How to maximise Assetto Corsa on dated hardware?

[Ross Balfour]

So basically, in what can only be described as a spur of the moment decision, I purchased AS after only looking at a few trailers and screenshots. - I truly am a marketers dream.
Anyway, as some of you may remember me from a few years back, I was massive into my Race07/GTR Evolution in and around 2008-2011. Sadly however my computer is now 7 years old and with a pitiful 2GB of RAM, it can barely run AS with more than 8 AI cars on the field. This creates a major issue for me, as I fear the pain and despair that will naturally occur for me the second multiplayer becomes available, as it will be almost unplayable.

So that brought me to my video settings within AS itself, and despite a few minor tweaks I still can't get the game running as smoothly as I would like. Does anyone have any suggestions on what settings to run to maximise the game on pretty dated software, and additionally, what would any of you recommend I do to find a cheap way of upgrading my specs so it can run smooth as butter.

Thanks!

 

[Juris]

Can you post a full spec list. It'll be hard to advise without knowing CPU, GPU etc. Cheers.

Edit: Also can you post your current settings, the FPS you get with them and the tweaks you made and what difference you noticed. Every system will react differently depending on available resources.

 

[Stereo]

When you set up a race, turning off collisions might improve your performance. But AI is mostly cpu-limited so there aren't a lot of options to turn off. Multiplayer shouldn't be as bad for collisions cause your computer only needs to calculate them for your car, not the entire field.

 

[Ross Balfour]

Ok cheers for the reply guys, the following is my in-game settings, computer specs and graphic settings:


Additionally, despite having Windows 7, I cannot upgrade to DirectX 10.1, meaning I have to make that edit on of the files within steamapps. resulting in the trees having white and green blocks around them, which partially ruins the driving experience for me, with 10.1 being Windows7 compatible, surely I should be able to upgrade to it?

Cheers.

 

[AMV8 VANTAGE]

Ok, so we know now what CPU/RAM you have, but we also need to see what graphics card you have. I'd say this would be the main culprit to the games poor performance. Also this may be stopping you upgrading to Direct X 10.1; which is the minimum required for this game.

The performance of the game will get better as a whole. They're not quite at v1.0 final release yet and who knows what they could do beyond this.

 

[Juris]

Ok cheers for the reply guys, the following is my in-game settings, computer specs and graphic settings:


Additionally, despite having Windows 7, I cannot upgrade to DirectX 10.1, meaning I have to make that edit on of the files within steamapps. resulting in the trees having white and green blocks around them, which partially ruins the driving experience for me, with 10.1 being Windows7 compatible, surely I should be able to upgrade to it?

Cheers.

1st off the 2gb ram is going to murder you. Windows is sucking up much of that out of the box and AC will have to page out heavily to the HDD. More ram is the only option there. I would advise disabling services on Win 7 which are not needed. There are tons of guides from Blackviper http://www.blackviper.com/ to help release some much needed resources Windows is soaking up. Even with that you need more ram tbh.

On the AC setting front you have both AF and AA running. Assetto has serious issues with AF at present, way out of proportion to the return it gives. It clearly needs optimisation as this is not the case in iRacing or others. Also drop your smoke generation settings and shadows. They kill fps on many systems.

We still need your GPU model and specs. Honestly its hopeless trying to help without it. Also do you have Faces per Frame settings and Cubemap on or off as you're not showing it in your pics. Cheers.

 

[RaceNut]

Great suggestions being made here and I agree with RAM being a limiting factor. 4gb is minimum needed just to run Windows 7 efficiently IMO. The good news is that RAM can be upgraded without spending a lot provided your motherboard supports it. The video card is going to be a key factor also.

At some point, you have to look at the total ROI (Return on Investment) and decide if you are better off saving money to buy a better PC or build your own low-budget gaming system vs. trying to upgrade your existing PC that will always be constrained by outdated components. That can become an exercise in futility pretty quickly.

While PC technology is still costly to be on the "Cutting Edge" of new developments. The pace of development today is not what it used to be so it's probably easier to squeeze more life (time) out of a new system than it was 5-10 years ago.

 

[Ross Balfour]

Ok cheers guys, sorry It's been 3 years so still trying to get up to speed with all this again!

Here's my GPU Specs and the additional in-game settings.

 

[Ross Balfour]

Great suggestions being made here and I agree with RAM being a limiting factor. 4gb is minimum needed just to run Windows 7 efficiently IMO. The good news is that RAM can be upgraded without spending a lot provided your motherboard supports it. The video card is going to be a key factor also.

At some point, you have to look at the total ROI (Return on Investment) and decide if you are better off saving money to buy a better PC or build your own low-budget gaming system vs. trying to upgrade your existing PC that will always be constrained by outdated components. That can become an exercise in futility pretty quickly.

