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 Home  Forum Index Neverwinter Nights 2 NWN2: Technical Support (Self-Help) Fixing Framerate problems and FAQs
NWN2: Technical Support (Self-Help)
Ace42
Game Owner
 NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
NWN 2
NWN 2: MotB
NWN 2: SoZ
Joined: 04 Aug 2002
From: eXistenZ |
 Posted: Tuesday, 14 November 2006 11:29PM |
Could a moderator PLEASE sticky this? I've had to type the information here out at least a dozen times.
Most importantly:
Turn off V-sync. Yes, I hate page-tearing, and I love triple buffering, but REALLY, it makes an almost inexplicable difference. This is not the usual "l33t" FPS mania, seriously, it made an insane difference to me. You can force Vsync to off in the Nvidia control panel. ATI drivers must have a similar option to force of Vsyncing and triple buffering.
Also, there was an issue with Xfire (the instant messaging program that was bundled with NWN2) killing frame-rates. There is a sticky at the top of this forum with a fix if this is the cause of your problem, but Xfire seemed to have resolved this problem itself for me.
For Nvidia users:
Make sure you have the latest drivers, especially Nvidia ones, as they have an entry that is optimised for NWN2 over SLI cards.
*** Due to an oversight, this Nvidia profile points to nwn2.exe (the frontend) instead of "nwn2main.exe" (the game engine) you WILL have to change this. There are threads on how to do it, but the easiest way is to download nhancer (www.nhancer.com) and simply add nwn2main.exe to the existing NWN2 profile. ***
Open up the NWN2.ini file IN YOUR DOCUMENTS (not the default one in the game's main folder) and set the ATI Workaround for Point Lighting entry to 0 (unless you have an ATI card, of course)
Some tweaks to improve the visual quality of the game now that the framerate should be fine:
Click start, go to "run", type in DXDIAG, go to the "more help" tab, then "overides" button, and set the refresh rate of DX games to whatever you desire (85 for CRTs, 75 for TFTs is usually the best).
You CAN force on FSAA (Anti-Aliasing), and it runs 8xS on mine, looks AMAZING, and that barely dents the framerate after I went through the above.
Some other common problems that can be worked around:
"I don't like the controls" - go into the nwn.ini (nwnplayer.ini?) in YOUR DOCUMENTS, not the one in the game's main installation folder, and set "Camerafollowsalways=0" to "1", now the camera will face the same direction as your character in driving cam mode.
"I want to use my right button to move the camera like WoW"
Click Here
"The henchman AI is rubbish!"
Click HereEdited By EvilTypeGuy on 11/25/06 05:49 | 
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directrealist
Game Owner
 NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
NWN 2
Joined: 01 Mar 2003
From: ambient |
Posted: Tuesday, 14 November 2006 11:35PM |
vsync off raises fps, but you get some tearing when you move teh camera around.
a better solution imo is to use dx tweaker to force triple buffering with vsync on.
i get the same fps as with vsync off, but i dont get tearing if I enable triple buffering using dxtweaker.
a good note about vsync and triple buffering:
http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=928593
instructions on how to use dx tweaker:
Click Here
where to get dxtweaker:
Click Here
you do need to set up a profile for this game in nvidia cards. make sure your profile has either vsync off, or vsync on with the dxtweaker enabling triple buffering.
_________________
godless | |
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Chris Priestly
Community Coordinator
Joined: 17 Oct 2001
From: Behind an Evil desk in Marketing |
Posted: Tuesday, 14 November 2006 11:38PM |
Sticky? Maybe in the tech support forum, but not here.
_________________
Like a great predatory piano, I sit silent in the darkness. Until it is time to attack and then I strike in a cacophony of violence and ivory keys. | |
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Ace42
Game Owner
NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
NWN 2
NWN 2: MotB
NWN 2: SoZ
Joined: 04 Aug 2002
From: eXistenZ |
Posted: Tuesday, 14 November 2006 11:40PM |
Quote:
vsync off raises fps, but you get some tearing when you move teh camera around.
