Frame drop after passing through clouds

[alike 0]

I get a huge frame drop (50%+) when passing trough the cloud layer. I'm using ASN for weather and REX Soft clouds, and have noticed that if I choose overcast weather (heavy thunderstorms...) from within the simulator, the drop doesn't happen. It's only when I use ASN that it happens. Anyone have a clue as to why?  

 

I will gladly provide any additional information to resolve my issue! 

[DylanM 1,069]

I don't have ASN, but I believe it had to with the number of layers that ASN generates (sure someone will jump in soon to clarify...). Have you tried using the DXT option (vs 32bit) in Soft Clouds? I can't tell a difference in quality, and get better performance in dense cloud layers.

 

Also, using DSR for AA (instead of SGSS in Nvidia Inspector) helped on my rig. Good luck.

[alike 0]

I don't have ASN, but I believe it had to with the number of layers that ASN generates (sure someone will jump in soon to clarify...). Have you tried using the DXT option (vs 32bit) in Soft Clouds? I can't tell a difference in quality, and get better performance in dense cloud layers.

 

Also, using DSR for AA (instead of SGSS in Nvidia Inspector) helped on my rig. Good luck.

 

Thank you for the answer. No I have not tried the DXT option. I will do so later I also have ASN set to 5 layers.

 

One question about DSR: Will it effect how small the application windows are? In other games it does...

[vgbaron 3,627]

One of the big pluses for ASN is it's ability to smoooooothly blend cloud transitions. This is achieved by sort of simulating he movie 'fade -in' technique, so at one point you will have both the old and new cloud sets present until the old one removed. This will have an effect when in heavy clouds.

 

I have dropped my cloud layers to 3 and it reduces the hit quite a bit and I haven't noticed any visual loss going from 5 to 3.

 

As others have mentioned, playing around to find the best cloud set that has the least impact on your system is important.

 

Vic

[nelsly 0]

Hi hope you don't mind if I chime in here. I was a beta tester of  the the ASN program from the very beginning and was with them for 10 years through all their development. A great bunch of guys lead by Damian. It is a great program and used by many on this forum. Since p3d ver 2.4 ASN for me was unusable because of stuttering. No matter what I did I could not get rid of it. If I used the default weather themes from P3D no stuttering. Finally Kostas of ASN arranged for a session with me to try and resolve the issue. He tried everything for more than 3 hours and we couldn't get rid of the stuttering. Was it a p3d or ASN issue I don't know. Last week I ordered rex soft clouds and also went and bought the opus weather engine. I can tell you now that I do NOT have stutter problems unless opus is updating weather which also happened with ASN only with ASN the stuttering continued. I do not get that with opus. Why I really don't know. I use the dxt clouds from rex soft clouds. I have really great weather and clouds. I also had great weather with ASN but way too much stutter. So what can you gain from all this, surely not that ASN is NO GOOD or OPUS IS Better because it's not true. This is just my experience and nothing more take what you want and experiment. Yes I will try ASN again when another update of P3D occurs or ASN itself to see if things change back but until that happens I will stay with what works for me. Best of luck

 

Nels

[Guest]

Hi Nels,

 

I've had similar issues with ASN in v2.4 also (regardless of the clouds used, Soft Clouds, P3D default clouds).  The ASN folks are good people, as are Opus and PILOT's FSGRW ... other's seem to be working well with ASN and v2.4 so it's likely some combination that's triggering sudden and drastic FPS drops.

 

I have yet to figure out why ASN is hit and miss on the performance front ... like you, P3D weather themes even Thunderstorms with heavy rain work well - no performance issues.

 

I've done all the usual diagnostics and isolated my environment so it's just ASN - removing all DLL.xml and EXE.xml entries except AS_connect, run ASN from another PC (networked) - I just can't seem to figure out what's going on with ASN.  Tried all kinds of P3D settings and still can't get consistent performance out of ASN.

 

I will keep trying ... ASN has a lot of settings.  I personally like having weather engine options and I'm looking forward to REX weather architect when that's released.  Perhaps it's a issue with the winds data in ASN?

 

Cheers, Rob.

[Michael Moe 495]

I have no issues with ASN and REX. Works perfect with no FPS drops worth mentioned, so it must be some sort of combo

 

Michael Moe

[psycoma27 0]

I noticed a massive Frame Drop when i fly through Clouds (tested with P3D Stock Clouds and REX4 Clouds, and FSGRW and ASN) when i use in NVI "SparseGridSuperSampling". When i use norma AA (which still looks ugly in P3DV2.4 :huh: ) i don´t recognize any frame lost.. So maybe this is one cause for the problem?

