Now as you may know I work on modding and update FPSC classic.



Now for me relaoded is running very bad about 13fps in the latest release when new games can run on high and ultra settings, so whats going on.



Well I have a brand new amd bulldozer cpu running at 4.1, now looking at its performance it runs very well but the problem is with a lot of new cpu's the applications running in single thread run very poor and a lot lower than older cpu's.



These cpu's are designed to run in multi threads not single.



So I think a lot of people who have newer cpu's are seeing bad performance because of how new cpus work.



Infact my old core2due run reloaded very well at 45 to 60 fps.



But this new cpu just don't like it.



Maybe its time for lee to think about multi threading in reloaded.



Why not have the same performance hits in fpscclassic you may ask ?



Well there a lot less shaders and the terrain is eating a lot of the performance up.



Best s4real

That's very curious that your new AMD processor would run so much worse than an old Core2Duo. I haven't had an AMD chip since the Athlon64 days, but it almost sounds like poor chipset drivers.



Have you checked your Mobo's website to see if there are new chipset drivers available, or even a bios update? Something doesn't sound right. It is true that newer chips run best with all cores being utitlized. But, there are still MANY applications that are single threaded (3ds max being one of them).



I've been using Intel chips for the last 6 years or so, and each new chip runs FPSC/Reloaded faster than the previous generation, even just utilizing a single core because of the higher clock speeds with each new generation (I don't overclock).



I'd be on the lookout for some new chipset drivers first of all. You didn't state your GPU when mentioning about the shaders eating performance up. I'd try a CPU/GPU benchmarking tool, and you can see exactly where the bottleneck is for YOUR machine. I use the EVGA precision tool for measuring GPU load. Even though I get decent framerates, the performance bottleneck for MY machine is on the CPU side of things, once I start adding crazy amounts of entities. I know this because the load on my GPU is far from maxed out.

Sounds about right here so? And? what was expected was going to be the case here any different?



Whatever, you cant expect the vast majority of users of Reloaded ever to be concerning themselves with things like chip set drivers and the bios for heavens sake. They buy a computer and software to run on it. How may sold products especially so called pro ones do you get that you are told you have to play about with your bios? Concern themselves with cores and how they work and a multitude of other technical issues. Is that a joke. We are talking in the main quite low end computer knowledge users here. Like me - don't know how to use a mouse if it goes wrong - it don't usually and just works. If TGC and the technical experts here cant make the product as it should be or even understand where the actual issues lie then your really, really are not living in the same world as the majority of would be Reloaded game makers. We don't in the main live in a technical programmers world of high level understanding. If such issues are known then the point being is they need be accommodated and corrected and the product updated so they don't come to light as an issue so users don't have to concern themselves with these things when they simply will not ever or cant do so.



They don't want to know why and never will - they just want it working as needed as they expect out of the box. Otherwise they just wont use it because they cant.



OK for computer experts if you are lucky enough to understand what is or actually find a solution if it is at all possible even.



Bottom line is if someone knows why and can make it better for all users by updating the product to remove the issues and user difficulties so they don't exist any longer then I presume that will be done.



You cant be expecting to be talking about the bios and so on to Reloaded users. I have not needed to even use the word for many years. The need to be Playing around with the bios disappeared an age ago. If you have need to do that as an average user of a computer today even an average indie game maker then there is something seriously wrong.



Need a complete change of thinking there in my opinion.



User update their bios? Cant believe anyone would suggest expecting a Reloaded user to consider such things.

Good post, Uman, and I totally agree with you. Maybe they can update the Construction Kit module- hammer to construct, brush to paint, and floppy disk (or cd) to update??

I don't think bond1 was saying all reloaded users should be doing this, just giving some pointers to S4real. Perhaps it is a personal PC build? If so then updating bios etc is a good idea. If it is a PC he has purchased, then you would expect all that to have been done (even then not always!).



