Performance optimisation.

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[Captain Baines]

I think many, if not most, players of Ship Simulator could benefit from a clear and comprehensive guide on which graphics settings (both in-game and driver settings) most influence performance (frame rate) in the game and, where applicable, how these are related to hardware limitations.

If you have a CPU that is a few years old and not top of the current range for instance. Lowering which settings will improve performance the most and which settings will play havoc with performance?

How can you distinguish between whether the performance bottleneck of a system lies with its CPU or its video card? If you buy an expensive fast video card but it then turns out that certain aspects of the game rely heavily on the CPU and your maxed out CPU is the ultimate limiting factor you'll not be pleased. With adequate information people can avoid such costly but ineffective operations.

Which settings will have more effect with less video card memory? Can you safely increase certain settings on a 512 MB card which you shouldn't do on a 128 MB card?

Will things like support for particular shader models allow you to safely increase certain settings that cards that lack support for higher shader model levels couldn't cope with?

How will performance be affected by Anti Aliasing settings? Are these effects linked to other settings or card specifications? How will resolution and refresh rate affect performance? And again will it be relatively safe in combination with particular hardware specifications but detrimental in other cases?

Etc. etc.

It would be very helpful if adequate information about such questions could be given in order to allow people to fine tune the graphics settings of the game and make the best choices when making decisions about hardware upgrades.

[BrianG]

I see this as one more part of user information. Like the other aspects such as vehicle handling it is too large and volatile to include in the printed User Manual.

Other parts of user information for Ship Simulator seem to be tackled with the combination :-
- A PDF of the current edition of the User Manual
- Discussion topics on the Forum
- An FAQ on the Forum controlled by Vstep based on what turns up in the discussion topics.
- Independently prepared web pages or PDFs for which links appear in the discussions.
- Help information provided within the program.

I suggest this structure be formalised by Vstep.
1. FAQ Topic for SS2008

2a. Child Topic. PDF and or web copy of current printed User Manual (Sticky). When a new edition is produced any FAQs that are included in the manual to be removed from the child topic/s.

2. Child Topics:- FAQs for each section/sub-section of the user manual :- Installation, General, Free Roaming.... plus information provided in the program.


3. Links:- Web addresses of independent sources. The link contents are offerred at the User's risk. (Collected from the discussion topics.)

Users can find most answers through the structure or by a search of the SS2008 topic.
I leave open the question of the various editions SS2006,2008,2009. Perhaps VSTEP in adopting a discussion point for the FAQs would classify it as applying to a particular edition/s.

Other topics such as Mission Editing and Ship Handling could be included in the structure decided by VStep. BrianG

[mvsmith]

Hi BrianG,
Since the maintenance of things on this forum is done almost entirely by volunteer members, and you obviously have more expertise than most of us, perhaps you would undertake the task of collecting and maintaining the information.
Regards,
Marty

[BrianG]

Hi BrianG,
Since the maintenance of things on this forum is done almost entirely by volunteer members, and you obviously have more expertise than most of us, perhaps you would undertake the task of collecting and maintaining the information.
Regards,
Marty

Hi Marty,
I will do what I can. I am now retired and my career with computers involved large computers such as the IBM360 and AS400 at several levels. I am not familliar with PC Hardware sufficiently to judge on its optimization. I of course now use a PC personally. For now I will be specific as far as I can as regards 'Performance Optimization' in particular. Then if VStep likes the approach they can extend it to other sections of the User Manual and appoint volounteers for each section.

I will reply again in detail when I have spent some time spelling it out.
 BrianG

[BrianG]

Hi BrianG,
Since the maintenance of things on this forum is done almost entirely by volunteer members, and you obviously have more expertise than most of us, perhaps you would undertake the task of collecting and maintaining the information.
Regards,
Marty

Hi Marty,

... and here is my followup.


I suggest it be tackled as follows :-

A This topic be moved to:-

Ship Simulator > English forum > Ship Simulator 2008 > Technical Support > Performance Optimization.

The first child topic to be a 'Sticky' containing links to 'Graphic Settings',and 'Troubleshooting' headings  of the pdf of the current User Manual. Vstep should consider adding a heading 'Performance Optimization' to the User manual with 'Graphic Settings',and 'Troubleshooting' as subheadings.

Each time VStep produced a new printed edition they would update this link. Any existing FAQ material added to the new printed edition  Would be removed from the FAQ topic by the volounteer maintaining the FA Topic.

