I am still looking
Bought the expensive server to run them all on one pc, and while it works, it does not run as nicely as I would like it too.

Currently aiming for a $400 i3 6100T mini PC. something with Vesa Mount. I should be able to run 2 or 3 cockpits off of each one, but for now trying one each. Just trying to find a better price.

http://psref.lenovo.com/Detail/ThinkCentre_M700_Tiny?M=10HY0021US

Easiest Sound to recreate is an electric car, turn everything off, but gearwine, tire, and wind.

I am aware of the server components issue vs gaming, but the system I have is just as fast as some older gaming machines, as far as single core goes. Dual 16 Core 6386 SE, typically runs at about 3.5ghz

I have commercial, last year and this year, have not actually used it to make cash yet though. The forum does not have a Commercial Licensed status, or it would be there.

I just need to know WHY the primary GPU runs at 100%, and the secondary runs at 50%. I do not want to run into the same problem if I build a different PC.


In the last test, I ran a few monitors on the 2nd GPU only, and it was a light load on the 2nd GPU, but it was also loading the primary.

I am currently assuming it is just the way LFS or Windows handles the full screen windowed mode applications.


Currently thinking about using separate i3-6100T mini PC on each cockpit.

Last edited by SimulatorRental.com, Sat, 12 Nov 2016 17:08.

I have two GPU cards, both RX480. Each limited to 6 DisplayPort monitors (with use of MST)

I have my computer setup to run multiplayer LFS on the one machine.
And the intent was to run 6 monitors off of each graphics card, and even add in a 3rd graphics card to get a total of 18 players. However, the graphics cards are posing a problem.

Obviously I cannot crossfire the video cards, as that would disable the video ports.
I cannot change the adapter settings in LFS, as the only one that works for windowed mode is the primary.

I can start up LFS in full windowed mode on any monitor plugged into the main gpu at well over 100 FPS, with a full grid of AI. If I drag the LFS window over to a monitor plugged into the secondary GPU it only runs at about 40~50 FPS. I can even open up more LFS windows on more monitors plugged into the secondary GPU and they too only run at 40~50, and 100+ on the primary.
Even in various hardware monitor programs the 2nd gpu never maxes out at 100%.


I am wondering why it is doing this, and if it is possible to make the secondary gpu run LFS at full speed. I need to know if I have to dump this single PC idea, and go with multiple Mini PC.


Is this due to something in LFS? Is LFS only optimized to use the primary video card?
I am kind of hoping this is all it is and they can fix it in the future.

Is this due to the graphics cards themselves? or the way dual graphics works?
Is there a setting I am missing?!

Is this due to some typical Windows crap? Win 10 Pro

Is this due to the fact that I am using a Server mother board with 32 Cores of Opteron Processors?
Is my server board bottlenecking video? I have 3 full 16x slots.

Last edited by SimulatorRental.com, Fri, 11 Nov 2016 21:31.

1.2ghz? check your windows power saving/performance options.

So I have been continuing to stick it out with the Opteron system.
Works great with the 4 seats/wheels I have now...
Still have yet to do an event with it though.


I have two RX480 graphics cards, each able to run 6 monitors with MST adapters.
However, all the processing is only done on the primary card, 0% load is put on the second card, even when using monitors plugged into it.

The primary graphics card is limited to running 8 players at 100fps, which is required to ditch the stuttering problem from earlier in the thread.

Is it at all possible to force LFS to run on a specific secondary graphics card?

I know about the area in the LFS options, to change what monitor/adapter the game runs on in the next reboot, however this is not enough. If you tell it to use an option other then the primary, it runs in full screen mode on that option, and if I run another LFS on a different option, it will only display the one that is currently active, with mouse input, the rest go black. Windowed mode will not work with anything but the default/primary option.

I also cannot use CrossFire, as that would disable 6 of the monitor ports, and LFS does not make use of the 2nd card this way either.



It would be great, if I could start up the game with something like:

lfs.exe /GPU=2

Then I could run half on one card and half on the other.



Because of the above issue..
I am currently thinking of running 2 to 4 separate PC's each with 5 or 6 Players each, and an additional host PC, for the server(s), and spectator screens. At least it would save me on monitor cable Length.

Scawen, while you are currently messing around with the mirrors.

Is it possible to increase the range of movement for changing the position of the center mirror? Even in real life I like to move my mirrors much higher, so they are not blocking the horizon in my line of sight. I sit taller, head usually hits roof of smaller cars. It is the worse on cloverleaf off ramps of USA highways, have to crane neck around mirror to see where I am going. I tend to move the mirrors so far up they also touch the roof line... sometime sit works some times it don't. Sometimes ill put it down by the dash.

Logitech G29 is only $240~ USD on Amazon.com Lowest Price I've seen it on there so far.

