Performance Advice

[CrashTestDanny]

So I have a halfway decent computer... it was best of the best a couple years ago when I built it, but this game and one other are beginning to cause issues for it. I believe I know the answer to my question already but wanted to see if any experts wanted to weigh in.

I currently have a 3.4 GHz core i7 on an MSI MPower Max Z87 MB with 32G of PC 12800 DDR4 RAM. I also run a Samsung evo 840 1TB SDD. As far as I can tell, right now I could only make very small improvements jumping up to the next versions of any of these items. My video card is where I think I will get the most improvement in KSP's performance. I currently run a MSI GTX 780 graphics card, which until now has been beautiful. But with the ever increasing demand on resources from games, it's beginning to have challenges keeping up.

So my question is, do the experts agree that upgrading my video card to say a GTX 980 will have a significant impact on my performance? Any other thoughts greatly appreciated!

Thanks,

Danny

[Taki117]

for KSP? Not really. Your system is actually pretty good. What performance issues are you having?

[Red Iron Crown]

KSP is generally CPU-bound, so you're likely to see little improvement from a better GPU. The best things you can do to improve performance is to try to keep you part counts down; if that doesn't deliver enough you could try turning up the max physics delta in the settings.

[selfish_meme]

Overclocking would give you some more performance, and if you are not running the Windows 64bit hack then that is a good system to run Linux 64bit which will help you run lots of mods.

[CrashTestDanny]

for KSP? Not really. Your system is actually pretty good. What performance issues are you having?

When I get over 200 parts, frame rate starts to go down and timer turns yellow, which I believe indicates that physics simulation rate has gone below 1:!...

At about 250 parts, I can count on crashing 2-3 times before I finish whatever activity I was doing with said ship...

And I like BIG ships!

Danny. I mean really big - like 350 parts is where I'd like to be STARTING!

- - - Updated - - -

Overclocking would give you some more performance, and if you are not running the Windows 64bit hack then that is a good system to run Linux 64bit which will help you run lots of mods.

I am running Win 64 bit... anything I can do to stick with that?

[selfish_meme]

Just overclocking, your GPU is not your problem, part count is the only thing that would lag your system and only higher CPU frequencies would help with that. 1.1 when it is released may help a bit too.

[Val]

When I get over 200 parts, frame rate starts to go down and timer turns yellow, which I believe indicates that physics simulation rate has gone below 1:!...

At about 250 parts, I can count on crashing 2-3 times before I finish whatever activity I was doing with said ship...

And I like BIG ships!

Danny. I mean really big - like 350 parts is where I'd like to be STARTING!

- - - Updated - - -

I am running Win 64 bit... anything I can do to stick with that?

I have a GTX 980 and i7-4790K @ 4 GHz and I see the same things you describe.

The only thing I can recommend, seeing as you also have a beefy Nvidia, is trying -force-opengl. That has improved stability a great deal for me.

I play at 2560x1080 with all settings on max, except reentry effects.

I settled on these settings after some trial and error. Don't really know what they mean.

[_Aramchek_]

Overclock your cpu, getting a new gpu will not give you much of a boost, but increasing the clock speed of your cpu can dramatically increase framerate . You should be able to get to 4.4-4.6ghz relatively easily.

[CrashTestDanny]

Thanks for the advice guys - I will definitely try out some overclocking before updating my GPU. Sounds like going to one of the newer CPUs with six or eight cores might also be a good option (if I just have to spend money), yes?

Thanks again,

Danny

[TimePeriod]

I've generally found that 2-300 parts is more then enough to do most stuff in KSP.

[RyanRising]

Thanks for the advice guys - I will definitely try out some overclocking before updating my GPU. Sounds like going to one of the newer CPUs with six or eight cores might also be a good option (if I just have to spend money), yes?

Thanks again,

Danny

A newer CPU might help a smidgen, but it's doubtful it'll help enough to justify the price. 6 or 8 cores will not help at all, since the big performance hog in KSP, the physics, is currently bound to a single core. Maybe once the switch to U5 is done having more cores will be helpful, but again, not now.

