

[Annitias]

What else is running in the background?

 

[Rainshine]

@Vanisher: I may not have needed the OC, but it was something I'd been meaning to go do for a while. My GFX card has been OC for ages, meant to do my CPU too. In any case, strangely I bumped the presets up to high and Hangar did, weirdly, run better. Looks like a AAA game now too instead of minecraft. However, AC still ran like total garbage; 35 fps while not looking at the core or planet, drops to 15 when enemies spawn.

@RussianJ: Not a whole lot, mostly just windows processes. Keep a pretty clean profile, RAM usage is usually around 6GB with SC running, so maybe 4GB total used by SC.

 

[D3Mark]

@Vanisher: I may not have needed the OC, but it was something I'd been meaning to go do for a while. My GFX card has been OC for ages, meant to do my CPU too. In any case, strangely I bumped the presets up to high and Hangar did, weirdly, run better. Looks like a AAA game now too instead of minecraft. However, AC still ran like total garbage; 35 fps while not looking at the core or planet, drops to 15 when enemies spawn.

Yeah SC is optimized backwards, basically the higher the settings the better it auto uses your resources instead of setting it lower making it run better. Sounds like you need to manually set core usage for your CPU, used to have that issue with ArmA 3, or at least make sure the way the CPU is using its cores is properly set up so that it can be allocated properly.

 

[ghost53574]

SC only uses about 2.4 - 3.2 Gb's on my machine. Anyway overclocking is a myth but only in the sense that you are just potentially lowering your CPU's lifespan because of wear and tear, in this case heat, is increased. My recommendation are to make sure V-Sync is turned off, your page file is set to 1.5 * your max physical memory (in your case it's 1.5 x 16000 = 24000MB's) and update your drivers. These pieces of advice probably won't help because it just seems that since Star Citizen is still considered pre-alpha they don't strictly have full fledged support for Mantle yet, so in hind-sight the game is not optimized for your graphics card.

https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/transmission/13362-Star-Citizen-To-Include-Mantle-Support

 

[Atriden]

What about your PSU? How many watts is it and does it meet the demand of your system? Do you have problems in other games? If yes, which ones?

 

[Rainshine]

@Gghost53574: I was under the impression that OC, with proper cooling, did not lower the lifespan of the chip. Only increasing voltage would do that. Both my GPU and CPU are overclocked, but voltage is still locked on factory. Currently, my Pagfile is indeed set at 24000ish with latest drivers. From what I'm experiencing, I think my CPU is just too old. Looking at upgrading to an 95-something, 8-core 4.7 GHz(OC to 5.1 apparently...), but I'd have to upgrade my mobo as well.

Thinking I'll just wait till end of next year :P

@Atriden: PSU is 1000 watt, shouldn't be an issue. I upgraded it along with my card in preparation for a Crossfired R9 290x's. Right now, that should be about 300-400 watts over what I need, so I got some breathing room.

Every other AAA title runs great, the highest demand I put on it is Remember Me on high, which runs at ~70 FPS @ 1080p.

 

[ghost53574]

@Gghost53574: I was under the impression that OC, with proper cooling, did not lower the lifespan of the chip. Only increasing voltage would do that. Both my GPU and CPU are overclocked, but voltage is still locked on factory. Currently, my Pagfile is indeed set at 24000ish with latest drivers. From what I'm experiencing, I think my CPU is just too old. Looking at upgrading to an 95-something, 8-core 4.7 GHz(OC to 5.1 apparently...), but I'd have to upgrade my mobo as well.

Thinking I'll just wait till end of next year :p

@Atriden: PSU is 1000 watt, shouldn't be an issue. I upgraded it along with my card in preparation for a Crossfired R9 290x's. Right now, that should be about 300-400 watts over what I need, so I got some breathing room.

Every other AAA title runs great, the highest demand I put on it is Remember Me on high, which runs at ~70 FPS @ 1080p.

First I said potentially and second a voltage increase does raise the amount of heat on the CPU. Lowering the amount of voltage is called underclocking but you said overclocking.

http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/106220/why-does-overclocking-a-cpu-cause-it-to-generate-more-heat