F.E.A.R. memory requirements

[Goi]

Hi,
I was just replaying F.E.A.R. again, and I have generally good performance, except in some specific areas, the game just stutters like hell. I have a reasonably good system(A64 Newcastle 3200+ running at 2.4GHz, 1GB PC4000 memory at 480MHz, 6800GT AGP at 410/1100MHz, 250GB Seagate 7200.8 SATA HDD, SB Audigy2 ZS). I know this isn't a graphics problem since I reduced my settings(disabled FSAA, AF, and even reduced resolution to 640x480 as a test) and still those specific areas stutter like crazy, and from what I've read, an A64 2.4GHz basically shouldn't be a bottleneck for this game. I've also defragged my HDD, so I'm wondering if it's my 1GB memory that's not enough?

My F.E.A.R. settings are 1024x768, 2xFSAA, 4xAF, most settings are either medium or maximum, and the in-game performance test shows 0% below 25FPS, 10% between 25-40FPS and 90% above.

So far 2 areas that I've noticed the slowdown are in a building when the Korean scientist is taking pictures of the gore on the floor after coming out of an elevator, and 1 other stage in interval 08 where there's this huge rocket launcher touting robot along with tons of other soldiers.

 

[BFG10K]

The game definitely likes 2 GB RAM.

 

[apoppin]

No . . . either you have a serious problem with your system [drivers] or you have Soft Shadows enabled.

Turn Soft Shadows Off!

edit:

there are a few places in the game where it just runs slow . . . if you look at even top-of-line sli'd rigs, there are some pretty severe FPS drops at places.

but 1GB more RAM shouldn't make that much difference

 

[QueBert]

I'm running a 3200+ a64 + 512 megs and the first few levels really were sluggish, but the game ran alright after that. I have an X800, the game seems to be poorly coded, parts would really slow down for no apparent reason.

 

[IamDonSharp]

When I first got FEAR and set it up to automatically detect my settings the game would be at around 10 fps in the beginning when you got out of the car. I was running it on an A64 3200+ socket 754 with 1.5gb ram and a geforce 6800gs agp card. I went into the options and turned the cpu setting down and it worked fine. Maybe that's what's happening. The same thing also happened to my roommate who has an a64 3500+ 939 1gb ram and a geforce 6600 pcie. He lowered the cpu setting and it stopped. Try that, if it works you can put the graphic settings up pretty high, but yeah, no soft shadows they're evil.

DonSharp

 

[Powermoloch]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
The game definitely likes 2 GB RAM.

Heck yeah, without a doubt

 

[Goi]

Well I don't have soft shadows on. I know that's a performance killer and doesn't even look that good to begin with so it has always been off. I googled a bit and found that apparently EAX Advanced-HD can cause stuttering as well, so I disabled that and just went with EAX 2.0 instead. It seems to be slightly better, but I'll try lowering my CPU settings as well.

Has anyone done a recent game comparison with F.E.A.R. in it that looks at performance with 1GB and 2GB? I know there were a couple a year or 2 ago with Doom3(AT had one) but I don't remember anything newer than that.

 

[Goi]

OK I think it's the memory. I loaded up the stuttering stage(Interval 08 - Point of origin I think) and then I alt-tabbed out to task manager and saw that it was using 1.30GB of memory. Then I loaded up another stage that was perfectly fine, no stuttering, and checked task manager again - 800MB. Since I have 1GB of memory I think we have the answer here - my system was trashing while I'm playing that stage.

Anyway, another question. Is FRAPS's ingame FPS readout accurate? I have my refresh rate set at 120Hz and vsync and triple buffering on, but my FRAPS ingame FPS seems to always stabilize at divisors of 120 (i.e. 120, 60, 40, 30, 24, 20). I thought that's only supposed to happen when vsync is on but triple buffering is off?

 

[n7]

I love how some old timers here still like to claim no one needs more than 1 GB for games...

You guys have been here long enough to see the amount of RAM needed for gaming jump from 256 MB to 512 MB, or at least 512 MB to 1 GB.

Why is it so hard for you guys to believe newer games benefit from 2 GB, or at least 1.5 GB???

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: n7
I love how some old timers here still like to claim no one needs more than 1 GB for games...

You guys have been here long enough to see the amount of RAM needed for gaming jump from 256 MB to 512 MB, or at least 512 MB to 1 GB.

Why is it so hard for you guys to believe newer games benefit from 2 GB, or at least 1.5 GB???

who is making that claim?
:Q

the only thing i mentioned was that 2 GB isn't "that" much more performance over 1GB - in FEAR . . . otoh, BF2 and other new games benefit "more".

i am willing to bet that the OP will still have stuttering problems in those same places with +1GB RAM.

Clearly RAM requirements are going UP . . . Vista evidently uses 800MB just to run well . . . but i will upgrade 'then'.

to the OP try turning OFF vSynch [and other background apps]

 

[CTho9305]

Originally posted by: n7
I love how some old timers here still like to claim no one needs more than 1 GB for games...

You guys have been here long enough to see the amount of RAM needed for gaming jump from 256 MB to 512 MB, or at least 512 MB to 1 GB.

Why is it so hard for you guys to believe newer games benefit from 2 GB, or at least 1.5 GB???

I played FEAR on my brother's PC, which has <1GB (512 or 768, not sure which) and never had any trouble with stuttering.

 

[Goi]

To be fair, so far I've only encountered 2 places where the stuttering occurs, so 1GB is still acceptable except in those places. Why do you think I'd still have stuttering problems even with an extra GB of memory? I've turned off all my background apps except for my Kerio firewall. That helped quite a bit with loads and saves.

I don't wanna deal with tearing, so I have vsync off. Does anyone have an answer to my FRAPS question?

 

[duragezic]

1GB is acceptable in pretty much every game out right now as long as you aren't a retard with 10 tray programs including constant virus scan, spyware scan, etc... You're not gonna pick that crap up if you're playing a game!!

Not that 1.5GB to 2GB isn't helpful, it is quite a bit in games like FEAR and BF2, but for me upgrading from 1GB to 1.75GB ram made BF2 hardly any more playable, just a little more convenient since it loaded faster.


Similar with HL2. When it came out I only had 512mb and played thru the entire game and quite a bit of multiplayer and never found hard drive swapping or loading times to be horrible. Upgrading to 1GB smoothed things out, but not a night and day difference like a video card uprade does.

 

[RedBeard]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
The game definitely likes 2 GB RAM.

Definately. If you have the textures turned all the way up (not soft shadows) you will benefit from 2gb.