[nelsly 0]

Hi Rob and thanks for the comments. I was beginning to think I was the only one with ASN problems. It is only since P3D ver 2.4 that I have noticed this stuttering. What is it like for you if you use

the opus weather engine or do you have it? The fact that this problem doesn't seem to exsist with the default weather themes is quite confusing. As I said Kostas really tried everything he could think of as I am sure you have and why some people have this problem and others dont is strange.

 

Cheers

 

Nels

[Guest]

Nels,

 

I do get frame rate drops with P3D normal weather themes when flying thru clouds (sorted expected for cumulus) ... I'll go from 30 fps to 23 fps.  With ASN I go from 30 fps to 16 fps.  I'm almost certain it's how P3D volumizes the clouds and how ASN favors cumulus clouds ... as I understand it, AA processing isn't being disabled from clouds in P3D  so when they volumize they tend to produce a significant FPS hit.

 

I did try all kinds of ASN settings to try to help and nothing seemed to make a difference once I'm in the cloud (pun intended).

 

With that said, ASN depiction of weather is pretty darn accurate and visually a feast on the eyes.

 

Cheers, Rob.

[nelsly 0]

Rob I really didn't notice any frame rate drop while flying with or within clouds so I will do a small flight and see. As I asked do you have the opus weather engine? Its the stuttering that really blew me away. Any way I will do a test flight with opus and ASN and post some results. I have my frame rate locked at 30

 

Nels

[vgbaron 3,627]

Don't want to get into a them vs us comparison but in mjany ways this is like comparing apples to oranges as to which one tastes better. under a specific circumstance one could say xyz stutters more than abc, and YOU would be correct, for YOUR system. Too many variables between engines AND systems to make a fair BROAD comparison.

 

IMHO, unless you can get both engines to inject EXACTLY the same cloud sets, etc all you are doing is running a test that is valid ONLY for you.

 

Sort of like comparing a 12 cyl Ferrari to an 8 cyl Ferrari and saying the 8 cyl is quieter but the 12 cyl is faster. Both are fine automobiles designed for similar things.

 

FWIW, I do a LOT of IFR flying with ASN and I rarely get stutters - I *DO* get them however but I still have been unable to figure out what is different between when I do and when I don't when I have solid cloud coverage. my guess is that it has to do with types of clouds and individual cloud sets.

 

Vic

[DylanM 1,069]

 

 

as I understand it, AA processing isn't being disabled from clouds in P3D so when they volumize they tend to produce a significant FPS hit.

 

Hi Rob, not sure if this was raised before, but would you know if the suggestion to disable AA processing on clouds had been explored by LM. I do know the DX10 fixer had that option in FSX, so wonder if that can also be applied in DX11?

[Guest]

Yes, was discussed before and I've discussed with Beau going back to v2.2 beta ... In DX9 and DX10 API you can disable the AA relatively easily for the cloud processing, in DX11 however you can not do this easily ... it can be done, but it would be a significant change in the rendering process that has the potential to break a lot of backwards compatibility.

 

My opinion (not speaking for LM) is that such a change would be best left to a future version while this series 2.x retains as much compatibility (even at the cost of performance) as possible.

 

Cheers, Rob

[nelsly 0]

Hi Rob and Vic, well just did a bit of a test using opus, I was also going to use ASN but forgot I had deleted it when I got opus. I may reinstall just for test. In any case this was done with opus and rex soft clouds with both 32 bit and DTX 5 clouds from soft clouds. In all flights and approaches my frames were locked at 30. They never at anytime dipped lower than 29 (turning or straight flight)  including approach. I first used the internal weather theme of thunderstorms and also heavy snows both with lots of clouds depicted with opus( it gave very good coverage) SIMILAR to what I got from ASN. NO stuttering and frames were constant at 29-30. I then loaded the weather for my test home base of CYTR Trenton ontario canada. Opus gave the local weather as 4 mile vis, snow and overcast at 1700 feet and broken at 10500. Loaded up the lear and took off. On the ground BTW the weather was depicted correctly. On climb out into clouds fairly quickly and frames remained very constant. Snowing like mad and finally on top at 3500 with the 10500 layer above. Did a pan all around and solid overcast as far as I could see (no holes) Frames still at 20-30) Carried out ILS to 06. all well right through to landing. Saw the ground at1200 agl Rwy at 2 miles. The weather was depicted exactly as far as I was concerned.  I will have to try and install ASN to try the same test. It would be interesting. Right now the bottom line for me is no stutters with opus and rex soft clouds weather  dtx 0r 32 bit and really can't see a visual difference any way. As Vic has said everyone system is different and while some things work for others and some don't is the reality of flight sim no matter what ver

 

Cheers

 

Nels