I have a i5-9400F and GTX1070Ti, when I was running 16GB RAM I noticed memory usage was approaching its maximum. I run on High End settings and FPS usually fluctuates between 30-50, but dips to around 12FPS in built up areas.
As JayzTwoCents advised the best upgrade for MSFS is RAM, and given it’s the cheapest updgrade option I went for an additional 16GB.
Although usage sometimes gets up to 19GB, it’s usually between 12-15GB, and I’m not really seeing much difference.
I was wondering if there’s a reason for this, or if there’s something I could tweak to make use of the available memory and improve performance?
as you wrote it sometimes spikes to 19GB , < stuttering/freeze when you have 16GB ram
And you also don’t want 100% memory usage coz the cpu also need space to make calculations and do other stuff at the same time.( like running windows itself )
Also windows makes usage of the pagefile , so it looks like your memory is not being used to the fullest but for that you have to knock on microsofts door.
I frequently get to close to 100% of my 32 GB when flying on photogrametry areas, specially with complex airplanes (airliners and glass cockpit). Proximity to clouds also spikes the RAM. I note that my video card has 8 GB VRAM and I think this also matters, since I believe that textures must be first on RAM before being sent to the VRAM. I also started with 16 GB.
I’m not sure if I’m experiencing placebo effects or confirmation bias, but I “feel” the game stutters less upon entering these complex areas with more memory, but I never benchmarked or recorded any comparison. Also, I “feel” the scenery is much more detailed. One thing is for sure: FPS is exactly the same.
Proberbly a better CPU.
GPU next.
Make sure your RAM runs at the correct speed in bios (XMP profile)
And be sure they are installed in the correct motherboard slots to bennefit from dual-channel. (check motherboard manual)
Ram alone won’t give a huge performance boost. But it can help with stutters from stuff loading in and out of memory.
More ram is usually better, but only if they are installed correctly.
The max usage I mentioned above is from MSI Afterburner and I assume that usage includes total usage including the OS.
I tried adjusting my pagefile settings, from 4GB to 16GB on my fastest SSD, to fully automatic. No difference.
I didn’t mention I only run at 1080p, maybe that doesn’t use much system memory, but I thought resolution was mainly affected by VRAM.
Interesting about a game ‘feeling’ better. I think we’re all guilty of watching the FPS counter way too much. But I still get stutters, no change there. I thought the RAM increase would help with this but I think even people with top end specs have this issue as well.
I did think about upgrading my CPU, but does MSFS use more than 6 cores? Besides, my CPU utilisation is low, whereas my GPU frequently maxes out at 100%.
Yes, my XMP is enabled, running at 3200 and all 4 slots are used, same type in each.
Your system is a close relative to mine, or at least it was until a month or so ago.
I had an i5 9600k @ 5Ghz and an RTX 2060 non-super. I already had 32Gb RAM so my next logical upgrade path was CPU (I also run the game at 1080p and was seeing frequent CPU bottlenecks on core #6). I maxed out what Intel’s 9th gen had to offer and bought a cheap i9 9900kf.
Turns out going from 6 cores to 8 (and doubling the threads) doesn’t do much either, except for making the game a bit smoother with less stutters. I’m still mostly CPU limited, now on “core” #16 and only in a few instances I see my GPU being close to 100% utilization.
In short, don’t go crazy on the upgrades yet. This sim is very poorly optimized right now and there are posts here from people with crazy high-end systems getting 20 fps at most. Just sit tight, wait maybe a few more months and perhaps around the update to Dx12 you will get a better idea of what exactly you should replace next. For now just come to peace with the fact that FS2020 won’t efficiently use your available resources.
I am on 1440p and 32Gb and occasionally (but rarely) see RAM usage up around 28 to 30 GB.
Large amounts of system RAM seem to be mainly useful when you are running higher resolutions or VR and, even then, the extra RAM has no effect on FPS it is just done to reduce stutters. Particularly those annoying micro stutters and the occasional ones where the game almost stops for like half a second or so. Presumably if you run out of VRAM the game caches some of the texture ? No idea ?
At 1440p it makes some difference though not major, no idea about 1080p, 16GB may or may not be enough.
Not sure why you are running High End settings when you are getting only 12 FPS and memory is filling up. If you want more FPS, you need to cut back the graphics starting with the LOD settings. You should consider reducing your graphics settings wether or not RAM is upgraded. Adding RAM just extends time flying until RAM fills up.
Thanks, though this came a bit late as I already ordered an i9-9900KF as well! Figured I may as well upgrade while these are still available new. Like you I also saw that my 6th core is being maxed out and although MSFS doesn’t use all cores fully the single core speed is a lot faster. Do you still see your one core being maxed out?
I still have no idea what causes the stutter, data, CPU, RAM, VRAM, as high end systems suffer too. I haven’t seen any definitive answer to this. Maybe it’s just down to the bad code. Definitely not RAM as I see no difference after upgrading to 32.
@PacificSet90456 I rarely go down to 12FPS in places like NY close to the ground. Didn’t think it would be worth reducing my quality setting for a few seconds of slowness.
In regards to RAM extending flying time, I thought RAM is constantly swapping out, so would only store what it needs now?
Yeah, it’s now core/thread #16 (last one, same as before). The overall experience will be a little bit smoother with the i9, but it’s not a night-day change (average fps stayed basically the same). I bit the bullet with the i9 because I also do photo editing and like you, I wanted one new while they were still around and relatively cheap.
Wait until Asobo addresses the performance issues before throwing more money at your PC. If you have other games and they all run fine, it’s clearly not something that you can fix in FS2020 with a BIOS setting.
Just wondering on your 9600k and 9900kf when running the sim, does the harder hit core runs at higher clockspeed compared to other cores?
Currenly on my Ryzen 2700X, all core max out their clockspeed when the sim is running, no matter whether it has less than 10% utilization. Thus I can’t take advantage of the one/two core boost.
Same. I overclocked the kf to 5 Ghz on all cores so I sort of removed the single core boost feature, but I did test it before overclocking it and 8 cores were running at the same max non-boosted speed. I am not very knowledgeable on CPU turbo-boosting, but it’s likely that FS2020 reports itself to the system as a multi-core program. Higher single core speeds are probably achieved for simpler programs that don’t access more than one core.
You can do the same thing I did and overclock your Ryzen. My 9900 couldn’t hit 5Ghz not even in a single core.
Windows starts swapping out ram at about 70% utilization. It does everything it can to prevent memory exhaustion. If you look at the MSFS recommendation for memory size configuration they go from 8 GB to 32 GB depending on the amount out graphics processing is being done.
For most programs, memory swapping is not an issue. For MSFS, performance drops dramatically when swapping starts because Windows is moving parts of real memory to slower virtual page file. To prevent swapping, reduce the memory needed by MSFS by selectively lowering graphics settings. Some users choose to avoid swapping by eliminating the virtual page file but there are other problems when memory is exhausted.