What is the deal with BF3?

[lavaheadache]

Seems like there are a few reputable members that rely of frame limiters for smooth game play for various games using either Amd or Nvidia setups.

 

[Grooveriding]

Thats right. My GTX 670's can easily get me there but my CPU just can't do it. Keep in mind that lowering graphics settings to medium or lower reduces the load on the CPU, so at that point a 60fps min is more likely. Ultra is a different story. But Ultra is what I play at and truth be told, the game runs great and is almost always at 60 or higher, but I still get those drops. The drops aren't brief either. They are persistent depending on where I am at on the map. If the whole map is in view from a rooftop, FPS goes to the 50s.



I believe you. You are also running at 5ghz, so this makes some sense. But even then, you have occasional drops to 50 as you mentioned. Isn't that a little crazy given your specs and OC?

I actually mostly run my system @ 4.8. 5 is the best stable clock I have but I got a little worried about running it with that much voltage all the time. I have the Intel overclock insurance but I don't know that I can use it just for degradation, think it only applies to killing the chip out right

As I said, it's just heavy destruction effects that cause the slow downs. I should try to monitor CPU / GPU and time it to see what is taking the hammer. I have a feeling the destruction is heavy on CPU, but also alternately think the smoke effects from the destruction are hard on the GPU... not sure

Overall though I think BF3 runs pretty well considering the visuals. In contrast Crysis performs worse on my system, and while I think overall it's a better looking game, that is just single player Crysis which is nothing like a 64 player game of BF3. Crysis really likes memory bandwidth though and Kepler cards are starved for bandwidth, so that may explain why Crysis is harder on my system. Crysis is one of the few games that performed better on my three 480s than it does on two 680s.

 

[skipsneeky2]

Seems like there are a few reputable members that rely of frame limiters for smooth game play for various games using either Amd or Nvidia setups.

Funny too cause some games like UT2004 are awesome at like 200fps but lol god behold if BF3 doesn't have a cap enabled to stay under 70fps lol,my last post about the testing with the x4 9150e gave me a conclusion as well.

Seems pc gaming is becoming assbackwards where stutter and lag is only fixed with vsync or a cap enabled,and a few years ago it was the whole other way around.

 

[Grooveriding]

Funny too cause some games like UT2004 are awesome at like 200fps but lol god behold if BF3 doesn't have a cap enabled to stay under 70fps lol,my last post about the testing with the x4 9150e gave me a conclusion as well.

Seems pc gaming is becoming assbackwards where stutter and lag is only fixed with vsync or a cap enabled,and a few years ago it was the whole other way around.

It's totally game/engine dependent. BF3 is not pleasant at all without a frame rate cap or vsync on. I don't notice microstutter most of the time, but in some games I can't miss it. Crysis it's pretty noticeable and Metro 2033 as well. It feels like the more demanding a game is, the more prone you are to see it.

In TF2 or WoW it feels fine to me with or without vsync.

I think a lot of what makes a game feel good is more dependent on the game's engine than your cards, especially with multi-gpu. I know developers have to actually take multi-gpu into account and make changes to the game to account for it. SLI didn''t work in Alan Wake for a while and the problem was engine related, not nvidia's drivers.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Coming back to the point, to people who say BF3 MP dips below 60 FPS.

Have you played these games with MSAA = 4x and MAX settings?

Sleeping Dogs
Hitman Absolution
Farcry 3
Crysis
Crysis 2
Metro
Need for Speed Most Wanted
There are probably other games like the above as well, including Alan Wake and MP3 but those two only throttle single GPUs.

Anyway, I doubt in any of the above games you get constant 60 FPS if you turn MSAA to 4x.

Anybody who has an experience which states otherwise?

If so, details please?

 

[brandon888]

Coming back to the point, to people who say BF3 MP dips below 60 FPS.

Have you played these games with MSAA = 4x and MAX settings?

Sleeping Dogs
Hitman Absolution
Farcry 3
Crysis
Crysis 2
Metro
Need for Speed Most Wanted
There are probably other games like the above as well, including Alan Wake and MP3 but those two only throttle single GPUs.

