Frame rate again, how to improve FPS?

[ffccnn]

My current route is only 6 x 4 baseboards so far with little texturing, not even a complete baseboard. I have the standards industries (power plant, lumber mill,pulp mill, containers), there are 4 consists stationed in the layout and twoportals spitting trainz at 10 min. intervals.
I have been observing the infamous stuttering lately, like jumping rabbits.

What could be killing my frame rate? please advise about possible causes or ifyou happen to have links to previous threads.

I tried searching this forum but the search engine is really useless. Most of the time it displays threads from the screenshots. I guess this is the right section of the forum to ask for technical issues and not about pictures.

Thanks in advance for your kind help.

 

[NJCurmudgeon]

There will hopefully be more knowledgeable folks who will chime in on this, but I have noticed the same problems, though with larger layouts than you are describing. It might help if you can give the specs of your computers, graphics card, etc. My guess would be it's your computer, but that's just a guess. I'm running 2012 on a laptop and I know laptops are not optimum systems for it. I'm rebuilding a route I had on 2009 and simplifying where I can. One thing I can offer is to experiment with removing assets and seeing if it makes a difference. I had a huge performance drop in Surveyor and tracked it down to a bridge track. Once I deleted it, the performance went back to normal.

 

[ffccnn]

This is my route content, maybe it's easier to spot a culprit, not one item is faulty:
1 track wood
20ft Container
3D1_Pg_BMO_D3-941
3D1_Pg_EK_D19-2290
40ft Container
40ft Container 'CAI 2
50ft Boxcar Allagash 3424
50ft Boxcar Allagash 4422
50ft Boxcar Allagash 4462
50ft Boxcar BN #249089
50ft Boxcar Canadian Pacific 214272
50ft Boxcar GBW #16256
50ft Boxcar UP #369009
6m Basic Streetlight
aa shadow 2m
AASHTO ParkingLot DoubleRow
AASHTO ParkingLot SingleRow
AB_building15
AB_building18
AB_building5
AJS Cobbles
AJS Grass 05
AJS Roundhouse 4 bay
AJS Roundhouse Left Closer
AJS Roundhouse Right Closer
AJS Turntable
AJS Turntable Stub
Aluminium Sheet Pallet
Amtrak Horizon Coach PhIII-Wide
Amtrak P42DC 7 TS2009 SP4/TS2010/TS12
Amtrak P42DC 83 TS2009 SP4/TS2010/TS12
Apple pallet
Arbys Restraunt
ASB Crossover Controller
ASB Crossover Trigger
Asphalt
Auran Track TS2009 Oak
Austin superbendy Track only
auto MB AutoTank
Automobile (invisible)
Aviation Fuel
Aviation Fuel Brenntag Tanker
Aviation Fuel GATX Tanker
Aviation Fuel VTG Tanker
Ballast new
Barley
Barley
Beer, pallet
Billboard Airfix Models
BMW X5 green
Bockbeer
Bockbeer brewery
Bogey wheel and axle scrap
Bogey wheel scrap
Bogey wheel scrap stack
BrickEngineHouse
Bridge end concrete
Bridge Support #2, old stone, single track
BrownDirt
BrownDirt 1
Building Finsbury Park depot
Building Haymarket depot servicing shed
Building Lumber Mill
Building Millerhill Depot office
Building RR Workshops
Building Silo
Building watertank
Building WaterTank
Bulk Overhead Loader 04
Bulk-Granular/Liquids Unloading Facility
Butter, pallet
Calm water
CanopyButted
Car 51
Car 52
Car 53
Car 54
Car 55
Car 56
Car Mitsubishi Magna 01
Car police 02
Car Spline 1