The second child topic also to be a 'sticky'

Ship Simulator > English forum > Ship Simulator 2008 > Technical Support > FAQs about Performance Optimization.

Here would be placed concise answers to questions raised and answered in the 'Discussion' topic by anyone. A volounteer would not thus need the time and knowledge to answer the questions personally to update the FAQs.
When producing a new edition of the printed User manual VStep would review the FAQ answers for inclusion in the new edition saving them some work and cost.
 
The third child topic , also to be a 'sticky':-

Ship Simulator > English forum > Ship Simulator 2008 > Technical Support > 'Discussion' (of Performance Optimization).

Here as at present anyone would discuss the subject. When a question seemed to be resolved the volounteer would put the material as one question and answer  and add it as a child topic to the FAQ topic.

So that is the structure I have in mind.

As to Content

As I said I am not an authority on PC performance but I offer my view till something better comes along.

1. Read the User Manual Sections on Trouble Shooting and Graphics and apply the knowledge.

2, Vista needs a bigger hardware spec than XP as it uses more of the hardware resources for itself.  Vista is inferior to XP as regards performance on the same hardware as it provides extra functions which Ship Simulator does not need. Vista also has more problems so if the choice is available then use XP.
If buying new then Toshiba (and maybe others) offer with Vista Business Edition PCs a recovery disk for XP because many Business Users won't buy a Vista PC otherwise. Having bought it you run the recovery procedure and you have a new PC running XP and more user power. Later you can always 'restore' Vista without having to pay extra.
Vista shares the main memory between the cpu and the graphics so that confuses matters.

3, Graphics Cards: The troubleshooting section of the User Manual recomends Geforce 5900  or Radeon 9600 Pro/X600. with 128 mb Graphics memory. If you have another card that you think is suitable then email the manufacturer. It is too costly for VStep to answer this sort of question. They did their bit by stating the minimum spec.

4. If short of CPU power try to stop unnecessary programs running in the background.  Vista has dozens.
Look elsewhere for advice on how to do this. Perhaps someone will suggest a source.

5. Captain Baines initial questions on this topic require an expert to answer. I suggest you raise your PC to the minimum spec specified in the User Manual then if it does not work contact Ship Simulator support at info@shipsim.com .

6. My guess is that users of Ship Simulator world wide constitute a large and growing market so perhaps Microsoft, and the manufacturers of the video cards, ATI and NVidia would be happy to give their advice for publication on this forum.
BrianG

[Captain Baines]

5. Captain Baines initial questions on this topic require an expert to answer. I suggest you raise your PC to the minimum spec specified in the User Manual then if it does not work contact Ship Simulator support at info@shipsim.com .

Which is exactly why I asked it here.

I'm not looking for general tips (although they may be relevant too) but for the knowledge of the people who have developed the software. They should be in the best position to have the knowledge and experience to give specific information about Ship Simulator. They should have the most knowledge of the graphics engine (Quest3D as I understand) underneath the game and its strong and weak points. They may even have made certain choices because they knew making them differently might exclude all people except the ones with recent hi-spec computers from enjoyable game play. They may also have a more extensive knowledge about the technology of video cards because it is closely related to their professional field.

They most likely have installed the software on many different computers and have been able to compare them. They maybe have upgraded the hardware in a number of them (or know about people that have) and know of the effects that had. They surely have experimented with settings more than the average user to see their effects. It is much more effective to share that knowledge and experience instead of everyone having to find it out for themselves. Especially because this is such a specialist subject. Also very important is that they should have access to the support people of Quest3D who should be even (much) more knowledgeable on this topic. They can pick their brains and tell us about the results of that here.

And I don't see this as a Tech-Support topic because it is not a 'problem' as such and it is not specific to any one person or computer. I also think many people with computer hardware well above minimum game specifications would still like to see some (or even considerable) performance improvements.

It will be very useful to get feedback from users if they have had positive results using the information that I hope will be placed here so others will know that specific bit of information has real potential to improve performance.

And although proper documentation on any relevant aspect of the game will of course be very useful (as it is with any software - unfortunately it is also the Achilles heel of most software, and frankly hardware too), I started this thread with the focus on how to tweak your computer in order to get the best (graphics) performance.

If it is indeed possible to give information with which people can achieve visible results I think it will be much appreciated by many players of the game.