Your PC specs seem very good, that CPU speed is much more than enough for LFS. Sorry I don't know what the reason could be. There must be some kind of problem. It may be worth making a special post in the technical assistance section (possibly include your graphics card in the thread title) maybe there is some kind of issue with it, maybe someone else has solved that in the past.

If you haven't already, check what's your z-buffer depth (at the bottom of 'Options > Graphics'). If it's 24-bit, try reducing it to 16-bit. Having said that, I get massive lag and fps spikes in Y when there's more than 1 car near so who knows

hey, i am playing patch y online one day, i have never used the bmw racer, but i liked it and played it for several games...

but... the thing is, when i switched back to the normal sports cars... my shifter doesn't work... i tried reconfiguring my controls but nothing worked... so now i am stuck playing the bmw car...

can anyone help me?

Quote from atlantian :

hey, i am playing patch y online one day, i have never used the bmw racer, but i liked it and played it for several games...

but... the thing is, when i switched back to the normal sports cars... my shifter doesn't work... i tried reconfiguring my controls but nothing worked... so now i am stuck playing the bmw car...

can anyone help me?

What controller are you using? Keyboard, mouse or wheel?

Try these ones:
1) Shift+g
2) shift+c

Quote from Gekkibi :

What controller are you using? Keyboard, mouse or wheel?

Try these ones:
1) Shift+g
2) shift+c

i am using an xbox 360 controller, but apparently it's not the problem, because i tried the shoulder buttons in other games, and i tried testing it in XBCD and i tried testing it in the control configuration menu in LFS. and i tried shifting with the default "s" and " x" shift buttons of the keyboard...

thx, btw, i will try that when i get home!

Quote from Tony1011 :

First of all scawen i apologize for my post, i'm very frustrated coz i'm unable to play LFS.

I've tried everything lowered all the settings. Infact i'm using the same configuration which i used in patch X. I even reinstalled OS & also upgraded the RAM. I even got my graphic card replaced from the vendor coz i thought there might be a fault there. I've even got 2 extra cabinet fans installed to keep my processor & graphic card temp down. After doing all this stuff my other games are working more better now. But did not find any change in LFS.

30 FPS is not bad at all. But when it comes down to 5-10 FPS it is simply unplayable. It only lags when a car is near me, near the pitstand & the first turn in blackwood.

Below is my PC configuration

Intel 3.2Ghz HT, 2GB 500DDR2 RAM, Nvidia 7300GT Graphic card

I felt the same fps problems when patch y came...
And im still having them... it as became a bit of a problem when a lot of cars are very close...or when im in midlefield. Even when i do lfs videos i can tell that my fps are lower.
Its sad when we have to quit the position and step aside just to not cause an accident.
In the older patch's my pc work fine....now...(and i only notice on lfs) with new patch....my pc seems outdated.
( P4 2,800mhz, 1GB Ram, Nvidia 7600 gs, samsung 19" wide screen)
Its not a new pc, but the fact is that it used to work just fine.
And i read other people talking about the same thing on servers.
I just think the fps drop from a patch to other a litle to big imo. I would understand if we were talking about LFS final version...but i don't think thats the case.
One think i used to like about lfs, was the fact that it was very light program... almost every avarage home pc would run it. And i used to recomend the sim to other people, because of that. Now it seems to me that we need a strong and expensive computer to go online on half-full and full servers.

We (poor people) need a lfs robin wood

Well... I think your PC specs are more than enough, LFS runs well on a 2GHz processor with an older graphics card like a Radeon 9800, as long as there aren't TOO many cars nearby.
Maybe there is some kind of problem on your PC between your graphics drivers and LFS. I feel it is probably not caused by the new patch. The new patch resulted in a bit lower frame rates due to the higher res textures and FBM car model, but nothing like the FPS drop you are talking about. There are always people who say a new patch has slowed down their frame rate, but when they finally try the previous version, they find their frame rate went down on that version as well, so the conclusion is that something changed on their PC, not the patch.

So... please could you try running a clean install of Version X again and see what happens? And compare that with a clean install of Version Y?