Anyway, I doubt in any of the above games you get constant 60 FPS if you turn MSAA to 4x.

Anybody who has an experience which states otherwise?

If so, details please?

here you go ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJOiayetmGA



680 all ultra on 1080P and it dips below 60 even on metro map .. on gulf of oman you will dip below 40

 

[moonbogg]

Coming back to the point, to people who say BF3 MP dips below 60 FPS.

Have you played these games with MSAA = 4x and MAX settings?

Sleeping Dogs
Hitman Absolution
Farcry 3
Crysis
Crysis 2
Metro
Need for Speed Most Wanted
There are probably other games like the above as well, including Alan Wake and MP3 but those two only throttle single GPUs.

Anyway, I doubt in any of the above games you get constant 60 FPS if you turn MSAA to 4x.

Anybody who has an experience which states otherwise?

If so, details please?

Played them all except for the top two. I don't think 60fps is maintainable on those games either due to GPU load. The reason BF3 can't do it is primarily due to CPU loading during multiplayer. NFS most wanted has SLI issues, so only a single card will work last time I checked. Original Crysis is hard to run because it only uses 2 cores. Far Cry 3 (awesome game) won't hold 60 due to GPU load, and rightly so as that game looks badass.
So, now that we went through those games and realized that they are demanding, how does this change the fact that BF3 is a very demanding game? It is demanding on both GPU and CPU where most games are mostly GPU limited. Noone said BF3 is the MOST demanding game ever. It has been simply noted that it will bring any rig to the 60fps threshold and most likely below, unless insane overclocks are used on the best CPUs. Also, no single GPU can hold anywhere near 60fps, just like with some of those other games you listed.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Need for Speed Most Wanted is CPU limited, not GPU limited. And it isn't MHz limited, it is architecture limited. I guarantee you 100% that a Haswell quad with HT and 7970GHz will max it out with 60 fps at 1080p no AA rest MAX perfectly fine. Which no present day system can do.

And the above problem is typical NFS whenever a new CPU arch is around the corner. It happened with the original Most Wanted as well which required Core 2 Duo for constant 60 FPS even though C2Ds were released about 12-18 months later.

Crysis is again CPU arch as well as GPU limited. Crysis 2 I guess is GPU limited.

Metro 2033 is GPU limited.

Absolution is both CPU arch and GPU limited, CPU arch for minimums and GPU for averages.

The thing is that with BF3 if I play at 1080p and switch off AA and keep rest ultra, I will probably get minimum FPS > 50 even with MP if I have a 4+ GHz SB/Ivy with HT. But with the above games I may still not manage that with the exception of Absolution which isn't as heavy.

And these are practically most of the intensive games out there. So basically most of the recent games are more intensive than BF3 unless you play Indie games or COD style games.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Even if I assume that we do get a 50% performance hit with MP, all I have to do is play at 1080p ultra and switch off MSAA/FXAA in BF3 MP to maintain 60 FPS.

Can I play NFS at 1080p Max but no AA with 60 FPS minimum? NO

Can I play Metro 2033 like that? NO

Can I play Crysis 1 with 60 FPS average? NO

And I am 100% sure that there are a lot of other such games perhaps on the lines of Planetside etc as well, which won't run okay even with out MSAA.

The only thing I need to do is drop MSAA with BF3 and I am all set. With the above games they still won't be playable.

 

[brandon888]

Even if I assume that we do get a 50% performance hit with MP, all I have to do is play at 1080p ultra and switch off MSAA/FXAA in BF3 MP to maintain 60 FPS.

Can I play NFS at 1080p Max but no AA with 60 FPS minimum? NO

Can I play Metro 2033 like that? NO

Can I play Crysis 1 with 60 FPS average? NO

And I am 100% sure that there are a lot of other such games perhaps on the lines of Planetside etc as well, which won't run okay even with out MSAA.

The only thing I need to do is drop MSAA with BF3 and I am all set. With the above games they still won't be playable.

problem is that 600 series have serious pixel filtrate bottleneck look at
gpu -z .... even on my GTX 560 ti 448 cores i can run BF3 ULTRA no MSAA with 50-60 fps .... then why buy 670/680 ?