I used to work in computer retail, and I am quite used to people who had no clue, and no real urge to learn about that sort of stuff. That's fair enough, if you don't build computers for a living you don't really need to know. However, the amount of people bringing parts back because they had built a computer and it didn't work properly, was very often because they hadn't installed the latest bios, chipset drivers or even graphic drivers! My boss used to really get on to me about telling them this stuff, he said I was training them for free! Possibly he was correct, I do remember one chap started as a total PC newb and after a few years of popping in and watching what I did became very proficient indeed! To the point he was going round his mates and fixing their PC's. Yes things are way easier now, but it is still possible to build a PC and not set it up perfectly, even if it seems fine.



Theres no harm in him giving some pointers about possible issues with a new build! TGC I am sure would not expect users to have to go into the bios or even drivers to get reloaded working properly! As long as it is setup correctly to start with!

Bond theroy is wrong I have the latest chipset drivers and graphics driver and can run all new games on high or ultra settings the only performance problem is reloaded at the moment.



Been building personal computers for years but this is my first amd machine been intel all the way before but thought I give it a go.



My point is that some cpu's run slower in single core than older cpus



This is my cpu running against a core2duo as you can see the core2duo is a lot faster with single thread apps but mine running in multi thread beats it.



This is coming more common with newer cpu.



http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/441/AMD_FX-Series_FX-4100_vs_Intel_Core_2_Duo_E8400.html



My specs are :-



Amd 4100fx running at 4.1 stable

graphics card 460 gtx latest graphics drivers.

8gb ram



Games play on high or ultra as a rule with these specs.



Framerate on fpsc reloaded :- 13fps



Framerate on fpsc classic :- 60fps hardly drops at all.



Framerate with fpscx10 300 fps ot more.





Thanks for the replys and feedback



S4real

Check ANY Steam forum for any AAA released game, and you will see the kind of advice I just gave. Check the Autodesk forums where people are having performance problems with programs like Maya and 3ds Max, and you will also see the kind of advice I just gave.



Yes, there still is a need to make sure your drivers are up to date. Chipset drivers, USB drivers, GPU drivers, etc. And yes, when new CPU's are released AFTER your Mobo is released, you will often need to update your bios as well to take full advantage of it. Whether you are computer savvy or not doesn\'t change this.



I was offering advice to a specific situation, where s4real stated his new AMD processor actually ran slower than his old processor. I gave a possible solution, my advice was sound.

Here's something to ponder...



In FPSC Classic, I run on my desktop (1 GB Video card, 4 GB RAM, Quad core- although the quad makes no difference) and on an outdoor level I manage 32-40 FPS. I take that same level and run it in VMWare (set to 512 MB RAM, internal video driver) and can get 28-30 FPS. I run Reloaded on my desktop and get 12 FPS; no point trying it in VMWare as I'm afraid negative FPS values will cause my system to sleep. Something does not seem right somewhere if my classic in VMWare runs faster.

Yes bond advice was sound but had already done those checks.



many thanks for the advice anyway



best s4real

Again, s4real's original post wasn't about framerates in classic vs. Reloaded. It was about his newer CPU performing WORSE than his older CPU. I gave a very valid, possible solution on why this could be so.



EDIT: Thanks s4real. I wasn't trying to stir anyone up, just trying to give a possible solution to a specific problem.

The point for the thread was that I think some of the performance problems could be cpu related on how they work, seems some amd cpu's run poor in single core.



best s4real

Just because I used classic as my example does not diminish the fact that Reloaded runs poorly for us right now on our desktop and we get better performance in classic using the two methods outlined. I felt it fit into this conversation- obviously I was mistaken.



My apologies to derail your thread.

Perhaps a better question would have been... does your new CPU have any problem playing other games. Then we could have skipped the need for upgrading drivers and bios. I think everyone knows by now that this is a software issue. We now have an option to set the players speed in the editor because no two computers run alike. How is that even a fix and how will it work when we distribute a game.



New Game System Requirements: Update your BIOS and Video Drivers, downgrade your DirectX, and don't forget to adjust the players speed.



Brian.

No need to apologies you hve valid points.



I think this thread was read wrong, with working on the classic source I see the limits fpsc can reach and the main problem is poor use in multi threading and gpu usage.



