We were talking GPUs

You know you're getting old when you can't remember what graphics card your PC runs, or at least that's what I've been told. Anyway, as we were discussing briefly on Saturday night, I am running 2 x AMD Radeon HD 6870 GPUs set up with Crossfire X enabled. Whether CrossfireX ever worked in CoD or now in DCS is anybody's guess. Currently, DCS runs around 29 fps when I'm on the ground, I get a pretty solid 30 fps during flight and it zooms up to 60 fps if I sit back in the cockpit and gaze at the clear blue sky.

Otherwise, I suffer from a very brief stutter at 1 or 2 second intervals, like the computer needs to skip a frame or two to catch up before returning to smooth image flow.

By coincidence, AMD/Radeon just issued a press release today, announcing the new RX500 series of GPU they are marketing to the 9 out of 10 gamers who are playing with outdated systems. You might remember the Steam technology survey a year or so ago, well the results of that survey indicate that 9 out of 10 of us are running on older systems.

Now I noticed right away that this GPU technology is DDR5 based, which I'm assuming is incompatible with my DDR3 parts (specifically my RAM)? I don't know that as a fact, so I'm posing the question to you guys to see what the consensus is. Can I upgrade with RX500 5DDR or do I need to stick with older format GPUs. I also asked my son for his advice, so I'll compare and maybe make a decision to upgrade in the near future. Full scale rebuild is not what I'm after, just improvements over what I have. (P.S. Hawk - any insights based on your current PC upgrade?)

(Update: looking at the HD 6870 specs I see that they are also based on GDDR5 memory and the bus interface is PCIe 2.1 x 16 pin with DirectX 11 and openGL 4.1 support capable. I think I'll prep a little comparison chart to see if the Radeon 8000 series might work. Update to me update. The HD 8470 is not even as good as the 6870. (smaller numbers better?) Getting nowhere fast so time to watch the ballgame. OK, I also just found out that PCIe 3.0 is backward compatible with PCIe 2.0 x 16 slot MBs. Geeze! what I don't know! Back to square one.

As for the RX500, you can read the article if you like and compare my setup to see if this new series is compatible with my chipset and MB. http://www.amd.com/en-us/products/graphics/desktop/r9

Radeon RX500

My system specs are:

CyberpowerPC Gamer Ultra 2063 120mm LQ,
AM3 Phenom II X6 1090T(3.2GHz),
ASUS M4A87TD EVO MB,
G.Skill Ripjaws PC3 12800 DDR3 1600 16 GB RAM,
2TB HDD,
Dual 1 GB AMD Radeon HD 6870 (Crossfire) GPUs,
Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit,

(I know this is getting messy so I'll clean it up once I work through the options)

Thanks

The memory on the video card has nothing to do with your system. As long as you have the appropriate PCI slot, you're fine.

Also, nVidia cards have generally been better than their Radeon counterparts lately.

What I would do, personally, would be to get a new updated motherboard, processor, and graphics card. I've never run dual card setups, but then I buy fairly top end graphics cards. I say save the hassle of compatibility with X-Fire or whathaveyou and get one card instead of two. Then, if you need/want to, you can buy a second one later when they're cheaper.

I also count on the fact that I'll be doing a complete rebuild every 5 years or so if I want to stay high on the graphics presets of new games. I usually look at one graphics card update between the rebuild.

So, complete new pc, then upgrade graphics card around the 2.5 year mark, then complete new PC around 5 years.

Because MB, RAM, HDs, Graphics Cards are always updating and changing. Eventually, if you want to get the best new part to add to your PC it means upgrading something else as well, which makes something else worth changing, etc.

If your PC is reaching the 5 year mark, then the MB and processor tech has moved on and is worth updating.

Thanks Wolverine,

That's pretty much what my son said a year ago when I posed the same question then (less the RX500 option). At some point I'll have to bite the bullet and consider my options to replace my MB and chip set, GPU or acquire a new PC.

I agree with the 5 year time frame and that was my original plan as my PC is now six years old. But, since I just laid out $5K on wheels and tires for the BMW, my poor PC will have to soldier on for the time being.

I'm probably the only one in the group who hasn't seen this yet, but just in case, my son directed me to a website that benchmarks all GPUs based on Direct X 10 and higher as he was trying to explain to me where my dual Radeon 6870's fit into the scheme of things.

So now, like a man sitting in traffic with his VW Jetta, next to a Ferrari anything, I'm feeling pretty insignificant with more than a little processing power envy. So the point being that I can now look for compatible tech with my processor/MB combo for a short term tuneup to get me over the hump while I save some cash for a new rig. Ultimate goal is to get into VR sim.

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/directCompute.html

After visiting the website above and talking compatibility with my son, I'm going to zero in on the Nvidia GTX1070 as the best balance between compatibility with my AMD system, cost and up to date performance. It smokes the Radeon RX480 in performance, which is where I was headed, but for $150 over the price of the Radeon unit, I'll get substantially better output from this GPU. Hopefully I can spring some pennies free to get this upgrade done in time for the release of Normandy 1944.

Speed wrote:I'm going to zero in on the Nvidia GTX1070

Good choice. You will be very happy with that card.

Screw the pennies. I just pulled the trigger and ordered the EVGA GeForce GTX1070 from Newegg. Not a bad price either, $519 plus the governments cut. EVGA GeForce GTX1070

Since I was going to buy a new power polisher for the car, I put that on the back burner since I figured I'd get more entertainment this winter from a new GPU than a polisher sitting on the shelf 51 weeks out of the year.

