F4 Menu = Performance Slowdown?

[Train-a-Mania]

Normally, OR runs with smooth framerates at or above 30 FPS. However, whenever I open the F4 menu, it causes the game to stutter (roughly 20 fps, but it is not even).

I have a 3.2 Quad core processor (AMD Phenom II), so my specs should not be the issue. Does anyone from the OR team know why this may be happening?

[mnjrr]

Hi Nick,

Just curious. Do you have glass windows enabled in the options menu?

[Train-a-Mania]

Yes.

[mnjrr]

I suspect that it is not necessarily the F4 menu which is causing OR to stutter and the low FPS, but having the glass window feature on is the cause. Testing by myself and other members of the OR team have found that turning on the "windows glass" has resulted in a significant decline in FPS on certain operating systems.

[seagoon]

Having just read this subject, I have tested the "F4" and "Glass" on/off effects and have found no difference at all.
On the same stretch of track (Cajon v4 route, near Riverside station) the FPS is identical (68 to 73, then stable at 73 after passing the station) whether either of the possible culprits are on or off.
No change to performance whatsoever.

Toshiba Satellite i7, Win7, Nvidia GeForce, 2Gb RAM.

Bruce

[sniper297]

Operating System: Windows XP Media Edition (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3
Model: Dell DXP051
CPU: Intel(R) Pentium(R) D CPU 3.40GHz (2 CPUs)
Memory: 2GB Crucial Ballistix
Video: NVIDIA GeForce GT430 1GB
Sound: SB Audigy
Hard Drives:
C:Western Digital WD5000AAKX-001CA0 462.0 GB 7200rpm
F:SanDisk SDSSDH120GG25 114.5 GB solid state drive


Running Port Ogden & Northern 10, Anderson 0800 activity, getting 14-16FPS with the glass on or off, any HUD open or all off doesn't matter. Animation very jerky.

On the switch issue, first facing point switch after pulling out of the shed is reluctant to throw, sometimes does throw curved, but insists on resetting itself to straight as I approach. Changing to the #8 free wander I checked several switches in the yard with the ALT click, about half work fine and half won't throw at all.

Haven't tested other routes yet, this is the first chance I've had to download it. Folder I'm using is a recently reinstalled default 1.2 MSTS without BIN or Xtracks. Could the switch problem possibly be related to that screwy animation bug we found a few years ago?

[mnjrr]

With the glass window option on, I get 50 FPS whereas with the feature off I get 55 FPS at the same approximate location.

[Train-a-Mania]

Walter, I'm not as sure it's the glass. The stuttering only occurs when the F4 menu is open.

[sniper297]

"50 FPS whereas with the feature off I get 55 FPS" when you get a new computer can I have that one?

[csantucci]

Changing to the #8 free wander I checked several switches in the yard with the ALT click, about half work fine and half won't throw at all.

Same happens here.

[jjtang]

Throwing switches has issues because currently OR tries to align switches before the path a train wants to pass through. In other words, if you throw a switch in front of a moving train (with a valide PATH setting), it may be aligned back to allow a safe passing.

The team is having a debate on this: auto-aligning will course the said problem, but insist on hand-throwing will make it annoyed sometime. In MP, we have disabled auto switching for all player-controlled train (except the dispatcher-controlled train) so the dispatcher has overall authority. BTW, MSTS uses auto aligning, but put some switches as auto and some as manual, this setting is currently ignored in OR.

[csantucci]

Hm, I am not able to throw some switches that for sure are not involved in the player train path.

Edit: such switches can be thrown, simply the needles don't move. Same happens to me in MSTS.

Edit: I found out that there were many missing JnodePosn () lines in the .w files. No ORTS issue.

[conrail1]

I suspect that it is not necessarily the F4 menu which is causing OR to stutter and the low FPS, but having the glass window feature on is the cause. Testing by myself and other members of the OR team have found that turning on the "windows glass" has resulted in a significant decline in FPS on certain operating systems.

Here's some testing on two fresh installs of Windows 7/SP1 64 and Windows XP/SP2 64-bit Edition on two different setups with glass on in-game windows enabled and disabled, with the F-4 window hidden and displayed. The first round of screens were taken on Windows 7/SP1 64 using an i7/Nvidia GTX680 setup and 306.23 WHQL drivers. All of the screen shots were originally taken at 1920x1080 resolution, 8xMS AA/16xAF and v-sync disabled.

One thing that I noticed is with the Windows 7 setup my frame rates were capped at 120 fps and while testing on the Windows XP setup they were not limited. With v-sync enabled both setups ran OpenRails without any stuttering whether the F-4 window was being displayed or not.



120 fps glass on in-game windows disabled -


120 fps glass on in-game windows disabled with the F-4 window displayed -


120 fps glass on in-game windows enabled -


120 fps glass on in-game windows enabled with F-4 window displayed -



117 fps glass on in-game windows disabled -


114 fps glass on in-game windows disabled with F-4 window displayed -


115 fps glass on in-game windows enabled -


113 fps glass on in-game windows enabled with F-4 window displayed -

[conrail1]

The second round of screens were taken on Windows XP/SP2 64-bit Edition using an i7/AMD 7970 setup and the Catalyst 12.9 beta drivers. Again all of the screens were originally taken at 1920x1080 resolution, 8xMS AA/16xAF, v-sync disabled.



133 fps glass on in-game windows disabled -



131 fps glass on in-game windows disabled with the F-4 window displayed -


128 fps glass on in-game windows enabled with F-4 window displayed -


125 fps glass on in-game windows enabled with F-4 window displayed -




63 fps glass on in-game windows disabled -


62 fps glass on in-game windows disabled with F-4 window displayed -


61 fps glass on in-game windows enabled -


60 fps glass on in-game windows enabled with F-4 window displayed -