(Another) Low FPS On A Great Computer

[khumak]

Maybe the performance bottleneck for the FNV engine is different than Skyrim, but after a lot of testing in Skyrim I discovered that for me the performance bottleneck in Skyrim was amount of video memory on my video card. 

In my case with no mods at all except ENB + SKSE + SKYUI + a few memory mods and an FPS/memory utilization meter I was getting a consistent 60 FPS inside and a horrible 15-30 FPS outside with relatively common dips into single digits.  With over 100 mods added + 2-4k HQ texture mods + max quality settings for lighting and visuals, no change in FPS.  With DynDOLOD set to very low texture size for distant objects but 2-4k textures for nearby objects and all other visual settings at max I get 40-50 FPS outside and a constant 60 inside.

I'm definitely curious what sort of difference I'll see when I try Fallout again.  The only visual enhancement I had to turn off in Skyrim was an enhanced grasses mod that seems to be a huge memory hog.

It's also quite possible that someone with a better computer than mine could have a different bottleneck.  My video card is a 2GB GTX 760.

My understanding of the way ugridstoload and DynDOLOD work though makes me think video memory was in fact your bottleneck as well.  Increasing ugridstoload basically tells the game to load full sized textures for distant objects.  From what I understand, setting ugridstoload higher can also break quests by making the game trigger things that normally only happen when you're close enough to actually see them happening except now you'll miss it.

DynDOLOD basically lets you tell the game to display lower size textures for distant objects instead of the full sized textures so it saves a huge amount of memory especially if you reduce the sizes from it's default.  Not sure if there's something similar for Fallout, I haven't looked yet.  I'm guessing you'd need a couple of 8GB video cards in SLI to be able to set ugridstoload much higher than 5 without massive performance loss though.

(edit: Out of curiousity I went and looked for a comparable FNV mod and there does seem to be one called Lodgen http://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/58562/? )

Haven't tried it so no idea how it compares to DynDOLOD as far as ease of use or feature set.

[jlf65]

If you want grass without the slow down, use GoS - Grass on Steroids. It's the most awesome grass mod out. I get faster rates with more grass than in vanilla.

[RoyBatty]

You can increase the grass distance if you have NVAC installed, it fixes the 3000 distance bug. I set it to 14000 myself.

[jlf65]

Hmm - no one noticed that my reply was on a Skyrim mod, not FONV. Sorry, was playing Skyrim at the time and had Skyrim on the brain.

[khumak]

[quote=jlf65]

 

Hmm - no one noticed that my reply was on a Skyrim mod, not FONV. Sorry, was playing Skyrim at the time and had Skyrim on the brain.

[/quote]

 

Haha, well most of my post was also about Skyrim.  The grass mod that I had to disable was the one from Enhanced Landscapes.  It looks good but my FPS drops from 40-50 outside without it to less than 20 with it.  Will have to try the one you mentioned but I think I'm already just at the edge of my video memory with my current setup.

I did notice that with the FO3 engine my FPS went up significantly if I disabled all grass (even the vanilla grass), but I didn't have any sort of FPS meter or anything so I can't quantify how much.  Basically choppiness and stuttering went away without it.

Planning to do some stress testing similar to Skyrim when I get around to reinstalling TTW but I'm having fun with Skyrim for now.  It was actually Skyrim SE that prompted me to start playing it again til I discovered that SKSE doesn't work so most of the mods I like don't work on it.  So I'm playing regular Skyrim, not SE.  It was free though so can't complain too much.

[jlf65]

I don't know - at the same relative settings, FO3/NV is between 50 and 100 percent faster than Skyrim on my A6-5400 APU. It was worse before I optimized the shadow settings and starting using GoS. I also remove the smoke and most particle effects on Skyrim. About the only place I notice Skyrim being faster is in loading - it gets to the main menu faster, and saves load in half the time.

 

[khumak]

You mean someone has a worse graphics card that me?  *shocked*

[jlf65]

[quote=luthien]

 

I should have excluded APUs and other IGPs from that statement. The 7540D chipset in the video side of your APU is quite terrible. :(

[/quote]

Got that right - it's on the bare edge of playable much of the time. I'm about ready for a new system, but still need to scrimp some bucks to put it together. Ideally, I want one that'll play Doom 2016 and Fallout 4/Skyrim SE at 1920x1080 at a decent rate (at least 40 FPS on the low side). I always put my own systems together using cheap on sale parts from New Egg. You can often find CPUs in a bundle deal with memory and a motherboard. I got the APU with a mobo and 8GB of ram for less than $150. It's served its purpose... done its duty. Now it's time to retire it with honors.

 

[khumak]

[quote=jlf65]

 

If you want grass without the slow down, use GoS - Grass on Steroids. It's the most awesome grass mod out. I get faster rates with more grass than in vanilla.

[/quote]

Finally got around to trying this and I do take a performance hit but still leaves me at a playable level.  Way less of a performance hit than I get with the grass from SFO or Enhanced Landscapes. 

Haven't decided yet if the nicer grass or a little better FPS makes more difference to me.  I lose about 5-10 FPS with it.  I think as long as my FPS never goes below 35 I'm probably fine.

[jlf65]

It makes more grass than vanilla, so you can turn down the grass a bit to get the same amount of grass, but without the speed hit. I believe that's mentioned in the description with a few numbers given for a few levels of grass people might be interested in.