X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Ask here if you experience technical problems with X4: Foundations.

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Imperial Good
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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by Imperial Good » Sat, 4. Feb 23, 09:46

alt3rn1ty wrote:
Fri, 3. Feb 23, 21:27
What are your thoughts on Hyper-Threading, is it beneficial to X4 or not.
It should make very little difference as the operating system will avoid scheduling threads onto the additional logical cores as long as real cores are still available. If the Jolt physics change of 6.00 goes live there might be some benefit to having HT enabled as that apparently can take advantage of hyperthreading/SMT.

Generally hyperthreading should be left enabled for maximum performance. The reason some games suffer reduced performance with hyperthreading is because they are not aware of the difference between physical and virtual cores and have very low, if not even negative, scaling with thread count. Once both logical cores of a physical core are scheduled, each logical core runs at roughly half the speed of the physical core. If one of those logical cores was running code on the game's critical path that is not speeded up significantly by multithreading then the game will run slower.

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by alt3rn1ty » Sat, 4. Feb 23, 23:05

Nice to know about the Jolt physics taking advantage of HT, I'm running the 6.0 Beta 2 right now but not sure if I am experiencing Jolt physics .. But I think thats probably due to me mostly so far flying around in a Kuraokami which is an M class ship and those have not had any Jolt physics applied to them as far as I understand.

I might still try disabling HT and see if there is any perceptible difference, but going to leave that until after 6.0 goes public and also after adding Kingdoms End with its extra Race / Sectors / Ship jobs load on the game. Overall at the moment I'm still happy with how the game performs, but the next DLC might just tip the balance a bit, we shall see.

Thanks again Imperial Good.
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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by CBJ » Sun, 5. Feb 23, 01:01

alt3rn1ty wrote:
Sat, 4. Feb 23, 23:05
I'm running the 6.0 Beta 2 right now but not sure if I am experiencing Jolt physics .. But I think thats probably due to me mostly so far flying around in a Kuraokami which is an M class ship and those have not had any Jolt physics applied to them as far as I understand.
If you are running 6.00 then you most certainly are experiencing Jolt physics, as that's the only physics engine there is in the game! All we mean by certain ships not having "Jolt physics applied" is they haven't been fine-tuned to make them work optimally with the new physics engine; they are still using it without that, just not as accurately as we'd like. By the next beta, all ships will have been "done", and any remaining issues will need to be reported so that they can be further tuned if necessary.

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by alt3rn1ty » Mon, 6. Feb 23, 08:14

Ah I see, I was going off DocAce 1 line in the Testing Jolt topic, known issues ..
"M Ships have not been Jolted yet and as such can have issues."
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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by CBJ » Mon, 6. Feb 23, 08:48

Yes, he is referring the process of adjusting the shapes used by Jolt that I just explained.

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by alt3rn1ty » Mon, 6. Feb 23, 11:28

I think I get it, the shapes you now mention are something like a collision boundary, which have to be not so complex as the object mesh so that they are optimal, but enough to encompass every part of the object so that collision detection works and without being too big so that we dont collide with this invisible object when we are nowhere near it.
I read DocAce's line quite literally, because before 6.0 beta came along any kind of physics to me I hadn't a scooby doo, it was just more game programming voodoo :roll:
Just did a search and found a github page on the subject, interesting stuff which scales better than other physics engines on multiple cores.
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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by HumanSDK » Fri, 10. Feb 23, 07:47

How game option i need change to reduce CPU usage?
At first strat 6.0 my cpu hit 100c*, i change in bios cpu ratio All core -> Turbo ratio offset, it did not help much, the temperature remained in the range of 90-95.
I have 11700k without any overclock, tower cooler and open case.
In other games, I have no problems with temperature, only a stress test gives a similar result.
screenshot

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by CBJ » Fri, 10. Feb 23, 09:12

The game is indeed CPU-intensive; more so than most games. However, if your CPU is overheating when playing, then that's a clear sign that your cooling system is inadequate.

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by Alan Phipps » Fri, 10. Feb 23, 12:45

While you think about what cooling changes may be needed, doing a clean up of all filters, grills, fans and heatsinks is always useful. Also think whether cables inside the case are getting in the way of airflow routes and see if they can be tidied away a bit. (Sometimes opening up the case can actually make airflow inside the case worse rather than better as the air can go sideways instead.)

Please be careful working inside the case, such as making sure that you earth yourself to remove any static beforehand and making sure that you don't leave anything disconnected or with a poor connection by accident.
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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by Imperial Good » Wed, 15. Feb 23, 16:32

HumanSDK wrote:
Fri, 10. Feb 23, 07:47
I have 11700k without any overclock
Unfortunately this is kind of an inherent problem with Intel 11th generation processors. Not only did they fail to out perform 10th generation processors in typical workloads, but they did so less efficiently due to the architecture being originally designed for "intel 10nm" but being ported to "intel 14nm". About 8 months after launch of 11th generation, Intel had already launched their 12th generation of processors with significant improvements.