[Moesly_Armlis]

KSP is generally CPU-bound, so you're likely to see little improvement from a better GPU. The best things you can do to improve performance is to try to keep you part counts down; if that doesn't deliver enough you could try turning up the max physics delta in the settings.

This is the best advice for performance increase. The default is 0.04 and increasing it to 0.08 will do wonders.

My experience with a slow computer and finding out that the game now plays twice as fast(still somewhat slow) and all because of increasing the Max Physics Delta-Time per Frame setting in the main menu or a mod (PhysicalTimeRatioViewer).

With high part count vessel the game would be a slideshow now the game play is much more responsive.

[jhousen]

I'm thinking it's time to do the intel/AMD debate...for the umpteen thousandth time (pick your game, this argument has come up...multiple times)

the fx8150 in my main comp has no issues (beyond the known). and I like 1500 part ships...

I have an i7 comp here, let me do some copying and testing

this might be interesting...

[_Aramchek_]

I'm thinking it's time to do the intel/AMD debate...for the umpteen thousandth time (pick your game, this argument has come up...multiple times)

the fx8150 in my main comp has no issues (beyond the known). and I like 1500 part ships...

I have an i7 comp here, let me do some copying and testing

this might be interesting...

It's already been done, every intel cpu wipes the floor up with any amd cpu.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/42877-CPU-Performance-Database

Also, don't worry about a hexa or octo core cpu, won't make any difference at all.

[CrashTestDanny]

ok, so based on all the advice here I went out and did not buy a new computer

I tried openGL, and stability was GREATLY improved, but performance on my GTX780 suffered in this mode. So after reading the 64bit thread I discovered there was yet another option to try; -force-d3d11. I turned that on and it seems to have made some marginal improvement to performance while not de-stabilizing the game. I have not seen a crash since Saturday! Yay!

I also did some overclocking, but my CPU doesn't seem to tolerate much of that.

I guess the next thing is to see if I can speed loading times by putting stuff on a ramdisk...

[_Aramchek_]

I also did some overclocking, but my CPU doesn't seem to tolerate much of that..

It should, you need to do some stuff though, what kind of problems are you running in to?

[wumpus]

It's already been done, every intel cpu wipes the floor up with any amd cpu.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/42877-CPU-Performance-Database

Also, don't worry about a hexa or octo core cpu, won't make any difference at all.

Note that multiple cores should have some effect with 1.1. Just don't expect miracles (like my AMD8320 catching up to an i3).

[Ilya]

This is the best advice for performance increase. The default is 0.04 and increasing it to 0.08 will do wonders.

My experience with a slow computer and finding out that the game now plays twice as fast(still somewhat slow) and all because of increasing the Max Physics Delta-Time per Frame setting in the main menu or a mod (PhysicalTimeRatioViewer).

With high part count vessel the game would be a slideshow now the game play is much more responsive.

Are you guys sure about that? I just tested, and increasing it from 0.05 to 0.08 made me lose about 5fps on my station, while lowering it to 0.03 made me gain fps.

[Chiboko]

Turn off v-synch, doesn't matter what game your playing or what the cause of the lag is, turning off v-synch will always improve performance.

[KerbalEssences]

Hi, upgrading from a 780 to a 980 will give you 0 performance increase. I upgraded from a 560 Ti to a 970 and see no gain in performance either. It actually dropped due to some KSP changes. The big problem for me right now is the new heat distribution system I think. Back in the older days once out of the atmosphere craft even with 500+ parts ran smoothly for me. This is history because we now have heat distribution which kills performance with a lot of parts even in space. A 780 is totally fine in my opinion and there is no need to upgrade especially not for KSP. You will be very disappointed! Hearing they are working on the heat system for the next update is actually something which makes me really look forward to.

edit: Something I wanted to add. My GPU runs only 40% max. while playing KSP even if it is a 10 - 15 fps during launch. Check your GPU usage during gaming.

Edited October 19, 2015 by KerbalEssences

[CrashTestDanny]

It should, you need to do some stuff though, what kind of problems are you running in to?

When I get the base clock over about 103 it stops before loading the OS and the bios comes back and says the overclocking failed. What kinda stuff do I need to do?

