Hi guys,

I am really impressed with LFS so far, but before purchasing a license there is one or two issues I'd like to clear up as if these things can't be improved I think I'd rather wait for the next release.

The most important one is frame-rate!

I can run the game with the graphics absolutely maxed-out on everything, and as long as there is no AI around, the framerate is fine (70+FPS). However, the addition of a three or four AI cars makes for a totally different story, especially when they are close to the player car. The addition of any decent amount of AI cars (10+) makes the game simply unplayable (stuttering and dropping under 20FPS). I've tried modifying the graphics settings, but even if I put them down low, the game stutters badly when more than two or three AI cars are visible but then runs perfectly smoothly once they are gone (above 70fps).

Is this due to the AI logic or is it a graphics hit because of the extra cars? I'm thinking it must be AI logic otherwise I can't understand how people could play this online? Is there anything that can be done to improve this?

For comparisons sake, I run GTR2 with everything totally maxed out, including high-res cockpits etc. and it runs perfectly smoothly even with a full field of cars in wet conditions at night (e.i. 20fps at absolute worst, average about 40fps in traffic). I just can't understand why only a couple of AI cars in LFS causes such a massive frame-rate hit.

FYI, my computer is a MacBook Pro, 2.4ghz core 2 duo, 2GB Ram, with NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT, and of course I run LFS using Windows (XP).

Any help appreciated.

The AI do decrease your fps much more than human players. If you're getting 70 fps in single player, then you'll probably have no issues with even a full multiplayer grid.

Hope to see you in S2 soon

Strange, your computer should have handled it better. But when that is said, the current AI demands a shitload of the prossessor, so say that me, got like 250+ fps alone, with full field of AI`s in front of me it`s down to 45-60fps, it really takes hard on the FPS.

How are you running Windows XP?

If it through parralells then you may ind major issues, through bootcamp you shouldn't have any problems

I have same spec MacBook Pro on Vista and I run minimum of 70FPS with 20 AI on track.....

I'm running XP through bootcamp.

Do you think installing Vista would make such a difference?

It's seriously unplayable for me once there is more than, say three or four, AI cars visible and especially so if they are close.

With no AI, it often goes above 100fps.

Yes, it's more than likely the AI. My frame rate solo is somewhere around 140, but a screen of AIs takes it to about 14. Add to that the fact that LFS doesn't use a lot of gfx card features and is very dependant on the CPU for things that can be handed to the GPU these days and it creates some strain.

Obviously your rate will drop when you go online anyway, because the physics for all the cars and objects is generated on-the-fly by the software, rather than just position updates.

If you can play online on the demo, you should have no problems with the S2 content.

Quote from J@tko :

The AI do decrease your fps much more than human players. If you're getting 70 fps in single player, then you'll probably have no issues with even a full multiplayer grid.

Hope to see you in S2 soon

Hmmm ... well that's good news!! Still if Thorvertonian can run 20+ AI on the same machine with no problems then there's no reason I shouldn't be able to as well!

I have no issues with any other game on my (new) Mac!

As for seeing me soon ... well. ... I have to practice more before playing online. Strange, I've been playing racing sims for so long on and off but I always seem to suck at them! Just don't have the patience I guess.

Quote from Thorvertonian :

How are you running Windows XP?

If it through parralells then you may ind major issues, through bootcamp you shouldn't have any problems

I have same spec MacBook Pro on Vista and I run minimum of 70FPS with 20 AI on track.....

Is that 20 AI cars, or 20 players online?

Quote :

Is that 20 AI cars, or 20 players online?

Quote :

I run minimum of 70FPS with 20 AI on track.....

.

erm thanks... :nerd:

If it's not already obvious, I just wanted to double check that he actually meant computer controlled AI and was not lumping AI in the same basket as human controlled opposition.

Definetly AI, but I made a bit of mistake, it does go lower, but I get a minimum of 33FPS, with an average of 70FPS with 20 AI

sorry, my fault! Blame work, my brain on meltdown!

Damn that's weird. I mean, good for you, but why does just two or three AI cars make mine stutter!? And I have exactly the same system.

