31 replies to this topic

[Ovion]

How to Optimise MWO if you're having Framerate Issues or are using a lower spec computer:
Not everyone has a powerhouse computer, and often MWO won't run amazingly well even if you do have a decent machine.
And even if you do, it may be worth optimising the game to improve overall performance regardless.

I've spent a long time dealing with the problem of a lower-spec PC and I've gathered quite a bit of info about improving performance out of necessity.
Much of this infomation is on the forums and in patch notes, but buried in the distant past and often spread across several threads and sub-forums.

user.cfg
The first thing and most useful thing is to adjust your user.cfg file.
This will be in C:\Program Files\Piranha Games\MechWarrior Online _{(or your personal install location for MWO)}
If you don't have a user.cfg, you can create a notepad file and name it user.cfg _{(ensure you have 'view file extensions' turned on, to void a file called user.cfg.txt)
If you have User Account Control active, you're best off copying (or creating) the user.cfg to the desktop, editing it there, then pasting it into your MWO directory.
If you have UAC active, in addition to the above, run MWO as admin (by right clicking on the launch icon and selecting 'Run as Admin') at least once for the changes to take effect.}

In that file put the following:

Spoiler

cl_fov = 86
gp_option_ShowCockpitGlass = 0
r_DepthOfField = 0
r_HDRGrainAmount = 0.0
sys_MaxFPS = 30
r_ssao = 0
r_ssdo = 0
e_TerrainAo = 0
sys_PakPriority = 0
sys_PakPriority 0
sys_PakValidateFileHash = 0

• fov is the Field of View, from memory this shouldn't be set higher than around 90-95, or lower than around 60 to avoid errors.
  
• Cockpit Glass is the texture on the glass, Flim grain adds film grain, depthoffield is blur. These don't really do much gamewise, just eat quite a bit of resources, or obscure the screen a little.
  
• MaxFPS is an FPS cap, meaning it won't attempt to run higher freeing up additional resources rather than trying to push for FPS, which can go to other things.- If you're hitting 30FPS fine, you can attempt increasing it to 45, then 60.
  
• The rest are things I still don't entirely understand, but they help, so I continue to use them!

Settings

In game go to Settings (found in the bottom right of the screen), then Video.
- Start by ensuring you've set the System Specifications setting on LOW.
- Screen Resolution should be set to your screen resolution. Lowering it will help performance though.
- - If lowering the Resolution, ideally start by retaining the Aspect Ratio of your monitor (refer to the following chart to find out what resolutions match the aspect ratio of your moniter)

Spoiler

Reducing the Aspect Ratio to 4:3 will further increase performance, at the cost of visual area and overall quality.
- Under Windowed Mode Full mode is the least graphically intensive from memory, though Full Window allows for alt-tabbing out easier, and multi-screen without your secondry (or more) monitor(s) freaking out.
- For Direct X Version, DX9 is often better than DX11 currently but it's hit and miss, though you'll need to compare performance with both to find out which works best fo you.
- Motion Blur should be OFF.
- 3D Vision Mode if you have the option for it, should really be OFF.
- V-Sync should be ON.
- Damage Glow should be OFF.

Under Advanded Options:
Start with everything in Advanced at LOW or OFF.
The most important one to have set 'LOW' is the Envoironment setting.
This is the single biggest resource drain.
After that, you can attempt raising Object Detail and Texturing to MEDIUM and see how it affects performance.

From there it's just tweaking the settings, raising each option Advanced Option one at a time to a point you still get a reasonably consistent 25-35FPS+ with the best graphics you can.

I would say improve Envoironment only after most settings are at MEDIUM, and Object Detail and Texturing are set to HIGH.

Additionally, if you have Graphics Software that comes with your cards Drivers (Such as Nvidia Experience, ATI Catalyst, etc), see if it has a 'Game Optimisation' tool.
If so, run that on MWO to see if it yields any performance improvements.

Happy Meching - Ovion

Edited by Ovion, 02 February 2015 - 02:51 PM.

[Alaskan Nobody]

This should help a fair number of people - thanks for compiling it all!

Maybe aught to see about getting it added to the guides list so it does not get buried and lost.

[Red Line Pilot]

Thanks man :-)

[Redshift2k5]

Great guide!

[Ovion]

Shar Wolf, on 15 November 2014 - 10:16 AM, said:

This should help a fair number of people - thanks for compiling it all!

Maybe aught to see about getting it added to the guides list so it does not get buried and lost.

No problem, I remember how it was, and I don't think without looking hard you can find any old threads anymore.

Getting it added to the guides list is a good idea, and I'll look into doing that.

[Napoleon_Blownapart]

you need to run notepad as admin to create or change the .cfg file.great guide.

[UrsusMorologus]

I would add to your comment regarding screen resolution. Lowering resolution is one of the biggest performance gains availalble, however it can make the game harder to play sometimes, especially on maps with a lot of lines and colors (like Mining Collective). You can correct some of that by re-enabling AA, and in some cases you can still end up with a signifcant performance gain. In my case, lowering resolution and enabling AA resulted in a ~30% gain over native resolution without AA. YMMV.

[Ovion]

Gorantir, on 16 November 2014 - 07:20 AM, said:

you need to run notepad as admin to create or change the .cfg file.great guide.

I will include this above, but this isn't the best way to do it honestly.

Ideally, if you have UserAccountControl active, you're best off copying (or creating) the user.cfg on the desktop, editing it there, then pasting it into your MWO directory.
This will ensure the least chance for errors.

