Opus, Rain, P3D v2 - anyone else having challenges?

[Alan_A 1,650]

Just had an interesting experience.  I was running some tests at KCGS near Washington DC in the Carenado A36 - mainly testing different combinations of autogen and shadows.  At some point I loaded real world weather from Opus 3.36.1.  We're at the tail end of a big coastal storm, so weather was overcast with rain.  As soon as Opus weather loaded, frames fell from the mid-30's to around 10.  In several subsequent tests, every time I loaded Opus, performance suffered.  Even with lower autogen and no shadows, when I loaded Opus weather, I got microstutters, even when frames held around 20.

 

Based on some findings yesterday, I thought the rain effect might be the culprit.  So I restarted and replaced Opus with the Gray and Rainy theme.  No performance issues there - frames came down slightly but held around 30, even with maxxed autogen (no shadows).

 

Another clue - at one point I tried to clear Opus weather using the Clear Skies theme.  All the Opus effects cleared - except for a white band above the horizon and reduced visibility.  Performance improved marginally but the stutters remained.

 

So I'm wondering if my system is experiencing some challenges related to the way Opus handles the haze layer or visibility on my system.  And am wondering if anyone else is having similar experiences.  I haven't yet taken this up on the Opus forums because I'm not at all sure it's an Opus problem - there may be some other issue in my setup or my settings.  But for starters - anyone in the same boat?

 

 

[Q_flyer 766]

Hi Alan....... I haven't yet tested or seen any rain from Opus in P3D2 yet, but I have had a ton of snow getting thrown at me from Opus (along with low clouds and visibility) and the frame rate remained uneffected throughout.   Perhaps the rain is harder hitting? ... will have to check that one myself.

 

I hope you get the issue solved!

[Alan_A 1,650]

Thanks, Dave - I saw your screenshots from your AXE flight just after I posted.  Impressive results and clearly snow is no problem for you.

 

This is pure speculation on my part, but I'm wondering if my Opus rain problems might be related somehow to the mist and smoke effects you get from the landing gear when braking.  I remember there was a similar issue with NGX brake smoke under FSX DX10.  I wonder if there's a similar way to toggle that effect.  Of course, the native Gray and Rainy theme didn't give me the same problems... but the mist and wet-pavement effects didn't seem so heavy there, either.  

 

Hmmm... more to explore...

[Jimmy RFR 406]

Alan, I can confirm your issue; I've loaded up Opus and flown a few times today, one of the flights gave me heavy rain.  Frames went from mid 40's prior to Opus loading weather, to 20's as soon as the weather loaded. Tried waiting it out for a minute or so to see if it was shader related, frame rates didn't improve.

[RWFeldman 159]

Jim Ive had the same thing happen with other weather engines and P3DV2. I'm not convinced its the weather engine as much as the sim handling the rain graphics? KJFK was BAD today as far as frames and weather. Like in the teens in rain and snow.

[HighTowers 1,436]

Interesting. Are these default p3d cloud textures? Or has REX or AS2012 textures been installed? I havnt done the texture install. 

Perhaps you have high texture setting? I kept mine at 1024, and overcast didnt do too much at all, but havnt been in rain yet.

[Alan_A 1,650]

Interesting indeed.  

 

@HighTowers - these are default P3D clouds set at 1024 (I always keep a 1024 limit, in FSX and here, too).  The only customization I've done is to install FTX Global (which might be a factor, depending on how the ground textures respond to rain.

 

The native (FSX-vintage) Gray and Rainy weather theme didn't have nearly as much impact - but the rain it generates is pretty light compared to what Opus was giving me based on real-world conditions.  

 

It does seem like there's an issue with rain textures specifically - Dave (Q_flyer) doesn't seem to have had problems in snow on his AXE flight.  On the other hand, there's RWFeldman's KJFK experience, so we can't rule out snow totally.

 

I'll have to try some more variables - maybe the Thunderstorms theme, and also one of the ones involving snow - and see if there's any impact.  I have to travel tomorrow into Friday but if the weather continues to clear out here, maybe I can run Opus again in lighter rain and see if that makes any difference.

 

In the meantime, I'll continue to be interested in what the rest of you come up with.

[meshman 109]

I wonder if during a storm and the drop in FPS, what effect reflections and shadows have in the FPS drop?

[YVRLHRDXB 321]

I have issues with cloud cover.. I'm getting 40fps no problem, when the weather from OPUS loads my FPS drop to 20fps and stay there no matter which direction I move my weather sliders within the sim. I'm assuming this program is drawing a very large default area of clouds which is killing the performance. Hopefully they fix this issue soon.