Also, no problems with any other games. That's just weird. And annoying.

Do you have the graphics maxed-out?

Maybe it's sound-related? Try switching the sound off (Shift-N) while testing.

I don`t think it`s a problem releated to sound, it just demands a lot of the CPU

So, my advice would be eighter run with less AI`s, or try online, would be more FPS.

Quote from The Very End :

I don`t think it`s a problem releated to sound, it just demands a lot of the CPU

So, my advice would be eighter run with less AI`s, or try online, would be more FPS.

There is a poster in this thread with exactly the same system as me that runs it fine with 20 AI! I can't run it with 3 AI!

Well, that's exaggerating. I can run it, but if all 3 are visible at once, and close by, my frame-rate would drop from 80 or 90 to around 20 or even below.

Maybe there is some problems with your computer. Anything special on the computer? Virus, spyware, adware ect etc.

Nope. Nothing special. It's pretty much a fresh Windows install too.

For comparisons sake, It runs GTR2 perfectly with everything on maximum and a full field of traffic. So it's not the computer.

Okay ... this is really weird...

As an experiment, I just ran a spectator-race with a full field (can only put 12) cars with everything on full.

The frame rate averaged probably around 45, however at times it would stutter badly for 1-2 second and drop down to 18. I can't pick exactly when or why it is doing this, as often the full field is visible and it's running at 45 fps, but then suddenly drops to 20 fps for a second or two without any obvious rhyme or reason.

Anyway, so I decided to fiddle with the graphics and see if I could get it to run smoother. I did the following.

Z-Buffer Depth to 16 from 24
Shadow type to low res from high res
Sky to 16bit from 32bit
Car and helmet skins to compressed from full.

Now it runs even worse!! Dropping down to 9FPS at times!!

What on earth is going on?

Perhaps run LFS in a window and monitor CPU/system/resources/load ?

This is a benchmark for LFS , is relatively simple to follow.

http://lfsbench.iron.eu.org/?c=completemax

People seem to forget how much the AI drains CPU time.
Compare the high detail setting to the min.

http://lfsbench.iron.eu.org/?c=completemin

Two things I can think of:

1) are you using AA and AF? These can lower performance quite a bit. Try adjusting them a little.
2) as for the 1-2 second stuttering: might want to increase the priority of LFS in task manager, in case it's some other process that's using a lot of processor cycles every now and then.

Quote from Ikaponthus :

I have to practice more before playing online. Strange, I've been playing racing sims for so long on and off but I always seem to suck at them! Just don't have the patience I guess.

You will learn a lot more, a lot quicker, racing online than you ever will driving against the crappy AI.

You will also get a lot a decent setups if you race online.

Thanks Gnomie - well I have those things set to "hardware controlled" in the Nvidia display panel.

And it's not another task. Through trial I have discovered that the frame-rate just drops at the same point on the track, but at the point there is nothing special happening. E.g. at one instance you might have a full view of the track with 8 cars in view and it's running at 50FPS. 20m down the road, the view is almost identical but it starts stuttering at 15-18FPS, even though there is no more complicated visuals etc. If I watch the AI doing laps as a spectator it happens in the same spots every time.

Quote from Ikaponthus :

I did the following.

Z-Buffer Depth to 16 from 24


What on earth is going on?

You answered yourself there. If you're decreasing the Z-Buffer Depth, you'll get less FPS. More=better.

Ah thanks for clearing that much up!

Quote from Gil07 :

You answered yourself there. If you're decreasing the Z-Buffer Depth, you'll get less FPS. More=better.

I don't see how lower Z-buffer precision would affect FPS negatively. You'd probably see more display corruptions with chalk lines etc. but I doubt the FPS would drop.

Anyway, going to 16 bit for textures and framebuffers on modern hardware (like the 8600) is pointless since they use 24/32 bit precision internally anyway. More performant 16 bit died around the GeForce FX era.

Things worth trying are Dynamic LOD reduction under the Misc tab, and the other LOD settings too. These will help when there's a lot of cars around. Also make sure your Macbook is plugged in when you play to prevent it from going into power-saving mode (which is slow).