The issue is not fpsc itself but dbp limits.



I'm sure lee will sort all these problem but thought it would help if I posted my findings so far.



best s4real

Personally I think that Xplosys has a very valid point which may or may not be relative and important in what he was referring to though I am no expert and maybe thinks incorrectly.



So too I know little of the BIOS which sounds like a bundle of trouble to get involved with for me and many others. I would not want to go there if I had an old or especially If I had just bought a brand new computer looking for a fix for to try and enhance the performance of a piece of software I just purchased - personally.



Autodesk and so on - not really bothered about what they say. They say a lot of things. I am only interested in how Reloaded will be for the majority of its end users in helping them as a game making tool and many just wont want to or wont be able to do the things of an advanced technical or risky nature either actual or imaginary. In any case its not the point. They should not have to do so.



I apologise if I offend anyone with my comments. Not meant. I understand that Bond1 was trying to be helpful to Xplosys. I was making a general comment not aimed at Bond1 personally but the principle involved as I saw it. I never mean personal offence ever I hope and much like critisism of Reloaded often its not meant to be aimed personally at the developers in person but the inanimate software itself notwithstanding that persons obviously make it. I understand its all not easy and the very opposite is the case.



Reloaded is still in Beta anyway so hopefully such things wont be required of end users and they will be as Happy as Larry - later.



I have almost run out of Steam (excuse the pun) now as far as Reloaded goes. I think it's all been said by now.



As said I am one of those that is not very technical or knowledgeable like many Reloaded users will or may be so time I stopped commenting so much and let TGC and the experts get on with it.



Stay happy and keep smiling all.

Hi,



Lee is working on a number of cpu draining issues and aims to add more rendering optimisations. We'll find the culprits and then the engine will be fast!



Trust in TGC!



Rick

There you have it.



Thanks for that Rick.

Looks like this is the one area that causes most misunderstanding and debate amongst us all. The reason for this? when someone points it out we don't want to be told the fault is ours and made to look stupid or ignorant of the development process or tech, that's trivializing the issue. Though I am sure bond1 didn't mean to do that, just as DVader maybe didn't mean to do it to me, but it's still frustrating.



I understand bond1 was offering another reason and option for poor performance towards s4real's opinion, but taking into consideration that he stated straight off that only Reloaded was running poorly and the fact that he actually does know his business....unless Reloaded requires specific drivers other game engines don't, then the point is moot. Also that there are very few users around here who do see remotely decent frame rates (for an empty level with no running scripts etc) and it does become annoying to us all when anyone defends it by saying it might be at our end.



In an empty level you should be seeing around 100-300fps depending on your m/c before populating it.



His theory about the cpu is spot on as running Reloaded editor alone brings my cpu to a standstill and the whole system become sluggish till it's closed again. I always have 3-4 programs open to develop media but can't even use the browser at the same time. That's on my dual core 4Gb Ram, the quad with 8Gb Ram is only a little better.Reloaded has too high a cpu usage regardless of chipset.



From here on in if someone suggests an issue or a reason for an issue it is probably best left to TGC to come up with a rebuttal, or not, if they don't then the failure will be at their end and at least we won't all be at each others throats.



If your having no issues and decent frame rates then that's fine for you, but heads up, if those of us who do have issues don't 'complain' about it your Reloaded game will not be running on our systems any more than ours do and it will be too late for you to whine about it.

s4real may be on to something here.



Newer CPUs. Especially AMDs are known to be slower on single thread applications. Look it up. And WOW64 makes it worse. Even the new Intels are getting hit there.



Quite a few of my older programs actually run faster on dual core with XP than quad core with win 7 64bit

Here are some screen grabs from my system showing various processes/cpu/physical memory usage for different software.



You can see variations/differences for yourself in my instance.



Attached desktop only no active programes.

Attached 32 bit software : Active software



Reloaded/Corel PhotoPaint/NeoAxis Engine



Of the 3 Reloaded uses most resources. Both cpu and memory.

Attached 64 bit Software : Power Director 11 Video Editing Software with Reloaded Video active.



