Should you use Nvidia inspector

[Eric Bakker 7]

Running the fixed fps in P3D (and FSX) is not a simple frame rate limit, like the setting in NI or an external limiter. Fixed fps in-sim invokes D3D look ahead frames. Look ahead frames, or pre-rendering, adds an initial cost to the maximum frame rate. This is often mistaken for a bug, so although we may see 60fps with Unlimited setting, we find we can only lock at 30 to 40 - because of the cost of look ahead pre-rendering. We can set the look ahead frames to 1 in CP or NI to reduce it (default 3), but is still not exactly the same as Unlimited. With pre-rendering some other work is done in our favour, so that the GPU can apply new detail in a smoother fashion. We should be able to get a smoother overall result by setting the in-sim fixed fps setting, (and matching that with NI fps limit if the setting allows), but we lose out on high fps. :excl: :mellow:

 

Steve, thank you for this very helpful explanation. One of many, because I learn a lot from your posts.  :Applause:  

 

There have discussions for years about the frame limiter in FSX (and now P3D) and if it is useful or even bugged. Many people said it is better to use an outside limiter, but this is not true than. I was wondering for some time already why the default setting of P3D is 'frame limiter 20'. I guess LM wants us to show this setting makes it smooth. However, I think 20 is a bit low for smoothness, On the other hand, 30 or 33 is a bit too high when I am flying in urban areas or detailed airports.

[SteveW 1,792]

Steve, thank you for this very helpful explanation. One of many, because I learn a lot from your posts.  :Applause:  

 

...I was wondering for some time already why the default setting of P3D is 'frame limiter 20'. I guess LM wants us to show this setting makes it smooth. However, I think 20 is a bit low for smoothness, On the other hand, 30 or 33 is a bit too high when I am flying in urban areas or detailed airports.

Thanks Eric.

 

 

Here's a way to consider fps limiting and we can try some easy experimentation. If we pan an outside view in Unlimited fps, the angular velocity alters depending on the complexity of the rendering. The control inputs seem stuck in unison with the view. If we set fixed fps and pan the view, the rotation rate keeps the same, and the control inputs seem disconnected from the constraint of the rendering speed.

 

So with Unlimited we are OK while going straight ahead in a tube, but when banking and turning a glider it can seem less fluid.

 

Below 30fps on a computer monitor is not like tv or films at 24fps etc. as they work by persistence of image. On the computer screen we are aware of the fps, like we are aware of the changes to an old style CRT monitor - when we set refresh between 72 and 80, we can see the difference.

 

Instead with the sim, we can concentrate on getting the time between frames consistent. 20fps smooth is better than an unsteady, peaky 30fps, which could show up worse with head tracking.

 

Another thing about Unlimited is that some addons, like head tracking, may be running on a frame by frame basis and can pull performance down as they increase their cpu overhead as fps increases.

[ComSimPilot 623]

That's the catch!  :excl: :mellow:

 

Running the fixed fps in P3D (and FSX) is not a simple frame rate limit, like the setting in NI or an external limiter. Fixed fps in-sim invokes D3D look ahead frames. Look ahead frames, or pre-rendering, adds an initial cost to the maximum frame rate. This is often mistaken for a bug, so although we may see 60fps with Unlimited setting, we find we can only lock at 30 to 40 - because of the cost of look ahead pre-rendering. We can set the look ahead frames to 1 in CP or NI to reduce it (default 3), but is still not exactly the same as Unlimited. With pre-rendering some other work is done in our favour, so that the GPU can apply new detail in a smoother fashion. We should be able to get a smoother overall result by setting the in-sim fixed fps setting, (and matching that with NI fps limit if the setting allows), but we lose out on high fps. :excl: :mellow:

 

Thank you Steve! So, you suggest limiting the Frame Rate inside P3D, and using the same frame rate in NI frame limiter? I think the problem then is that users with TrackIR (like me) will get stutters because I suppose the pre-rendered frames cannot pre-render where our head will move. I will try setting this to 1 and see if it's smoother.

[SteveW 1,792]

Yes you would get very small lag, but it won't stutter.


...When testing P3D turn the menu off (hold down Alt) since this induces stuttering. Another thing to note is that up to a certain point we can get smooth frames with P3D, cross that point, by fixing too high or setting sliders too high, and we cannot get rid of stutters, period.

