Company of Heroes directx10 patch released

[Woofmeister]

There's a decent post on the Relic forums about what Relic was trying to achieve with the DX10 shader quality here.

 

[Woofmeister]

Hold the phone! Nvidia just released new beta drivers Version 158.45. The top highlight of the release:

Improved performance for DirectX 10 version of Company of Heroes

Please, somebody leave work early and download these puppies!

Updated--Initial reports are not good. This poster is still seeing massive frame rate hits in exchange for an improvement that is, at best, subtle.

 

[solofly]

Originally posted by: gersson
PLEASE post screen shots of DX9/10
Come on, guys

http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_coh_videos.html


Testing notes from NVIDIA:

* Download and install NVIDIA ForceWare 158.45 driver from www.nzone.com.
* We recommend freshly installing Company of Heroes and applying all patches up through to v1.7. A fresh installation will require the following patch sequence: v1.0 C v1.4 C v1.60 C v1.61 C v1.7.
* Create a shortcut to Company of Heroes.
* Right click on the shortcut and selected Properties.
* Disable Vsync by adding ?-novsync? to the end of the path - "C:\Program Files\THQ\Company of Heroes\RelicCOH.exe" ?novsync
It is important to disable Vsync with this command line option for DX10 testing, because it can greatly affect scores, even if average frame rates are well below screen refresh rate if Vsync was enabled.
* Launch Company of Heroes.
* Go to Options C Graphics and set options as desired (see following section for optimal gameplay settings for various cards).
* Select ?Performance Test?.

Additionally:

* We recommend restarting the application between tests. Testing continuously without restarting the application may cause slowdowns due to memory leakage.
* For GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB and GeForce 8600 GTS, medium quality texture setting is recommended. High levels will cause slowdowns due to
insufficient texture memory.
* SLI is currently not supported in the DirectX 10 path of Company of Heroes. If you attempt to run the game with SLI enabled, you will see flickering menus and textures, and likely negative performance scaling. We are working to enable this in a new driver to be released around mid-June.
* To take a screenshot from within the game, hit the standard PrtScr (Printscreen) key. The image will be automatically saved in your ?\Documents\My Games\Company of Heroes\screenshots? folder.
* If you enabled a setting that crashes the game, delete ?Documents\My Games\Company of Heroes\configuration.lua? and restart the game.

 

[SPARTAN VI]

Sweet, I just got back into CoH too. If I remember, I'll try this out and take comparative screenshots for y'all when I get off work.

 

[LittleNemoNES]

Originally posted by: solofly

Originally posted by: gersson
PLEASE post screen shots of DX9/10
Come on, guys

http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_coh_videos.html
<SNIP>
Thanks for the link!
:: Downloads::

 

[Woofmeister]

Originally posted by: solofly

Originally posted by: gersson
PLEASE post screen shots of DX9/10
Come on, guys

http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_coh_videos.html


Testing notes from NVIDIA:

* Download and install NVIDIA ForceWare 158.45 driver from www.nzone.com.
* We recommend freshly installing Company of Heroes and applying all patches up through to v1.7. A fresh installation will require the following patch sequence: v1.0 C v1.4 C v1.60 C v1.61 C v1.7.
* Create a shortcut to Company of Heroes.
* Right click on the shortcut and selected Properties.
* Disable Vsync by adding ?-novsync? to the end of the path - "C:\Program Files\THQ\Company of Heroes\RelicCOH.exe" ?novsync
It is important to disable Vsync with this command line option for DX10 testing, because it can greatly affect scores, even if average frame rates are well below screen refresh rate if Vsync was enabled.
* Launch Company of Heroes.
* Go to Options C Graphics and set options as desired (see following section for optimal gameplay settings for various cards).
* Select ?Performance Test?.

All that just to disable Vsync? Why not just disable it using in-game options or even with Nvidia Control Panel? Personally, I hate using shortcut hacks to get games to function properly, I thought we'd seen the last of that after Splinter Cell Double Agent and F.E.A.R. Extraction Point.

 

[schneiderguy]

Text

Someone with a 2900 tested the DX10 patch, apparently he gets an average of 48fps at 1650x1080 with 2x AA and ultra details, which is way better than the performance a 8800 gets :Q

 

[Extelleron]

My performance is pretty bad, like everyone else. The 158.45 driver really helps though, as you can see by my results:

System:

AMD X2 3600+ Brisbane @ 2.8GHz
2GB (1GBx2) DDR2 @ 800MHz 5-5-5-15 1T
eVGA 8800GTS 640MB


All Settings @ Maximum, 1680x1050 0xAA/8xAF

FW 160.03, 8800GTS 640MB @ 500/1600: 9.0/17.6 FPS
FW 160.03, 8800GTS 640MB @ 612/1950: 10.6/19.8 FPS

FW 158.45, 8800GTS 640MB @ 500/1600: 11.6/22.7 FPS
FW 158.45, 8800GTS 640MB @ 612/1950: 13.4/26.3 FPS

FW 160.03 -> 158.45, No-Overclock = +28.8%/29.0% (min/avg FPS)
FW 160.03 -> 158.45, Overclock = +26.4%/32.8% (min/avg FPS)

It looks like the HD 2900XT is creaming even the 8800GTX / Ultra at this game, and I don't think anyone can claim it is due to drivers... AMD's drivers are pretty bad (performance wise) at this stage and overall nVidia's drivers are fairly mature.