Yes I bought one to bring with me to the next event, however it will only last a few minutes. Last time, at this same event, power was out for about 45 minutes.

Still debating weather I am going to have it ALL plugged into the backup, monitors, wheels etc... or just the server to keep it ready to go when power is back.

I also have 2 Slot Car tracks I could keep up and running with it...

Well that took some time to sort out but it worked.
I now only need to start one desktop icon to get all 9 instances of LFS started up, and each player with a different color car, and each running on a different pair of processor core/threads.

Is there another script that auto runs when a player joins a MP game?
The /join in an autoexec runs before it is connected to the host.
I guess the temporary solution will be a Ctrl+? key that pulls all the connected players in via the host screen.

Is there a command to send the current LFS window to a specific monitor in full-screen-borderless mode?


This is all meant to make it faster/easier to get things up and running again if I lose power during an event or something.

There is no /MP for outside the program.

I run 9 Instances of LFS for 8 players, on the same computer, from the same LFS installation folder. (very easy to maintain with one installation) One is host, then each loads the game with 8 different player names (player 1, player 2, etc...)

I believe that file will run every time I run LFS, I do not want it to always join a local server, only when I am running the multi player setup.

Can there be separate autoexec files, like the .cfg files?
If not, I guess if I really needed to, and since I am already starting it with a .bat file anyway, I could just have the .bat Copy or Rename different versions of the autoexec around as needed right before it runs each instance of LFS... then maybe I can also use it for /color /setup for each of the different players cars.
This may not work, if each LFS loads before it gets renamed, going to have to refresh memory on the .bat syntax.


This is creating a long chain of files being run/read... just to start the program.

I also do not know what I can or cannot put in the lfs autoexec file. I assume nothing but LFS: /commands ...?

/join servername, looks for a server on the master list. My server is not on the master list, or even online.

I need LOCAL lan... infact it is even running on the same PC.

One PC, with 8 LFS racers.

I guess they need to update the /join command.
Because there are more than one /join for more than one use... and it should have the option to do this: /join LOCAL IP PORT

I use LFS with 1 host and 8 player program instances, on ONE computer to run a multiplayer game.

Is there a working /mp command for the external start up command line yet?

Trying to start them all up with a single .bat file.

For now I just have the /mp command as Ctrl F12, so it is somewhat easy, but it could be better.

Yes, I've been shopping for another PC to use...
The problem is I need to sell the one I have now to pay for the new one... and I doubt anyone wants to buy an opteron system these days.

I have been paying with affinity more... if it is setup right, it does help. The way I have it now, it looks like it will run at 100+ even with 8 players, as long as the number of AI is kept low.

What is odd, is sometimes one of the instances will run much faster, like one of my cores is really fast (or most of them are really slow?!)
But it does not always happen...

Does anyone know the best way to split up cores?
If I need 2 cores for 8 or 9 programs on a 2 Processor each with 16 cores, system?

The two processors are split up into 4 nodes, and I'm not sure if 0 and 1 are processor 1, or 0 and 2 is... I am assuming 0 and 1, is. I need to google more.

Right now I have it so each is using one "core/thread" on each processor, and that seemed to work best so far, but it really just takes the first one it is allowed to use, and mostly just uses that.


Also does anyone know how to get the multiplayer delay to run even smoother?
Since these are not only local, but literally the same computer, I was hoping for less multiplayer stuttering when viewing a car generated on another instance. I tried putting the network bandwidth to ridiculously high settings, and maxed out the smoothness to 12 (even though it says 6 is max), but it is still noticeable.... I will put up with it if I have to, but if I can nullify it, that would be much better.

Last edited by SimulatorRental.com, Sun, 31 Jul 2016 19:30.

Yes, hardware is one of my issues... I originally planed on doing virtual machines, so I built a server with a pair of the fastest Opteron processors. (I started off with FirePro cards as well, but now I have an RX 480 which is game speed)

I post more about this in the other thread, but... I can run 8 instances IN MULTIPLAYER with each running 1 AI, plus a few extra AI on a host instances. You running what looks like 8 instances each with 24 AI (192 AI), and still getting 80-100FPS just makes me regret the use of server processors even more. Thinking of selling it, and buying something else... I may go for a maxed out i7, since zen is not out yet.

After some tinkering I am able to get all 8(~9) running in the 80-120FPS range, but only with a couple AI on the host instance in addition to the 8 players. And while this tinkering has reduced the effect of the focus boost, it is still there. I mostly changed the affinity and priority, using the command line at start up. High, and 2 Cores. This worked better, since manually changing it in task manager did not fix it entirely. The stuttering has also been reduced... it is almost nill now, although it shows up again at random.

The issue is more of the boost in FPS, then a drop in FPS, but while one is boosted the others drop a few FPS. It just seems like they should ALL be able to run at the boosted level, which is about 20-30FPS faster.