Again a variation with cpu usage at nil/zero/0



Not sure if any of that is helpful to anyone. Not to me at least other than for consideration.

I think we can easily say that the CPU is not the issue here I have a very powerful CPU and a very powerful GPU and as you can see in my screenshot the CPU usage is tiny never going above 20%, which for reference is far below that of almost every other game I play. It is also making full use of all 8 cpu cores to spread the load.



However the GPU uasge on a nVidia Geforce GTX 780 Superclocked edition with 4GB of dedicated ram is peeking at 80% usage which is far too high I don't even get that GPU usage on Battlefield 4 in that game it hogs the CPU and that is the only bit that limits the game.



I think some serious work on the GPU end needs doing, the processors are fine, I have 5 pcs here running Windows XP, 7 and 8 and all of the them show similar patterns although this one (my main pc) is the most obvious hence why I am posting.



EDIT: As an extra point when not looking at terrain and I am surrounded by only the buildings my frames jump 40 fps.

Hi the next are you using an older beta as i see your fps is above 60 or have you found away to turn it off

I am using the current beta.



Like I said my PC is very powerful I would expect to get above 60 at all times if I don't something is seriously wrong. I get a solid 120fps on Battlefield 4 and Crysis 3 on High and always above 60 on Ultra.



When I see a CPU load of 20% and a GPU load of 80% and only 84 frames sometimes as low as 40 frames I know something is not right. It seems like too much logical processing is being handled by the GPU and the CPU is getting off too light.

Im just wondering as i am locked at 60 at all times wont go above that im running an I7 3.6mhz unlocked, 2 Crossfire Ati cards and 24gig memory and ssd hdd before this beta i was running great fps :/ crazy



Possessor load is fine dosnt go above 9%

I Think it is locked by refresh rate of your monitor.

that was my understanding that's why i asked as i would like my fps back.

There is no reason to have your fps back as your not seeing anything over your screen refresh rate. Any extra frames are wasted performance by your machine. You would be running your PC extra hard for absolutely no benefit over 60fps on a 60hz monitor. However I have a 144hz monitor so should see mine capped at 144fps or 120 depending on the setup.

Its a strange one as the reason i would like it back is i have a barrel this is just one example but before my game would not be affected if i jumped on it the fps would go down a little but would still run great now with the same barrel i jump on it the fps drops like a brick and effects the game its low polly also.



I read somewhere its to do with collision but that dosen't take away the fact it was fine before and not now its the same with buildings drops when i walk in and out them :/



This is what i get may not be the same for others

I am confused as to why so many have bad FPS.



Just to see the base of performance I tested my old laptop, It is my lowest spec machine (i5 1.7GHz, Integrated graphics, 8GB RAM, SSD, Windows 7) it runs at a min of 25 frames sometimes I get as high as 32 frames. Not much but it is very good for this machine and to be honest is on par with almost all other games I play on it.



I am going to run tests on a standard HDD tomorrow as I have a feeling that may be part of the issue as all my machines with SSDs are coping ok.



See image for frames and render quality.

Its the first time i have seen a game run so different on so many computers here is mines with a SSD everything at max







Edit: just by looking at it your nets on the cent things look better

@ the next



The fact is you not using all 8 cores that why you only using 20% my cpu runs at 20 to 30% as fpsc is a single core running at 32 bit program so it can't use

s4real,



I think all you expert technical guys are way to far advanced for me!



I have just tested some levels here.



Get to the river with default enemies. I get a low of around 25fps in a spot used for testing. Enemies all alive or all killed makes little or no difference for me with the fps hovering around the same.



In a level I use just to test enemies with a lot of simple entity objects to block enemies view as a test I added about a dozen enemies and get average of 35fps as there's little other complexity in the level. If I kill them all fps remains roughly the same.



I have a test level I use - with no enemies, though enough entities to make adding any more not an appealing idea due to lowish fps in parts at least down to perhaps 12fps I thought I would then add some enemies to it and see how they impact on fps as in the levels mentioned above they don't over severely do so. Thus I thought adding some to an already Reloaded level of a little more complexity and quite a few existing non enemy entities it would be a decent test of how they affect fps.