We can't really try to figure out what the problem is without some absolutely comparable results like that. It's probably best to descibe the situations where the frame rate drops down to 5 fps as well, is this on T1 in a race with many cars or is this at random times when you are driving alone?

I suggest making a new thread in the Technical assistance (with your Graphics card name in the title) so people can be alerted to your specific issue and may be able to help.

Scawen.

Since Patch Y I have been unable to play LFS due to stupidly low frame races more notibly in South City but also at other tracks too when there's more than 8 cars running (more than 3 cars on SO).

I've tried Patch X clean install and that runs fine 100+fps (down to 50fps with 10 AI cars). Then I move to a clean Patch Y install and all that drops to single digit FPS when there's more than 3 or 4 cars around online. As I understand it online uses up less of the system resources compared to running AI. Am I correct here?

With patch X i ran all graphics options menus set to the right side which as i understand it is high detail for LFS, in Y I ran with them all set to the left side with no performance increase at all compared to them all switched to the right side. I use 512x512 skins from LFSW, however I've also tried the 256x256 setting which made no difference.

I've also tried new graphics card drivers, old graphics card drivers (removing previous driver fully first), turned Hyper-Threading on/off.

Other games run fine on high details (RACE07 and rFactor), so it's not a hardware problem, it's a problem with Patch Y.

My specs are
P4 3.06GHz
2GB DDR400
GeForce 7600GS 256MB

Have you tried setting Options... Graphics... Full size textures -> NO

That is the main difference with the new South City and Blackwood compared with the old ones. Some very high resolution textures have been used and that can have severe effects on performance, depending on your graphics card.

Other than that, when you say there are frame rate issues with more than a few cars, please state which car you are using. For example, the Formula BMW has more polygons and higher resolution textures than other cars. So if your test was done with a Formula BMW then that will also affect frame rates.

By the way I'm not just asking those questions randomly, I really am interested in the answer. I suspect that maybe the textures are just too high resolution. Personally I'd be happy with lower resolution because I am trying to race, not take screen shots.

I am very interested to know just how much the frame rates are affected by the texture resolution. Maybe the solution is that LFS needs to start up using lower resolution textures by default...

I wouldn't mind betting its a HT related thing, maybe even due to having a G25 too, I have fps issues to and I noticed it ever since getting a new G25 wheel.

Quote from mr_x :

Scawen.

Since Patch Y I have been unable to play LFS due to stupidly low frame races more notibly in South City but also at other tracks too when there's more than 8 cars running (more than 3 cars on SO).

I've tried Patch X clean install and that runs fine 100+fps (down to 50fps with 10 AI cars). Then I move to a clean Patch Y install and all that drops to single digit FPS when there's more than 3 or 4 cars around online. As I understand it online uses up less of the system resources compared to running AI. Am I correct here?

With patch X i ran all graphics options menus set to the right side which as i understand it is high detail for LFS, in Y I ran with them all set to the left side with no performance increase at all compared to them all switched to the right side. I use 512x512 skins from LFSW, however I've also tried the 256x256 setting which made no difference.

I've also tried new graphics card drivers, old graphics card drivers (removing previous driver fully first), turned Hyper-Threading on/off.

Other games run fine on high details (RACE07 and rFactor), so it's not a hardware problem, it's a problem with Patch Y.

My specs are
P4 3.06GHz
2GB DDR400
GeForce 7600GS 256MB

I have the same graphic card, had the same problem, instaled DX10 and some new software, and it works great on 1024x768 with all graphic on max..

Quote from danowat :

I wouldn't mind betting its a HT related thing, maybe even due to having a G25 too, I have fps issues to and I noticed it ever since getting a new G25 wheel.

I doubt that very much, I have a P4 3GHz with HT tech, ON-Board GFX(128MB), 512MB RAM and i still get atleast 30FPS on Blackwood/South City. The only way i managed to get low FPS was by adding 20AI on BL1 in single player. And then the minium i got was 10FPS...

Quote from Scawen :

Have you tried setting Options... Graphics... Full size textures -> NO

That is the main difference with the new South City and Blackwood compared with the old ones. Some very high resolution textures have been used and that can have severe effects on performance, depending on your graphics card.

