Fallout 4 PC Performance Thread

I'm experiencing performance issues on my setup in complex areas and buildings as for instance big cities and buildings (Wilson's Atomatoys Corporate HQ). Framerate drops down from 60 to the 50's and 40's. And I'm playing on an 47" TV screen without Gsync, which makes it even more tedious.

Current setup:
Intel Xeon E3-1245 V2 @3.40 GHz (up to 3.80 GHz with turbo boost)
gtx 780 (OC version with boost up to 1006 MHz)
8 GB Memory and an SSD

As for the settings, I'm running the game at 1080p with the Ultra presets. But switching to the High presets doesn't help (maybe 2-3fps) despite the heavy downgrade in the view distance settings.

Got the video card just recently and this game's my first 'demanding' pc game, so I don't have much experience in tweaking graphical settings.

Is my PC just not powerful enough or is this a general issue due to insufficient optimization? I'd be grateful for some advice. Maybe you guys can recommend me some settings I can lower so I can squeeze out those fps I need to reach 60 without sacrificing image quality more than necessary.

TurboLibre said:
Why can't I get a PS4 controller to work on this game? When I hard wire it in, it randomly disconnects which has caused my game to crash quite a few times. And even when it "works" the buttons often don't work the way they're supposed to (L3/R3 don't work, X causes my favorites menu to open).

And when I use DS4Windows the disconnections and button confusion stop, but none of my menu buttons work so I can't pause the game or enter any settlement/view options. Anybody know what I'm doing wrong here?
Click to expand...

Fallout 4 has native support for DS4 controllers, but it's buggy as hell, making it completely useless. You must emulate your DS4 as an Xbox controller in exclusive mode by enabling "Hide DS4 Controller" in the Settings of DS4Windows. If it's not enabled, your game will read every input of your controller twice - once the native (and messed up) DS4 and once your emulated Xbox controller.
 
Just started playing this. Decided to turn off godrays and put shadow distance to medium right at the start so I don't get attached to them. Been running at a smooth 60 so far, but I'm only in Concord.
 
daninthemix said:
Just started playing this. Decided to turn off godrays and put shadow distance to medium right at the start so I don't get attached to them. Been running at a smooth 60 so far, but I'm only in Concord.
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Yeah just wait until you get to diamond city and surrounding areas. Mine went from a decent stable 60fps to as low as 19fps. The built up city areas hit hard.
 
blly155 said:
Yeah just wait until you get to diamond city and surrounding areas. Mine went from a decent stable 60fps to as low as 19fps. The built up city areas hit hard.
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20fps? I've already been everywhere in the city but I never experienced 20fps (Xeon 1230/GTX770). Godrays off, Shadow Distance medium. Everything else is on High/Ultra. Sure it drops to 40-50fps but not 20fps (and I have around 15 mods installed).
 
Bl@de said:
20fps? I've already been everywhere in the city but I never experienced 20fps (Xeon 1230/GTX770). Godrays off, Shadow Distance medium. Everything else is on High/Ultra. Sure it drops to 40-50fps but not 20fps (and I have around 15 mods installed).
Click to expand...

What resolution are you playing at?


At 4K I would run at 40-50 most of the time, but dipped into the 20's too frequently for me to play at unfortunately.


So I ended up running at 1440p. IQ is a lot worse, but I get 50-60 at most points, with dips into the 30's when the game decides its going to eat shit for a moment.
 
BigTnaples said:
What resolution are you playing at?


At 4K I would run at 40-50 most of the time, but dipped into the 20's too frequently for me to play at unfortunately.


So I ended up running at 1440p. IQ is a lot worse, but I get 50-60 at most points, with dips into the 30's when the game decides its going to eat shit for a moment.
Click to expand...

I'm playing in 1080p. Of course if all of you are playing in 4K, then my performance is not comparable^^ I always assume 1080p is still the standard for everyone :-P
 
Zack Zavage said:
Yeah, I've already turned Godrays completely off. Didn't help much. Gonna try to lower the shadow distance as well.

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Setting shadow distance to medium is a godsent. Game is running at a rocksolid 60fps now 99% of the time, even in the big cities and on the top of big towers. Hell even on the
mothership of the BoS
! Thanks again for the help!

There are some exceptions though. I've experience framedrops in the HalluciGen Inc. facility to 40 and even 30 fps, but that must be completely due to optimization issues.
 
Zack Zavage said:
Setting shadow distance to medium is a godsent. Game is running at a rocksolid 60fps now 99% of the time, even in the big cities and on the top of big towers. Hell even on the
mothership of the BoS
! Thanks again for the help!

There are some exceptions though. I've experience framedrops in the HalluciGen Inc. facility to 40 and even 30 fps, but that must be completely due to optimization issues.
Click to expand...