Can't wait. I'll give you guys an update once its installed and I experiment with resolution settings in DCS (hopefully I can crank up the anti-aliazing to max.

Just remember to keep expectations in proportion. You should see a boost, but it's not going to suddenly allow you to run everything on max at 60fps. If you expect that, then you'll be disappointed.

No I'm not setting myself up for that. I realize that the best GPU in the world will be constrained by the rest of my system specs. Not to worry, my objective is to ensure that Normandy 1944 runs without serious stuttering. If I can get a reliable 30-60 fps with the ground clutter I expect in the new map, and can manage a higher setting for my MSAA to get rid of some pixelization on the wings and around the canopy frame, then I'll be happy as a clam. For me, the priority is a high res cockpit, realistic details in the aircraft around me and good ballistic/particle effects (most of which are really good already) and hopefully a solution to my image shearing (not serious, but it's ever present along the cockpit frame when panning quickly with TracIR).

Mostly I want to be able to see if Hawk has a mustache? That upper lip just doesn't resolve in 1080 ;-{)

Usless graphics like grass and traffic will stay on low settings.

Thanks for all the advice, I really needed it. (I may have spent $500, but if it works, I'll save $2,000 on top of that in the near term)

P.S. I don't expect this will enable VR. I wasn't even considering that when I made this decision. That will be on the bucket list a few years from now.

Well once again Newegg comes through in record time. Three days from order to delivery, very impressive.

GPU was easy to install and software was supplied on a CD. Once I was up and running I down loaded the latest drivers from the internet and installed Direct X 11.

Had to adjust my Sharp 70" to dot for dot (image was bleeding off the edges)

Started DCS and set everything to max except traffic (medium) and grass/clutter (mid-way). The differences were as follows:

What used to take seven to eight minutes to load, now takes thirty seconds.

On the ground, I get a steady 30 fps (not dropping down to +-20 fps randomly)

In the cockpit, I set max pixels for all frames, and really noticed an improvement to the 3D effects (one of my pet peeves with DCS was the flat appearance of the image) now the sight unit actually looks like it's hanging out of the TV. Very cool.

Cockpit image when flying is 59-60 fps. Man what a treat.

Head tracker is smooth as butter. I can pan around without any stuttering. (I still get image shearing along the canopy frame when I pan so I need to work on that)

Image quality is still about the same (except for the cockpit which is better) ground and sky haven't changed, but I can see a lot farther.  

I now have a horizontal distortion 90 degrees either side of the propeller? I read one review of the GTX 1070 where the tester turned off his Vsync to improve the image. Seems counter intuitive but it's worth a try.

Best of all, the sim now runs steady and smooth. The constant frame skip is gone.

I just wondered if anyone else had tried to optimize their graphics settings in DCS and low and behold, look what I found. Very similar system specs to mine and some very interesting results.

You might find this interesting.

https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=165917

Played around with some of the settings this morning and settled on what I think is best for my set up.

Textures: High
Terrain textures: High
Civ Traffic: Medium
Water: Medium
Visb Range: High
Heat Blur: Low
Shadows: High
Resolution: 1920x1080
Aspect Ratio:1.7777
Monitors: 1
Res of Cockpit Displays: 1024 Every Frame
MSAA: 16x (I experimented with 16xQ and found my fps dropped to +-30 when flying near the ground. I also retained some aliasing along the wing edges and the shadow area between the ailerons and wing edge. With MSAA set to 16x, the wing edges look near perfect, the shadow area is smooth and well defined and the fps stays at a rock solid 60 fps no matter where I fly. I tried rolls and loops and everything that used to kill my frame rate and it stayed at 60 fps throughout. The ultimate test will be a flyover of Las Vegas (tonight).
Depth of Field: Bokeh
Lens Effect: Dirt and flare
HDR: ON
Grass/Clutter: 930
Trees Visibility: 21,810
Preload Radius: 130,400
Anisotropic Filtering: 16x
Terrain Object Shadows: Flat
Vsync: Enabled (just read an article that is supportive of my comment above about the GTX 1070 test https://hardforum.com/threads/how-vsync-works-and-why-people-loathe-it.928593/  I'll try turning it off to see if my fps changes and if it might cure my tearing issue around the canopy frame and propeller) Wow! Like unleashing the genie from the bottle! My frame rate in the air is now north of 85 fps but more importantly the tearing is much less evident. Technically it's still there to a much lesser degree, but I'm using my pan switch to look around which is very sudden, so with TracIR in use, I might not notice the tearing along the cockpit frame at all, and the propeller now looks normal. Near the ground I get 65 to 75 fps with very smooth pan of the scenery (still some slight lag) but 10 times better than I've ever experienced in DCS before. Do yourself a favor and turn Vsync off if you've not yet tried it.
Full Screen: Enabled

Overall image quality is now improved. I can even see a difference in the DCS text which is now sharply defined and very clear.

Final verdict: I'm a happy man!!

Total success boys! Flew over the city at 75 fps and as I got directly over the strip the lowest it dropped was 51 fps. For the first time I noticed all the colours of the city, the trees, traffic and cool buildings just seemed to be clearly defined for the first time. At 9 fps you don't see much if you want to keep your plane in the air.

Also noticed that dogfighting is made easier since the target plane is more predictable with a smooth image flow.

Ready for Normandy.

I'm very jealous of happy for you Speed. Judging by your reaction, I'd say you are pretty happy too.