CMBS Performance

[Kiwo]

Hey,

so i got the following problem, the game takes about 4-8 minuts to load in to a battle, it does not really matter if its a small battle or huge one, it loads really fast till 25-ish% and then stops for about 4-8 minuts sometimes i even get a CTD, 

also the ingame performance isnt the greatest on lowest settings small quick battle i get around 30-70 fps on max settings and again small qick battle i get, funny enough, ""stable"" 25-35 fps

now i dont think my pc is not good enough got:
win 10 64

Ryzen 5 3600

RX 5700 XT OC

32GB ram 3200

and game is on 1tb SSD evo 970 

 

If you have any idea how i could make the game run better, it would mean a lot to me so thanks a bunch ! 

[Schrullenhaft]

I think part of the 'slow loading' issue may be the fact that you have a Radeon video card. In the past there have been loading issues associated with the Radeon drivers. I don't know how much this changes between driver versions, but in the past there has been a significant speed difference between Radeons and GeForces when it comes to the loading times. I assume, but I don't really have solid knowledge, that the OpenGL drivers from AMD may not be quite as good as the Nvidia ones - in certain respects. Rendering-wise within the game they give similar quality levels.

In-game performance may be a matter of expectations. You'll never get FPS-like performance out of the CM series. The CM games are primarily CPU-bound (and single threaded, for most game functions) and while a Ryzen 5 3600 is fairly fast I don't think any current CPU is fast enough to make the current engine perform like many people may expect. It's possible that the OpenGL 2.x calls have significant limitations performance-wise, but they possibly make graphics development a little more straightforward and possibly help with compatibility. With only one programmer it is pretty amazing what the CM series has in it. Several programmers on hand could definitely help to 'optimize' the graphics performance, which can be a pretty complex task.

As for the CTD's, is there more info about the error (Event Viewer, etc.) ? I suspect this MAY be due to video drivers, but I don't know. I wouldn't know what exact Radeon driver to recommend with CM and your RX 5700 XT. On occasion the latest driver MIGHT NOT be the best. I would suggest trying to minimize anything running in the background. The loading process is actually one of the few spots in the code that can utilize multiple threads.

Edited May 21, 2020 by Schrullenhaft

[Kiwo]

25 minutes ago, Schrullenhaft said:

I think part of the 'slow loading' issue may be the fact that you have a Radeon video card. In the past there have been loading issues associated with the Radeon drivers. I don't know how much this changes between driver versions, but in the past there has been a significant speed difference between Radeons and GeForces when it comes to the loading times. I assume, but I don't really have solid knowledge, that the OpenGL drivers from AMD may not be quite as good as the Nvidia ones - in certain respects. Rendering-wise within the game they give similar quality levels.

In-game performance may be a matter of expectations. You'll never get FPS-like performance out of the CM series. The CM games are primarily CPU-bound (and single threaded, for most game functions) and while a Ryzen 5 3600 is fairly fast I don't think any current CPU is fast enough to make the current engine perform like many people may expect. It's possible that the OpenGL 2.x calls have significant limitations performance-wise, but they possibly make graphics development a little more straightforward and possibly help with compatibility. With only one programmer it is pretty amazing what the CM series has in it. Several programmers on hand could definitely help to 'optimize' the graphics performance, which can be a pretty complex task.

As for the CTD's, is there more info about the error (Event Viewer, etc.) ? I suspect this MAY be due to video drivers, but I don't know. I wouldn't know what exact Radeon driver to recommend with CM and your RX 5700 XT. On occasion the latest driver MIGHT NOT be the best. I would suggest trying to minimize anything running in the background. The loading process is actually one of the few spots in the code that can utilize multiple threads.

alright guess there isnt much i can do then, sadly.. and yeah i checked everytime the Event viewer but there is nothing, no " warning" no "issue" no "crash/ critical" nothing so thats also a bummer,

and about the driver versions ive tested some older ones, cant remember which ones but the result was the same, i guess it really comes down to the AMD card which is a sad thing ,

but hey can only hope that A. there is a tweak or so out there that only one person knows about xd or B. that CM will get optimized better for AMD cards. 

thanks for the reply !

[Schrullenhaft]

I installed CMBS on Ryzen 7 3800X with a Radeon RX5700 XT (32GB RAM, 860 Evo SATA SSD). Using the 20.2.2 driver, running a single display at 1920 x 1200 I got fairly quick load times of less than 1 minute for battles of various sizes. I'm using the default graphical settings within the game and the Radeon Software. So there is no anti-aliasing, vertical sync/FreeSync, etc. For the game I have the default settings for the 'Options', typically 'Balanced'. There wasn't much loaded up in the background (browser, antivirus, SSD util, etc.).

