[H] Battlefield 4 Windows 7 vs 8.1

[stahlhart]

Beat a dead horse over Windows 7 versus Windows 8 and start menus in Operating Systems, not here.
-- stahlhart

 

[Childs]

I saw I had a spare 840, and since I have the week off I decided to try Windows 8.1. I actually ran into quite a few issues, most likely because I cloned my Win 7 volume, upgraded to 8, then 8.1. In any event, there does seem to be an improvement. On my config using my settings, I'm seeing around 10% or more at times. I run a combo of high and med settings because I'm trying to always stay above 120fps. Looking at the graph, it appears more stable. These are different maps and some settings were different, so its not the same conditions, but these examples of the graphs are typical of what I was seeing with each OS:

Windows 7 cores parked:

Windows 7 cores unparked:

Windows 8.1:

The important thing is the graph. Its relatively smooth on Windows 8.1, whereas on Windows 7 its fairly jagged. While unparking the cores on Windows 7 made the game playable (graph was typically 3-4x as jagged), it does seem better on Windows 8.1. I'm still evaluating it and have lots of clips saved with numbers from Windows 7, but it does seem better. I'm not sure specifically if its Windows 8.1, as this seems like too big of a jump compared to what most people saw, so maybe NV's SLI drivers are better on 8.1. Typically I am in the 120-160 fps range now, where as before it was more like 80-120. I changed a lot of things since the launch, so it might be some combo of settings and OS. Since I still have the Win 7 install I may go back and do a more thorough analysis.

 

[24601]

snip

Have you tried with speedstep off and HT off in Windows 7 yet?

 

[Childs]

Have you tried with speedstep off and HT off in Windows 7 yet?

Not speed step, but I did turn off HT before I started unparking the cores. There was no difference with HT off. There might have been a slight difference, but at that point I was only concerned with the game feeling playable or unplayable. At the time I thought BF4 just had a more resource intensive engine, but the performance issues seem more related to the user environment.

 

[24601]

Not speed step, but I did turn off HT before I started unparking the cores. There was no difference with HT off. There might have been a slight difference, but at that point I was only concerned with the game feeling playable or unplayable. At the time I thought BF4 just had a more resource intensive engine, but the performance issues seem more related to the user environment.

What I'm guessing is happening is that because Nvidia's driver can load more than 1 core [likely because of Driver Command Lists](compared to AMD/ATi's driver that can only load 1 core) paired with the BF4 itself using 4 cores you get to a problem with a CPU that is 4 cored.

Usually the way to fix this is to lower the amount of cores the game uses itself by 1. (Don't try to do this yourself in task manager/process explorer, you have to actually change the game as it uses different threading models for it's different target CPUs that is set outside of user reach)

Core parking, Speed Step, and Hyperthreading muddle this issue alot since they all play their little parallel tricks which wreck havok on serial workloads like games.

This is the same huge problem that was happening during the very start of the BF4 beta as the game seemed to be using 1 core too many in their configurations corresponding to the cpus the game was running on.

As the game is a staunchly AMD/ATi title, I don't know if there is much you can do as an end user when using Nvidia drivers other than to get yourself a 5 core CPU without lower IPC or clock speeds (4930k being your only real choice).

One of the things you can do is to use the config I listed earlier in this thread so that the CPU doesn't overload itself preparing future asynchronous frames so that the CPU isn't doing potentially redundant work as the CPU cores are already thrashed by the program.

Here is a link for some of the topic I discusses in this post:
http://pcrepairaugustaga.com/battlefield-4-beta-pc-console-commands/

 

[moonbogg]

@ Childs

Welcome to the dark side. You're here to stay now. With windows 7, my main concern was the same as yours: I need to get BF4 playable. Windows 8.1 made it run like an old game and I find the difference pretty hilarious actually. Higher FPS, but the most important thing of all, no skips or stutters (usually). Its much better in any case and I'm not usually distracted by performance anymore. I don't even use FRAPS anymore because I'm over it.

 

[Childs]

@ Childs

Welcome to the dark side. You're here to stay now. With windows 7, my main concern was the same as yours: I need to get BF4 playable. Windows 8.1 made it run like an old game and I find the difference pretty hilarious actually. Higher FPS, but the most important thing of all, no skips or stutters (usually). Its much better in any case and I'm not usually distracted by performance anymore. I don't even use FRAPS anymore because I'm over it.

Yeah, the difference is fairly dramatic, which makes me question it even more! We have similar systems, so maybe the game is anti Intel + Nvidia.

 

[Spidre]

I'm thinking of switching to 8.1 just for bf4, but the cheapest I can find it is $98.99 (tigerdirect)

 

[Childs]

I'm thinking of switching to 8.1 just for bf4, but the cheapest I can find it is $98.99 (tigerdirect)

If I didn't previously buy two copies when they were $40, I wouldnt have even considered it. But after trying it, it might be worth it depending on how your game running.

 

[Teizo]

Disabling core parking also helps i5 cpus. None of my i5 2500k's cores were parked while playing BF4, but the game was stuttering badly until I disabled parking. I didn't realize how bad it was until I did. Butter smooth afterwards.

Thanks. If I run in to problems, I'll be sure to download that app and see if it helps me as well.

 

[2is]

Yeah, the difference is fairly dramatic, which makes me question it even more! We have similar systems, so maybe the game is anti Intel + Nvidia.

My improvement was even more drastic than yours, but I was playing it before any patches were released during the beta when I was under windows 7. I'm also running SLI and my GPU utilization is far better under 8

 

[omeds]

I have both win7 64 and win8.1 64 installed and BF4 runs noticeably smoother with SLI and 4770k under 8.1. Have not really noticed much performance difference, though.

 

[nenforcer]

I'm thinking of switching to 8.1 just for bf4, but the cheapest I can find it is $98.99 (tigerdirect)

Look for a copy of Windows 8 Pro on FeeBay for around $70 and then you can just do the free update to 8.1.

 

[Teizo]

Just updating that with my set up as is in my signature with my 760 SLI running at 1267/7200 I am getting anywhere from 75-150fps so far in Windows 7 with driver 331.82. I am using Ultra Settings with 4XMSAA post processing AA High @ 1080p. This is in the Single Player in the Shanghai level.

My max gpu RAM usage is 1.9GB, and system RAM is 4.5GB.

Game is running fast and smooth for the most part. Imagine with further driver updates and game patches it will get better.

2GB of VRAM appears to be enough @ 1080p, but any higher resolution I would likely run into problems.

 

[rancherlee]

On my "ancient" Phenom X6 system there is a HUGE difference between 7 and 8.1. Using Default "Ultra" 1080P setting I was only pulling 40-50fps with the CPU holding my 7950 (1100/1600) back and suffering quite a few FPS drops into the high 20's. With Windows 8.1 I'm now seeing 60+ FPS and the 7950 is almost always at 95-100% usage! lowest I've seen is high 30's when the building falls on Shanghai otherwise its smooth to me. Windows 8.1 is, at Minimum, a 20% gain over 7 for me.......... more like 35-40% on the minimum FPS. cost me 40$ for Win 8 Pro upgrade, best 40$ I've spent in a long time an after a week of using it I actually find myself liking the interface.