Ya...Shadow Distance from high to medium had the biggest impact for me as well. On High it was incredibly stuttery in the city but on medium it's a near constant 60fps.

Sucks too since it's a noticeable visual difference even when you are on slightly elevated terrain out in the wooded areas of the game.
 
madmook said:
Why is the Geforce guide thingy dead now? I just got the PC version and I need that guide. I only got a measly GTX 960.
Click to expand...

Nvidia probably knows the game engine is utterly broken and endless complaints came from having a tweak guide?

To posters having issues in cities, its like that for everyone, no matter howuch power you throw at the game. The engine is well past it's use and Bethesda trying to extend it further than its limits makes an almost broken game.

After 100 hours so far the game can look breathtaking at times with the right mods, but the performance can be downright hideous at other times when the game looks terrible. Bethesda should publicly apologize to anyone who bought this game and maybe take the time to fix the game. Though this will probably never happen. We can only hope that Elder Scrolls 6 uses a new engine.
 
Neo_Geo said:
Nvidia probably knows the game engine is utterly broken and endless complaints came from having a tweak guide?

To posters having issues in cities, its like that for everyone, no matter howuch power you throw at the game. The engine is well past it's use and Bethesda trying to extend it further than its limits makes an almost broken game.

After 100 hours so far the game can look breathtaking at times with the right mods, but the performance can be downright hideous at other times when the game looks terrible. Bethesda should publicly apologize to anyone who bought this game and maybe take the time to fix the game. Though this will probably never happen. We can only hope that Elder Scrolls 6 uses a new engine.
Click to expand...


Dude, it's not that bad. Sure, performance drops in cities, but that's kind of to be expected. I don't like Gamebryo either, but you're acting as if the game doesn't even start.

Besides, the guide was taken down just hours after it was published and I'm pretty confident Nvidia didn't get bombarded with complaints the second they published the article, as you're implying.
 
I hit 99 hours last night. I've never encountered any noticeable framerate problems while out exploring, but have had some odd dips here and there in a few select indoor environments. I've also encountered two areas where the game crashes to desktop: one that was repeatable (walking to a certain area and encountering a few raiders -- came back after fast traveling and was able to progress fine) and another that was a one-off when I engaged a few enemies. In both circumstances, said enemies were invincible to my attacks and then the game crashed after about 10 seconds of landing the first hit.

Not perfect, but nothing even close to deal breaking.
 
Älg;190688133 said:
Dude, it's not that bad. Sure, performance drops in cities, but that's kind of to be expected. I don't like Gamebryo either, but you're acting as if the game doesn't even start.

Besides, the guide was taken down just hours after it was published and I'm pretty confident Nvidia didn't get bombarded with complaints the second they published the article, as you're implying.
Click to expand...



Keyword that you bolded but weren't able to comprehend, "almost". 6 letters, not that hard, man.

You expect abysmal performance when next to nothing is going on because an engine that is over a decade old can't properly handle what a cheap company is over-stuffing into it and spoonfeeding to you? You would probably suggest moving most detail sliders to PS3 levels to get decent performance, yes?

Continue to apologize while others are able to see that Bethesda is fucking us over in what should have easily been GOTY, but our companions will continue to walk into a bench while our performance drops for no reason other than we are using an engine designed for the Xbox 360.
 
Neo_Geo said:
Keyword that you bolded but weren't able to comprehend, "almost". 6 letters, not that hard, man.

You expect abysmal performance when next to nothing is going on because an engine that is over a decade old can't properly handle what a cheap company is over-stuffing into it and spoonfeeding to you? You would probably suggest moving most detail sliders to PS3 levels to get decent performance, yes?

Continue to apologize while others are able to see that Bethesda is fucking us over in what should have easily been GOTY, but our companions will continue to walk into a bench while our performance drops for no reason other than we are using an engine designed for the Xbox 360.
Click to expand...

image.php
 
I agree with Neo_Geo. Fury X and 3930K @ 4.2Ghz can't maintain 60FPS everywhere with severe drops in cities and other places at random, and through scopes -- even in 1080p implying it's not a graphical issue but an engine issue.

And yet a game like GTAV for example with an incredible amount more going on on the CPU side, which also graphically more technically impressive, runs buttery smooth.

Älg;190688133 said:
Sure, performance drops in cities, but that's kind of to be expected.
Click to expand...

I disagree that this should be expected at the level we're talking about. It's not like the drops are from 120 fps to 112 fps here, it's from 60+ to ~35 in some cases.
 
LTTP but what is wrong with this game omg. Extended framedrops when GPU and CPU usage are fine.
3WEtK4C.png
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For reference I have an i5 4590/GTX 970/8GB DDR3 and everything is on the highest setting except god rays which are on high.
 