 

[Maximilian]

I really don't get it when people say that BF3 is taxing. Really, it is far from that.

Of course I have only played the Single Player but I have finished it and it is one of the lightest games on my PC that I have played in recent times including Sleeping Dogs, Absolution, Farcry3, Crysis1 without mods, Crysis 2 without mods, NFS etc. all these games are far more intensive that BF3 SP.

These are the kind of FPS I used to get in BF3 SP with the setup below:
2600k 4.3
16gb ram ddr3 1866+
7970 at 1125 1575
Cat 12.4 or something. Way before recent drivers came out.

1080p 4x AA, everything max
Avg fps 80-100+ maybe higher I don't remember exactly
Min FPS mostly 70-80+ with rarely below 70 fps

1440p max but no Fxaa no msaa
Avg fps 70-90+
Min fps usually around 60-70 or so and very rarely below 60 if at all

And the other games I mentioned don't run this well with my rig, not even Crysis2 which is the lightest of the lot.

I really don't get it why people think it is intensive. There are dozens of games more intensive that this including Shogun, Metro, above list etc.

Of course MP is more intensive but I still don't see it being as intensive as some of the more intensive games I have played.

As for BC2 you rarely go below 50-70 fps even at 1440p 4x msaa and max. And avg is more like 80-120 fps or so.

/thread

 

[aaksheytalwar]

I installed MP and as expected, I was right.

BF3 MP

A random 64 player map:
1080p Ultra no AA : avg fps 90-120, min 70-90 fps
1440p Ultra no AA : avg fps 80-100. Min fps 70+
1080p Ultra 4x MSAA : same as above

Caspian border:
1080p Ultra 4x MSAA: Avg 60+ with occasional dips to 50s. Again, very playable.
Now if I just remove MSAA or even use 2x MSAA then I will easily get 60+ fps minimum 99.9% of the time including fights.

My experience with BF3 MP is exactly the same as with SP. there is no difference in fps. And I have tried 2 different 64 player maps. There may be a 10-15% performance hit or something but nothing extreme.

I rest my case.

 

[brandon888]

I installed MP and as expected, I was right.

BF3 MP

A random 64 player map:
1080p Ultra no AA : avg fps 90-120, min 70-90 fps
1440p Ultra no AA : avg fps 80-100. Min fps 70+
1080p Ultra 4x MSAA : same as above

Caspian border:
1080p Ultra 4x MSAA: Avg 60+ with occasional dips to 50s. Again, very playable.
Now if I just remove MSAA or even use 2x MSAA then I will easily get 60+ fps minimum 99.9% of the time including fights.

My experience with BF3 MP is exactly the same as with SP. there is no difference in fps. And I have tried 2 different 64 player maps. There may be a 10-15% performance hit or something but nothing extreme.

I rest my case.

i had oced 670 .... it's same as 680 ... and i had 40 fps dips an caspian and 35 on gulf of oman .. sure average was like 60-70 .... and ihad same cpu as you .. so idk ... even oced 680 has 40-45 dips at least in caspian

 

[aaksheytalwar]

I will try again. And I will also try a few other maps. And just one map doesn't mean anything. 8 out of 10 maps will never dip below 70 fps.

Which CPU do you have?

And with the new 12.11 and my 7970 at 1125 1575 my card is like 20-30% faster than a 680 stock in bf3 due to:
My high oc
And newer drivers compared to older nvidia drivers or amd drivers respectively

 

[poohbear]

People never claimed that single player was taxing. At least thats not what I remember reading. Single player will run on a core 2 duo. If you want to see what everyone is talking about, go to a 64 player Gulf of Oman match and report back with your FPS.

this. SP ran fine on my 5870 on ultra but @ 2x AA. run 64 player maps and its a different story entirely. with ur rig u'll be fine, but u won't be seeing 70-80 min fps

 

[aaksheytalwar]

I am seeing the exact same fps, or very similar as I did with sp. mp 64 player maps are not very different.

