F1 2011 How to: create a FPS boost on PC

[blackcelica]

Firstly I will just say I was getting 26fps maximum in the benchmark with full detail 4xAA and v-sync off @ 1920x1080 res. The game was playable but I knew my PC could do better.

Tried all the hardware settings config tweaks, tried the audio tweaks, tried the everything tweaks.....

What i didn't do and I just decided to try it (kicking myself) was to turn SHADOWS TO HIGH FROM ULTRA.

With doing this I got an instant FPS boost beyond belief and you can't even tell the difference. I've now put it up to 8xAA and v-sync ON and i'm commanding a respectible 46 average FPS in benchmark and a solid 60 FPS in normal gaming mode most of the time. The lowest FPS i've experienced is 39 FPS starting a race at the back of a full grid.

Give it a go and see.

 

[Paul Lock]

Good info there. I remember doing the exact same thing with 2010 and it making a difference to the FPS - I should have remembered that!

For info, my rig is a stock i7, 6gb Triple Chan, and 2x 4870s in crossfire and its currently pulling in 59FPS in game benchmark and more in actual play. Thats with everything maximum in game, 8xAA @ 1920x1080 - I will drop the shadows down a notch tonight and report back.

I must also say thanks to whoever it was that suggested setting up a F1 2011 profile in RadeonPro to boost the performance of ATI crossfire, as that also gave me a +10 FPS boost. Well worth a try for anyone running crossfire setup, as CM and ATI dont seem bothered about refining/maximising performance in this area at all - in fact, before I started tweaking, a single 4870 was pulling more FPS than 2 cards in crossfire!

 

[Jan-Olov Johansson]

Firstly I will just say I was getting 26fps maximum in the benchmark with full detail 4xAA and v-sync off @ 1920x1080 res. The game was playable but I knew my PC could do better.

Tried all the hardware settings config tweaks, tried the audio tweaks, tried the everything tweaks.....

What i didn't do and I just decided to try it (kicking myself) was to turn SHADOWS TO HIGH FROM ULTRA.

With doing this I got an instant FPS boost beyond belief and you can't even tell the difference. I've now put it up to 8xAA and v-sync ON and i'm commanding a respectible 46 average FPS in benchmark and a solid 60 FPS in normal gaming mode most of the time. The lowest FPS i've experienced is 39 FPS starting a race at the back of a full grid.

Give it a go and see.

Interesting find, I think I tried that in 2010 with no diffrence but I will give it a try
You don't mention what your computerspecs are though ? (DX9 or 11) ?

 

[chi]

@Paul lock. What setting do you have in radeon pro? I'm running a 4870x2 and can't seem to get over 45fps in gaming. Tbh it's not bad but I would like to hit 60.

 

[Roy Sutton]

I'll have to try this, because with everything on max i get 39 FPS in the benchmark test, i'll go check it now.

My specs are.
CPU = AMD athlon x4 640
Ram = 8Gb's DDR3
GPU = ATI 5770 1GB
OS = Windows 7 ultimate x64 bit

No improvement on FPS.

 

[Paul Lock]

@Paul lock. What setting do you have in radeon pro? I'm running a 4870x2 and can't seem to get over 45fps in gaming. Tbh it's not bad but I would like to hit 60.

1. Setup a new profile in RadeonPro pointing at the F1 2011.exe.
2. Go to the 'Tweaks' tab, and under the MVPUMode, move the slider to 'Alternate Frame Rendering'.
3. Right click on the F1 2011.exe in the left hand pane and choose 'apply'.
4. Right click again and choose 'play now'. The game should launch and hopefully you should be getting 10 or so more FPS.

thats how I remember it - I have seen somewhere else about chosing the Dirt2 in the 'Force CrossfireX Profiles' dropdown between steps 1 and 2, so maybe thats worth a try too, not sure I did that bit.
I was trying to search for the original post but RD have disabled the search facility!

So I hope it works for you guys - and I must say thanks goes to the original OP for the info, who I would have thanked personally if I could have found the thread!

 

[chi]

Cheer Paul will give it a try tonight.

 

[blackcelica]

Interesting find, I think I tried that in 2010 with no diffrence but I will give it a try
You don't mention what your computerspecs are though ? (DX9 or 11) ?

Sorry, I'm running DX11 and my specs are:
i7 720 @2.8 quad core
8GB of ram
1GB ATI HD5850
Windows7 64bit

 

[Scott Webber]

i have everything maxed out and im getting a constant 60-70fps ... everything is all on full, V-Sync is off tho!

ATI XFX 4890 1GB DDR5
Intel i5-2500K 3.3Ghz (Stock)
Corsair Memory Vengeance Black 8GB DDR3 1600 MHz CAS 9 XMP Dual Channel
Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD3H-B3 Motherboard

i find having v-Sync on it reduces the FPS.

 

[Paul Lock]

i have everything maxed out and im getting a constant 60-70fps ... everything is all on full, V-Sync is off tho!