UrsusMorologus, on 16 November 2014 - 09:15 AM, said:

I would add to your comment regarding screen resolution. Lowering resolution is one of the biggest performance gains availalble, however it can make the game harder to play sometimes, especially on maps with a lot of lines and colors (like Mining Collective). You can correct some of that by re-enabling AA, and in some cases you can still end up with a signifcant performance gain. In my case, lowering resolution and enabling AA resulted in a ~30% gain over native resolution without AA. YMMV.

Yes. It'll be a BIG gain, for a big graphical reduction.
Ideally you want to match the Aspect Ratio of your monitor at a lower resolution, though switchin it to a 4:3 resolution will result in an even greater increase in performance, at cost of 'peripheal vision'.

To help, here's a handy chart:

Edited by Ovion, 16 November 2014 - 09:56 AM.

[Atreides76]

Thanks so much for your assistance Ovion !

[ExoForce]

Thank You! I play at 12 fps.

[SnagaDance]

Great guide! My settings have been lowered and my user.cfg tweaked for quite some time now but there are some things in here that might still help to boost my performance even further. Thanks!

[mad kat]

Something worth mentioning here is razers game booster. If like me you dont want to have to go through ms config to prevent things starting at boot this gives you a list of which processes and services you can temporarily kill whilr playing the game. It doesnt yield a huge gain but can help. It also adjusts a laptops power settings.

Im not sure on this one either but i also turn off antivirus and even tried temporarilly turning of win defender last night. Then you have the ready boost function with an ssd pen drive but im not convinced that does very much at all.

The best gain i got was from trying to keep my laptop cool so i sit it on a tray with built in fan.

Edited by mad kat, 19 November 2014 - 03:19 AM.

[Ascaloth]

Thanks pal, i'm going to try this.

My specs:
FX-6300 (Six Cores, but MWO seems to not benefit much from this)
Sapphire HD6670 1GB DDR3 (just meh)
8GB Ram
2 160GB hard disks (MWO is on the main hd)
2 Fans on the cabinet
Power supply Corsair FX600

I'm thinking about getting an aftermarket cooler, adding another cabinet fan and do some overclocking. My fps in LOW settings (except textures: Medium) is quite good (25-30), except when there's too much going on (10-15) or i turn on Night Vision / Thermal Vision (last one is even worse, Frozen City is a pain in the arse when snowing....).

[ExoForce]

There was a post somewhere on the forum (Ive lost my bookmark) with exact FOV values depending on monitor resolution.

[Ovion]

I know the thread you mean
The gist of it was, the 'best' FoV for each aspect ratio, due to MWOs verticl FoV setting, meaning:
16:9 = 79
16:10 = 85
4:3 = 95
5:4 = 99
However, a lot of it is personal preference as well as to how much of the mech you want to see.

That said, lets make this a group effort - any suggestions people have, lets bring it in, I'll periodicly add things to the main post and we'll try and get everything we can in one place.

Edited by Ovion, 22 November 2014 - 03:25 AM.

[Gamuray]

Added the user.cfg file as you suggested... Well... It only helps while standing still... Which was never really a problem in the first place framerate-wise -.-' . It's funny, normally I run ~20-25 fps on any map, but just now river city decided "Nope, 5-9 fps for you buddy". ... No apparent reason, no different than my matches a few days ago. Must be that darned patch >_>

That fov thing makes my mechs seem much less crowded and much less "in the wall" feely when I bump something.. (have to run a 4:3 aspect ratio for frames..)

Edited by Gamuray, 19 November 2014 - 06:02 PM.

[mad kat]

Not really a FPS thing this but seeing as a poor frame rate can affect your accuracy ensuring you have a good connection is usually a wise idea. If you can use an ethernet connection instead of the wireless for a more consistent and faster connection. Not always feasible though.

*wonders if turning the display off on my laptop and using a VGA cable to the TV would save power consumption for the laptops power supply*

[SnagaDance]

So I updated my user.cfg file, but because I couldn't remember what setting I had put V-sync on I decided to check the in-game Settings menu. Turned out that a few patches ago (the one that also made global chat automatically unchecked), apparantly all game settings for me had been changed to Medium instead of Low (which they were). And here I was wondering why my performance had been not so good lately.

[Ovion]

Gamuray, on 19 November 2014 - 05:41 PM, said:

Added the user.cfg file as you suggested... Well... It only helps while standing still... Which was never really a problem in the first place framerate-wise -.-' . It's funny, normally I run ~20-25 fps on any map, but just now river city decided "Nope, 5-9 fps for you buddy". ... No apparent reason, no different than my matches a few days ago. Must be that darned patch >_>

That fov thing makes my mechs seem much less crowded and much less "in the wall" feely when I bump something.. (have to run a 4:3 aspect ratio for frames..)

Are you running Windows Vista / 7 / 8 with user account control on?
You may need to run mwo as admin at least once to get the changes to take hold (will add to main post when home)

[Ovion]

Gamuray, on 19 November 2014 - 05:41 PM, said:

Added~mes..)

Part 2 - Not on my phone.

The other thing(s) I could suggest, would be lowering the FPS cap even further.
Bring it down to 25, or even 20 if that's the highest you can reasonably pull and see if it helps you maintain that better.

Double check that all the settings are still low in MWO too as it looks like a recent patch may have changed them.

In addition to running 4:3 have you scaled it down to a lower resolution too? 1024x768 (or even 800x600 if available? not sure if it is.. I know it's not on mine..)