Running FRAPS for framerate counting I got about 21 - 52 fps in the setup of one quick battle (a map with forests and some hills). The larger the resolution, the more trees and buildings and possibly the more varied the terrain elevation, the lower your framerate will be. The in-game camera height/view and the how much of the battlefield is 'in the window' also makes a difference in framerate.

So if you're running a really high resolution (above standard HD, 1920 x 1080), you may want to reduce it in the game 'Options'. 'Balanced' for the 3D Texture and 3D Model Quality might also help. You may also want to turn off Vertical Sync, unless you're certain you're benefiting from it.

[Kiwo]

6 hours ago, Schrullenhaft said:

I installed CMBS on Ryzen 7 3800X with a Radeon RX5700 XT (32GB RAM, 860 Evo SATA SSD). Using the 20.2.2 driver, running a single display at 1920 x 1200 I got fairly quick load times of less than 1 minute for battles of various sizes. I'm using the default graphical settings within the game and the Radeon Software. So there is no anti-aliasing, vertical sync/FreeSync, etc. For the game I have the default settings for the 'Options', typically 'Balanced'. There wasn't much loaded up in the background (browser, antivirus, SSD util, etc.).

Running FRAPS for framerate counting I got about 21 - 52 fps in the setup of one quick battle (a map with forests and some hills). The larger the resolution, the more trees and buildings and possibly the more varied the terrain elevation, the lower your framerate will be. The in-game camera height/view and the how much of the battlefield is 'in the window' also makes a difference in framerate.

So if you're running a really high resolution (above standard HD, 1920 x 1080), you may want to reduce it in the game 'Options'. 'Balanced' for the 3D Texture and 3D Model Quality might also help. You may also want to turn off Vertical Sync, unless you're certain you're benefiting from it.

oh well, i have 2 full HD monitors one 60HZ one 144hz and the 144hz is my main monitor, about freesync yeah thats off for CM, every other setting i just left it at default,

yeah and the driver seems it does not make a big effect i before had the most up to date one 20.4.2 went down on 20.2.2 still the same.

 

[Schrullenhaft]

What resolution are you running at ? You may want to go into your CM game's 'Options' menu and set it to something other than desktop if you're running something really high. You may have to use the 'display.txt' method of entering a resolution if what you want doesn't appear in the Options listing (only a couple of resolutions appear there, with 'Desktop' being the most convenient). The format of this file would be simply (without quotes) '1920 1080 60', for horizontal, vertical and then vertical refresh rate. You could possibly specify '144' for the vertical refresh rate, as long as the video driver supports it.

Adjusting the resolution most likely won't help with the slow loading times (to my knowledge) and the occasional CTD. I wouldn't think it would be the sound driver, but what sound chip/card do you have installed ?

[Kiwo]

4 hours ago, Schrullenhaft said:

What resolution are you running at ? You may want to go into your CM game's 'Options' menu and set it to something other than desktop if you're running something really high. You may have to use the 'display.txt' method of entering a resolution if what you want doesn't appear in the Options listing (only a couple of resolutions appear there, with 'Desktop' being the most convenient). The format of this file would be simply (without quotes) '1920 1080 60', for horizontal, vertical and then vertical refresh rate. You could possibly specify '144' for the vertical refresh rate, as long as the video driver supports it.

Adjusting the resolution most likely won't help with the slow loading times (to my knowledge) and the occasional CTD. I wouldn't think it would be the sound driver, but what sound chip/card do you have installed ?

running FullHD (1920x1080) and sound goes from the mainboard should be realtek or something 

[Bufo]

I have almost the same setup:

3600X + 5700XT + 32GB RAM + MLC SSD

 

What helped me with reducing load times is: setting the two (texture and model) quality to balanced. Anything more will significantly affect the time to load the battle.

 

the other thing is setting the triple buffering for opengl in the  radeon settings (its off by default).

 

This way my average load time went down to 1 and a half minutes instead of 5.

 

I left antialiasing on as it didnt have an effect on performance. Vsync is off since I use freesync and it works.

Edited May 26, 2020 by Bufo

[Kiwo]

9 hours ago, Bufo said:

I have almost the same setup:

3600X + 5700XT + 32GB RAM + MLC SSD

 

What helped me with reducing load times is: setting the two (texture and model) quality to balanced. Anything more will significantly affect the time to load the battle.

 

the other thing is setting the triple buffering for opengl in the  radeon settings (its off by default).

 

This way my average load time went down to 1 and a half minutes instead of 5.

