FPS questions

[ayana]

so I can launch 100 part rockets without any real FPS issues, but my space stations turn docking into a slideshow. anyone have advice what I could do about it?

here's a screenshot of one, as an example. I purposely try to keep the part count down by taking things off with KAS but it doesn't seem to help

[Superfluous J]

The station looks pretty spartan, How many parts is it? Are those docking parts on the top vertical column? You could ditch the two that are in line with the horizontal part, I personally wouldn't dock with them much and suspect you may avoid them too. Other than that no, I don't see much.

One thing you COULD do is EVA everybody, then build a new station that is exactly the same as this one, and putit on the launch pad. Support it so it doesn't fall apart. Then use Hyperedit to put it in orbit (which will remove the launch clamps, I believe. Or you can remove them with staging once you've put it in orbit) and then exit the game, edit your persistence file to delete the old station and put the new one in its place, and then reload the game and see if that makes anything better. I don't know if it'll help but if there's something weird going on with the station that's not parts related, it could.

How much debris and other ships do you have? I'm not talking nearby (in the physics window) I'm talking all told. The more of those you have the more time KSP needs to spend calculating stuff.

[ayana]

The station looks pretty spartan, How many parts is it? Are those docking parts on the top vertical column? You could ditch the two that are in line with the horizontal part, I personally wouldn't dock with them much and suspect you may avoid them too. Other than that no, I don't see much.

One thing you COULD do is EVA everybody, then build a new station that is exactly the same as this one, and putit on the launch pad. Support it so it doesn't fall apart. Then use Hyperedit to put it in orbit (which will remove the launch clamps, I believe. Or you can remove them with staging once you've put it in orbit) and then exit the game, edit your persistence file to delete the old station and put the new one in its place, and then reload the game and see if that makes anything better. I don't know if it'll help but if there's something weird going on with the station that's not parts related, it could.

How much debris and other ships do you have? I'm not talking nearby (in the physics window) I'm talking all told. The more of those you have the more time KSP needs to spend calculating stuff.

I have maybe 10 to 12 flights in progress right now, no debris. the station is exactly 101 parts, but causes far more lag than a 108 part Mun rocket. the timer doesn't even switch to green anymore.

[Kasuha]

I can remember that on my previous computer (4 years old i7 and Nvidia card which was low end even by standards 4 years ago), similarly complex station also caused significant framerate drop. I never measured it but I believe it was somewhere around 2-4 FPS. So the question is, what is your hardware?

Edit: one more idea: how high in orbit that station is? Kerbin is drawn at different levels of detail at different orbital heights and higher orbit often means higher FPS.

[ayana]

I can remember that on my previous computer (4 years old i7 and Nvidia card which was low end even by standards 4 years ago), similarly complex station also caused significant framerate drop. I never measured it but I believe it was somewhere around 2-4 FPS. So the question is, what is your hardware?

Edit: one more idea: how high in orbit that station is? Kerbin is drawn at different levels of detail at different orbital heights and higher orbit often means higher FPS.

I'm running an i7 clocked up to 4 GHz and a very new graphics card, and I have the station up at 200 kilometers just because of the detail level. I suppose I could build a station with simpler parts and less docking ports to see if that makes a difference

[Superfluous J]

Just going to the station (like through the tracking station) causes lag? I'd give my suggestion a try to replace it.

Make a big fat copy of that persistent file before you start though. Editing those things is fraught with danger.

[ayana]

after some investigating with 150 part rockets, it looks like the docking ports are to blame. 8 of them on anything immediately hurts the framerate badly. I guess them being fancy and animated is what does it.

[ayana]

Just going to the station (like through the tracking station) causes lag? I'd give my suggestion a try to replace it.

Make a big fat copy of that persistent file before you start though. Editing those things is fraught with danger.

the culprit has already been found, now I just need a way to stop the docking ports from causing lag and get rid of the excess ones.

edit: the stock docking ports don't have this problem.

[Amaroq]

Ahhh, very interesting. At this point, I don't think you're a "Gameplay Questions and Tutorials" thread anymore. I suggest you report the laggy docking ports to the modder who created them, and indicate your issue.