Make space station building correct...and make them stable.

[strider3]

I am SOOO over my space stations coming apart, for no good reason. No, please don't tell me your thoughts...I have many posts, over the last 3 years, on the subject, and many attempts at building them...most successful...and none successful in 1.7.3.

Once parts are "joined"...I'm DONE! They are welded, they are forever joined...there will be NO weird parts flying off for no reason...and I ain't talking about the "increasing wobbles". If KSP 2.0 doesn't correct these stupid issues with constructed parts coming apart when targeting, when coming into 2K meter range, when coming into 200 m range or when actually docking...I'll save my hard earned money. Fix it...or forget it.

[razark]

38 minutes ago, strider3 said:

No, please don't tell me your thoughts...

Uh...

Quote

fo·rum

/ˈfôrəm/

noun

noun: forum; plural noun: forums; plural noun: fora

1. 1.

   a place, meeting, or medium where ideas and views on a particular issue can be exchanged.

I think maybe you're looking for soapbox.kerbalspaceprogram.com?

 

Edit:

 

Edited February 24, 2020 by razark

[mcwaffles2003]

Wooooooow lol

49 minutes ago, razark said:

Uh...

I think maybe you're looking for soapbox.kerbalspaceprogram.com?

 

Edit:

 

My boy's got that oppo research rockin xD

Edited February 24, 2020 by mcwaffles2003

[Incarnation of Chaos]

1 hour ago, strider3 said:

I am SOOO over my space stations coming apart, for no good reason. No, please don't tell me your thoughts...I have many posts, over the last 3 years, on the subject, and many attempts at building them...most successful...and none successful in 1.7.3.

Once parts are "joined"...I'm DONE! They are welded, they are forever joined...there will be NO weird parts flying off for no reason...and I ain't talking about the "increasing wobbles". If KSP 2.0 doesn't correct these stupid issues with constructed parts coming apart when targeting, when coming into 2K meter range, when coming into 200 m range or when actually docking...I'll save my hard earned money. Fix it...or forget it.

There are welding mods you can find for KSP1, along with joint reinforcement mods. I'd HIGHLY reccommend using either KJR Continued or KJR next; they'll likely completely resolve your issue.

As for welding; there's a reason we don't do it often in KSP. Once you weld those parts they're considered 1 part from that point foward, so it makes it far harder to modify them.

[DStaal]

All comments on experiences in KSP1 aside - they did indicate that performance of large vessels was something they've worked on.  I'd expect that you could still build something wobbly if you tried, but ideally it would be because it's a bad design.  Large stations shouldn't inherently be worse than smaller ones.  (As much of the issue with really large stations in KSP1 is physics oscillations when under large automatic physics warp, which large stations tend to put you into.)

[XLjedi]

I built a very large station (400 parts) kinda in the shape of a box...  All assembled in orbit via 20 spaceplane missions. 

To solve the inherent part "floppiness" there was a central part that I declared to be the "Root".  For this type of design, using autostruts on each corner and a few selective crossbeam sections (maybe 8 autostruts total?) each targeting the central "Root" part.  It worked quite well in terms of rigidity.  It is a large framework though (docks 3 Mk3 spaceplanes) and has no reaction wheels of its own.

No mods, no welding...   I do wish the robotics parts were a tad less noodle-like though.

[dave1904]

33 minutes ago, XLjedi said:

I built a very large station (400 parts) kinda in the shape of a box...  All assembled in orbit via 20 spaceplane missions. 

To solve the inherent part "floppiness" there was a central part that I declared to be the "Root".  For this type of design, using autostruts on each corner and a few selective crossbeam sections (maybe 8 autostruts total?) each targeting the central "Root" part.  It worked quite well in terms of rigidity.  It is a large framework though (docks 3 Mk3 spaceplanes) and has no reaction wheels of its own.

No mods, no welding...   I do wish the robotics parts were a tad less noodle-like though.

What's your cpu and gpu specs and what fps do you have with 400 parts. I'm not sure if I should invest in an upgrade. I have a 250 part station right now and it is at 10 fps. Thing is I am almost certain my 970 is the bottleneck and not my 4770k. Maybe even ram lol. Everything is maxxed out but I have the feeling it's gpu. 

