What is your part limit?

[Oafman]

My absolute limit is 600, and I'll only do that if I know it won't be long until I start ditching parts. Moer than that and the game ceases to be fun.

So, am I right in thinking it is CPU which determines what FPS you get from high parts counts?

[Ravenchant]

I usually start noticing lag at around 400 parts, so I try to keep most ships under that...anything over 600 lags severely :/

[Hannu]

It would be great if everybody told what FPS they are getting instead of saying based on "Feeling"... because Others consider as 30 Fps "Playable", I don't even consider about 48-50 Fps as playable because it gets choppy and I'm so used to playing with silky smooth 60 Fps... (I can't wait till I get a 120Hz monitor so I could enjoy 120 Fps...)

You are right. I am sure that personal preferences of what is enough FPS gives more variation to people's part limits than true differences in computer performance, if we talk about quite modern desktop computers (maybe excluding the most cheap budget models). Fortunately I am so old computer gamer that my nerves are used to quite low values, 10-15 fps without problems and therefore I can launch over 1000 part monsters.

My quick test gave results:

Parts FPS

167 40-50

448 13-18

1072 8-9

I have i7 3770K @4.2 GHz and Nvidia GTX660 graphics card. I use 1920 x 1200 window on 2560 x 1440 screen. KSP is 0.24.2 32 bit windows version, Windows is 7 pro. First vessel was about 1500 t launcher, second was 4000 t launcer and the last one was hundreds of empty 0.5 t fuel tanks added to the second. It seems that any launcher goes well in current versions. You need just couple of struts to most critical places. Couple of versions ago 2000 t launcher needed insane mess of hundreds of struts between everything.

Edit: I forgot to write, that tests were ascents from KSC under control of the MechJeb2's ascent guidance. My graphics settings are: terrain detail: high, render quality level: fantastic, texture quality: full res, other: defaults.

Edited October 24, 2014 by Hannu
Information added.

[Tail_TL]

You are right. I am sure that personal preferences of what is enough FPS gives more variation to people's part limits than true differences in computer performance, if we talk about quite modern desktop computers (maybe excluding the most cheap budget models). Fortunately I am so old computer gamer that my nerves are used to quite low values, 10-15 fps without problems and therefore I can launch over 1000 part monsters.

My quick test gave results:

Parts FPS

167 40-50

448 13-18

1072 8-9

I have i7 3770K @4.2 GHz and Nvidia GTX660 graphics card. I use 1920 x 1200 window on 2560 x 1440 screen. KSP is 0.24.2 32 bit windows version, Windows is 7 pro. First vessel was about 1500 t launcher, second was 4000 t launcer and the last one was hundreds of empty 0.5 t fuel tanks added to the second. It seems that any launcher goes well in current versions. You need just couple of struts to most critical places. Couple of versions ago 2000 t launcher needed insane mess of hundreds of struts between everything.

Edit: I forgot to write, that tests were ascents from KSC under control of the MechJeb2's ascent guidance. My graphics settings are: terrain detail: high, render quality level: fantastic, texture quality: full res, other: defaults.

Now thats what I'm talking about! Spot'on! Because of this, now I see that others have similar performance with similar specs and that my PC isn't under-performing. Although there is a problem with my standards.

Edited October 24, 2014 by Tail_TL

[cantab]

Really wish I could change answers after poll voting. I hit 200-300, but actually that may be optimistic. My PC is pretty feeble.

Then again it depends whether you mean lag as in the physics time ratio goes much below 1, or lag as in the framerate drops so much the motion visibly stutters. The latter takes more parts than the former. Running at about half speed became pretty much the norm for me.

I have run much higher part counts, up to 1500, but only when I really really want to.

I'm surprised how almost nobody is checking their FPS.. Do You even benchmark bro?... When I built a space station around kerbin it had 216 parts.. and my Fps was 28-40, but in 64bit I gained about up to 30-50 Fps.. as you can see I didn't have such stable fps, it fluctuated a lot. I actually start feeling un-smooth gameplay when I hit 55 Fps.. (My Fps is locked on 60) So for me... anywhere near 30 Fps is ******* annoying and don't want to play it, heck, even at 50 fps I start to get annoyed because I my controls start to feel a bit sluggish (Very little but still).

It would be great if everybody told what FPS they are getting instead of saying based on "Feeling"... because Others consider as 30 Fps "Playable", I don't even consider about 48-50 Fps as playable because it gets choppy and I'm so used to playing with silky smooth 60 Fps... (I can't wait till I get a 120Hz monitor so I could enjoy 120 Fps...)