[RJC68 823]

Hi Julian 

 

I haven't tried running with unlimited fps yet.  Hopefully that improves things somewhat.

 

I also installed EZDOK last night which I was very happy about, but couldn't imagine that it would be the cause of laggy TIR 

 

I have tried locking frames at various different values, nothing is as smooth as Vsync - on and FPS unlimited. I use a 42" 1080P LED TV for my main monitor and I had been using a VGA cable to DVI adapter. I tried an HDMI cable last night and it is way better. I could never get things looking right with the HDMI on FSX. I even did a quick test using DSR and it looks awesome. I could never get this working properly using the VGA cable.

 

I really am thinking about leaving FSX for good now

 

Richard

Also trying to find the sweet spot...but I'm not satisfied with the image quality of the suggested settings.

 

I have a very satisfactory result using the following:

 

------------------------------------

Prepar3D:

 

FXAA: On

MSAA: 4x

Texture Filtering: 4x

Texture Resolution: High 2048 x 2048

Vsync: On

Triple Buffering: On

Frame rate: Unlimited 

 

Nvidia Control Panel:

 

DSR: 2x, Smoothness: 20%

Maximum pre-rendered frames: 3

Multi-display/mixed-GPU acceleration: Single display performance mode

Texture filtering quality: High quality

Triple buffering: On

Vsync: Adaptive

 

Nvidia Inspector:

 

Default - no settings

 

Prepar3D.cfg

 

Default - no tweaks

 

------------------------------------

 

 

These are not any "scientifically driven" kind of settings, but a trial and error attempt trying to find a smooth result.

Maybe it would be good to try using a frame rate limit inside P3D.

 

 

Try it and report back if you like...If we ever find that graphic's nirvana..we'll all be happy.

 

I am in a position that I am not sure if smoothness is more important than graphics. When you see what you can get with these settings in terms of image clarity, you think that you "saw the light" and anything else with some shimmers degrades the whole experience.

 

Try adding the following to your p3D.cfg

 

FFTF 0.01

TBM - 120 

 

I also turn triple buffering off in P3D, I have Vsync set to Adaptive in Nvidia Control Panel

 

That's all I have, we have similar setups and I am loving P3D

[Eric Bakker 7]

Steve, what do you advise (to try) regarding the use of TrackIR in the sim? I noticed that moving my head induces more stutter than banking the aircraft, and it also seems that using 'mouse look' to pan around is more fluid than TrackIR. Is there a logic and a sweet spot?

 

Also, are their numbers that are with the limiter to avoid, or ones to favour? I mean using 23 or 27 makes no difference technically? Or do I need to divide something or multiply to get ideal fps numbers?

 

And, if I use 20 it means that it will go under it a lot of the times it seems, loosing fluidity. I tried 25 with pretty good results.

 

Last point: what is the use for using both P3D frame limiter and an outside one (like NI) at the same time?

[SteveW 1,792]

Steve, what do you advise (to try) regarding the use of TrackIR in the sim? I noticed that moving my head induces more stutter than banking the aircraft, and it also seems that using 'mouse look' to pan around is more fluid than TrackIR. Is there a logic and a sweet spot?

 

Also, are their numbers that are with the limiter to avoid, or ones to favour? I mean using 23 or 27 makes no difference technically? Or do I need to divide something or multiply to get ideal fps numbers?

 

And, if I use 20 it means that it will go under it a lot of the times it seems, loosing fluidity. I tried 25 with pretty good results.

 

Last point: what is the use for using both P3D frame limiter and an outside one (like NI) at the same time?

I don't get that. Looking around the VC with TIR in Unlimited and not fixed in NI, is a lurching disaster compared to 20fps fixed in P3D and PS_FRAMERATE_LIMITER_FPS_20 in NI - smooth panning of view outside or in the VC. I'm using DisplayPort.

 

 

...If the monitor is, say, 60Hz refresh, and we choose to fix our fps at a division of that, (15, 20, 30, 60), then our frames will coincide with the monitor refresh more often, and can reduce micro-stutter.

[Eric Bakker 7]

...If the monitor is, say, 60Hz refresh, and we choose to fix our fps at a division of that, (15, 20, 30, 60), then our frames will coincide with the monitor refresh more often, and can reduce micro-stutter.