Added about 8 enemies in editor and then hit test level. Unfortunately I did not get very far in my test. When loading the level Reloaded refused to run and returned the Red Screen of Death message saying "Problems with memory mate sorry".



Not sure how anyone picks the bones out of that lot but it seems not only can I not add any more entities to make a credible level but certainly not any number of enemies for sure. I have to know when I am beaten I would say and give up at the moment developing levels further.

Here's what CPU useage I am getting. No idea if Reloaded is multi core or not as yet, hard to say as each core won't be used the same way, as far as I am aware. I'm no expert by any means, but I believe most games split specific tasks between cores, so performance may vary. I don't think you will ever get an equal spread. I could be wrong, I'm going from info I read years ago, so it may well be outdated now.

I have a Q6600, (overclocked by about 400mhz, not that I really see much difference ), a Geforce 260GTX and 8 Gig of ram. CPU usage looks to be on average 30% or so.



I would agree that GPU usage is more of an issue than CPU here, as most games are. Obviously dependant on your system. You would have to have a really slow CPU for that to be seriously limiting your gameplay though.



AI does seem hoggy, however on my setup I have run with a small scene and over 20+ enemies running about. It didn't slow the system that much, certainly less than I expected. I was expecting it to crawl!



Oh, I had Gimp, PSP, Reloaded and Blender running as I normally do when playing with Reloaded, with an obligatory messenger program and Steam of course, plus other basic apps, just to be more accurate.



This probably won't help a blind bit, but I may as well post my screenie too! You never know.



Edit - The original scene was desert, but Reloaded still insists on loading the lush terrain up every time! Even though it says it is Desert. Hopefully fixed next release, if I can help it! Already notified Lee about this.

I hadn't looked at it too closely and maybe just jumped to conclusions as to cause and effect. But s4reals theory seemed tied at first to performance issues I have with other programs being open at the same time, as soon as I close Reloaded everything works fine again, it doesn't mean his theory isn't part of the cause of issues with Reloaded and how it uses single core. Still it does use over 800mb of memory at start up with an empty level, even Max after some usage will start to get way over bloated and Firefox has to be the worst browser out there as a memory hog (what the heck is it using over 292mb for when its sitting static on my e-mail and minimised on the desktop?) I remember Comodo firewall chewing memory big time which was fixed eventually.



There could be a number of reasons not least of which is probably my need to empty out a lot of the crap built up on my HD and defragging, but it's Reloaded that slows it all to a standstill bringing it to my attention Maybe my system isn't allocating the other cores to these single core programs even though I don't expect a spread but at least allocation of separate software, out of my field here

Reloaded is not using multicore as off yet as far as I know as DBP does not support multicores or multithreading.



My cpu usage is using only 25 to 30% so we got a lot of cpu usage not being used.



The other thing is gpu is hardly used as well only 15 to 20% so reloaded seems to be working exact the same as fpsc classic.



FPSC has always had diffrent results with diffrent machines and some performance added to the source can infact slow some machines down.



Well anyway I have a nice 35 to 40fps now by turning off skype.



When skype on the framerate drops to 13fps when its off it goes up to 35 to 40fps in the test level with reloaded.



Never have a program been effected with skype before in this way as I always have it on.



This is something for lee to look into as a lot of people use skype.



best s4real

Lee's latest blog post gives me much hope!

s4real you are right about the AI I have report this to rick some time before your post. when you take the character out of get to the river map you gain more more frames back. but I think this could be solve by using the Lua scripts which is suppose to make thing faster then using fpi. but we will see in the next beta.also if you all use all the full screen shaders on like bloom or sun rays this will be another reason why performance is very low. the point of the sliders is to set reload at your graphic card scale rate.it's like any game out there to date when you go into the setting and putting the quality from low to vary high. you will lose frames depending on the level of your graphic card.reload is no different and the shaders it use is like any other post shaders. fpsc x10 had the same problem when you have the water effects on with all the other shaders it have.I could go from 600 fps down to 300 fps with fpsc x10. what Lee have to solve here is how the shaders can perform with draining the performance so much. but even in fpsc if we could put both bloom and rays shaders on at the same time it would drain the performance probably down to 30 fps. all I am trying to say here is don't be so hard on reload it's at a beta stage all these things are normal and Lee still have some tricks up his sleeves.all go though this performance issue but by the time reload is finish you all may want to upgrade your graphic card because in the end trying to get reload to run good with a low or mid card with all the post shaders would be like trying to get COD or battle field to run at ultra settings thinking you won't see no frames lost.