[shdwlrd]

2 hours ago, dave1904 said:

What's your cpu and gpu specs and what fps do you have with 400 parts. I'm not sure if I should invest in an upgrade. I have a 250 part station right now and it is at 10 fps. Thing is I am almost certain my 970 is the bottleneck and not my 4770k. Maybe even ram lol. Everything is maxxed out but I have the feeling it's gpu. 

Easy enough to check if it's your GPU, change you graphics settings to low. If your frame rate goes up, it's probably your GPU. If it's doesn't, there's something else going on. 

[XLjedi]

@dave1904  Yeah, it's 390-400 parts...  not to mention the two Mk3 spaceplanes I had docked to it.  Which tacked on, I'm guessing, another 250 parts or so.  I know the one space plane is like 180 parts.

I just rebuilt the PC in January, so I have the stats unusually handy. I thought the mobo died, but turns out it was the PSU that failed.  So I might have extra parts now for a machine to stow under my desk at the office.

These parts are new:

• Mobo:  ASUS ROG Strix X570-E Gaming ATX
• AMD Ryzen 7 3800x 3.9 GHz Socket AM4  (4.5 GHz max boost, but I don't overclock it)
• G.SKILL Ripjaws V Series 32 GB (2x16GB) 288-Pin DDR4 3600  (I have 2 open slots, but 32 has been fine for my workload thus far)

The DDR4 was a requirement of the new Mobo (else I would've just continued using the 32 GB of DDR3 4x8 that I already had) and I continue to go with the dual PCI slots to run nVidia cards in SLI mode.  I continue to use the dual GTX 970's running in SLI.  I'm quite sure those are my bottleneck as well, but they seem to be doing fine for now.

I haven't actually displayed the framerate, but can check it later tonight.

I had bought my daughters' a couple new iphones for Christmas; so I got to apply a $125 credit at BestBuy to pickup the Ryzen 7 for almost half-off!  The DDR4 ram is a pretty good deal right now too.  Aside from the mobo being SLI-ready and I have used ASUS for years...  I really wanted the built-in wireless capability.

 

Edited February 24, 2020 by XLjedi

[dave1904]

29 minutes ago, shdwlrd said:

Easy enough to check if it's your GPU, change you graphics settings to low. If your frame rate goes up, it's probably your GPU. If it's doesn't, there's something else going on. 

I do not really get good results this way. I will try it again however because I have not really done since 1.8.1

9 minutes ago, XLjedi said:

@dave1904  Yeah, it's 390-400 parts...  not to mention the two Mk3 spaceplanes I had docked to it.  Which tacked on, I'm guessing, another 250 parts or so.  I know the one space plane is like 180 parts.

I just rebuilt the PC in January, so I have the stats unusually handy. I thought the mobo died, but turns out it was the PSU that failed.  So I might have extra parts now for a machine to stow under my desk at the office.

These parts are new:

• Mobo:  ASUS ROG Strix X570-E Gaming ATX
• AMD Ryzen 7 3800x 3.9 GHz Socket AM4  (4.5 GHz max boost, but I don't overclock it)
• G.SKILL Ripjaws V Series 32 GB (2x16GB) 288-Pin DDR4 3600  (I have 2 open slots, but 32 has been fine for my workload thus far)

The DDR4 was a requirement of the new Mobo (else I would've just continued using the 32 GB of DDR3 4x8 that I already had) and I continue to go with the dual PCI slots to run nVidia cards in SLI mode.  I continue to use the dual GTX 970's running in SLI.  I'm quite sure those are my bottleneck as well, but they seem to be doing fine for now.

I haven't actually displayed the framerate, but can check it later tonight.

I had bought my daughters' a couple new iphones for Christmas; so I got to apply a $125 credit at BestBuy to pickup the Ryzen 7 for almost half-off!  The DDR4 ram is a pretty good deal right now too.  Aside from the mobo being SLI-ready and I have used ASUS for years...  I really wanted the built-in wireless capability.

