The OFFICIAL FFXIV Benchmark & Beta Performance Thread

[Amele]

So w/ fixing the default, 2nd card stuck around 40% load, while crisis pushed it to 90%? Havent tested the SLI settings yet, but plan to use Crysis settings for retail.

Stuttering is a GPU issue. All a better HD will do is decrease load times and potentially make characters / mobs load faster. It won't affect NM camping pops and stuff.. well unless there is massive amounts of ppl camping one thing. But even then its 95% on your ping

first had issues with the 258.64 (or whatever the may '10 rev. drivers were) not recognizing period - 0% load on both chips (single card, two chips) - 10fps tops. in other news, [email protected] can do 10fps basically by itself apparently.

moved to the latest driver rev (258.97 - july '10) and got to 40% load on both chips, using AFR2 (nvidia recommended defaults) I created the profile for FFXIVgame myself - the driver profiles did not include one when I grabbed it, even under a wrong name. cpu was also at about 40-50% load in this situation. multi-gpu AFR2 was functional at this point, so 'sli' has been functional the whole time for me.

set that profile to crysis compatibility flags, and got past 40% - I have not hit 90%+ on cpu or either gpu - so something is still artificially capping my ceiling. haven't been able to stay connected to the server long enough to actually do any testing hte last few days though. the crysis flags look like SFR to me but I haven't looked at it too closely. overall now, the game is playable but performance with the multi-gpu card leaves something to be desired (pretty sure a 260GTX or 5830 would outperform me, whereas on a more normal engine dx10 game I'd beat both of them.)

[Kylewhataru]

I did, it didn't do anything at all for me, exact same fps in the exact same location with same camera angle etc etc.

I figured, this game shows classic symptoms of cpu bottlenecks and it makes no sense to me that either nvidia or ati can do anything about it through a driver update, this is all on SE's shoulder.

[Fhuri]

Just overclocked and got a score of 3372^^ but the temperature was averaging about 66 degrees with a couple spikes to 69 for a brief moment. This will take some adjusting but I'm well on my way. Thanks for the help

[shaddix]

Just overclocked and got a score of 3372^^ but the temperature was averaging about 66 degrees with a couple spikes to 69 for a brief moment. This will take some adjusting but I'm well on my way. Thanks for the help

this score on high or low? overclocked your gpu or cpu?

[Fhuri]

Low and GPU. I got it up to 3600+ but it was running a little warm.

[Kylewhataru]

What program can you use to show CPU % usage OSD? Afterburner seems to only do GPU.

[Akiyama]

Uh.. well I use CPU core, but it's not an OSD. I just use it with ShiftWindow (emulates fullscreen) so you can alt-tab and check temps. My CPU usually jacks up to 45-47 at peak usage.

[Ferr]

seeing at how this game doesnt seems to give an almost 100% usage on both GPU and CPU, I wonder if OC my CPU and GPU could give me any benefit.
My GTX 460 1GB (OC model at 715) is at stock speed and my ph II 955 is just at 3,4.

[shaddix]

If your gpu usage is below 99% in FFXIV then overclock your cpu until it is. And if you OC your cpu and it still isn't 99% then jack up your settings until it's 99%, then watch your system explode into a ball of fire.

[Ferr]

well with Depht of Field i get 99% GPU usage in Coerthas, CPU is still around 50% in the field, I lost some fps compraed with DoF off (like 5 fps less) and between 70 and 80% in Coerthas camp.

Thing is in La Noscea my GPU usage drops to 70% (CPU is the same than in Coerthas) but i still have some fps less with DoF enabled. Funny thing is in Limsa i have 50ish GPU usage and 70ish CPU usage, and is where I have the worst fps of all

[alecrast]

well with Depht of Field i get 99% GPU usage in Coerthas, CPU is still around 50% in the field, I lost some fps compraed with DoF off (like 5 fps less) and between 70 and 80% in Coerthas camp.

