In general, the mirrors hamper performance for slow systems, and yes the LOD and resolution is affecting it all. On a slow system, your only best option is to disable the Mirrors completely, and you'll notice at least a 10-20 FPS boost on a slow system. At the cost of having no mirrors of course.

The Multiplayer Car draw for the visibility of the cars is indeed a crude way of optimizing how many cars you want visible in front or behind your position, because you lose the ability to see the cars in long distances... or, if you want it really low, starting on a grid you wont see an accident ahead of you or cars that are really close... because the dynamic lod reduction removes cars even when the set distance is fairly far.

As much as I don't like saying this, I really think LFS could make use of really simple LOD models of the cars that look like boxes. This would be only on slower systems that need to make use of better LOD options, but it would help A LOT. The cars aren't always the reason for FPS drops though, I blame it on the tracks for being pretty detailed... even when you want the LOD levels down a bunch. The tracks cause a lot of FPS drops. Heck, even on my slow system, the last chicane on Aston National is really undriveable with the lowest possible graphics settings and no other cars present. The Simple Track option doesn't even do anything either, the track looks exactly the same (does anyone EVER notice a difference if you use this option???).

This, plus the stutters from players pitting, is just a bad mix for anyone.

lfs already has such models Tweaker - when running 23 cars on the current compatible patch they appear.

I know there are such models, but they only appear under very extreme conditions. Why can't I see them when I want them too? Would help LOADS for FPS.

You have to set the dynamic lod reduction to the highest value (1.0). This will make the cars look like boxes at the start, but increases the FPS quite a lot.

Quote from Tweaker :

[ snip ]

the stutters from players pitting, is just a bad mix for anyone.

This has always been and is still one of the biggest downfalls of the LFS netcode. I've had this since the first day I played S1 demo back in '04 and get this still today, which is why I much prefer a server with no midrace join enabled (not that people should be entering a track that has an ongoing race anyway).. but you always get retards who decide that as soon as they connect online, now's the time to start popping in and out of the pits to adjust their setup

The other thing as mentioned, WTF does LFS act like a women with connections and only be able to do one thing at a time? Why can't someone connect and someone pit? It's friggin' ridiculous! and don't understand how complex physics maths can be achieved yet a simple threading or similar can't be done for this area of the game

LFS netcode has always been good and shone way brighter than anything else IMO.. right now, rFactor has better netcode IMO.. why? because I can pit, join, quit and don't get lag when people pop in and out of the pits in rF, something I can't with LFS... oh and have also had perfectly smooth 40 car grids.

I think to summarise, LFS is now dated and needs a serious overhaul in many areas to bring it up to "today's standards".. it was once king in the online arena, but that title's slipped and only slipping further as the weeks tick away.

On a plus note, the cars feel better to drive these days.. but only when an LSD is used.. had a few _great_ races and battles last night.. something that I hadn't managed to do for a long time. FZ5 and LX6 in particular have actually become quite pleasant to drive and interesting to race

Just my £0.02 worth FWIW.



Regards,

Ian

Quote from Ian.H :

FZ5 and LX6 in particular have actually become quite pleasant to drive and interesting to race

I concur... + RAC has also become usable. The jump in driveability is like when the new tire fizics came out last April.

I don't know what clutch preload is, but I sure do like it.

Hey there! =)
I've noticed some bug. well it shows up when playing replay recorded in W17 patch (also was on W9). All goes fine until someone goes to Pits. Then the OOS error appears. I've tried it only with single player replays, don't know what about multiplayer

P.S. If I'm missing something, tell me pls. I read about some problems with replays in other patches, but no word of probs in W9 and W17

Quote from GP4Flo :

You have to set the dynamic lod reduction to the highest value (1.0). This will make the cars look like boxes at the start, but increases the FPS quite a lot.

I still don't think anyone is understanding this. Dynamic Lod Reduction (@ 1.0) won't make the cars look like boxes if I just have 6 or 8 cars around me. There has to be a whole lot more cars nearby for it to actually become effective. And if the cars are very close, they are in their true shape. That is the problem with big grid starts, where if you have tons of cars near you on the start (say Aston frontstraight where you 3-car wide caravans), FPS just drops hard. LOD doesn't really help though, because it is constantly changing from [performance -> quality -> performance], and never at one set amount of quality. That's not a very good way of optimizing graphics is it?

Anyways, this is all just another spinoff discussion regarding FPS and improvements.

I agree Ian

Quote from tristancliffe :

This issue needs to be brought up again. Perhaps W17+n can have some sort of queuing system built in? So if a Player is Leaving or Joining, the LFS just waits 5 seconds and tries again automatically. After a few tries (or if Cancel Join Request is clicked) then it gives up.

Otherwise it's becoming quite easy to get Too Many Clicks errors, which I've managed to avoid almost entirely in the past.

there should rather be a complete change to how you join and disconnect
it should somehow be done in a way that doesnt influence any other connection to the server ie you wont get that annoying "cant pit" message and two drivers can connect at the same time (not sure if the later can be done)

Quote from Tweaker :

As much as I don't like saying this, I really think LFS could make use of really simple LOD models of the cars that look like boxes.

or for starters low lod models that still look somewhat good (and dont constantly change like you posted yourself)

but for me the biggest problem is that lfs currently only seems to be able to reduce the lod on the cars
especially at the start im focusing on other cars and even on my fairly quick system they fade in and out of high lod constantly making the scene very uneven and nasty
why doesnt lfs reduce the track lod first before it starts to reduce the lod of the things youre actually looking at ie cars ?