 

[Zenoth]

It looks like the HD 2900XT is creaming even the 8800GTX / Ultra at this game, and I don't think anyone can claim it is due to drivers... AMD's drivers are pretty bad at this stage and overall nVidia's drivers are fairly mature.

And the reason is extremely simple: http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2007q2/radeon-hd-2900xt/index.x?pg=3

Company of Heroes is a vertex shaders intensive game, and that's exactly where R600's architecture excels, and where G80's architecture is behind.

It's a similar case for the Dawn of War games, also using a lot of shaders. I've seen DoW Dark Crusade demo'ed at my local store running with an HD2900XT, and despite the immature drivers it ran almost two times faster at an higher resolution than it currently runs on my system. There will be a few cases where the HD2900XT outperforms even the 8800GTX/Ultra, and G80 fans out there will eventually need to get over it.

 

[Extelleron]

Originally posted by: Zenoth

It looks like the HD 2900XT is creaming even the 8800GTX / Ultra at this game, and I don't think anyone can claim it is due to drivers... AMD's drivers are pretty bad at this stage and overall nVidia's drivers are fairly mature.

And the reason is extremely simple: http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2007q2/radeon-hd-2900xt/index.x?pg=3

Company of Heroes is a vertex shaders intensive game, and that's exactly where R600's architecture excels, and where G80's architecture is behind.

It's a similar case for the Dawn of War games, also using a lot of shaders. I've seen DoW Dark Crusade demo'ed at my local store running with an HD2900XT, and despite the immature drivers it ran almost two times faster at an higher resolution than it currently runs on my system. There will be a few cases where the HD2900XT outperforms even the 8800GTX/Ultra, and G80 fans out there will eventually need to get over it.

R600's architecture is suited for Company of Heroes, we've seen that through the DX9 tests. But in DX9, even in very high resolutions, the HD 2900XT was slightly slower than a GTX. Here, with DX10, it is much faster (it sees much less of a performance hit going from DX9 -> Dx10). This suggests that the HD 2900XT has better DX10 performance than the 8800GTX; the fact that R600 is well suited to CoH is irrelevant.

 

[Munky]

DX10 performance can't be accurately judged based on one game only. Each architecture has its own quirks and limitations, and even something as fundamental as the order of instructions in a shader program can influence performance. However, on paper the 2900xt seems like it should beat the 8800gtx in overall performance, so maybe people are just surprised with COH DX10 results based on the 2900xt's underwhelming performance upon launch.

 

[ronnn]

Originally posted by: munky
DX10 performance can't be accurately judged based on one game only. Each architecture has its own quirks and limitations, and even something as fundamental as the order of instructions in a shader program can influence performance. However, on paper the 2900xt seems like it should beat the 8800gtx in overall performance, so maybe people are just surprised with COH DX10 results based on the 2900xt's underwhelming performance upon launch.

Actually I am surprised at how poorly dx10 patched games are running on anything. If trends turns out to be accurate than both companies should be in consumer court for misleading advertising. Maybe ms is the culprit.

 

[Zenoth]

Originally posted by: ronnn

Originally posted by: munky
DX10 performance can't be accurately judged based on one game only. Each architecture has its own quirks and limitations, and even something as fundamental as the order of instructions in a shader program can influence performance. However, on paper the 2900xt seems like it should beat the 8800gtx in overall performance, so maybe people are just surprised with COH DX10 results based on the 2900xt's underwhelming performance upon launch.

Actually I am surprised at how poorly dx10 patched games are running on anything. If trends turns out to be accurate than both companies should be in consumer court for misleading advertising. Maybe ms is the culprit.

I believe in DX10, in it being much better, on paper, than DX9, at least as far as potential goes. Now, we need the game developers to figure out how to exploit the DX10 advantages. And that's where communication resides as being the most important catalyst in making DX10 "good", just as Microsoft is advertising it to be. The developers need to raise their hands like they did at school when they wanted to know something from the teacher, and ask questions. They need to understand how the new API instructions work, how to implement them properly.

Historically, I remember that when DirectX9 was introduced it took quite some time before a 3D game was released as "DX9-only" and being a good performer. Do you guys remember Star Wars: An Empire Divided ? It was one of the first DX9 games out there, and the performance was horrid at best. And then a few months later, it slowly but surely became better, along with better drivers. But the performance adjustments didn't only came from the drivers, that's the point here. Both the GPU makers and game developers, along with the OS creator that all the stuff runs on (I.E Windows, thus Microsoft) all need to communicate and cooperate between themselves, and that guys I'm sure is the lacking element at the moment.