Car Spline 4
Car Volvo V70 01
Car11
Car14
Car15
Car17
Car18
Car2
Cattle
Cheese, pallet
Chessie System GP40-2
CHN worker01-dispatcher
CHN worker03-dispatcher
CHN worker04-dispatcher
CHN worker05-dispatcher
Class 50 Scrap
Clickety Clack Trigger
CNR Dwarf Signal
CO dirt01
Coal
Coal drop off Basic
Coal Pile01
Coal Pile02
Coal01
cobbles01
Concrete 1t
Container Forklift Crane 2
Container Station
Container Straddle Crane YM
Containers-002
Containers-005
Conveyor - Coal
Copper Bars on Pallets 02
Corrugated iron fence 01
Crane Track Straddle Crane
Crude Oil
Darkbrown Dirt
DDD Sign 08
Derelict scrap metal 02
Desert
Diesel Fuel
Diesel Fuel Brenntag Tanker
Diesel Fuel GATX Tanker
Diesel Fuel VTG Tanker
Dk_Coal
Dock Rails
Driveway
Dump Truck 01
Dumpster
Dumpster 01
Factory 8 GenGoods
Fence Chain Link 1942
Fire Engine
flour bags
Flour Mill 1
Footbridge kit stairs 9 risers grey
Forklift Hyster 50a
Forklift Hyster 50b
FSF-AU Dirt 01
FSF-AU Dirt 04
FT straight 100m
FT straight 10m
FT straight 25m
Fuel Crane front
G: grass03 - light dry short
gas plant
Gasworks Coal Pile
Gate A
Gate House
Gate Keepers Cottage
Gate Keepers House 1
Gate security 11.8m (Open)
gatehouse
General Autoparts
General Goods
generic tank 04
ger gravel
Goods Shed Ind
grass6
gravel a
gravel1
Grid
Hedge Spline 01
HighwayBus 01
Horizontal Tank #1
Hose industrial 100mm 01
Hose invisible
hotel2
HOTT Hidden track 1
HOTT Scale house 1
HP_US_Car_01_scenery
HP_US_Car_02_scenery
HP_US_Car_05_scenery
HP_US_Car_10_scenery
HP-Frau_002
HP-Frau_003
HP-Frau_005
HP-Frau_007
HP-Frau_008
HP-Mann01
HP-Mann03
HP-Mann04
HP-Mann07
HP-Mann09
Hyde Pulp Mill
IKEA pallet
ikea unloader
ikea_industry2
Industrial Building 01
Industrial Building 02
Industrial Building 05
Industrial Building 06
Industrial Building 07
Industrial Building 08
Industrial Building 09
Industrial Building 10
Industrial Building 11
Industrial Building 12
Industrial Building 13
Industrial Building 14
Industrial Building 15
Industrial Building 17
Industrial Building 19
Industrial Cabinet 01
Industrial Gantry Crane
Industrial Mast 02
Industrial Plant 01
Industrial Plant 09
Industrial Scrap Tyre
Industrial Scrap Tyre Stack
Industrial Scrap Tyre Upright
Industrial Tank 05
Industrial Tank 07
Industrial Tank 09
Industrial Tank 11
Industrial Tank 12
Industrial Tank 14
Industrial Tanks on Platforms
Industrial water tank (open)
Industry Airport
Industry Warehouse Small
Invisible Road
inviso rail
IR SD40-2
Iveco Tankzug Obermaier
JJS Cantilever Gantry Support
JK Junction Wire (Grey 2 Core)
JK Way Gauge 3T-5.0-FT (1.5m)
jpk coal dumptruck body
JPK CoalTruck
JPK CoalTruck2
JR 53ft Trailer USA Truck
JVC Grass 400 Dry trackside
JVC Grass 407 Dry/green group
JVC Grass 407 Dry/green single
JVC Grass 407 Dry/green trackside
JVC(S5) Grass 'B-III Dry' group.
JVC(S5) Grass 'C - Dry' group II.
JVC@-Grass346 large group
JVC@-Grass360 Cluster green summer
JVC@-Grass362 Cluster green summer
JVC@-Grass363 Cluster green summer
JVC@-Grass366 Cluster green summer
JVC@-Grass367 Cluster green summer
JVC@-Grass368 Cluster green summer
JVC@-Grass369 Cluster green summer
JVC~(Gr-1 group) Dry/green grass B 1.5m.
LightGravel 1
Log Wagon
Logs
Long Factory
Lumber
Lumber Mill
Lumber-3StackP
Lumber-4Stack