More about my experience:

Caspian map
Non vegetation areas: 1080p 4x msaa avg 80-110 fps or so. Min 60-75 fps or so.
Vegetation areas: avg 60-75 or so. Occasional 50s. Momentary 40s for a split second. Nearly impossible to notice 40s. Practically 50+ throughout and mostly near 60ish or above. 100% playable. No need to reduce the settings.

A third map, again 64 players
1080p 4x msaa or 1440p no msaa, avg 70-80+. Occasional 50s/60s. Practically never below 50-55. Again, no need to reduce settings. More than playable. Perfect performance.

A fourth 64 player map
Again, same experience.

Conclusion:
1080p no msaa ultra
You will rarely dip below 80 fps regardless of map I guess
And occasional 60s/70s are no problem in case that happens

1080p 4x msaa ultra
Map dependent. But only occasional dips below 70-75 fps, sometimes 50s/lower 60s but equally playable. Practically never below 50 fps except for like 0.1 second per 10 minutes or so.

1440p ultra no msaa
Similar performance, again perfect performance.

Long story short, this is one of the lightest games that I am currently playing or have played recently which include sleeping dogs, nfs, metro, absolution etc.

 

[Stoneburner]

Why keep asserting a set of facts that has been empirically proven wrong by several members?

You could give the 64 player maps a try yourself.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Why keep asserting a set of facts that has been empirically proven wrong by several members?

You could give the 64 player maps a try yourself.

Do you know how to read? Or do you post just to increase your post count? I have already played 64 player maps and proved everybody wrong. My system handles the stuff pretty decently. I have already stated all this above.

 

[jackstar7]

Can someone explain why this matters?

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Because people make a big deal about how intensive bf3 is when it isn't. There are lots of games which perform far worse and several of them are in fact CPU limited as well.

Bf3 is just another average game from a performance perspective. It is no Crysis. It is just another game which everybody with a mid range system can max without AA and with a regular high end single gpu setup with AA.

 

[jackstar7]

Because people make a big deal about how intensive bf3 is when it isn't. There are lots of games which perform far worse and several of them are in fact CPU limited as well.

Bf3 is just another average game from a performance perspective. It is no Crysis. It is just another game which everybody with a mid range system can max without AA and with a regular high end single gpu setup with AA.

But why does that matter?


It happens to be a popular game that many people play, so it's something that most people want to see benchmarks for because it could definitely be a factor in an upgrade...

 

[chimaxi83]

What's the point of this thread? To tell us that single player performance is better than multiplayer performance? Just confirming what we already know then? Well thanks, I guess.

I liked this line:

Vegetation areas: avg 60-75 or so. Occasional 50s. Momentary 40s for a split second. Nearly impossible to notice 40s. Practically 50+ throughout and mostly near 60ish or above. 100% playable. No need to reduce the settings.

You did a good job explicitly stating that those minimums were momentary, but minimums in the 40s are still minimums in the 40s. Doesn't really matter if it's momentary, that is still your minimum. BF3 single player can't be compared to multiplayer, at all. Get into actual multiplayer gameplay before you make broad (and stupid) conclusions.

 

[BD231]

Because people make a big deal about how intensive bf3 is when it isn't. There are lots of games which perform far worse and several of them are in fact CPU limited as well.

Bf3 is just another average game from a performance perspective. It is no Crysis. It is just another game which everybody with a mid range system can max without AA and with a regular high end single gpu setup with AA.

That wasnt true when it came out, and yes msaa/hbao is still plenty intensive.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Even single player gives the same FPS. There is not much difference. People clearly don't read the whole thread before blabbering.

 

[Grooveriding]

I thought I would add some data. I was actually surprised how well it performed for me. This is a full 64 player Gulf of Oman with everything on Ultra and 4xMSAA, I only have post-AA disabled. I don't believe the post-aa setting has any performance impact. I play with a FOV of 90. Obviously I disabled the frame rate cap, it was horrible without the cap btw Screen tearing and choppy.

These are two separate recordings from different times of play. One is straight FPS, the other is the frame time graph some are obsessed with

FPS

Frames: 28864 - Time: 343732ms - Avg: 83.972 - Min: 42 - Max: 171



Frametime