Garrett Hawke said:
LTTP but what is wrong with this game omg. Extended framedrops when GPU and CPU usage are fine.

For reference I have an i5 4590/GTX 970/8GB DDR3 and everything is on the highest setting except god rays which are on high.
Click to expand...

Yep game runs like shit. I remember reading that the draw calls in the city were something like doubles the majority of GTA5.

Quote from ENB guy:

GTA5 rarely have 4000 draw calls, mostly it's 2500-3000. So by this factor it's very well optimized. But it have other strange choices which degrade performance by utilizing dx11 in wrong way.
Click to expand...

Then another from that topic on his website:

And holy hell, what's with all the draw calls? Getting 23fps & 6,200 draw calls overlooking Diamond City.
Click to expand...
 
It may not be of much use, but I haven't had the frame-rate drop beneath 60fps at all - not even once - and I have been to Diamond City. Wandered around it. Went to the top on the elevator. Nothing.

I have Godrays off and Shadow Distance set to medium, but I was still expecting drops from everything that's been written here.
 
daninthemix said:
I have Godrays off and Shadow Distance set to medium, but I was still expecting drops from everything that's been written here.
Click to expand...

Amazing how setting XBox One levels of shadow distance makes the problem disappear. :p It also gives shadows the benefit of not existing at all in any setting where you can see further than several meters ahead of you. Yay!


Garrett Hawke said:
LTTP but what is wrong with this game omg. Extended framedrops when GPU and CPU usage are fine.

For reference I have an i5 4590/GTX 970/8GB DDR3 and everything is on the highest setting except god rays which are on high.
Click to expand...

The game is built on an engine that was designed for 2005 hardware, Bethesda have decided to release a new AAA game on said engine and pushed it past its breaking point.

The lack of communication and any update past the first small one is very disturbing. I seriously doubt the game can be fixed.
 
I had fantastic performance in this game during the launch period, a steady 60 FPS with the usual settings tweaks (e.g., turn down shadow distance) and a couple of INI tweaks, but the 1.2 patch they released in early December has given me sub 60 FPS in a lot of sections with identical settings. What is going on?

Geforce 770 4 GB
Formerly i7 930 @ OC 3.8 GhZ, now i7 6700k @ OC 4.5 GhZ
 
daninthemix said:
It may not be of much use, but I haven't had the frame-rate drop beneath 60fps at all - not even once - and I have been to Diamond City. Wandered around it. Went to the top on the elevator. Nothing.

I have Godrays off and Shadow Distance set to medium, but I was still expecting drops from everything that's been written here.
Click to expand...

Did you go to the top of Trinity Tower? That place made my Titan X setup cry ...
 
Neo_Geo said:
Amazing how setting XBox One levels of shadow distance makes the problem disappear. :p It also gives shadows the benefit of not existing at all in any setting where you can see further than several meters ahead of you. Yay!
Click to expand...

Yeah I get that, but I was still surprised as this thread lead me to believe that a constant 60 was impossible at any settings.

d00d3n said:
Did you go to the top of Trinity Tower? That place made my Titan X setup cry ...
Click to expand...

No, haven't been there yet. Is it near Diamond City?
 
Trace said:
Yep game runs like shit. I remember reading that the draw calls in the city were something like doubles the majority of GTA5.

Quote from ENB guy:



Then another from that topic on his website:
Click to expand...
That's pretty much solely because of the dynamic objects in Beth games versus the mostly static environment of the GTA series. You can't pre-batch objects when your world is largely interactable and with the addition of settlement building most of the objects have to be viewed as singular entities. It's not visually visible to the users, but technically the games are really long ways apart due to the gameplay requirements being a lot different. The fact that engine can actually manage that many draw calls is actually quite impressive. That said, the technical reasoning is not always to the end user, especially to the console players who can't (at least yet) enjoy the massive increase in modding compatibility and easy to use tools of the game.

It's also plays a huge part of why the game is so easily modifiable, for example compared to the Witcher 3 where a lot of the environment is batched into less draw calls and partly pre-baked occlusion culling with Umbra is also the reason why the environment is much more static and much tougher for modders to work with.
 
daninthemix said:
Yeah I get that, but I was still surprised as this thread lead me to believe that a constant 60 was impossible at any settings.



No, haven't been there yet. Is it near Diamond City?
Click to expand...

Yeah, it is close by. It is the largest skyscraper in the area, I believe.
 