Lumber-SingleP
MB rail only track
MeatPackingPlant
Medium Factory
Mercedes CLK 200 K marine
MILW-Boxcar-50ft-L-01
MP Track concrete rusty v2
MP Track wood v2
Multiple Industry New
n man 1a
n man 5a
n man load 1
n man unload 1
n man walk 11
n man walk 3
n man walk 4
NH3Tank
No Cloud 01
Oats
OCR coal 1
Office ADM
Offices - St. Margaret's House
Oil Refinery
Oil Tanks 1
ONR SD40-2 1730
Orange pallet
oz grass tuffs on dirt
oz reddirt
oz reddirt dark
oz reddirt shrubs
Ozark Valley SD40-2 #502
Pallet Goods Stack
pallet1
pallet2
Palletised Goods
Pallets 02a
Pallets 05a
Paper roll
Parking Lot Double
Passengers
Permissive Dwarf Signal
Person15
Petrol Fuel
PgTree7_EL1_1-843
PgTree7_K1-184
PgTree9_PL1_1-1744
PgTree9_PL1-1845
Pitch black Coal
Plate Girder Bridge Platform
Plate Girder Bridge, bendy
Police Ford Crown Victoria
Portal
Potatoes, bagged on pallet
Powerstation
Railroad Worker 02
Road Corner Intersection (90)
Road T Intersection with Sidewalks
Road with Sidewalk
rusty spare rails
Safetran Signal Gantry
Scrap
Scrap boiler plate
Scrap Buffers 1
Scrap Buffers 2
Scrap Metal
Scrap Metal 1
Scrap Metal 2
Scrap Metal 3
Scrap Metal 5
Scrap wheels
Scraper Terex TS14B 01
Scraper Terex TS14B 02
Scrap-Metal Processing Building
Scrapyard Crane
SD40 CSX YN3 #8376
SeasonalAsphalt3
SeasonalGravel
Semi-Truck Tractor
Semi-Truck w 20ft Container Trailer Loaded
Semi-Truck w 40ft Container Trailer
Semi-Truck w 40ft Container Trailer Loaded
Semi-Truck w Dump Trailer
Semi-Truck w Livestock Trailer
Semi-Truck w Refridgerated Trailer
Semi-Truck w Tanker Trailer
SEN CITY Siding Gate 2
Sidewalk 12FT
Sidewalk 4 RR stats
Sign Speed 15
Sign Speed 30
Sign Speed 45
Sign Speed 65
Sign12LNER
Signal Rail End USA
Signal USA 2 02
Signal USA 2 04
Signal USA 2 05
Signal USA 2 L02
Sound Horn
Speed 50 mph
Steel Industry - Blast Furnace
Steel Industry - Blower House
Steel Industry - Continuous-Process Strip Mill - No Name
Steel Industry - Plate-Mill
Subaru Forester 03
Switch Lever
Switch wLamp Lt RG
Switch wLamp Rt RG
Switchstand Short Frame 1
Switchstand Short Frame 2
Tank AGIP
tank amoco
Tank CALTEX
tank Conoco
Tank Diesel Only
Tank Truck
Track Direction Marker
Track Invisible
Track mark
Track Only Rusty
Trailer container11
Trailer Container2
Trailer Container5
Trailer Container6
Trailer Container7
Trailer Tanker
Tree AlaskaCedar 02
Truck
truck 5
Truck cement mixer 01
Truck Chevy Cheyenne 01
Truck Chevy Cheyenne 03
Truck Chevy Cheyenne 04
Truck Chevy Cheyenne 05
Truck Ford F1 pickup 05
Truck garbage 01
Truck Mack B61 dumper 02
Truck Mack B61 dumper 03
Truck shotfirer's 02
Truck Volvo A25D 04
Truck_Conrail
TruckSmall Ute only
Tside Freight Depot
Tside Relaybox
TUME-Bridge Station-1T
Turnout Frog Left
Turnout Frog Right
Turntable Track
Umbrella Table 1, large
Union Pacific 61ft Woodchip Gondola
United Grains Dumptruck
United States
Unloading grate for rail or truck
Untitled
Us - Trailler Shell Tanker
Usa - flat nose Truck
Usa - semi Truck red
Usa - semi Truck Yellow
Usa - Trailer Truck 1
Usa - Trailer Truck 2
UST NW 2 4 Bay H62R
UST NW 4 Bay H62R
Vegetable, (canned) pallet
Vehicle Truck 10
Vehicle Truck 2
Vehicle Truck 7
Vehicle Truck 8
Vehicle Truck 9
Wheat
Woodchips
Worker 01
Worker 04
Worker 06
YARN L2 DL1 +1Si-1Si +Sh