Quote from tristancliffe :

This issue needs to be brought up again. Perhaps W17+n can have some sort of queuing system built in? So if a Player is Leaving or Joining, the LFS just waits 5 seconds and tries again automatically. After a few tries (or if Cancel Join Request is clicked) then it gives up.

Otherwise it's becoming quite easy to get Too Many Clicks errors, which I've managed to avoid almost entirely in the past.

http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?t=23489

Quote from Renku :

How much optimisation can there be (I dunno of course), do you want 32 cars on grid and MX 440 as VGA card? Nobody is forcing you to go 20+ server. I know my 9600XT will certainly choke, but I won't ask Scawen to stop developing LFS because of that (adding more racer slots in this case). In leagues like MoE, it would be understandable if there is a requirement: "participant's PC must be powerful enough to handle 32 cars on track (+ spectators).

Man,

I have 7900GT and no matter if I set AA from 2x to 8x I have still same FPS no matter how many cars is on the screen.Even when I set it to 16xAA then I have like 5 percent drop so LFS even cant use potential of my graphic card at all.Also doesnt matter if I change resolution.I also dont understand when setting LOD lower there is FPS boost but where I set AA higher there is no FPS drop.Doesnt make sense to me.

I think nice function for 3D engine would be INSTANCING for the car models so it is called thru API only once and not several times but LFS would need to upgradfe to DX9.I think this would give us some FPS boost with many cars.I see many possibilities but I think there is hardly any place to dig the performance just using DX8.DX9 should be more effective in using vertex shadding and other DX features.Probably DX8.1 over DX8 too.

I have A64 3200+ and since LFS cant use more then 1 core this might became quite a issue with 32 cars because there are not many people around who have so great PCs.Even when you have A64 X2 processor runnin at 2.6Ghz its still like since core A64 2.6Ghz so same performance.

LFS was always about that you dont have to have megamachine to run LFS fine.I am also for every progress with LFS which makes sense.32 cars field is nice addition but might cause some issues at start/T1.I know the best is to have 50FPS for smooth driving.I want progress but discussion is usefull too in some cases.

Just quickly looking at LFS unofficial benchmarks site:
average-mix-max.
1 falcon5 0.5W Core 2 Duo E6400 @3.333G 2048 Radeon X1950 XT (512) - - 143.161 89 207
2 Dizman 0.5W Opteron DC 2200 @3G 2048 Radeon X1950 XTX (512) - - 93.09 58 132

Thats with just few AIs.How many people have Intel Exxx runnning over 3GHz - just few people.


I dont know where else can Scawen dig mor performance but there should be done either optimization with LFS 3D engine or rest of the code otherwise adding more cars to be able to race with them is getting quite useless.Its fine during race but at start or T1 it might became a pain for people with less PC spec. then me and I dont have megame performance PC.

I wanted to become quite with such a responses and only help with testing and reporting bugs but you made me forced to answer.I would consider a bit discussion about this "issue".


EDIT:I have noticed with servers having many cars that when LFS shows message "player xxx connected" the connection bars get quite high for all copnnected people for like 1-2 sec (looks like small lag)and then its normal again.Tested on several W17 servers and it was always the same.I dont know the servers spec so it might be the slow connection they run on or maybe its something else - bug?

Quote from Shotglass :

there should rather be a complete change to how you join and disconnect
it should somehow be done in a way that doesnt influence any other connection to the server ie you wont get that annoying "cant pit" message and two drivers can connect at the same time (not sure if the later can be done)

I thini this is quite important for bigger servers. Even with 20 people on same server it can be quite a pain to get out/in. I have never managed to get in with first try if the server has many racers. And it will be very painful with full 32 racers. If nothing, at least there might be something to make the whole process of joining/leaving/pitting/spectating/changing options faster so that it would not happen so often that two actions happen at the same time.

The strange thing is that never had any join lag or pit-join-lag or stutter before V version. After that I have had these mysterious stutters which come from nowhere and usually destroy my race. The good thing is that those are extrememly rare. But very destructive.

If left untouched the collision detection and the inability to join/ leave/etc. at the same time will make the online experience a bit more struggle than it is now.

If you think that because you have lots of cars around you your video card can't handdle them and that's why your FPS drop you might be right, only if you have a really old video card like a GF440, otherwise the main FPS drawback is from CPU and belive it or not it's from the sound engine, try to disable your sound card and then run LFS, you'll see that you get a lot more of FPS, this applies to the start grid when all the cars around you are making varous sounds killing your CPU.

Another way to test that is to watch a replay in 2x, that way LFS automatically disables sound, you'll see a sudden increase of FPS.

Quote from LFSn00b :

W17? I have missed 7 patches...

I have missed all W new patches :chairfall

hmm sry to this but is W17 compatible with W10 hosts ? i need know before update

First thing i saw when i fired up W17 using pitspotter....

Quote :

InSim : first byte in packet does not match size

Im assuming this is due to the changes made in the Insim system??

Quote from theycallmeebryan :

Im assuming this is due to the changes made in the Insim system??

read: http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?p=404558#post404558

Hmm, If LFS is a sim, I would Know in what races there are 32 cars..

Quote from ESPAÑA[XTM] :

Hmm, If LFS is a sim, I would Know in what races there are 32 cars..

NASCAR has 43 or so

Someones less in oval?

Quote from ESPAÑA[XTM] :

Someones less in oval?

Fia GT, LMS, ALMS etc

Carrera Cup and similar Clubman Cups have that many cars on the grid

32 at Bathurst

in our stock car we have 43 cars in a grid, none of the tracks are oval

Insim packets changed again :
What is your real quest dear devs ?
You wanna ruin regularly all mods helping organisers to manage leagues in progress ?
Why you are not able to keep compatibility between each new change ?