So you'd think. Except I get *no* page tearing with Vsync off. Like I said, maybe not clearly enough, this is not generic "turn off vsync for every last frame!" posturing. There is a fundamental flaw with the way this game handles Vsyncing over dual-core or SLI (prolly crossfire too) cards. I DID force on triple buffering with Vsync on, and it was barely playable with everything off. This wasn't just the game being limited to the same update rate as the screen was refreshing, it was literally stalling with the graphics set to minimum.
Turning it off made my FPS go through the roof with everything set to max, anti-aliasing ramped up, etc.
Believe me, I was as sceptical as you were, there are posts here suggesting the same thing as you did, but for the time being, *forcing* off Vsync is vital for a lot of users. | |
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Ace42
Game Owner
NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
NWN 2
NWN 2: MotB
NWN 2: SoZ
Joined: 04 Aug 2002
From: eXistenZ |
Posted: Tuesday, 14 November 2006 11:43PM |
Quote: Posted 11/14/06 23:38 (GMT) by Chris Priestly
Sticky? Maybe in the tech support forum, but not here.
Move it then? Although you'll notice that there's dozens of posters bad-mouthing the game over this issue in here... Including the Xfire (technical) sticky up above (yah, I'm citing precedent  ). AND there's game play issues too, such as henchman AI and UI tweaking. A sticky would cut down on the masses of off-topic techie posts in here. | |
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Voqar
Game Owner
 NWN 2
Joined: 03 Mar 2003 |
Posted: Tuesday, 14 November 2006 11:55PM | |
This is more of a tech support thread than a general thread and this general forum has too many stickies as it is. | |
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Ace42
Game Owner
NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
NWN 2
NWN 2: MotB
NWN 2: SoZ
Joined: 04 Aug 2002
From: eXistenZ |
Posted: Tuesday, 14 November 2006 11:57PM |
Quote: Posted 11/14/06 23:55 (GMT) by Voqar
This is more of a tech support thread than a general thread and this general forum has too many stickies as it is.
Which means I'll have to type it out each time, in each new thread, because here's where people are bringing these issues up. A lot. Because they can't find the information concisely in a single-thread.
But yes, there are way too many stickies. It needs a clean-up. | |
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Cric
Joined: 22 Jun 2002 |
Posted: Wednesday, 15 November 2006 01:36AM |
nice tips, thank you.
Strangely enough, forcing AA in the drivers did little effect in NWN2 for me( i.e. not working), with an exception of the appearance of some ugly white dots on the character edges.Edited By Cric on 11/15/06 01:40 | |
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Kaftan Barlast
Game Owner
 NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
SW: KotOR PC
Jade Empire:SE
NWN 2
Mass Effect
Joined: 27 Jul 2004
From: sweden |
Posted: Wednesday, 15 November 2006 01:42AM |
Forcing FSAA on my 7900GTX worked now after disabling the ATI option thingie in the nwn.ini(and also bloom effects and character lights although I dont know if that had any effect)
still it doesnt do it very well, 8x sample FSAA shoud make things smooth as buttah, but it looks more like 2x | |
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Ace42
Game Owner
NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
NWN 2
NWN 2: MotB
NWN 2: SoZ
Joined: 04 Aug 2002
From: eXistenZ |
Posted: Wednesday, 15 November 2006 05:47AM |
Quote: Posted 11/15/06 01:42 (GMT) by Kaftan Barlast
Forcing FSAA on my 7900GTX worked now
(...)
still it doesnt do it very well, 8x sample FSAA shoud make things smooth as buttah, but it looks more like 2x
Looks top notch on my 7950 GX/2, Did you double check that the profile you were altering pointed to nwn2main.exe and not the default (and ineffective) nwn2.exe ? | |
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Visceral
Game Owner
 NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN 2
NWN 2: MotB
NWN 2: SoZ
Joined: 17 May 2002
From: Austin, TEXAS |
Posted: Wednesday, 15 November 2006 05:55AM |
I've been keeping a running list of this stuff here:
https://rwillmore.wordpress.com/
Regarding AA. I was under the impression that it does not work, at all, not matter what settings you set or turn off. I'd be interested in seeing some screen shots showing the game with AA "off" and "on" on your machine, just to see what kind of difference we are talking about here.