It's a fair point. Personally on Linux the only way I know to check framerate is with a mod, which I'm always paranoid is actually affecting the rate.

I also believe that variation in frame timing is more significant than absolute framerate. Your milage may very but I'd expect a locked, rock steady 30 fps would be nicer than something wobbling all the time between 40 and 60. Mind you even a steady 30 is the stuff of dreams for me in KSP.

Edited October 24, 2014 by cantab

[Frozen_Heart]

I start lagging at about 400 parts but I can tolerate up to around 500. I do builder craft larger than that but not for serious missions.

[Caelib]

I cant seem to find anything to do with small craft, like a small SSTO, idk what to do with one once i have made it, i mean i tried making a small SSTO with cargo bays for an example, and this is my version of small (360 parts)

I do quite a bit of exploration with probes/landers so most of my payloads have part counts of 30 or less. Building small has great advantages in cost and efficiency -- I've been able to get a probe to explore the Jool system with less than 50 parts total and a cost of less than 50,000 funds.

[Bekiekutmoar]

My rockets / ships / bases / stations are rarely above 100 parts, but now I'm designing a lander meant for Eve, and including launcher it has around 165 parts. It results in a yellow timer and slightly lower framerate during launch and when looking at the ocean. Lag gets worse when re-entry effects are visible.

[hellion13]

My part limit the Last time I played KSP over a year ago with 0.20-0.21. was somewhere on the verge of 2k parts @20fps. The game has been optimized a bit since then.

With the PC I had, I never experienced the crashing and frame rate problems others did, I dont really know why. PC specs as follows:

CPU: FX-8350 OC'D@ 4.9GHZ

GPU: 2x 3gb HD7950s

RAM 32gb Corsair 2400mhz(oc:2600mhz)

Mobo: Asus Sabertooth v3(the special one with PCI-e 3.0)

(I believe the stupid fast CPU combined with a capped 4gb of the fastest RAM out when i built it was the reason I never had crash problems. I was pushing the data too fast for it to build to crash levels.)

Edited October 24, 2014 by hellion13
reasons

[LostOblivion]

Is video memory the bottleneck for me? I'm running an old HD 5670 with 1 GB, but have an OC'd 1st gen i7 at 4 GHz. Still it begins lagging at only 100 parts, and at 300 it is unplayable for me. The timer also turns yellow and with 300 parts 1 kerbal second = 2 realtime seconds. If I turn the dt from 0.04 to 0.10 the timer goes from yellow to green, but the lag remains. Does KSP require that much vmem?

I don't need real time physics, but the graphics lag is killing me...

Edited October 24, 2014 by LostOblivion

[herbal space program]

I've built some humongous space stations that were awesome but basically unusable as fueling depots because they were so laggy. Start the final docking approach, go have dinner, make a correction, watch TV for an hour, dock, go to bed!

[Francois424]

500 - 1000 for me.

Above 500 it starts being annoying (ie: 1 real second for each 3 sec of play).

Above 1000 (only launched ONE ship of the kind), it took 20 minutes to launch into low kerban's orbit. It got better as I shedded part count, but it was super annoying.

Ppl tell me to stop suggesting and wait for next unity which apparently will fix the issue, but since I like building big... yeah. annoying.

[hellion13]

Is video memory the bottleneck for me?

I would say yes. I've always thought the minimum specs required for this game were set a little low.

Truthfully I dont really know. I had a really cheap base build I slowly built up as I figured out what worked. I did learn RAM speed helped out the most. As soon as I went from crappy stock 1333mhz ram to the 2400mhz stuff I was crashless. That happened before I added the second GPU. All that did was get me another steady 10fps.

[Guest]

Totally useless discussion without rig specifications.

AMD Athlon II X4 630 Processor, 12GB RAM, GTX 550 Ti, Windows 7 x64

Limits:

200 parts - Ok

300 parts - Bearable

400 parts - Bad

And I count physics time slowdown as undesirable effect, limiting maximum parts counts. Bearable is actually quite subjective thing - bearable for one person is unplayable for other.

Edited October 24, 2014 by Guest
typo

[NecroBones]

For me, I can usually handle 800+ on the pad. But once the mission really begins (LKO and beyond), I want it under 500. But assuming we're talking about launch size, I think of the "hard limit" as being around 1000.