 

[ffccnn]

I had a huge performance drop in Surveyor and tracked it down to a bridge track. Once I deleted it, the performance went back to normal.

How did you find it out? looks very cumbersome to keep deleting, replacing with something else, testing again, man, too much.

 

[ffccnn]

My system is a 3-4 years old desktop I try to keep upto date with latest drives and since I have MSDN subscription my Windows installation is up to date.

forgot to say my video card is a ATI Radeon HD 5700 Series.


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[RoysTrainz]

well ffccn,

stuttering fps can have many reasons!

first check your computer config and specs settings of your grpahics board, enough ram,
on trainz look at the options where you can play with the sliders.
I assume you work in TS12 and see only few boards many trainz industry so heavy load and frame killers the built-in ones!
others are the splines for flora and other objects.
In short it is how you organise how many objects different ones per board and spline try only track and road,powerlines. Industries take regular buildings and industry track first much nicer and less load.
What else can i come up with....
your disk old one defrag if SSD you should already have good fps and no defrag needed, it is that simple.
Well its a start maybe other people have other tips.
My routes are huge and no stuttering only if you jump around like a kangaroo but that is not the route's fault.

good luck
let me know your findings ok? 6x4 should be as smooth as Philskene's routes check with him too

Roy:wave:

 

[sniper297]

In game, main menu, options, developer settings. Check on "Show performance stats in surveyor" and/or "Show performance stats in driver" depending on which you want to test.

I have no idea what all these numbers mean, but the worst buffer and worst index lines tell you what the big resource hogs are in each area as you move around. Numbers less than 100 for the buffer count are allegedly okay, what the index count means was never explained anywhere I could find. Anyway;

Next step is to view dependencies, view in main list, click the Asset KUID tab at the top to sort by KUID numbers, scroll down to find the number(s) you noted in the performance statistics to see what it is / they are. Worst in the area I used for the demo is the track, which it should be since there's a lot of polys in the repetition of a lot of track (and it is 40th Street yard). Got something like a grass object that has a buffer count of 600 or something weird like that, check the asset in PEV mesh viewer to see if it has 16 million polygons per blade of grass, you never know when some detail oriented model maker is gonna add dewdrops, caterpillars, and ladybugs to a grass mesh.

 

[ffccnn]

thanks Sniper, your comments and help comments are very useful and funny and well documented, etc etc. You're one of my favorite forum members.
I have something else to reply to you but I need to find the correct thread first.

Back to business, I will track down those numbers in Driver, or maybe it is a good idea to check them right in Surveyor while laying down items that may be frame rate killers later in Driver.

 

[ffccnn]

A quick run in Driver shows this
worst index count around 1,125,300 for Plate Girder Bridge, bendy,<kuid2:124017:25029:1>
and worst buffer count about 35 same item.
Now what? I need it very badly, I don't see a replacement, am I screwed with it?

wait, there is another figure "worst script library mcscripthud.gs 7612334" ( I am typing from the screenshot)
humm, is that related to my other thread a loco fiddling with the HUD? http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?95929-Davesnow-are-you-around-here

 

[H222]

You're one of my favorite forum members.

There's a first

Just kidding Jim, you're a great help to trainz and it's community

Jamie

 

[philskene]

ffccnn --

6 x 4 layout with, from your Post #3, about 10,000 different dependencies? Wow!~!

I think the problem, and the solution, is obvious.

Try this little experiment. Download my DowntownTractionCo. It has 10 baseboards. Run a train around it and tell me what frame rate you get. It should be quite good.

Why? Use Content Manager to find the number of dependencies. It's 181. How does that compare with yours? But does DowntownTraction look densely populated? Yes. And textures OK (even through it's only 14)? Yes.

Got the solution?

There are a few other tricks too. Like using structures that use a common texture.

Phil

 

[mtldrm38]

the super bendy bridge s where updated'; I believe look up as YR (front) or 2010 at the end of the title.,
I also noted YARN roads etc., also should be replaced with a yarnish version s due to the invisible track associated with em
is a fps killer in 2010 I found...........

Studying Phils routes is a big plus the guy has a magic touch for smooth runnin routes....