 

[Ebnrune]

I thought I'd chime in about CoH performance. My friend is running an X2900XT and he gets around 20-21 FPS with the new patch, I think the performance numbers for the 2900XT are under DirectX9 in that last link. I stumbled across this review that matched up fairly well with the numbers from my rig (running a GTS) and my friends. It looks like the XT is faster than the GTS in CoH, but still falls behind the GTX and Ultra.

http://www.clubic.com/actualite-74516-company-heroes-performances-directx.html

 

[tuteja1986]

Originally posted by: munky
DX10 performance can't be accurately judged based on one game only. Each architecture has its own quirks and limitations, and even something as fundamental as the order of instructions in a shader program can influence performance. However, on paper the 2900xt seems like it should beat the 8800gtx in overall performance, so maybe people are just surprised with COH DX10 results based on the 2900xt's underwhelming performance upon launch.

yeah it all falls down to UT2007 and Crysis... Unreal 3.0 is the engine everyone one is using to make their game !!


kidding or am i !!

 

[ShadowOfMyself]

Originally posted by: Ebnrune
I thought I'd chime in about CoH performance. My friend is running an X2900XT and he gets around 20-21 FPS with the new patch, I think the performance numbers for the 2900XT are under DirectX9 in that last link. I stumbled across this review that matched up fairly well with the numbers from my rig (running a GTS) and my friends. It looks like the XT is faster than the GTS in CoH, but still falls behind the GTX and Ultra.

http://www.clubic.com/actualite-74516-company-heroes-performances-directx.html

Yeah that certainly looks more accurate, unfortunately for AMD

 

[Herradura]

With a smile on my face as I launched CoH after patching my emotion was quikly turned to sadness and shock. I was so sad I set out on OC'ing my Video card and CPU as much as I can to get the most I could. After that I decided to do some fooling around with the graphic settings so I can get some boost in gameplay. I was happy to figure out that if I change my model detail down to low or low-half way I get some of my FPS back. Now you might think your riflemen/tanks will take a visual hit but they wont look much different. When I change to lower detail the only thing I notice is that some foliage is changed around along with some "world litter" which is removed and also moved around. unless you look at both setting at the same time you wont notice anything besides your FPS go up a bit ( not alot but abit. With my setup and setting,
I am able to play CoH smoothly on these setting even in have arty battles.


(Settings)
http://img386.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cohsettingsds3.jpg]

[/URL]

High Model
http://img352.imageshack.us/my.php?image=modeldetailhightx4.jpg]

[/URL]

Low Model
http://img352.imageshack.us/my.php?image=modeldetail25zq7.jpg]

[/URL]

Cant Figure out how to post the links right but pay attention to the tress in the background and the rocks in the grass.

 

[tuteja1986]

My buddy gets average 53 fps and min of 28FPS on his system on 2900XT
DFI 600
E6600 @ 3.7Ghz
2GB DDR 1000
Powercolor 2900XT

 

[ronnn]

Well my son would prefer low, as better visibility.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: tuteja1986
My buddy gets average 53 fps and min of 28FPS on his system on 2900XT
DFI 600
E6600 @ 3.7Ghz
2GB DDR 1000
Powercolor 2900XT

At what res?

 

[Sylvanas]

I tried the -novsync command in COH and here are the results, rig in sig using overclocked settings.
Maxed out settings in game

AVG/MAX/MIN

1920x1200 8XCSAA with VSYNC ENABLED (It is enabled by default in 1.7)
26.3 /48.3 /8.6

AVG/MAX.MIN
1920x1200 8XCSAA with VSYNC DISABLED
28.8 /63 /9.9

So there is a difference when turning off vsync, but I really couldn't care about a big increase on the max frame rate, It's the Minimum frame rate that needs some work.

 

[Herradura]

Im not sure but I dont think you can say that the 2900xt is better than the 8800's I mean sure it does have more shader power but I think its safe to say from everyones numbers even the 2900xt's that the problem is DX-10 itself.


e6420@3.25
RAM@810
88GTS@660/1000

With that I only get avg=48.7
max=62 somthing
min=20 somthing

 

[solofly]

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/507/1/

 

[golem]

Originally posted by: solofly
http://www.legitreviews.com/article/507/1/

Does this review match the results most people are getting? It seems like from a sampling of forum comments that the HD2900XT was doing better under Directx10, but this reviews seems to show different?

Are they doing something right that others are missing or are they doing something wrong?

 

[manimal]

K I tested COH with the new patch and with everything maxxed average framerates were about 20-30 frames lower than they were in DX9. My system is a 6600@ 3.5 with a gts moderately OCd. The extra antialiasing options and the extra particles make the game look AWESOME. I can easily see why framerates are lower. What I cant figure out is the few times in the test that frames dropped to 9 frames a sec. It happens a few times when big explosions happen and when that plane crashes. I am going to try to disable Vsinc and see how it goes.

I am actually very excited to play trough the game again with all the eye candy turned up. I am gonna back off AA to the middle of the option scale and test again without Vsync. We have all SCREAMED for a DX10 game and now we have one. It truly does do more visually but as with all upgrades to DX they have been INCREMENTAL. Remember everyone screaming that BF2 was unplayable on all but the best hardware.......