 

I left antialiasing on as it didnt have an effect on performance. Vsync is off since I use freesync and it works.

Triple Buffering it is then ! awesome thanks! yes it did help out a lot ! firstly it now freezes at 43% not 25% anymore xd 

And i sert up a timer just to look how long it will load and its about 1 minute and 20-ish seconds thats HUGE i was so pissed to wait always 4-8 minuts !

thanks ! 

would still love to see  Battlefront optimize this game bit more !

[Kiwo]

Sooo still no optimizing update sad

[Schrullenhaft]

Not sure what you're expecting... I don't think any patch is slated to come out to increase the performance of any of the CM games. Such changes are probably beyond what Battlefront would consider a 'patch'. Sometimes an 'engine upgrade' will improve the performance, but what most people may be expecting in performance increases would require an engine re-write, a task that can take years. Most recent patches have addressed data/behavior issues with the game.

[nox_plague]

I'm very interested in folks experiences with Radeon GPUs, Windows, and CM. There seems to indeed (and based on searching these forums that appears to be the consensus) be a loading issue.

As an interesting data point that it could be AMD Radeon Driver related I offer this data point:

CM Red Thunder - Gog and Magog

1. MacOS: 15.37 seconds 
2. Windows 10: 185.15 seconds

That is a crazy 12x or 1200% faster performance.

No Mods, all settings identical (Display 1280 x 960 (because MacBook has different display this is the best way to standardize), Vert Sync OFF, 3D Quality BEST, 3D Texture BEST, Antialias ON, Tree Detail HIGH, Shader ON)

These computers are surprisingly similar, so I think it is 80% a software issue. I recognize Apple does special hardware optimization, but given these are both Intel w/ Radeon systems hardware alone cannot explain these differences.

Additionally Apple writes their own drivers for MacOS, and they have even deprecated OpenGL (Battlefront please make sure you're ready for Metal/Vulkan.). So again seems like the Radeon driver on Windows 10 or how CM calls the driver is creating serious overhead.

MacBook Pro 2019 16" specs

• Intel 9980HK 8 Core 16 Thread 2.4 GHz Turbo 5.0 GHz
• AMD Readon Pro 5500M 8GB 
• NVMe SSD AP2048N 2TB PCIe 3.0 (Supposedly the memory for these SSDs is manufactured by Samsung)
• 32 GB DDR4 2666 MHz RAM
• macOS Monterey 12.2.1

Custom Windows 10 built PC specs

• Intel 9700K 8 Core 8 Thread 3.6 GHz Turbo 4.9 GHz
• AMD Radeon 6700 XT 12GB GDDR6 (Powercolor Fighter) Driver Version 22.3.1
• NVMe SSD Samsung Evo Plus 1 TB PCIe 3.0
• 16 GB DDR4 3200 MHz CL14 RAM 

This desktop 6700 XT Radeon GPU runs circles around the 50 watt 5500M in the MacBook Pro, except in Combat Mission

Edited March 21, 2022 by nox_plague

[Schrullenhaft]

The current CM series will NOT be updated for Metal/Vulkan. That is a significant enough of a difference to require an engine re-write and to be cross-compatible it would have to be in Vulkan rather than in Metal. I believe the next engine should accommodate such issues, but the previous (current) games are NOT going to see an update to accommodate the deprecation of OpenGL on MacOS.

The issue for the Radeons has always been the driver. I don't know what the differences are between the drivers that are supplied with the MacOS and the drivers that are developed for the Windows platform. I would say that they are almost completely the same except for a few specific details that Apple specifies that drivers supplied to them must have. This might result in better compatibility with games such as CM (better backwards compatibility with older OpenGL calls), while the Windows drivers may see some heavy optimization (and less support for older OpenGL calls) that causes problems with CM (the longer loading times).

I've heard mention that CM puts out 'quads' for their 3D models instead of 'tri's' and maybe such 'quad' data is undergoing some sort of conversion (to 'tri's') during the loading process (this is simply a guess). Whereas the Nvidia driver seems to have less of an issue with this and maybe the MacOS Radeon driver does too. However such a change would suggest a significant difference at the core of the Radeon driver between MacOS and Windows.

Edited March 28, 2022 by Schrullenhaft

[Lucky_Strike]

On 3/21/2022 at 6:44 AM, nox_plague said:

MacBook Pro 2019 16" specs

• Intel 9980HK 8 Core 16 Thread 2.4 GHz Turbo 5.0 GHz
• AMD Readon Pro 5500M 8GB 
• NVMe SSD AP2048N 2TB PCIe 3.0 (Supposedly the memory for these SSDs is manufactured by Samsung)
• 32 GB DDR4 2666 MHz RAM
• macOS Monterey 12.2.1

 

You could try running Windows in BootCamp on the MacBook to get a direct comparison.