Also, about vsynch. I agree that in almost 90% of the time this will help, however, if you have a newer card with 512 megs of video ram, turning on vsynch and activating triple buffering in directx can actually give you a smoother ride with slightly higher fps. | |
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Cironir
Game Owner
 NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
SW: KotOR PC
Jade Empire:SE
NWN 2
Joined: 27 Aug 2002
From: Germany |
Posted: Wednesday, 15 November 2006 06:05AM |
Quote: Posted 11/14/06 23:29 (GMT) by Ace42
ATI drivers must have a similar option to force of Vsyncing
How to turn off Vsync for ATI card users: Click Here | |
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Ace42
Game Owner
NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
NWN 2
NWN 2: MotB
NWN 2: SoZ
Joined: 04 Aug 2002
From: eXistenZ |
Posted: Wednesday, 15 November 2006 06:21AM |
Quote: I'd be interested in seeing some screen shots showing the game with AA "off" and "on" on your machine, just to see what kind of difference we are talking about here.
Well, I tried grabbing some, but because they are saved as jpegs, the difference between the two screen shots is really understated. I could alt-printscreen some bitmaps, but I suspect they'd be massive. They also don't show the texture-anti-aliasing off very well. I'm too lazy to setup a photobucket account, so PM me with e-mail addy if you want me to send them, such as they are.
Incidently: I do have mine set to 8xS antialiasing. I'm not sure, but I think that might be Nvidia's SLI based anti-aliasing which works by offsetting dual cards/cores frames. Thus it is exclusively hardware based, and won't be effected by lack of software support. Just a theory.
Quote: I agree that in almost 90% of the time this will help, however, if you have a newer card with 512 megs of video ram, turning on vsynch and activating triple buffering in directx can actually give you a smoother ride with slightly higher fps.
On any other game, I'd agree with you. But not with NWN2. As I have said repeatedly, there is a major issue with the vsynching here. A "newer" card would probably be dual-core or SLI (or crossfire), and those seem to be the ones suffering from major problems. In the SLI thread someone ('dog I think) gave the best explanation I can come up with, saying that there are vsyncing issues with dual core/cards. While this doesn't explain why I don't notice a performance hit on other D3D games with vsync and tripple buffering on, it does demonstrate how adding a secondary card, which needs to have its frame update pre-synched with the primary card, can complicate buffering as well as synching with the monitor's refresh rate.
While it could be the case that single core/card GPU sets support vsynching and triple buffering fine, they won't be needing to read this thread anyway, so they can comfortably be ignored. My belief is that all the people going "my PC's 2 years old, and works fine out of the box!" are people with older single-card / single-core systems, and as such are vsyncing / triple buffering fine.
<deep breath>
If anyone wants to do some solid testing on different rigs, they can confirm or deny these opinings. | |
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Zesen
Joined: 15 Nov 2006 |
Posted: Wednesday, 15 November 2006 01:49PM |
Woah.. Sticky this!
Gotta make some changes when i get home, I had those serious lag spikes(Even tho my computer have all the recomended and alittle higher), and i'm running on low.
Hopefully it wont lag after i've done some of those fixes, really neat!  | |
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Lehti
Game Owner
 NWN
NWN: SoU
NWN: HotU
SW: KotOR PC
NWN 2
Joined: 15 Jan 2004 |
Posted: Wednesday, 15 November 2006 01:53PM |
I seem to be having a bizarre issue with forcing vsync off with an XFX NVidia 7800GT, driver version 93.71 .
If I force vsync off in the Nvidia control panel, the game seems to run somewhat smoother than normal. However, this only happens for a few seconds. After that, there is a bizarre "flicker" in the geometry, where some polygons or areas of the screen flash black. No, it's definitely not tearing. After the flicker, the FPS decreases by about 10. If I let the game run, the FPS constantly starts decreasing after every flicker.
Now, if I alt+tab out of NWN2 after a few flickers when the FPS is about 15 or so and then alt+tab back, the game runs smoothly again. After this, the flickers shortly return again and the FPS starts decreasing.
If I have vsync set to "let the application decide", the FPS seems to be capped at about 30, which would suggest that vsync is in fact on (19" TFT, 60Hz refresh rate), despite what it says in my nwn.ini file. Not a problem as such, as 30 FPS is more than enough to play the game, but the problem is that the next step is at 20 FPS, which on the other hand is a bit low.
Anyone else experiencing the same thing, and do you have any suggestions? | |
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