Other than that, when you say there are frame rate issues with more than a few cars, please state which car you are using. For example, the Formula BMW has more polygons and higher resolution textures than other cars. So if your test was done with a Formula BMW then that will also affect frame rates.

Full sized textures are at 'no' which made no difference either..

I usually only get time to play LFS during team nights so we use a wide variety of cars, usually TBO class, but recently it's been XFG/XRG too. Different cars/tracks don't make a difference. (apart from South City which obviously has a bigger drop).

Quote from Scawen :

I am very interested to know just how much the frame rates are affected by the texture resolution. Maybe the solution is that LFS needs to start up using lower resolution textures by default...

according to options => graphics SO with a single FBM on it takes up no more than 64mb in vram which shouldnt be too much for any remotely modern card
that said lfs does indeed have some major frame rate issues that can bring the most modern of pcs down to a crawl especially when theres a couple of cars on screen

Quote from FOX 1977 :

I just think the fps drop from a patch to other a litle to big imo.

I did a little investigation on my PC to see just how much the difference is. (I had the feeling also of more problems online in servers)

My PC specs are P4 3.2GHz 2.0GB Geforce 6600GT

I first did a clean install of patch X into a new directory, then went straight to single player (so all default settings) and selected the XFG on BL1 with 12 AI only, running 3 laps. I got the following fps results:

Start line to first corner in cockpit view of 8th car on grid average 38fps
Leading car for the reaminder of the lap had average of 70fps for the last sector
Overall range of fps observed were approx 30-90fps

I then did a clean install of patch X into another directory and patched it to version Y and repeated the above tests with the following results:

Start line to first corner in 8th car average 34fps
Leading car for last sector 70fps
Overall range observed 28-8xfps

I then did this test in the install of LFS I use normally with a grid of 20 AI with the following results:

Start line to first corner in 8th car average 25fps
Leading car for last sector 60fps
Overall range observed 19-6xfps

So overall it doesn't look unreasonable, which suggests there maybe other issues with some peoples setups. I also have a momo and G25 wheel and will try them shortly with similar test routines and report the results. I have tried to race with a grid of 20 AI before with the G25 wheel and found it was too stutterry, so maybe there is an isue with the G25 will edit this post with more soon.

Well I just tried it with me starting in the 8th position on the grid using a G25 wheel and there was no appreciable difference in fps. I'll try the same tests at SO1 in the LX6 now as that's were I noticed problems before.

Quote from Glenn67 :

I did a little investigation on my PC to see just how much the difference is. (I had the feeling also of more problems online in servers)

My PC specs are P4 3.2GHz 2.0GB Geforce 6600GT

I first did a clean install of patch X into a new directory, then went straight to single player (so all default settings) and selected the XFG on BL1 with 12 AI only, running 3 laps. I got the following fps results:

Start line to first corner in cockpit view of 8th car on grid average 38fps
Leading car for the reaminder of the lap had average of 70fps for the last sector
Overall range of fps observed were approx 30-90fps

I then did a clean install of patch X into another directory and patched it to version Y and repeated the above tests with the following results:

Start line to first corner in 8th car average 34fps
Leading car for last sector 70fps
Overall range observed 28-8xfps

I then did this test in the install of LFS I use normally with a grid of 20 AI with the following results:

Start line to first corner in 8th car average 25fps
Leading car for last sector 60fps
Overall range observed 19-6xfps

So overall it doesn't look unreasonable, which suggests there maybe other issues with some peoples setups. I also have a momo and G25 wheel and will try them shortly with similar test routines and report the results. I have tried to race with a grid of 20 AI before with the G25 wheel and found it was too stutterry, so maybe there is an isue with the G25 will edit this post with more soon.

Well I just tried it with me starting in the 8th position on the grid using a G25 wheel and there was no appreciable difference in fps. I'll try the same tests at SO1 in the LX6 now as that's were I noticed problems before.

hi.
Nice test
I was wondering if you can do the same test, but online this time...say... half-full server to get a avarage result.


