Widescreen Gaming Forum

Is it just me, or does anyone else think its crazy that even the 8800gts can't run F.E.A.R with graphics all the way - and vertical sync on - without slowing down sometimes?

It's the vertical sync that kills it. Everything runs along smoothly until you hit a big open area, or one with lots going on, and then the frames cut in half. Same with Call of Duty 2 - and that game was made back in 2005!! I guess its the 1680x1050 that does it, but even on my 1440x900 the pc cant cut it with vsync on...

Looks like the newer games are owning the top graphics cards... benchmarks on upcoming games like Call of Juarez are showing very low framerates - granted that they haven't been optimized yet...

Do ya'll play with vysnc on or off?

I play with VSync on. I played with it off on my old CRT monitor, but the tearing on my LCD monitor bothers me too much to leave it off (in games like Mafia for example, at times during cutscenes and in-game there's so much tearing that it causes jerky motion during camera pans). Like you mentioned though, the downside is that if the game can't output at least 60fps it cuts it in half to 30fps to keep it in sync with the monitor. With VSync on even with a modern game like S.T.A.L.K.E.R., it still runs fine except for the rare graphically intensive or perhaps unoptimised areas (this is with static lighting though, full dynamic lighting produces an insane amount of swapping for me). I'm not particularly bothered by the jumps from 60fps to 30fps, and vice versa.

Also, F.E.A.R. is notoriously slow if you enable soft shadows (it also apparently doesn't work properly if you have anti-aliasing on). Have you tried disabling that and seeing if there's any gain in performance?

I've been playing everything but the newest, newest games on all highest settings with my 8800 with V-synch and have never really had a problem. Sometimes I do turn shadows down simple because I don't care about them... FEAR is one of those.

Only game I ever had tearing on and need vsync was Doom3. Once I turned it on game was flawless tho.

FEAR's got a crap engine which runs at fairly low framerates at high resolutions, even on the newest hardware. :P

As for vsync, I'd try running games without it by default, and only see if it improves things if you're noticing serious tearing. If vsync seems to be seriously reducing your framerate, make sure your game is using a feature called triple buffering. That'll prevent vsync from gimping your framerate too much, however it'll also use up more memory.

If you're okay with a bit of tearing and care most about high framerates, vsync off and triple buffering off is the way to go.

Here's a good post on how vsync works: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=928593

Hmm, FEAR runs at a constant FPS of about 60 on my 1900XT with everything at highest and VSYNC on. :|

Same here... FEAR is doing well... With my HD2900XT i get 110FPS with a res. of 1920x1200 everything at the max settings.

FEAR's got a crap engine which runs at fairly low framerates at high resolutions, even on the newest hardware. :P

That only really applied when FEAR was released, and a few months after that. :) To be honest, I thought FEAR's engine was pretty good - lots of games have worse ones, after all.

My X1950XTX merrily pounds out the framerate in FEAR and Oblivion at 1920x1200 with everything at max and Vsync on (I get tearing in pretty much every game if I don't). The only thing I disable in FEAR is Soft Shadows.

I might suggest to the OP that you have something running in your background processes that is causing your problems; an 8800, whether GTS or GTX, should have absolutely no problems with FEAR at all. Neither should it have issues with Call of Duty 2.

[quote]FEAR's got a crap engine which runs at fairly low framerates at high resolutions, even on the newest hardware. :P

That only really applied when FEAR was released, and a few months after that. :) To be honest, I thought FEAR's engine was pretty good - lots of games have worse ones, after all.

Okay, my bad. I just remember all the engines which are slow at release and don't ever forgive them. :P

Yeah, I know what you mean. ;)

I was playing FEAR on my 3400+ rig last weekend. It does surprisingly well on anything 7800/X1800 or greater. :)

It's gotta be the soft shadows then with FEAR... Game looks completely different without them though. But yeah without soft shadows everything is fine. I just hate having to turn off anything in a game thats a few years old... But oh well.

Whenever vsync is off the tearing is horrible - not just tearing but choppy gameplay as well, but when its on and frame drops to like 59, then it cuts in half, and the fast-then-slow thing is what I have trouble with.

Ok FEAR is driving me crazy in Vista. I am getting VERY poor performance in Vista compared to XP. In XP, with my 8800GTX, I am able to average well over 100FPS in the performance test with everything at maximum (except soft shadows) running at 1920x1080. In Vista, I only average around 30-40FPS at the same settings. I have been scouring the web looking for a fix or others with the same issue. Apparently I am the only one who has this problem (or the only one who noticed) besides one review of Vista game performance on Extremetech who saw similar issues.