 

Please do. Would be cool to know the fps because I do not think SLI would make much difference. I wish we had a community benchmark craft and maybe even mod folder to compare the current hardware. If you use kerbal engineer it will tell you exactly how many parts you are using. 

[XLjedi]

24 minutes ago, dave1904 said:

Please do. Would be cool to know the fps because I do not think SLI would make much difference. I wish we had a community benchmark craft and maybe even mod folder to compare the current hardware. If you use kerbal engineer it will tell you exactly how many parts you are using. 

Oh, I know the exact part counts... and probably far more than most would ever care to look into.  LOL

It was this space plane:

https://kerbalx.com/XLjedi/SC-33-Crescent-Eagle

The tech report at the bottom of that page has it listed at 117 parts when completely empty.  As loaded with the stuff I included on KerbalX, it's 184; but I had it reconfigured to carry other stuffs into orbit that day, so was a bit of guesstimate on my part.  The other Mk-3 craft I had attached was my orbital nuke-powered light carrier, but I never posted that one so haven't done a blueprint.  Fewer parts though maybe 50-80 ish?

Edited February 24, 2020 by XLjedi

[shdwlrd]

28 minutes ago, dave1904 said:

I do not really get good results this way. I will try it again however because I have not really done since 1.8.1

The only reason I'm suggesting that is the low graphics settings is the pre-updates graphics for KSP. I've never seen frame rates that low until I've reached about 800-1000 parts with any of my Intel machines. I've played KSP on I-7 3rd, 4th, and 6th gen laptop processors. The only time I had frame rates that low was the game was using the integrated Intel GPU for some reason.

PS, the last time I've really played KSP was 1.7.1, I haven't built anything that large since the newer updates dropped.

Edited February 24, 2020 by shdwlrd

[dave1904]

1 hour ago, shdwlrd said:

The only reason I'm suggesting that is the low graphics settings is the pre-updates graphics for KSP. I've never seen frame rates that low until I've reached about 800-1000 parts with any of my Intel machines. I've played KSP on I-7 3rd, 4th, and 6th gen laptop processors. The only time I had frame rates that low was the game was using the integrated Intel GPU for some reason.

PS, the last time I've really played KSP was 1.7.1, I haven't built anything that large since the newer updates dropped.

its mods too. I have never played stock ksp to be honest. 

[shdwlrd]

2 hours ago, dave1904 said:

its mods too. I have never played stock ksp to be honest. 

Do you have visual mods or restock installed? I can see those impacting the performance.

[mcwaffles2003]

2 hours ago, shdwlrd said:

Do you have visual mods or restock installed? I can see those impacting the performance.

Does restock really hit performance? It's just new models

[shdwlrd]

3 minutes ago, mcwaffles2003 said:

Does restock really hit performance? It's just new models

And much larger texture files. Most all of the texture files are multiple layer, high fidelity images. Textures like that can slow down GPU performance. (Think how Crysis makes even today's high end PCs cry for mercy when on ultra high settings.)

[mcwaffles2003]

That makes sense, when I hear performance I think CPU hit since that's far and away the bottleneck

[Incarnation of Chaos]

7 hours ago, dave1904 said:

I do not really get good results this way. I will try it again however because I have not really done since 1.8.1

Please do. Would be cool to know the fps because I do not think SLI would make much difference. I wish we had a community benchmark craft and maybe even mod folder to compare the current hardware. If you use kerbal engineer it will tell you exactly how many parts you are using. 

The Zen 2 "Ryzen 3000 series" is likely the majority of the improvement XLjedi saw; SLI wouldn't make much of a difference (And likely isn't supported; CFX wasn't and i had to force it).

[dave1904]

5 hours ago, shdwlrd said:

Do you have visual mods or restock installed? I can see those impacting the performance.

everything you can think of including restock and scatterer. Normal craft are 40-60 fps. Its just the massive stations that can be extreme. 

1 hour ago, shdwlrd said:

And much larger texture files. Most all of the texture files are multiple layer, high fidelity images. Textures like that can slow down GPU performance. (Think how Crysis makes even today's high end PCs cry for mercy when on ultra high settings.)