New beta patch available:
Beta Update 1.3.45

New Features

New ambient occlusion setting, HBAO+
New weapon debris effects (NVIDIA cards only)
Added status menu for settlers in your settlements
Added ability to rotate an object you are holding with left/right triggers and pressing down on left thumbstick lets you switch the rotating axis
Improved "ESDF" keys remapping support while in Workshop mode

Gameplay Fixes

General memory and stability improvements
Improved performance when looking through a scope
Fixed issue where player could warp to a different location when aiming
Companions can no longer get stuck with radiation poisoning
Fixed an issue where Vault 81 residents would not dismember correctly
Big Leagues perk now displays calculated damage correctly
Fixed issue with third person camera not displaying properly after exiting certain crafting stations
Fixed an issue where subtitles would occasionally not update properly
Effects will properly be removed on companions when items are unequipped
MacReady’s Killshot perk now calculates headshot percentages properly
Fixed an issue with NPCs getting stuck in Power Armor
Fixed a rare issue with companions getting stuck in down state
Second rank of Aquaboy now calculates properly
Fixed an issue with resistance not always lowering the damage correctly when added by mods
Enabled number of characters available when renaming an item (XB1)
Fixed issue with player becoming dismembered while still alive
Robotics expert is now usable in combat
Stimpaks can now be used on Curie after
the transformation
Playing a holotape found in wilderness while switching point of view no longer causes the screen to blur or controls to be locked

Quest Fixes

Fixed an issue with "Taking Independence" where the minutemen remaining from the battle against the Mirelurk Queen would not gather in the Castle
Fixed an issue where invulnerable characters would get stuck in combat
Fixed an issue where Preston would send player to a settlement instead of a dungeon as part of a Minutemen quest
Fixed an issue where Synths could attack the Castle while the player was friends with the Institute
Fixed an issue where killing a caravan would leave a quest open
Fixed an issue where Dogmeat would stay at Fort Hagen after "Reunions" was completed
Fixed an issue where the player couldn't talk to Desdemona to complete "Underground Undercover"
Fixed an issue where the player could get stuck exiting the cryopod
Fixed an issue where the player could no longer get Preston as a companion
In "The End of the Line," fixed an issue that would prevent the player from killing the leaders of the Railroad
Fixed an issue with Minutemen quests repeating improperly
Fixed an issue where the player couldn't get back into the Railroad headquarters after being kicked out of the Brotherhood of Steel
After finishing "The Big Dig," fixed an issue where Hancock would no longer offer to be a companion or help with the "Silver Shroud" quest
Fixed an issue with obtaining the Dampening Coils from Saugus Ironworks before going to Yangtze
During "Unlikely Valentine," fixed an issue where the player could be blocked from entering Vault 114
In "Confidence Man," Bull and Gouger can now be killed
During "Taking Independence," fixed an issue that would prevent the radio transmitter from powering up
In "Human Error," fixed an issue where killing Dan would cause the quest to not complete properly
Fixed an issue with "Tactical Thinking" where leaving dialogue early with
Captain Kells to reprogram P.A.M. could cause quest to not completely properly

Workshop Fixes

Fixed a bug that would cause settler counts to appear incorrectly
Fixed an issue that could prevent the player from setting up a supply line in settlements with a high population
Improvements to snapping pieces together while in Workshop mode
Fixed an issue that caused powered items to stop functioning permanently if its power source was ever removed
Player can now build workbenches in their Diamond City house
Building wires no longer uses up copper
Fixed issue with certain settlement attacks not generating properly
Fixed an issue with settlement happiness calculations
Settlers assigned to weapons stand will now stand next to it
Diamond City house now shows provided power
Repairing items will now correctly consume resources
Fixed an issue where companion would ignore commands at workshop locations
Fixed an issue with crops appearing destroyed after saving and reloading
Click to expand...

Time to break those mods.
 
HBAO+ looks ace as usual. Very significant difference with the regular SSAO used on PC and consoles. It widens the gap even more with Fallout 4 on xbone and ps4.

The game also runs better for the most part, so the cost of HBAO+ becomes very reasonable.
 
Is that weapons particle stuff like Borderlands? Anyone test it yet? Can someone take a shot of an indoor place with AO? Does it help make objects look like they actually belong?
 
Irobot82 said:
Is that weapons particle stuff like Borderlands? Anyone test it yet? Can someone take a shot of an indoor place with AO? Does it help make objects look like they actually belong?
Click to expand...

The particles don't look anything special, certainly not in the same league as GPU Physx effects.

As for HBAO+ try for yourself, the difference is there.
 
Dictator93 said:
Is that POM decals or is that geometry holes in the ground?

Can someone get a grazing angle shot of the bullet holes in the stone like that?
Click to expand...
I'd say POM decals, though the pic isn't too good.
mXVHiCN.jpg
Click to expand...
Are these a new addition, can't remember if they were there last time I played?

Edit: There seems to be different kind of particles depending on the impact surface. Little splinters flying out of trees and so on.
 
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