To Master Scawen :

I wrote about the fps only now, because i see that more people had the same complications and i also thought that probably the problem was with my pc. It's not a new one, and wasn't the top notch when i bought it back then. It's a fact.
But also a fact is that i was using the exact same pc setup with patch X and it worked well( acceptable 80/90/100/120 fps depending on track or nº of players ), and immediately i felt the FPS drop has soon as i instaled the patch Y. I felt the "normal" fps drop from a new and better looking patch, but was after trying offline, when i decided to go test it online and the servers started to get more people, that i really started to find some major fps problems.

I always install new patchs from scratch. I save the lfs folder as backup on my hardrive, install a new and fresh one on diferent folders.
I've tryed almost everything that you and other members sugested or tested, besides upgrading.
In the end, with all the changes setting up or down the lfs graphics, working with graphic card quality setups, card drivers installs/uninstalls, directX tests, memory tests, processor tests, disk clean, defragmenter, antivírus scans, trying diferent net cables, connecting directly from the modem or with router or with switch, i decided to format hardrive, reinstall windows XP and start from scratch. It got a litle better but i still have problems on servers with more than 10-12 cars.
When im racing, i normally use low quality graphic set, because im not actually going to look at them, i use the "wheels view", and i used to use mirrors, but now i just have to look back or to the sides, all because it helps my fps go up, but i really miss that mirror with no fps lost. I only use a bit more quality when im doing some video or screenshot.

my pc:
P4 2.800 mhz, 1 GB Ram, Nvidia 7600GS, 120 GB Hardrive( almost empty ), 19" wide Samsung TFT ( btw...this screen uses his " Native resolution" witch is 1440x900, any other resolution will look really bad.), i have a 8MB connection, and i use a DFP wheel.

2 questions...

1 - Is the patch graphic improvements overloading in some way the lfs connections or servers capabilitys to run smodly or "lighter", as they did before?

2 - wouldn't be possible in the future, and since the graphics are going to be better and better each time, that LFS came in two packages.... 2 in 1 .. HD version and LD one. Each one chooses the best version for his needs.


Thanks in advanced.

There's certainly some problem when a lot of cars are on the track..
Loaded some replay yesterday to watch a cool race i had on SO chicane and FBM couple of months earliear, and FPS went down to 30 when i was having a camera on one of the back-grid'ers I think that's unacceptable as i think i have a pretty good system (C2D E6550 2.33ghz, 2 gb ram and 8600 GLH).
What will happen with new cockpits starting at the back of the grid with ~20 cars? one digit FPS?
rFactor can handlle how many, 60 cars? on server.. can't imagine the FPS having 60 cars in LFS, and from a "racing simulator, not a screenshot generator" it became one of the hungriest PC games since patch Y..
The problem is, that it seems that none of those graphical options make any difference to performance, just the looks of the game, many of my team mates are not having better performance with textures half or full, LOD adjustments and all that, maybe 2, 3 FPS up, that's it...
I know that it's 2008 and all that, people should upgrade their ancient PC's, but LFS doesn't have all this new graphical mumbo jumbo's, pixel shaders and all that, so what's the reason for this high PC load?

Well, on the other hand, LFS has an amazing physics engine, so maybe it's hogging more CPU than it should. Or it could also be that the GPU isn't given enough work to do.

I remember when the "Haze effect" was first introduced, and how drastically it improved frame rates at the time. Is there any way it can be improved a bit to give better frame rates once again? Or maybe bring in "Haze effect 2"?

Quote from shiny_red_cobra :

Well, on the other hand, LFS has an amazing physics engine, so maybe it's hogging more CPU than it should. Or it could also be that the GPU isn't given enough work to do.

Don't think it is a CPU issue at all. My CPU is only utilised 26% when LFS is running 20 AI around SO1 and only 5% when running 4 AI

My system is deffinately limited by graphics more than CPU power, which is to be expected I guess

Quote from Boris Lozac :

There's certainly some problem when a lot of cars are on the track..