I would suggestion checking the boost clocks you are getting while playing X4. If it is hitting anywhere from 4.6 to 5.0 GHz then the temperature is not impacting performance much. If it is running at a significantly lower clock then that might indicate an incorrect cooler selection, suboptimal case or poor mounting of the cooler to the CPU. Total package power usage might also indicate cooling issues since it should ideally draw over 125 W under heavy workloads but will draw at the cooling capabilities if thermal throttling. If the temperature is a concern for you and you cannot physically fix it, you could try lowering the power limit of the processor to 65W odd, which should encourage the processor to run more efficiently at a small cost to performance rather than aiming for the highest clock speeds.

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by HumanSDK » Mon, 6. Mar 23, 11:36

Alan Phipps wrote:
Fri, 10. Feb 23, 12:45
While you think about what cooling changes may be needed, doing a clean up of all filters, grills, fans and heatsinks is always useful. Also think whether cables inside the case are getting in the way of airflow routes and see if they can be tidied away a bit. (Sometimes opening up the case can actually make airflow inside the case worse rather than better as the air can go sideways instead.)

Please be careful working inside the case, such as making sure that you earth yourself to remove any static beforehand and making sure that you don't leave anything disconnected or with a poor connection by accident.
i installed back my old watercooling system, now the cpu temp is 60-65. It's strange that there's such a big difference since the previous cooler was dust-free and I thought it would handle it better. (Ice Hammer IH-4401B)

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by alt3rn1ty » Tue, 21. Mar 23, 01:10

Imperial Good wrote:
Tue, 26. May 20, 05:03
alt3rn1ty wrote:
Tue, 26. May 20, 02:59
Might be worth linking this post in the OP?.
Out of interest, did you notice performance gains when playing X4 when turning off the mitigations? If the gains are only a percent or so it generally would not be worth while for people to turn them off.
For the last couple of days I have been trying out Steve Gibsons InSpectre and Disabling Meltdown and Spectre mitigations before playing and then enabling them again afterwards (plus a computer restart after disable / enable), and I think you are right for people with Desktop PCs.
On my laptop I can gain literally only 2-3 FPS (thats in all of the usual test cases of nearly empty sector / landed on a station / with map open, versus what I am used to seeing in the same cases without disabling these mitigations).
Its a little bit helpful for laptops, but I guess desktops would not notice the difference.
Its also a PITA having to restart every time you disable / enable these settings :D
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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by IvanT » Sun, 16. Apr 23, 16:32

Hello,

A completely anecdotal experience from me. Having had X4 installed on GoG since it first released, each DLC has been simply appended to the existing install.

My rough specs are a 2015 Intel i7 6700k (4Ghz), 32GB DDR memory, Samsung EVO 1TB, Asus RTX3070. No matter what settings I changed, my fps would hover at about 20fps. Absolutely not what you'd expect from a 6700k coupled with an RTX3070, with average utilisation at 60% per core, peaking at 80%.

Completely uninstalling X4 and reinstalling results in a peak FPS of 120, and an average of 60. My only thought here is that there were changes in the engine and/or configuration for the latest version of the XTech engine that didn't sit well with the previous install configuration.

For those of you who have struggled to get past this, a complete wipe and fresh install (with your saves backed up), may be an option worth considering.

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by Vheissu » Thu, 18. May 23, 21:11

Just picked X4 up a couple days ago. Having some serious problems with stuttering and fps, it's nigh unplayable in and around stations and asteroid fields.

Specs:
i510300H
2060 gpu
16gb ram

This meets/exceeds the recommended requirements on paper. Taking into account that its a laptop there's a performance deficit, however it is still well, well above the minimum requirements. Tested on high, medium and low settings - no significant difference in performance.

Any idea what the issue might be?

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by CBJ » Thu, 18. May 23, 21:13

We can't give you any useful advice based on just a quick summary of your system components. Have a read of the "Please read this before posting!" sticky thread a couple of lines above this one, and provide the information requested there (particularly your DXDiag and vulkaninfo) in a new thread of your own.

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by Vheissu » Thu, 18. May 23, 21:26

Ahh pardon, I'll do that.

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by Vheissu » Thu, 18. May 23, 22:10

The thread is posted! thanks

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by Caribou89 » Sun, 4. Jun 23, 00:27

I was just thinking about making a post asking for recommendations and once again the community provides!

I'm currently running a Ryzen 7 3800X, 32GB Ram (overkill? maybe), and a 1050Ti. My game runs pretty well all things considered however I am finding my GPU is starting to show it's age and may need to tag out with a more modern one, so this post was very helpful!

Thank you community, you guys are the best!

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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by MakerLinux » Sat, 10. Jun 23, 15:56

I have a performance troubleshooting suggestion to the developers:
Please allow motion blur to be turned off.
I know most of the usage comes from the CPU but allowing this setting to be changed would probably get things better.
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Re: X4 Performance Troubleshooting Suggestions

Post by alt3rn1ty » Sat, 10. Jun 23, 23:59

MakerLinux wrote:
Sat, 10. Jun 23, 15:56
I have a performance troubleshooting suggestion to the developers:
Please allow motion blur to be turned off.
I know most of the usage comes from the CPU but allowing this setting to be changed would probably get things better.
+1

We need to keep it enabled if we want to see Anomalies (distortions), but Motion Blur has always been a contentious issue, same as God rays/Lens flares .. Its an effect that annoys some people, so tying it in with something we want to see in game to find them (anomalies) makes it damned annoying.
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