Thing is in La Noscea my GPU usage drops to 70% (CPU is the same than in Coerthas) but i still have some fps less with DoF enabled. Funny thing is in Limsa i have 50ish GPU usage and 70ish CPU usage, and is where I have the worst fps of all

FPS in FFXIV has thus far proven not to be completely related to GPU or CPU utilization. As stated previously, there are places around the game you can go where both GPU and CPU usage drop way down... unfortunately, so does framerate. Something is preventing this game from running at full bore. I'm still going to point my finger at debugging code until after launch, at which point I'm shifting blame to the game's use of multi-threading.

I finally got a chance to run some more benches on that Phenom II x3 720BE with a GTX460. With the processor clocked at 3.2GHz which is a modest overclock (2.8GHz stock), with all 3 cores going, the game averaged 34.8fps with 64% GPU utilization and 82/68/57% utilization per CPU core. When I set the BIOS to only allow 2 cores, fps dropped to 30.7 with 54% GPU and 91/77% utilization per core. It shows that a dual-core setup has a harder time trying to extract performance out of a GTX460. The dual-core experience for Phenom II was passable but there were points where keyboard input lagged while one core was pegged at 100%. A controller may work better but I'm staunchly anti-controller on my PC. The i7 860 with only 2 cores was able to squeeze a lot more performance out of the GTX460 which leads me to say that i3 and i5 systems would be totally fine with FFXIV, especially as the game gets optimized.

[shirasoma]

For those with great FPS outdoors, but terrible FPS in town, are you all running Vista/7 32/64? I have a theory that may help this problem, but I haven't tested it myself. It's my thinking that Vista/7 is absolutely raping town FPS. Yes, you heard that right. I'm thinking it's not a hardware problem, but an OS problem.

Here's my reasoning. Running FF11 on my laptop with a 8400M GS with Vista x86 was a chore. Simply put, FPS ate shit everytime I got anywhere within a bunch of characters on the screen. That and the game stuttered like every 5 seconds. When I switched the laptop over to XP x86, the problems magically went away. The stuttering was completely gone, town FPS a little better but still pretty bad, but it was a much better running game. And seeing as both these games are dev'd by Square Enix, I wouldn't put it past them that some of the problems they had with 11 carried over to 14.

Some more info that might lend credibility, a poster over on FFXIAH claimed to get 30-40 fps in town, like the adventurer's guild, with a Core 2 Duo / 4770, compared to my 15-20 on a Athlon II X4 / 4850. The only difference was the OS, their's is running XP, mine is running 7.

Does anyone having this problem currently have a dual-boot system to test? I'm about to dual-boot myself in order to figure if this will finally fix this problem, but I figure'd I'd ask here first.

[Siya]

I don't have an FPS meter, but I was quite disheartened when I went from outside into town with my new PC =/ it runs flawlessly outside but inside it runs great but I can tell there is some FPS difference (just not sure how much exactly). Currently running Win7 64bit. I got 4600 on the benchmark btw.

[shaddix]

I don't have an FPS meter, but I was quite disheartened when I went from outside into town with my new PC =/ it runs flawlessly outside but inside it runs great but I can tell there is some FPS difference (just not sure how much exactly). Currently running Win7 64bit. I got 4600 on the benchmark btw.

OC that i7 yet?

[Shecky]

Does anyone know where we voice our opinions to the FFXIV team? I went on to the Beta Dev forums but it wont let me post anything. It keeps telling me "you don't have an account to do that" which doesn't make sense as I had to log into the Dev site.

[Gokulo]

It means you don't have the privileges. Only Alpha and Closed Beta(not one's invited by codes though) can post on forums. S-E basically doesn't care about your feedback on beta site atm ;p Your only choice is posting on fan sites etc. hoping they will ever stumble upon that post!

[alecrast]

Does anyone know where we voice our opinions to the FFXIV team? I went on to the Beta Dev forums but it wont let me post anything. It keeps telling me "you don't have an account to do that" which doesn't make sense as I had to log into the Dev site.

Only those accounts that existed prior to the open beta phase are allowed to access those parts of the dev forum. Do not worry, though. The black van filled with fanbois will be along any moment with your dose of Kool-Aid and an explanation of why "it's a good thing!" due to signal-to-noise ratios and all that. Lock your doors, turn out your lights, and bask in the artificial glow of monitors eternal.