 

I assume I would need to turn Vsync on in P3D for that, or is it not necessary?

[SteveW 1,792]

No, vsync is about holding the frames for the start of the monitor redraw so that there is no line produced someway down the view. It's not a line but rather a mismatch in that place between the last frame and the new. So with vsync=on only the completed frame is shown.

[ErichB 3,642]

Also trying to find the sweet spot...but I'm not satisfied with the image quality of the suggested settings.

 

I have a very satisfactory result using the following:

 

------------------------------------

Prepar3D:

 

FXAA: On

MSAA: 4x

Texture Filtering: 4x

Texture Resolution: High 2048 x 2048

Vsync: On

Triple Buffering: On

Frame rate: Unlimited 

 

Nvidia Control Panel:

 

DSR: 2x, Smoothness: 20%

Maximum pre-rendered frames: 3

Multi-display/mixed-GPU acceleration: Single display performance mode

Texture filtering quality: High quality

Triple buffering: On

Vsync: Adaptive

 

Nvidia Inspector:

 

Default - no settings

 

Prepar3D.cfg

 

Default - no tweaks

 

------------------------------------

 

 

These are not any "scientifically driven" kind of settings, but a trial and error attempt trying to find a smooth result.

Maybe it would be good to try using a frame rate limit inside P3D.

 

 

Try it and report back if you like...If we ever find that graphic's nirvana..we'll all be happy.

 

I am in a position that I am not sure if smoothness is more important than graphics. When you see what you can get with these settings in terms of image clarity, you think that you "saw the light" and anything else with some shimmers degrades the whole experience.

 

 

Daedalus

 

I used all of your settings this evening and... amazing!

 

My frames are now between 27 and 35 with the internal limiter set to unlimited.  The sim also looks good visually.  My stuttering and lagginess has disappeared.

 

Thanks to Steve and yourself and everyone else for making suggestions.  This is the best state my P3D has been in since V2 was released.   I did a quick flight in the 777 at OMDB.  Amazing,

 

 

thanks again

[ComSimPilot 623]

 Erich,

 

I am very glad I was able to help...we try and see if settings improve the flight experience.

 

Some more tweaks you may try additive to the previous configuration I posted, taking into account the Steve's and Richard's suggestions, I use them now and I get an improvement:

 

-------------------------------------------

Nvidia Inspector:

 

Frame Rate limiter : 30fps

 

Prepar3D.cfg:

 

[Main]

FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION=0.01

 

[Display]
TEXTURE_BANDWIDTH_MULT=120

-------------------------------------------

 

 

I have very smooth results...try and see if you also get any improvement.

 

Steve and Richard..thanks again.

[ErichB 3,642]

 

 Erich,

 

I am very glad I was able to help...we try and see if settings improve the flight experience.

 

Some more tweaks you may try additive to the previous configuration I posted, taking into account the Steve's and Richard's suggestions, I use them now and I get an improvement:

 

-------------------------------------------

Nvidia Inspector:

 

Frame Rate limiter : 30fps

 

Prepar3D.cfg:

 

[Main]

FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION=0.01

 

[Display]

TEXTURE_BANDWIDTH_MULT=120

-------------------------------------------

 

 

I have very smooth results...try and see if you also get any improvement.

 

Steve and Richard..thanks again.

 

 

Thanks Ifikratis

 

I've already got the Fiber Frame Fraction tweak in my .cfg. but will try the Texure Bandwidth tweak this evening.

[ComSimPilot 623]

Thanks Ifikratis

 

I've already got the Fiber Frame Fraction tweak in my .cfg. but will try the Texure Bandwidth tweak this evening.

 

You're welcome! I think the frame limiter inside NI did make a significant difference too.

[ErichB 3,642]

 

 

You're welcome! I think the frame limiter inside NI did make a significant difference too.

 

I've deleted the NI profile.  From what I experienced last night, I think I'm happy with what its giving me, so I'll consider that it  'aint broken' so won't try to fix it anymore....for now.. :smile:

[SolRayz 392]

 

[Main]

FIBER_FRAME_TIME_FRACTION=0.01

 

This setting creates more problems than its worth. Sure its smoother, but you will get blurries and popups.