Thanks for the explanation michael x. I agree that the answer at the moment is to turn down the features to gain performance. What others here are trying to bring out is that this shouldn't have to be done, not when their system is very capable of playing other new, intensive games with full features on. I know some people like to say.... it's early and everything will be fixed in the next beta, but the fact is that it's been in development for more than a year and with a minimal level the performance is dismal. No one is saying that it won't get better, but if we don't point out the obvious issues, who will know about them or fix them?







I guess all I'm trying to say here is don't complain about the complainers, because they are the ones who get Lee & Company to focus on the major issue/s. It's not about being hard on Reloaded, but about bringing real issues to light and ensuring that the important things are fixed.



Brian.

Thanks michael x for your post.



I would turn everything down but they already our, the problem is in fact skype, turn it off and have nice framerate.



I'm gettting 60fps without skype on switch it on I'm back to 13fps again not sure why this happens at the moment.



Full screen shaders eats about half the framerate and needs to have the option to turn them fully off.



I'm not sure if the bloom usage is in fact turned off in reloaded as it already using a camera, the only way to do that would be to reload the world without the camera so the bloom being switched off might still use exact the same cpu usage.



Full screen shaders have to be switched off before the map is made like in the setup.ini.







Well said and I'm not going to be a that looks awesome and that works fine when I don't think it don't.



I've always been the same and feel this helps lee and comapnay more (maybe upset them a bit) than thinking everything rosey.







best s4real

I,m not complaining about people who are complaining about reload that is all good and TGC wants you all feedback about reload. All I'm saying is specific how you are testing the beta and report your PC specs so Lee can know how to approach reload fixes. it leaves a big question mark you all are just saying hey I'm getting less frames then the last beta. right it's like a crowd of people yelling out hey this wrong without any real order on how to say I'm getting this many frames and here my specs.this where the are when I turn the sliders down and this is where they are when I turn the slider up. We need to report the bugs they have ensure us they are listening.



s4real as far the skype go many programs may sometimes clash with others in a bad way this to is a normal thing. but even having a virus software running in the back ground can cause errors or slow down to other programs.it is always best to close other programs when stress testing games on the hardware. it would be like having two games running at the same time knowing they both are using the gpu. also you can turn off the bloom and the other effects by turning the sliders all the way down to zero. but I have to say one thing because of this thread decide to install reload on my other PC which is not the best but it has intel duocore 2.0ghz 9800gtx. I will report the performance later between both of my PCs.



to everyone I'm getting on anyone here just want to see order it come to making bug reports or performance issues. I know it's been a year but as Lee would say this is the life of a game engine developer. what knows now is what he did not now when he first started the engine. My only thing would be don't stop working on it until it is fully develop.so keep complaining with your feedback this is a good thing.just do it with some order of respect.



as far as the memory I'm seeing him making that any better then fpsc was because the terrain is like a prefab on the grid that we are able to change and that alone it probably about 200mb.he might get it down to 500mb to start with a blank level but the terrain is keeping whatever amount it use. but this is why I say it is a idea 64bit game engine because the more feature you add to it the more memory it will take. which for now reload is at a limit where it could go beyond if it was 64bit. no I'm not say it should be 64bit right now but for the future TGC may want to think about this for a next gen software.



also thank you s4real for posting back with respect as I am not saying all this with no disrespect intended.

@michael x :- Im surprised how many people are given me advice that I already know, infact I know fpsc more than most people and how it works inside and out and the programming limits of the software within dbp.



I have already shown my system specs.