While PC technology is still costly to be on the "Cutting Edge" of new developments. The pace of development today is not what it used to be so it's probably easier to squeeze more life (time) out of a new system than it was 5-10 years ago.

Yeah I really don't want to upgrade my PC, as I would only be using it really for gaming, as I have a laptop which I use everyday at university and for assignments etc.
I was thinking of upgrading to 8GB Ram, but some more research would need to be done in order to find if my computer can handle it. My graphics card I feel is okay, but then again if it can't handle DirectX 11.0 I think It would be time to upgrade.


EDIT: On that, my NVIDIA control panels states that I have DX 10.0, while inside my DirectX Dianostic Tool it states that I currently have DX 11.0?

 

[Jan-Olov Johansson]

Yeah I really don't want to upgrade my PC, as I would only be using it really for gaming, as I have a laptop which I use everyday at university and for assignments etc.
I was thinking of upgrading to 8GB Ram, but some more research would need to be done in order to find if my computer can handle it. My graphics card I feel is okay, but then again if it can't handle DirectX 11.0 I think It would be time to upgrade.


EDIT: On that, my NVIDIA control panels states that I have DX 10.0, while inside my DirectX Dianostic Tool it states that I currently have DX 11.0?

That is because the DirectX software is capable of dx11 but your card is not.

 

[Dinca Andrei]

Hey Ross,you really had a big break from simracing.
From what i see you really need a new Video card,but check your motherboard to see if it supports the new cards.
I think your system needs a imminent upgrade if you want to play AC smooth.

 

[James Moran]

I'd look at a new budget gaming rig, rather than an upgrade. You need more ram, a faster cpu and a DX11 card, then to account for them, likely a PSU upgrade too. I can just hold 60fps with an AMD FX4100@4.4 and a 7770 1GB @1120mhz on decent settings.

 

[James Moran]

I should add that Corsa with 15 cars uses .. 60% cpu & 90-95% of my gpu

 

[Ross Balfour]

I'd look at a new budget gaming rig, rather than an upgrade. You need more ram, a faster cpu and a DX11 card, then to account for them, likely a PSU upgrade too. I can just hold 60fps with an AMD FX4100@4.4 and a 7770 1GB @1120mhz on decent settings.

Geez, this will add up to be extremely expensive for me! So is upgrading my current not advisable at all, just to get me through for 2 years until I finish university?

 

[Juris]

Geez, this will add up to be extremely expensive for me! So is upgrading my current not advisable at all, just to get me through for 2 years until I finish university?

Do you have a budget. The new Maxwell GPUs from Nvidia are just coming out. Quite cheap and the last generation will get discounted. It won't be that expensive to get sorted.

 

[Dan ONeill]

Try shadow resolution lower than you have it, turn off smoke generation and especially turn off smoke in mirrors.

Get 2 more GB of ram, 32 bit windows will only be able to address 4 GB.

Upgrade windows to 64 bit? This will allow the use of more RAM.

Perhaps over clock your CPU?

Get a cheap 8GB memory stick and use it for windows ready boost.
This may help with the lack of RAM as it acts as a kind of cache for the HDD.

 

[Ross Balfour]

Do you have a budget. The new Maxwell GPUs from Nvidia are just coming out. Quite cheap and the last generation will get discounted. It won't be that expensive to get sorted.

Well as a student I really can't spend anything over £80-£100.

 

[Bryan O'Connor]

Are you in the UK?
Hunt Gumtree and the like for a used GPU. Possible to find a GTX580 for under a ton. Still a very decent card by today's standards if lacking in VRAM compared to new cards.
This will probably mean an upgrade of your PSU. Don't scrimp on this, get a certified 80 plus bronze. Doesn't have to be expensive..... Coolermaster and Antec etc do a budget one.

 

[Pete Bone]

Well as a student I really can't spend anything over £80-£100.

With such a low budget your only real option is Ebay or similar for a new GFX card, but i still don't think you will get much for that.

As it is AC isn't optimized and so anything less than a top end PC will struggle to run it on anything other than the lowest setting.

As an example, i have an i7 3770k at 3.5ghz, 8gb ram, Win7 and a GTX 670 2gb and it run ok on mid to high settings with around 20 cars at Monza.

 

[Dan ONeill]

I've just introduced my brother to PC racing by giving him my old HW, plus he had to buy a case and my old GTX460 (which was fine btw).
He is running it smooth ( hot laps) on an E8600, 4 GB RAM and W7 64 bit.
Cheap case with built in 509W PSU was 35 quid, ( the system was at 270W whilst in game).
Probably wont be great for multiplayer but if I can just race him then that's fine.

So, upgrade CPU, get more RAM, get better GFX. Probably get all that for 100? No, but close...