Upgrading for AC

[Chris James]

I recently bought an AMD 7970 to replace my old 6870, with AC and rF2 in mind. I was disappointed that the upgrade didn't provide the boost I was hoping for, and I now suspect that my aging CPU are what's holding me back. I have an AMD Phenom II 1100T X6, but I'm looking at the AMD FX-8350 Eight-Core, and a new Mobo to go with it. Obviously it's a faster chip, and it scores better on benchmarks, but will it actually bring an improvement in AC? Will AC utilize that many cores?

I run 3 screens, so with my current hardware, I have to keep everything on low, which will not do at all. Don't get me wrong, even on low settings, the AC TP looks awesome, but I want more.

So, is this a good upgrade? I welcome and appreciate any suggestions on a different proc.

Thanks guys.

current specs:
AMD 1100T X6
Asus M4A89TD Pro
Radeon 7970
12g

 

[Juise]

Remember that if you want to be competitive FPS should be around 100 or preferably more (I recommend 120Hz monitor and over 120FPS)
120Hz monitor gives you smoother picture and more FPS means less lag on your inputs and in FFB and the physics overall -> you end up driving more consistently and very soon after that you drive faster.

And when you upgrade your GFX card remember to think about tomorrow also. Your monitor might go blank and you have to get a new one and i'm pretty sure many of you want to have bigger one

So in GFX cards it is not a bad idea to invest some more to get good solid fps especially if you plan on using lots of opponents or run in bigger races online.

 

[Jari Vinnari]

Out of curiosity I tested AC TP with default and overclocked settings.
I have i5-2500K and Nvidia GTX 670 video card. Overclocking my CPU from default 3.3GHz to 4.0 had no effect to average framerate of 133. Framerate jumped from 133 to 146 after overclocking my video card.

I dont see any reason to overclock or upgrade my CPU based current version without AI, weather and other features. To improve framerate I need a better videocard and perhaps then overclocking CPU would be benificial. Currently im GPU limited but it will be interesting to see what the full version brings.

 

[Kreshnik]

Juise
i see you have no understanding of coding. input is as good as always running on an own thread. of course its somehow bounded to the game physics, because when an input is registered, it has to tell the game so in any of their running game-loops. physics have mostly a fixed framerate. the most often used fixed value for physics is 60 fps. if your game runs > 60 fps and is a physics based game like AC, then the positions inbetween are most likely interpolated ones. playing AC with 60 fps or with 600 fps will not have any effects on your lap-times if its coded correctly.

 

[Peter]

Juise
i see you have no understanding of coding. input is as good as always running on an own thread. of course its somehow bounded to the game physics, because when an input is registered, it has to tell the game so in any of their running game-loops. physics have mostly a fixed framerate. the most often used fixed value for physics is 60 fps. if your game runs > 60 fps and is a physics based game like AC, then the positions inbetween are most likely interpolated ones. playing AC with 60 fps or with 600 fps will not have any effects on your lap-times if its coded correctly.

Why did you do that.
I just wanted to order my self a GTX Titan and a 240Hz monitor and beat you guys in every race.

 

[Hannes-Joshua Thor Barthel]

Juise
i see you have no understanding of coding. input is as good as always running on an own thread. of course its somehow bounded to the game physics, because when an input is registered, it has to tell the game so in any of their running game-loops. physics have mostly a fixed framerate. the most often used fixed value for physics is 60 fps. if your game runs > 60 fps and is a physics based game like AC, then the positions inbetween are most likely interpolated ones. playing AC with 60 fps or with 600 fps will not have any effects on your lap-times if its coded correctly.

I think you mean hz but however 60fps is a frequency of 60 hz yes.. ... but 60hz for the physics engine for a racing simultation is way too low... that may work in a shooter for the ragdoll things and so... but not when you travel with 300kmh over a laserscanned track.. at 300mkh you would update the physics only every 14mm (rounded.. ) (in other words you skip every 14mm) and there comes alot more into play... because not only the bumps etc needs to be received but also all the movement of the suspension travel etc needs to be "calculated / refreshed" (and alot more)

yes physics are seperated and running it's own refresh rate but... a rate which is alot higher then 60hz for a race sim...

 

[Juise]

Juise
i see you have no understanding of coding. input is as good as always running on an own thread. of course its somehow bounded to the game physics, because when an input is registered, it has to tell the game so in any of their running game-loops. physics have mostly a fixed framerate. the most often used fixed value for physics is 60 fps. if your game runs > 60 fps and is a physics based game like AC, then the positions inbetween are most likely interpolated ones. playing AC with 60 fps or with 600 fps will not have any effects on your lap-times if its coded correctly.

Test it yourself. Try AC TP, rF2 whatever game you like. By inputs i meant your own inputs according to what you see on the screen and feel in your hands (and how they go together.) This has nothing to do with theory or coding or anything like that just observed facts. And I'm pretty sure someone can explain in depth what are the reasons behind this.

Someone feels that 60 fps is enough, but usually in racing games / simulations it just isn't.