I have been reading some of it, that sleep is similar, but comes in play during the game, not when inactive...

I decided to try playing with Affinity again, only this time I made desktop short cuts so I did not have to manually change each one.

I also added /HIGH, apparently this actually allowed LFS To run high priority, doing it manually did not appear to change anything.

I can now run about 4 to 6 instances of LFS at 100 to 150 FPS, with the occasional burst as high as 300fps. The GPU is not yet maxed at this point, however as I add more instances, the GPU starts to peg at 100%, and the small stutteryness returns. However I can now lock them at 90FPS and still get 80-90 out of up to 8 Instances. So it is an improvement.

The boost to the focused window is not as obvious anymore, but it is still there.

Hopefully slapping a second RX 480 in the system will help...

I just fear that in non-crossfire mode, it will only use one card, and try to duplicate the signal on the other display ports.
Or in CrossFire mode, I will not be able to use the 2nd cards display ports at all.
Then there is the fact that LFS does not really use CrossFire.

Some games have a simple variable for when the program is not running with focus. It may be a sleep delay, that can be zeroed, or a max frame rate that could be increased. Or so I am learning via google...

Most of the times I saw answers for this, it was due to people wanting to stream their game online, and it was slowing down when not in focus, most of the games had an accessible variable in a config file that fixed it.

My next event only hired me for 4 cockpits, so, for that event I can run all 4 at 60FPS the way I have things setup now.
However, when I finally get the trailer and at least 8 cockpits setup inside it, I will need to disable the off-focus throttling.

They are NOT minimized.
Just saying that is why LFS has code that slows it down... if you minimize LFS to go answer an email, there is no need for it to run full speed. But it doesn't just do it when it is minimized, it does it when it loses focus.

But in my case I need the windows that are not in focus to keep running the best they can, because of the multi-headed game setup.



They are running in borderless-full-screen-window-mode.
Or, at least tiled across one monitor if I don't have all my monitors turned on.

Windows only allows ONE window to have focus. So to run them equally I have to click the desktop, to make all 8 of them lose focus, or click on a 9th window running as server.

A few weeks ago, I've taken the time to split LFS between threads, I tried one core each, two each, and three each... there was no noticeable difference. So I've not bothered to waste time doing that.. since I have to do it each time I start it up... individually for each instance, it is too much of a pain.

Above when I said my CPU are not parked was because I stopped seeing the "parked" label on the CPU tags. When I first installed win 10 they were almost all parked, after I made setting changes none of them are. Setting it to 100% is suppose to also, disable parking, and it appears to have done that.

Right now this current issue is more due to the CPU and LFS, and less due to the GPU.

I am 99% convinced the stuttering, is caused by how much difference there is between the fastest LFS window, and the slowest, which is in turn caused by LFS slowing down to save CPU resources when minimized, and giving a boost to the one that has Focus. All programs do it... I just need a way to disable it in LFS, but that will require Scawen to make some pretty big code changes.

If I lock them all at a framerate that is slow enough that they all STAY there and don't budge, the stuttering is almost gone.

So if I had more GPU, I could lock them at a higher FPS, but right now the most I can get with out it budging is 50, which is still better then the 30FPS I could get from the Fire Pro.

As far as I know, my CPU's are not parking right now.
Ever since I set the performance to 100%.

I also noticed for the first time my CPU are running past the max 2.8ghz, and are hitting 3.2ghz. I only noticed this recently since I installed the new graphics card, not sure if that is why though. But in the past I tried to get it to do it, but never figured it out.
Would be stupid if that is how AMD squeezes more frame rates out of their graphics cards, boost the cpu! lol


If like before, I lock all the frame rates on all 8 instances of LFS, it runs a bit smoother, but this time I can lock them at 50fps, instead of 30, and use at least 4x alias, instead of 2x, without it ever dropping below 50.

8 Instances of LFS only uses about 20% of CPU, so if it did not slow down when losing focus there is plenty more CPU to use.

SCAWEN,

In relation to my using One PC to run multiple instances of LFS, for multiplayer gaming. I have an issue with frame rates being too low on the separate monitors, because only one can have focus.

I have been googling for frame rate drops when window loses focus...

Almost every reply/answer/solution to whatever game or program, is related to a setting in the game itself. Some games have separate frame rate cap variables for when the window does not have focus, or is sleeping, to save power/resources.

Scawen, is there a variable for the non-focused sleep frame rate in LFS?
(Asked this in the other thread about this as well)

Been googling for frame rate drops when window loses focus...

Almost every reply/answer/solution to whatever game or program, is related to a setting in the game itself. Some games have separate frame rate cap variables for when the window does not have focus, or is sleeping, to save power/resources.

Scawen, is there a variable for the non-focused sleep frame rate in LFS?

Steam VR test with RX 480 REF Card