Danny

[Padishar]

When I get the base clock over about 103 it stops before loading the OS and the bios comes back and says the overclocking failed. What kinda stuff do I need to do?

Adjusting the base clock tends to cause all sorts of problems with other parts of the system because their speeds get changed too (e.g. the PCI bus and memory access timings). You may be able to tweak other things to allow a higher base clock but you really need to adjust the clock multiplier to get serious overclocks. However, not all CPUs allow this. (K suffix, e.g. i7-3770K do allow it as do some others).

Edited October 20, 2015 by Padishar

[Eilifein]

Hello Danny,

It seems that your CPU might be the i7 3770. That gives you no overclocking capabilities, except for the base clock you mentioned (which is the worst way atm to overclock a CPU). It would be really helpful (if you are willing to spend money, that is) to sell your current CPU, and buy the unlocked sibling, the i7 3770k. Also, you didn't specify but the intel stock cooler is a no-go for overclocking. Additionally, programs like RealTemp are helpful to see if you are temperature limited.

With regards.

Edited October 19, 2015 by Eilifein
typo

[katateochi]

KSP is generally CPU-bound, so you're likely to see little improvement from a better GPU. The best things you can do to improve performance is to try to keep you part counts down; if that doesn't deliver enough you could try turning up the max physics delta in the settings.

When I get over 200 parts, frame rate starts to go down and timer turns yellow, which I believe indicates that physics simulation rate has gone below 1:!...

At about 250 parts, I can count on crashing 2-3 times before I finish whatever activity I was doing with said ship...

And I like BIG ships!

Danny. I mean really big - like 350 parts is where I'd like to be STARTING!

- - - Updated - - -

I am running Win 64 bit... anything I can do to stick with that?

I have the same performance issues but on a slightly lower spec machine (3GHz i7) than OP. I reckon on 300 parts being the limit for ok/fair performance these days.

As CPU is the main thing, I also recommend bringing up the task manager and ruthlessly killing as many processes as possible, especially browsers, windows aero, any background tools that you don't need while playing. It can help a little.

But this is such a sad situation!

This is half the part count that used to be possible (on the same machine). 600 parts used to be very feasible and performance was still ok.

I've generally found that 2-300 parts is more then enough to do most stuff in KSP.

You can do all of career on even less parts, but that's not the point. When you start wanting to build detailed replicas, intricate designs or large stations and bases (which are then joined by other large ships), that part limit leaves a lot to be desired. A lot of what KSP is about is just being creative and building crazy things, it's frustrating having a large box of lego but only being able to play with 300 parts at a time.

I'm glad to see more and more threads about performance, because a few months ago I (and a couple others) felt like we were shouting at a wall about this. At least others are feeling it now so....here's hoping. I hope the unity upgrade brings improvements, but I'm not holding my breathe, the core game need addressing.

[Majorjim!]

I have the same performance issues but on a slightly lower spec machine (3GHz i7) than OP. I reckon on 300 parts being the limit for ok/fair performance these days.

As CPU is the main thing, I also recommend bringing up the task manager and ruthlessly killing as many processes as possible, especially browsers, windows aero, any background tools that you don't need while playing. It can help a little.

But this is such a sad situation!

This is half the part count that used to be possible (on the same machine). 600 parts used to be very feasible and performance was still ok.

You can do all of career on even less parts, but that's not the point. When you start wanting to build detailed replicas, intricate designs or large stations and bases (which are then joined by other large ships), that part limit leaves a lot to be desired. A lot of what KSP is about is just being creative and building crazy things, it's frustrating having a large box of lego but only being able to play with 300 parts at a time.

I'm glad to see more and more threads about performance, because a few months ago I (and a couple others) felt like we were shouting at a wall about this. At least others are feeling it now so....here's hoping. I hope the unity upgrade brings improvements, but I'm not holding my breathe, the core game need addressing.

It's so good to hear someone talking sense for a change on this issue. There is nothing wrong with our setups. Mine is purring like a kitten. The drop in performance associated with the 1.0+ updates is fact, saying otherwise is counter productive.

Edited October 19, 2015 by Majorjim