And for the sake of clarity i'm not working for any hw supplier or anything just wanted to tell people things what we have seen and felt racing in league for the last 10 years. It's just a suggestion, everyone for their own

 

[Stereo]

I think you mean hz but however 60fps is a frequency of 60 hz yes.. ... but 60hz for the physics engine for a racing simultation is way too low... that may work in a shooter for the ragdoll things and so... but not when you travel with 300kmh over a laserscanned track.. at 300mkh you would update the physics only every 14mm (rounded.. ) (in other words you skip every 14mm) and there comes alot more into play... because not only the bumps etc needs to be received but also all the movement of the suspension travel etc needs to be "calculated / refreshed" (and alot more)

yes physics are seperated and running it's own refresh rate but... a rate which is alot higher then 60hz for a race sim...

Good for most of the post, but it's 1400mm, not 14; a bit over a metre moved per frame.

As far as I know most racing sims are using 500-1000Hz physics, at high speeds you're still moving quite a way (~100mm per step) but that's what the CPU can handle reliably, and if you're using a fixed step, then failing to calculate physics in time means bad problems (like no multiplayer).

 

[Kreshnik]

I think you mean hz but however 60fps is a frequency of 60 hz yes.. ... but 60hz for the physics engine for a racing simultation is way too low... that may work in a shooter for the ragdoll things and so... but not when you travel with 300kmh over a laserscanned track.. at 300mkh you would update the physics only every 14mm (rounded.. ) (in other words you skip every 14mm) and there comes alot more into play... because not only the bumps etc needs to be received but also all the movement of the suspension travel etc needs to be "calculated / refreshed" (and alot more)

yes physics are seperated and running it's own refresh rate but... a rate which is alot higher then 60hz for a race sim...

yeah you are right about racing games. i havent coded a racing game till now, just some fps and third person games. i may have simplified my sentence too much =).

I found a list of some popular racing games:

After some research:
'98 Sports Car GT - 50 Hz [from Blackhole Motorsports article]
'98 Viper Racing - 60 Hz (general) / 300 Hz (some aspects) [email with Dave Broske]
'98 Grand Prix Legends - 144 Hz
'00 F1 2000 - 50 Hz [from Blackhole Motorsports article]
'00-'08 Racer - 300 Hz (general) / 3000-30,000 Hz (tyre rotation) [posted by Ruud in a thread archive on racer.nl, dated '01]
'01 F1 2001 - 200 Hz [from Blackhole Motorsports article]
'02 Total Immersion Racing - 100 Hz (uses RK4) [from press release]
'02-'08 Live For Speed - 100 Hz (collision detection) / 2000 Hz (vehicle dynamics) [posted by Scawen on lfsforum]
'03 NASCAR Racing 2003 Season - 288 Hz (possibly)
'04 VirtualRC Racing v1.0 - 300 Hz (general) / 600 Hz (tyre model) [posted by Todd on lfsforum]
'05 VirtualRC Racing v3.0 - 250 Hz (general) / 500 or 1000 Hz (tyre model) [posted by Todd on lfsforum]
'05 rFactor - 400 Hz
'05 Forza Motorsport - 180 Hz
'06 Test Drive Unlimited - 100 Hz (collision detection) / 1000 Hz (vehicle dynamics)
'06 netKar Pro - 333 Hz [posted by Kunos on RSC]
'07 Forza Motorsport 2 - 360 Hz [from wikipedia article]
'07 Rigs Of Rods - 2000 Hz [from ROR forums]
'08 Ferrari Challenge: Trofeo Pirelli - 60 Hz
'08 rFactor Pro - 800 Hz [from official website]
'08 iRacing - 360 Hz [from AutoSimSport]
'09 Supercar Challenge - 60 Hz
'09 Need For Speed: Shift - 180 Hz / might be 360 Hz (effective due to 2 physics passes per timestep?)
'09 Forza Motorsport 3 - 360 Hz [from gamespot article]
Motorsport - 333 Hz (but still being tuned) [posted by Stenyak on RSC]

(copyright @ Bob Smith https://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?t=48927)

those rates should be all fixed.

the physics are still encapsuled from graphics and should run even on Min-Specs with the desired update-rates. the most simple way to guarantee no advantages to better PCs is with a fixed update rate.

this has nothing to do with multiplayer being possible or not. there are a lot of ways to implementing multiplayer for physics based games. if we go any deeper here, we are completly off-topic though xD.

if you cant get 60 fps on minimum settings, its very likely that input lag also occurs in some way.

AC wont be about the faster PC. it will be about the faster player. (at least i hope so)

 

[Hannes-Joshua Thor Barthel]

Good for most of the post, but it's 1400mm, not 14; a bit over a metre moved per frame.

As far as I know most racing sims are using 500-1000Hz physics, at high speeds you're still moving quite a way (~100mm per step) but that's what the CPU can handle reliably, and if you're using a fixed step, then failing to calculate physics in time means bad problems (like no multiplayer).

omg yes ofcourse.. quite a bit of facepalming me ofcourse it's 1400mm which is ofcurse even alot worse