[Amele]

I'd buy that if they'd actually done a decent job of selecting alpha and beta testers - it's basically a random sample and not people with any actual testing expertise

[alecrast]

For those with great FPS outdoors, but terrible FPS in town, are you all running Vista/7 32/64? I have a theory that may help this problem, but I haven't tested it myself. It's my thinking that Vista/7 is absolutely raping town FPS. Yes, you heard that right. I'm thinking it's not a hardware problem, but an OS problem.

Here's my reasoning. Running FF11 on my laptop with a 8400M GS with Vista x86 was a chore. Simply put, FPS ate shit everytime I got anywhere within a bunch of characters on the screen. That and the game stuttered like every 5 seconds. When I switched the laptop over to XP x86, the problems magically went away. The stuttering was completely gone, town FPS a little better but still pretty bad, but it was a much better running game. And seeing as both these games are dev'd by Square Enix, I wouldn't put it past them that some of the problems they had with 11 carried over to 14.

Some more info that might lend credibility, a poster over on FFXIAH claimed to get 30-40 fps in town, like the adventurer's guild, with a Core 2 Duo / 4770, compared to my 15-20 on a Athlon II X4 / 4850. The only difference was the OS, their's is running XP, mine is running 7.

Does anyone having this problem currently have a dual-boot system to test? I'm about to dual-boot myself in order to figure if this will finally fix this problem, but I figure'd I'd ask here first.

I tested on the following system:

AMD Phenom II x3 720BE @ 3.2GHz
MSI FX790-GD70
8GD DDR3-1600
80GB Intel X25-M
Palit GTX460 1GB (800MHz/1600MHz/4000MHz)

These are the settings used:
Display Mode: Fullscreen
Window Size: 1920x1080
Multisampling: 16xQ CSAA
Buffer Size: Resolution
Shadow Detail: Highest
Texture Quality: High
Texture Filtering: Highest
AO: Off
DoF: Off


The "benchmark", if you want to call it that, involved running a 10 minute path from the Adventurer's Guild in Limsa Lominsa, down past Beared Rock, and then back again along the same course. The same path was repeated as closely as possible for both runs.

The first test, with Windows XP Professional 32-bit and NVIDIA driver 258.96:

avg gpu usage = 68.7824773413897
avg framerate = 37.8354803625378
min framerate = 11.639
max frametate = 60.099

The second test, with Windows 7 Professional 64-bit and NVIDIA driver 258.96:
avg gpu usage = 68.1867469879518
avg framerate = 37.6627138554216
min framerate = 16.981
max frametate = 60.158

So no, OS isn't playing an issue in the performance of the client to any meaningful degree.

[shirasoma]

I tested on the following system:

AMD Phenom II x3 720BE @ 3.2GHz
MSI FX790-GD70
8GD DDR3-1600
80GB Intel X25-M
Palit GTX460 1GB (800MHz/1600MHz/4000MHz)

These are the settings used:
Display Mode: Fullscreen
Window Size: 1920x1080
Multisampling: 16xQ CSAA
Buffer Size: Resolution
Shadow Detail: Highest
Texture Quality: High
Texture Filtering: Highest
AO: Off
DoF: Off


The "benchmark", if you want to call it that, involved running a 10 minute path from the Adventurer's Guild in Limsa Lominsa, down past Beared Rock, and then back again along the same course. The same path was repeated as closely as possible for both runs.

The first test, with Windows XP Professional 32-bit and NVIDIA driver 258.96:

avg gpu usage = 68.7824773413897
avg framerate = 37.8354803625378
min framerate = 11.639
max frametate = 60.099

The second test, with Windows 7 Professional 64-bit and NVIDIA driver 258.96:
avg gpu usage = 68.1867469879518
avg framerate = 37.6627138554216
min framerate = 16.981
max frametate = 60.158

So no, OS isn't playing an issue in the performance of the client to any meaningful degree.

Ouch, guess I was off the mark. Definitely appreciate the time you took to test this out, though. Much thanks . This rules out one of the variables I was thinking was affecting performance the most.

The only thing I can think of is some odd variation of CPU + GPU is making this happen, that or this is all completely in SE's hands.