The problem is, that it seems that none of those graphical options make any difference to performance, just the looks of the game, many of my team mates are not having better performance with textures half or full, LOD adjustments and all that, maybe 2, 3 FPS up, that's it...
so what's the reason for this high PC load?

Graphical options do make quite a difference on my end, say if on max settings in one point in a replay gives me 19fps when I put all settings to the min settings it will hit about 30-32 at the same spot. That equals a 57% jump in performance but I agree its not great for trying to race time to get a new graphics card and see if I can swing a new system with it

Well it's not like the graphics are amazing in LFS, no offense to anyone, but many games have better graphics and yet get higher frame rates. LFS doesn't even have built-in AA or AF. So why would the GPU slow it down if it's not being used to it's full potential?

I just tested between Patch X and Y for 20 AI on SO1 in LX6's.

The average difference between fps on my system is a hit of 25% in patch Y, the CPU usage is identical between both versions.

I suspect that the performance issues with graphics is at least partly to do with an outdated and I suspect poorly supported DirctX8 graphics system in the newer versions of DirectX9c etc which would also explain why newer graphics cards still don't perform as well as expected. It's like having a 220kw engine but only being able to depress the throttle by 20%.

What I have noticed, which worries me, is that when fps drop low that I seem to loose precision in my G25 and in worst cases find it almost impossible to stay in control of the car. Where at high fps like 75fps the wheel response is rock solid. This worries me because I thought that the wheel inputs was completly independent of fps.

I've also had more problems than I used to in patch X with lag on servers but suspect that is more an issue with local internet problems rather than LFS.

[edit]
On further investigation I have found that the system also struggles more in the CPU department than I first thought, it seems with a full grid of AI that the graphics required to be driven by the cpu is quite high. When I alt tab to monitor the cpu usage (lfs minimised but AI still racing i.e. no graphics being rendered) it shows 26% cpu usage, but when I shift F4 (winodwed mode i.e. graphics being rendered) the cpu usage indicates 45-50% so is maxing out one core.

This seems to indicate that the graphics overhead on the cpu is nearly as high as the physics overhead and that indeed the cpu is the limiting factor.

With 20 AI on SO1 there is often as much as 50% reduction in fps over the patch X version on my system and thats with full size textures set to No and skins to Compressed.

Hello guys my problem has been sloved. I went through few forums & found out that the processor temp can be a reason for low FPS. So i bought Artic silver 5 thermal compound from ebay & applied on my processor & suddenly i've seen temp drop. I'm now getting FPS of around 90-150 online & 30 FPS with full grid cars offline.

I hope this helps.

I will check out for few days if i have any FPS drop

Quote from Tony1011 :

Hello guys my problem has been sloved. I went through few forums & found out that the processor temp can be a reason for low FPS. So i bought Artic silver 5 thermal compound from ebay & applied on my processor & suddenly i've seen temp drop. I'm now getting FPS of around 90-150 online & 30 FPS with full grid cars offline.

I hope this helps.

I will check out for few days if i have any FPS drop

That won't fix my problem as my CPU is running at ~40-45C under load.

If I get a chance I'll try some of the tests that Glenn67 did above... Spare time to do it is hard to come by at the moment though.

I have some FPS problem too, not very annoying, but it's there. I was not able to reproduce the situation where I first noticed (online race) so I had to test it offline with AI drivers.

http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/1139/lfsfps1ep6.jpg

http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/9953/lfsfps2me8.jpg

I did try to lower the graphic settings, with/out trees, shadows, wheels, full textures, compressed... every option alone, even z-buffer from 24 to 16, but there is no difference (may be some FPS more, but not noticeable, with shadows and trees the most). The only difference was to pause/unpause the game (10FPS more in the counter).

There are some drops below 20 FPS during the race, but only in spectator mode:

http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/386/lfsfps4kl7.jpg

The specs:

WinXP32SP2
C2D E6600@3GHz
3GB DDR2
8800GTX 768Mb
Latest certified drivers (non beta)

The FPS may vary from one car to another, but not much (about 10 FPS more with XF GTI using the same scenery). I have noticed too that not every car has shadow, mostly if they are far away.