[xtoro]

I'm surprised how almost nobody is checking their FPS.. Do You even benchmark bro?... When I built a space station around kerbin it had 216 parts.. and my Fps was 28-40, but in 64bit I gained about up to 30-50 Fps.. as you can see I didn't have such stable fps, it fluctuated a lot. I actually start feeling un-smooth gameplay when I hit 55 Fps.. (My Fps is locked on 60) So for me... anywhere near 30 Fps is ******* annoying and don't want to play it, heck, even at 50 fps I start to get annoyed because I my controls start to feel a bit sluggish (Very little but still).

It would be great if everybody told what FPS they are getting instead of saying based on "Feeling"... because Others consider as 30 Fps "Playable", I don't even consider about 48-50 Fps as playable because it gets choppy and I'm so used to playing with silky smooth 60 Fps... (I can't wait till I get a 120Hz monitor so I could enjoy 120 Fps...)

Totally useless discussion without rig specifications.

AMD Athlon II X4 630 Processor, 12GB RAM, GTX 550 Ti, Windows 7 x64

Limits:

200 parts - Ok

300 parts - Bearable

400 parts - Bad

And I count physics time slowdown as undesirable effect, limiting maximum parts counts. Bearable is actually quite subjective thing - bearable for one person is unplayable for other.

I agree with both statements here.

My specs:

CPU: i7 4790K overclocked at 4.5Ghz

RAM: 16GB HyperX Fury ocverclocked @ 2400

Motherboard: MSI Z97-GD65 Gaming board

GPU: 2x Radeon HD 5830's crossfired and overclocked

PSU: Thermaltake 750W

HDD #1: Three Spinpoint S4's in RAID 0 config (OSes, programs and important data)

HDD #2: 1TB Western Digital Black (Storage for music, downloads and movies)

Case: Coolermaster CM690II lined with sound-deadening Spire Soundpad matting on both side panels

Case Cooling: 5 fans for case controlled by Scythe fan controller

CPU Cooling: CPU is watercooled with Corsair H80i watercooler.

I recorded a video as well. Unfortunately the recorder bogs the CPU during the game, and I do get much better FPS when not recording. I tried a few screen recorders and ended up using Bandicam.

For some reason though, I can't get FPS to show on screen. I also tried recording with FRAPS running but it also won't show it. I also downloaded a mod called ShowFPS that is supposed to show it in-game, but it doesn't seem to work with .25.

Anyways, I loaded up TimeControl because that at least shows you what percentage of game speed it's running at. But as you can see, it's still very smooth and playable even with 600 parts, and only gets better from there.

You need to watch it in HD to make out the part numbers and game speed. All graphics settings are also on MAX.

WITH screen recording software I get:

It starts off launching from the launchpad around 25-30FPS.

Stage 12(469 parts) it's just over 40FPS.

Stage 9 (285 parts) it's at 70FPS.

And it just goes up from there until I'm burning the last stage at 140FPS.

WITHOUT the screen recorder running I get much better:

It starts off launching from the launchpad around 45FPS.

Stage 12(469 parts) it's just over 65FPS.

Stage 9 (285 parts) it's at 90FPS.

And it just goes up from there until I'm burning the last stage at 160FPS.

Quite happy with the setup and I think I'll make a 1000-part ship to see what the limit is until it's not smooth anymore...

I may record another video just recording my monitor with a camera so you can see the difference. I also want to figure out how to get the FPS up on the screen...

Edited October 24, 2014 by xtoro

[Vahal]

I always try to keep part count as low as possible. 300 parts is usually my upper limit. I had some monstruosities with 700/800 parts but the lag is just a fracking waste of time.

[Moss]

I'd say for me it's about 12.

[elkar]

Imagine the day when 1000 part ship will still gives you green FPS time number.

[xtoro]

Imagine the day when 1000 part ship will still gives you green FPS time number.

I'd be happy with yellow, as long as its not red

[cantab]

Just as long as it's not accomplished by 990 of those parts being physicsless...

[metaphor]

What do you mean by lag?

The game gets slower and slower as I add more parts to a ship. There isn't really any number where it suddenly becomes noticeable. Even a 1-part ship can cause my computer to lag sometimes. But I can still build 2000-part ships, and run them at 2-5 fps.

[elkar]

I'd be happy with yellow, as long as its not red

Game would suddenly got so much more potencial.

[TheDarkStar]

I can do up to 500 with only a few problems, and I've gone over that (600 parts, iirc) with it still controllable.

[Laie]

Totally useless discussion without rig specifications.

Totally useless, period. Some state the number where they get the first flicker of yellow. Others seem to be of the opinion that it's not lag until you feel it -- whatever "feel" means.