ATI XFX 4890 1GB DDR5
Intel i5-2500K 3.3Ghz (Stock)
Corsair Memory Vengeance Black 8GB DDR3 1600 MHz CAS 9 XMP Dual Channel
Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD3H-B3 Motherboard

i find having v-Sync on it reduces the FPS.

Scott, thats because V-synch locks your framerate to the native refresh rate of your monitor. So if you have a 60hz monitor, it locks it to 60FPS etc.
This is to avoid your PC throwing too many frames that the monitor can't handle, and the onscreen effect of that is called 'tearing'.

Its correct for v-synch to cap and reduce the FPS, but only really has a purpose if you are getting the tearing problems without it.
Just remember, with it enabled you will never go above 60, 70, or 120 FPS on a 60hz, 70hz or 120hz monitor.

 

[slavko.g]

Use the latest ATI drivers with the latest profiles. There is big improvement.

 

[kelaroost]

E8400 3.75 ghz 2 cores,
4 gig corsare memory 5 5 5 15 timings,
8800 gtx card.
Max game out 2560x1600 with 25 fps,
1920x1200 40 fps 8xaa
1920 1080 50 fps 8xaa
1920 1080 60 fps 4xaa shadows on high.

keep drivers up to date dont run any system hogging programs.

 

[Jan-Olov Johansson]

I think there is bigger impact in changing/lowering the settings with a dx11 card since it puts much more load on the GPU than running it on dx9. I have a single 4870 so dx11 is out, but I have the exact same avg fps as in 2010. Also, my drivers are almost a year old, found no need to upgrade yet, if it ain't broke, dont fix it...

 

[Paul Lock]

For sure DX11 mode increases the load, but as we all know, its not really DX11. Yes there is some better candy, but fundamentally, No tessellation = no DX11 - and tessellation is not possible on a direct console ported game.

 

[Jan-Olov Johansson]

For sure DX11 mode increases the load, but as we all know, its not really DX11. Yes there is some better candy, but fundamentally, No tessellation = no DX11 - and tessellation is not possible on a direct console ported game.

True, and tbh the diffrence between dx9/10 and dx11 (except for maybe tessellation) is not really noticeable unless you do a side by side comparison of still frames.

 

[Paul Lock]

I do wish they could make a game bespoke to PC and then water it right down for consoles, rather than the other way round

I think Codemasters could use a day out at DICE / EA HQ!

 

[Jan-Olov Johansson]

Yep, develope the games for a superultragtiturbo PC and then downgrade it for consoles

 

[blackcelica]

I put my v-sync back on to keep things smooth with 8xAA. With v-sync off it want to sometime display fps above 60. It's that jump upwards that also causes the tearing effect. Keeping it locked to a max if 60fps keeps it slick on my machine.

 

[Graham Laing]

I crossfired 2 Radeon HD5770's today, and was massively disappointed with the default 11.9 Drivers and profiles.

With the graphics settings at a reasonable level of my choice, the default drivers gave me 33fps and 25fps, using the build-in benchmark. Hardly any better than a single card.

Using Radeon Pro, I tried forcing the Dirt 2 profile, and this improved the figures to 42fps and 28fps.

Reading one guy's post on the Codemasters forum, he suggested forcing the 'D3D AFR Friendly' profile via Radeon Pro. This gave me a much improved frame rate than Dirt 2's profile. In this case I got 53fps and 44fps, so I suggest that others might try it out too .....

I haven't tried Paul's 'alternate frame rendering' method yet.

EDIT: I just did a quick test using the 'D3D AFR Friendly' profile + alternate frame rendering, and based on the 1 test I got 49 fps & 38 fps, a reduction in framerate from 53 & 44 .....

 

[Paul Lock]

I crossfired 2 Radeon HD5770's today, and was massively disappointed with the default 11.9 Drivers and profiles.

With the graphics settings at a reasonable level of my choice, the default drivers gave me 33fps and 25fps, using the build-in benchmark. Hardly any better than a single card.

Using Radeon Pro, I tried forcing the Dirt 2 profile, and this improved the figures to 42fps and 28fps.

Reading one guy's post on the Codemasters forum, he suggested forcing the 'D3D AFR Friendly' profile via Radeon Pro. This gave me a much improved frame rate than Dirt 2's profile. In this case I got 53fps and 44fps, so I suggest that others might try it out too .....

I haven't tried Paul's 'alternate frame rendering' method yet.

EDIT: I just did a quick test using the 'D3D AFR Friendly' profile + alternate frame rendering, and based on the 1 test I got 49 fps & 38 fps, a reduction in framerate from 53 & 44 .....

Thats interesting. What about just using alternate frame rendering without the D3D? Ill give the D3D a shot later on.
TBH, ive got crossfire turned off at the moment. The game gets more frames with crossfire in normal play, but it seems to be worse when I record with Fraps compared to just running a single card with Fraps. Work that out!

Im astonished that ATI havent CAP'd this game yet. I know we get on CMs back about bugs, but there is no logical reason why we should get the same sort of performance with xfire as a single card without using some 3rd party software, and ATI should have sorted this issue by now for sure. Shambles.