 

[rickf77]

"That old Sniper.......thinks he's so smart.......", whoops, good morning. I have to agree with Jamie. That guy knows his stuff! The great thing is he's willing to help those fumbling fools (me), who felt perhaps getting into trainz might not have been such a great idea. You might even get away with asking the same question twice. Three times? Well, you'd be really pushing your luck! Thanks Sniper, thanks to you and other great guys, I have not chucked TS12 out the window. Stay healthy, some of us (me) need a lot of help.

Thanks old top, Cheers to you.....Rick

 

[clam1952]

It's only the worst buffer count you have to worry about, adding the line uncached_alphas 1 to the config fixes it, however no point unless the buffer count is over 100. Problem items will normally be way in excess of that. Ignore the index count they are all very high values and not the problem neither is a worst buffer count of 35, if you remove all the items with a high worst index count you will end up with a blank untextured board. Need to look elsewhere for the problem.

Looking at your dependencies the problem is going to be Fence Chain Link 1942 it wipes out boards, use the uncached_alphas 1 fix on it and that should fix the problem or help to.

 

[NJCurmudgeon]

How did you find it out? looks very cumbersome to keep deleting, replacing with something else, testing again, man, too much.

I got lucky in that the performance drop was in Surveyor (not Driver) not long after adding the offending spline. So there were only going to be a handful of things I added immediately before noticing the drop. Looking at the threads further along, it seems it may be a rail bridge for you too. Not sure if it's the same one I had. Awesome suggestions by Sniper and philskene.

 

[BD1]

placemarker

 

[clam1952]

Don't have to disconnect that will just encourage TadDaemon to keep trying to connect every 2 minutes while in game which probably offsets killing the AV etc. Just exclude any on access scanning of the Trainz Folder, disabling Windows Indexing on the Trainz folder is also a good idea.
But in this case I think the problem is going to be that fence I mentioned as I had major problems with it.

 

[sniper297]

I forget if it was flight simulator 4 or 5, but one of them had an expansion pack you could buy that had game editors, and I went nuts creating a scenery mod - houses, hills, trees, let's see some DETAIL!!! The mods I eventually uploaded to the flightsim bulletin board (no internet back then) were a lot more basic, super detail is great for screenshots, but that's all it's good for. These days (where are we, 25 years later?) I tend to be conservative while creating scenery, and still end up deleting some stuff and replacing with lower poly things that don't look as good but provide better framerates. Hard to get a balance, it really cramps your style.

 

[NJCurmudgeon]

Perhaps not entirely germane to this thread, but a helpful hint on frame rate conservation I discovered was to use low poly track for long stretches where the trains will be going top speeds. You're not going to notice the detail if you're going down the track fast, so no point wasting resources on it. I know prototypical purists scoff at using the four-track spline, preferring to lay four individual single tracks instead. But I found it's excellent for those long high speed areas - easy to layout and not a resource hog. (I do use a matching single track to do curves.) When getting into an area where the train will be going slow enough to notice detail or stops, I'll use the more detailed tracks again.

 

[ffccnn]

Looking at your dependencies the problem is going to be Fence Chain Link 1942 it wipes out boards, use the uncached_alphas 1 fix on it and that should fix the problem or help to.

First, I want to thank all of you for your help.
Really? well, but how do I know that such and such item has a high poly count? am I supposed to edit all available fences with one of PEV's tools, take note of every poly count, sort the list, revert every edited item, go back to the game and do a global replace of the bloody fence of mine? WOW! that is another job, not enterteinment. Repeat and rinse with every track, switch, signal, building, tree, texture, etc.

I am just looking at my shiny new Cities XL 2012 DVD

I have the impression that I am trying to cover too many topics at the same time, I have been opening many threads and getting too much info to digest in one sitting. Last night that AI train drove me crazy. Ordered it to go to three successive track marks and when it was about to reach the 3rd one went into a spur just 1 inch apart. That idiot!

Anyways, I am taking a deep breath and I am going to check that fence. My route is small but I am concentrating a lot of industry and complicated track layout. I have two layers of tracks: one at ground zero (which is level +100) for heavy trains and the other track is at level +109 for passanger trains (kind of monorail, not exactly just some Amtrak trains running on that bendy track).

Where can I see the frame rate? I have Fraps...


Too much stuff? please take a look.....


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