[Jimmy RFR 406]

My cloud textures are default. Most of the cloudy weather that Opus has injected has been fine, not too much effect on the sim.

 

It's worth noting that the rain which affected my fps so badly was really, really heavy.

 

I didn't happen to play around with sliders, perhaps it could be a ground texture thing.

[Alan_A 1,650]

 

 

...perhaps it could be a ground texture thing.

 

I think you're onto something... and Meshman, too, about reflections.  I didn't have shadows on, during this test.  But the rain was heavy and the reflective apron surface (in FTX Global) really stood out.  Also, frames took an even worse dip when the mist kicked up during braking.  Maybe some combination of heavy rain, ground reflections and effects.  Could be worth playing with the reflections settings and the effects sliders.  If I get a chance to, I'll report back.  If others get to it first, let us know.

[Alan_A 1,650]

Just had time for a very quick test.  I can't seem to get Opus to give me weather from earlier in the day (maybe some kind of compatibility issue?)  But I loaded the Heavy Snow and the Gray and Rainy themes and taxied the Carenado A36 up and down at KCGS while altering a few settings.  Frames in all these scenarios were better than with Opus weather (when I did get Opus to load current weather, which is overcast, my frames came down from 40 to 20).  But the biggest performance variation seemed to be the effects sliders.  With both effects sliders at high, as soon as I hit the brakes and generated a cloud of mist, the frames dropped by 50 percent.  With the effects sliders at low, there was considerably less mist and it lasted much less time.  And the frames barely took a dip.  

 

I did get wet runway textures using both weather themes, but I'm not sure they had much impact.  I checked the reflections settings, but if I'm not mistaken these apply only to water.  The effects sliders didn't seem to change the look.

 

It may be that a couple of things are going on at once - Opus overcast performs much less well than the native weather themes at identical settings.  And having effects sliders at high produces severe transient dips.  Using the two in combination - heavy Opus weather and high effects settings - could be the problem.

 

I was reading elsewhere that Active Sky is producing severe high temperatures (for example, 160 degrees Farenheit) when it injects weather.  The interaction of weather programs with P3D v2 doesn't seem to be completely settled.  And the effects settings are a new variable.

 

It may be worth looking at these combinations.  If I could get Opus to give me heavy rain again, I'd be able to run a better test.  But I may have to wait for the next big real-world storm.

 

Will be interested to hear what others come up with.

[Jimmy RFR 406]

Alan, I appreciate your observations. I think you're very correct in that it's a combination of things going on all at once. Much like FSX was, but of course now we have even more sliders and separate considerations for things that tax the CPU or the GPU or a combination of both.

 

When I get back on the sim tomorrow night, I'll try to replicate your findings about the effects - I'm sure I do have mine set to high and perhaps that's one of the culprits.

 

I do recall testing out some of the heavy weather themes when I first installed P3d; it occurs to me that they didn't hit the fps nearly as bad as the Opus injected heavy rainstorm did.

 

I also noticed that the in game MSAA (mine is at 8x) & really heavy clouds have a noticeable impact.. almost as if they had a CPU load associated with them, which it may well have. There is a definate distinction between items that are shifted to the GPU and items that are handled by the CPU, but it's not always obvious in advance what those items are.

[Alan_A 1,650]

I also noticed that the in game MSAA (mine is at 8x) & really heavy clouds have a noticeable impact.. almost as if they had a CPU load associated with them, which it may well have.

 

That sounds very similar to my DX10 experience with FSX, where I had MSAA and SGSS (in NVidia Inspector) both set to 8, and every time I hit a cloud my frames would drop under 10.  None of the fixes worked and I eventually went back to DX9.  In P3D V2, I've got MSAA and SGSS both set at 4.  But the behavior parallels yours.  So yes, first there's Opus and its cloud layer impact.  If DX11 behaves like DX10 when rendering clouds, then that could be related to our problem.  Then the effects sliders add another complication.  

 

I'm sure we can all manage to figure this out, but you're right, it seems to require a whole new way of thinking about settings and sliders and how they all work.

[gandy 18]

I have not tested with opus yet but creating a custom weather theme.. full overcast and heavy rain i dropped to about 30fps ( still a  good number ) in the Carenado T210 with global installed from about 50 to 60 with the stock weather theme, lowering my AA and AF inside the sim gave me a 10fps boost, was using x16 AF and x8 AA and changed them to x8 AF and x4 AA so it seems the AA and AF are bringing down the fps which is a normal thing to happen when you use them at high levels.