This problem exists regardless of how many different drivers I have tried from Nvidia. I had the same issue with my X2 system in Vista. I want to play the game and to an extent, I guess the game is playable but certainly not enjoyable. Especially when I know the game runs like a dream in XP. I have tried re-installing the game from scratch, running as administrator, blah blah blah... Nothing fixes it. I will note though that once in a while, the benchmark will get similar numbers to XP, but if you run the test again, it is back to 30-40FPS.

Anyone else notice this 60%+ performance loss in Vista with FEAR?

Hmm, FEAR runs at a constant FPS of about 60 on my 1900XT with everything at highest and VSYNC on. :|

But what resolution are you on? Theres no way 1900xt could do that with 1680x1050.

Ok FEAR is driving me crazy in Vista. I am getting VERY poor performance in Vista compared to XP. In XP, with my 8800GTX, I am able to average well over 100FPS in the performance test with everything at maximum (except soft shadows) running at 1920x1080. In Vista, I only average around 30-40FPS at the same settings. I have been scouring the web looking for a fix or others with the same issue. Apparently I am the only one who has this problem (or the only one who noticed) besides one review of Vista game performance on Extremetech who saw similar issues.

This problem exists regardless of how many different drivers I have tried from Nvidia. I had the same issue with my X2 system in Vista. I want to play the game and to an extent, I guess the game is playable but certainly not enjoyable. Especially when I know the game runs like a dream in XP. I have tried re-installing the game from scratch, running as administrator, blah blah blah... Nothing fixes it. I will note though that once in a while, the benchmark will get similar numbers to XP, but if you run the test again, it is back to 30-40FPS.

Anyone else notice this 60%+ performance loss in Vista with FEAR?

Sorry I'm still runnin' XP, but you're not the only one with that problem. I've heard from other people as well that games (not just FEAR) tend to run slower in Vista right now. Nvidia and Microsoft will work it out in time I'm sure. Vista is actually supposed to run games faster - At least that was Microsoft's intention. I guess we'll see after a while..

8800 forceware is not doing so great yet, vista is still not 100% put the two together I guess your bound to have issues.

I run fear 1920x1080 and its totally playable with all settings max except no soft shadows. Im not in the super high fps tho, I can feel it dip down in heavy action somtimes.

My copy of vista is due to be devliered on saturday, I dont know if I even want to install it :P

(plus I have ALOT of file backup to do before I can format my hdd)

[quote]Hmm, FEAR runs at a constant FPS of about 60 on my 1900XT with everything at highest and VSYNC on. :|

But what resolution are you on? Theres no way 1900xt could do that with 1680x1050.

Well, my X1900xtx does. 1680x1050, everything on high, v-sync on, but I disable soft shadows. And that is in Vista, too. Although, a friend of mine has an identical build, with an x1950xt, and he gets awful performance in Vista.

The thing is, the higher resolution you are running at, the less you need anti-aliasing. Maybe try taking you AA down a notch or two; most likely you will hardly notice the difference graphic-wise, but the performance should be much better.

[quote]Hmm, FEAR runs at a constant FPS of about 60 on my 1900XT with everything at highest and VSYNC on. :|

But what resolution are you on? Theres no way 1900xt could do that with 1680x1050.
Well, I'm even on a 1920 x 1200 screen. I do have AA on 2x I believe, perhaps that's why it runs so smooth.

[quote][quote]Hmm, FEAR runs at a constant FPS of about 60 on my 1900XT with everything at highest and VSYNC on. :|

But what resolution are you on? Theres no way 1900xt could do that with 1680x1050.
Well, I'm even on a 1920 x 1200 screen. I do have AA on 2x I believe, perhaps that's why it runs so smooth.

Wow - that's pretty impressive. I didn't think the 1900xt could do that - xtx maybe, but that's pretty good! You have soft shadows off though right? That's what I was doing wrong - soft shadows on and AA on full :)

I wonder whats going to happen when the 120hz lcds hit the market? Vsync on would mean you would have to maintain 120FPS constantly... Otherwise it would half it to 60, right?

I can't see ANY video card out right now running the upcoming DX10 games at 120FPS on 22" or 24" widescreens - maybe not even FEAR with full settings.

Sorry I'm still runnin' XP, but you're not the only one with that problem. I've heard from other people as well that games (not just FEAR) tend to run slower in Vista right now. Nvidia and Microsoft will work it out in time I'm sure. Vista is actually supposed to run games faster - At least that was Microsoft's intention. I guess we'll see after a while..

5-10% performance loss is acceptable at this point (as is the general average performance loss between vista and XP due to vista's more demanding nature and immature drives) but 60%? FEAR is the worst of all the games I have tried in Vista. Pretty much everything else has run fine with little issue.

Overall though, gaming in Vista has been pretty slick. It's just the performance-monger that I am wants it to be like XP. Patience is a virtue I suppose.