To be fair this station almost never has this many vessels docked. I cannot stand 10 FPS. Its a mun fuel station where I transport LH2 from the surface to the station. (I use mun over minmus because its 1 day from kerbin) There are 5 big vessels attached, Redirct orion craft and an alcor lander with 60 parts. In total its 250 parts. 

[XLjedi]

@dave1904  I couldn't figure out how to display a frame rate, but here's a demo video of the station, and framerate doesn't seem to be too much of an issue.

Spoiler

 

 

[shdwlrd]

@dave1904 It's all the shiny stuff that is killing your frame rates. It looks pretty, but too much in one spot, definitely a frame rate killer. I will have to admit, your GPU is probably the bottleneck here. 

But I did notice that your physics clock is yellow, is that normal for you? 

[dave1904]

3 hours ago, shdwlrd said:

@dave1904 It's all the shiny stuff that is killing your frame rates. It looks pretty, but too much in one spot, definitely a frame rate killer. I will have to admit, your GPU is probably the bottleneck here. 

But I did notice that your physics clock is yellow, is that normal for you? 

No. Physics is never yellow especially since 1.8. This craft is an anomaly. 

Edit: I can run 15x physics acceleration at 30 fps with a 30 part vasmir craft and it runs great. I never really considered GPU being an issue before 1.8 but now it seems to be the case. I'll need to look at the current hardware market and maybe get  something like a 2080 or 2070. Ksp 2 will probably be heavier on GPU anyway when mods start coming. Not to mention I want a 4k system for the future. Maybe even an additional 16gb of ram and I might be able to squeeze a year or 2 out of my 4770k. It's still a good cpu and maybe it's best to skip a gen or 2 of cpu. If ksp2 needs a better cpu can upgrade then. The game is 6 months away anyway. I might even wait for next gen cards. That's all assuming ksp2 is not trash. 

Edit 2: next gen cards are only a few months away so I'll wait. Waste of money to buy the 20xx series. 

 

Edited February 25, 2020 by dave1904

[Incarnation of Chaos]

I'd invest in X570 and a Ryzen 3000 chip, and hold off on any GPU upgrades. 

PCI 4.0, DDR4 will be far greater upgrades than a GPU going forward, and the RTX 2000 series is a complete farce. They didn't even have it on their roadmap; it only existed because AMD can't seem to make a big GPU without falling flat on their faces.

Tldr. Platform upgrade now, and see if the GPU is needed l8r. 

[dave1904]

5 hours ago, Incarnation of Chaos said:

I'd invest in X570 and a Ryzen 3000 chip, and hold off on any GPU upgrades. 

PCI 4.0, DDR4 will be far greater upgrades than a GPU going forward, and the RTX 2000 series is a complete farce. They didn't even have it on their roadmap; it only existed because AMD can't seem to make a big GPU without falling flat on their faces.

Tldr. Platform upgrade now, and see if the GPU is needed l8r. 

I know they are good but replacing a 4770K is a waste for now. Its only a 20% single core performance boost and that is not enough considering the age of the 4770. You need to keep in mind that right now I only play KSP, stellaris and F1 games. I do not see the point in upgrading the whole system and keeping a 970. The 970 was the bottleneck in 90% of the other games I played. I will always regret not getting a 980

Edited February 26, 2020 by dave1904

[shdwlrd]

8 hours ago, Incarnation of Chaos said:

it only existed because AMD can't seem to make a big GPU without falling flat on their faces.

Nah, AMD wants to be the leader in the mid-range GPU market. Understandable since that area of the market sells the most cards. 

2 hours ago, dave1904 said:

RTX 2000 series is a complete farce.

I think it was created just to show off their new ray tracing processor. It's the next generation cards I'm interested in seeing.

But thinking about @dave1904 problem, if KSP2 graphics are going to be close to Restock, (which they seem to be so far) people who are using older GPUs are going to have a rough time around the colonies and the mega interstellar ships. 

Even with well optimized graphics, reflections are hard on GPUs.