Performance issues with addons

[Kammak]

Issue: OFP runs smooth as silk with default BIS stuff, and with most addons in general.  Whenever a BAS helo (which I love) gets near the player, I have a slideshow period of about 1-2 seconds, with a lot of hard drive access, and then the frame rate smooths out again.  With some addons, like the armed woodland hummers, I get a complete CTD after using.

Specs - OFP 1.96, Pentium4 1.8gh, 256mb ram, video card is an nVidia GeForce 4 MX440 64mb ram.

Is this issue soley due to the MX card and its abilities, and I would I see a huge difference with an FX series card?  Is the "-nomap" cmdline argument causing this delay at runtime as the addon is not memory mapped and loaded until that very instant?

What would be the single best way to improve performance, specifically with BAS helos?  The BAS MH-47 is a *big* performance killer on my system.

Any helpful input is appreciated!

[DaveDash]

Issue: OFP runs smooth as silk with default BIS stuff, and with most addons in general.  Whenever a BAS helo (which I love) gets near the player, I have a slideshow period of about 1-2 seconds, with a lot of hard drive access, and then the frame rate smooths out again.  With some addons, like the armed woodland hummers, I get a complete CTD after using.

Specs - OFP 1.96, Pentium4 1.8gh, 256mb ram, video card is an nVidia GeForce 4 MX440 64mb ram.

Is this issue soley due to the MX card and its abilities, and I would I see a huge difference with an FX series card?  Is the "-nomap" cmdline argument causing this delay at runtime as the addon is not memory mapped and loaded until that very instant?

What would be the single best way to improve performance, specifically with BAS helos?  The BAS MH-47 is a *big* performance killer on my system.

Any helpful input is appreciated!

Sounds like nomap is definately causing that problem. I am guessing BAS addons come with a lot of scripts attached also.

Ok all my experiance with OFP points to RAM. Not video card, not CPU, but RAM.

To tell you the truth my system benchmarks in the 7000's and I still don't get desirable results. P3.10GHZ, Nvidia FX 5600 Ultra, 512MB 433MHZ ram.

Having said that, i am making a mission with hundreds of objects (I have three hangars full of beds, troops, TV's, chairs, etc) and it seems to run that fine.

Things that I have noticed about the game:

Things that don't have much of an effect on FPS:
Resolution 1280x1024 and 1024x768 make virtually no difference in frame rate (Most likely because of my video card).
The Frame Rate setting.
Object Shadows on/off.

Things that do make one hell of a difference:
Viewing Distance, this is a biggie. Anything over 2000 and my system chugs.
Terrain Detail: I have this on normal. Having it on a higher setting would improve the game dramatically (more cover), but even with NO units in game, the highest setting makes my computer CHUG. This game is a few years old now, I'm not sure what computers BIS were running when they made it...
Visual Quality: This doesn't have as much as an effect as the others, but I do notice a difference when this is up high compared to down low.

I also have heaps and heaps of addons, some large, some not so large. It doesn't seem to have a great effect at all on the game.

My suggestions to you: Get more ram, and try without -nomap. Close down everything you can before playing OFP, as it is VERY ram heavy.

[m21man]

First, tweak your settings. Go into Preferences and set Terrain Detail to 512 x 512, then go into the game and try experimenting with the viewdistance and terrain detail. Second, buy as much RAM as you can, as 256MB is inadequate for today's OFP. Try for 1GB for starters, then you might even want to upgrade to 2GB. Your processor is OK, though you won't be able to set off nukes over Tonal . You might also want to get a 128MB graphics card, but start with RAM.

[landrover]

I think you'd notice quite a difference with 512MB RAM. 1GB is nice. 2GB is total overkill for this game, and most others. Even Far Cry doesn't need 2GB. You don't need over 512MB to have a very smooth Flashpoint with any addons you want.

A good 128MB video card (At least a Radeon 9500 or GF4 Ti4200) plus additional system RAM would make a very noticeable difference in your case.

And just so you know, many of the lower end FX cards, such as the 5200, are slower than the older Ti4200 cards. An FX 5600 is about even with a 128MB Ti4200.

[Tango Down]

word of advice do NOT get the FX 5200, i thought it was to good to be true to get a 128mb GFX card for £60 and it was. Look at getting the geforce 4 cards or get the FX 5900 it you have got the cash!..the reason for the slow frame rate when a BAS helo comes near you is that in the pack it causes dust to erupt when near the ground part of the animation so fiddle about with the settings, i change them from mission to mission sometimes