Without trotting off upstairs and firing up all my stuff I can't quote you my system specs, but roughly I have a fairly recent 27" 4K Intel iMac with a Radeon card of some sort vs a custom built PC with a 1660 nVidia GPU, Win 10 and have never noticed any slow starts like you experienced with your Radeon endowed PC. Anecdotal evidence of course. I will have a go with my iMac in BootCamp to see if it has issues when loading a game. Must say never liked Radeon cards in PCs just didn't ever perform so well for me (CM is the only game I play).

[Ultradave]

I have run BS in Parallels desktop on my MacBook Pro and while I haven't put a timer on it, the load times were pretty similar, subjectively. Certainly nothing like that huge disparity. 

It doesn't run that well in Parallels. Graphics are pretty lame, but I'm sure that's because my Mac has onboard graphics, which doesn't seem to matter on the Mac side but does make a big difference in Windows. But that also might lend some more credence to the GPU driver idea, since that's not a factor in mine.

Dave

[Redwolf]

I also have CMCW in Parallels on a Mac with ATI card. No loading slowdown compared to my Windows laptop with NVidia graphics chip.

[Lucky_Strike]

14 hours ago, Ultradave said:

I have run BS in Parallels desktop on my MacBook Pro and while I haven't put a timer on it, the load times were pretty similar, subjectively. Certainly nothing like that huge disparity. 

It doesn't run that well in Parallels. Graphics are pretty lame, but I'm sure that's because my Mac has onboard graphics, which doesn't seem to matter on the Mac side but does make a big difference in Windows. But that also might lend some more credence to the GPU driver idea, since that's not a factor in mine.

Dave

Yeah, Parallels or any other VM will not really utilise the GPU in the same way as a proper OS, it'll work but just not to it's full potential. I'm thinking that BootCamp would be the way to go cos it's a proper OS install fully utilising the GPU. I have BootCamp set up on my iMac so I will give it a go, see what happens.

[nox_plague]

15 hours ago, Ultradave said:

I have run BS in Parallels desktop on my MacBook Pro and while I haven't put a timer on it, the load times were pretty similar, subjectively. Certainly nothing like that huge disparity. 

It doesn't run that well in Parallels. Graphics are pretty lame, but I'm sure that's because my Mac has onboard graphics, which doesn't seem to matter on the Mac side but does make a big difference in Windows. But that also might lend some more credence to the GPU driver idea, since that's not a factor in mine.

Dave

Why run it in parallels?  Why not just run it on MacOS, the game works well in MacOS.

[nox_plague]

1 hour ago, Lucky_Strike said:

Yeah, Parallels or any other VM will not really utilise the GPU in the same way as a proper OS, it'll work but just not to it's full potential. I'm thinking that BootCamp would be the way to go cos it's a proper OS install fully utilising the GPU. I have BootCamp set up on my iMac so I will give it a go, see what happens.

Yes, I can try BootCamp just to see if it is also slow like my desktop.  If in BootCamp it's as/nearly as fast as in MacOS, that would indicate some sort of other bottleneck in my custom desktop PC.  I'll update here with my results.

[Ultradave]

8 hours ago, nox_plague said:

Why run it in parallels?  Why not just run it on MacOS, the game works well in MacOS.

Normally that's what I do. I was checking something for Beta testing.

Dave

[Lucky_Strike]

11 hours ago, nox_plague said:

Yes, I can try BootCamp just to see if it is also slow like my desktop.  If in BootCamp it's as/nearly as fast as in MacOS, that would indicate some sort of other bottleneck in my custom desktop PC.  I'll update here with my results.

Testing BootCamp vs Mac on my iMac. Specs of iMac:

iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, 2019)

3.1 GHz Intel Core i5

40 GB 2667 MHz DDR4

Radeon Pro 575X 4 GB

1TB SSD

Windows 10 vs MacOS 10.14

Did a fresh install of CMFB on BootCamp. CMFB on Mac side already installed, pretty much vanilla.

From a fresh boot and start up of game loading time for scenario To Verdenne & Victory described as Huge was about 30 seconds under MacOS, nothing abnormal. Same scenario under Windows 10 took about 50 seconds, slower but tolerable. Second runs on both were appreciably quicker by about a third to half.

Certainly nothing like the 3 minutes you experienced. Game play was pretty much identical.

Probably a driver level issue with your GPU. Just one thing to make sure of, is the PC utilising the GPU when running CM or is it using any built-in on CPU graphics chip by default? This can happen on PC that have both.