Screen resolution effects on RW performance

[railbard]

I am currently reloading Railworks via Steam after upgrading from Win Vista 32bit to Win7-64bit. That gives me full access to the 4gb of RAM I had installed and the 1gb on my video card and has improved my system performance substantially.

So now I'm wondering how much of a Railworks performance hit I would take if I quit using the 1028 x 7xx screen resolution I have been using (when I was limited the 3.25gb RAM) and went to my monitor's maximum of 1600 x 900? Or somewhere in between?

Thanks for your thoughts.

[Cardinal51]

I upgraded my Mainboard RAM too (from 2 x 1 GB to 2 x 2 GB). But Win7-32 only sees / uses about 3 GB on my system.

Nevertheless I do notice a nice performance increase.

I also upgraded my videocard. Affter that just sticked with the native resolution of 1600 x 1085 (also pick that native resolution in the pre-game screen). I only reduce the resolution , and disable full screen , when I use fraps.

[railbard]

Yes, 32-bit can only access 3.25gb of all RAM on system (including on the video card), so I was wasting 1.75gb!

When I stopped at Staples yesterday to pick up a couple of thinks (more ink for my printer, among others) they were having a day of "one-hour" sales and the featured item 20 minutes after I got there was Windows 7 upgrade for 89.99. You know i snagged that puppy!

Once I had 64 installed, I saw a marked increase in system performance though it has slowed a tiny bit as I have reinstalled my software. I have about 10 more items to do, but wanted to get Steam and Railworks redone since I knew it was going to be a long process since I have all DLC except for 11 pieces. Of course I still have a boatload of 3rd party payware and freeware needing to be reloaded as well but I do believe I shall be more discriminating in my install this time.

[Machinist]

I am currently reloading Railworks via Steam after upgrading from Win Vista 32bit to Win7-64bit. That gives me full access to the 4gb of RAM I had installed and the 1gb on my video card and has improved my system performance substantially.

So now I'm wondering how much of a Railworks performance hit I would take if I quit using the 1028 x 7xx screen resolution I have been using (when I was limited the 3.25gb RAM) and went to my monitor's maximum of 1600 x 900? Or somewhere in between?

Thanks for your thoughts.

People says that the best resolution (for performance purposes) is the native, but I always play the game in my desktop which has a 1280x1024 monitor, setting the game's screen resolution to 1280x720 (16:9 format). Commom (desktop) monitor usually has more opaque screen therefore is usually better than laptop screens which are not designed for playing games.

Some more hints to you set your screen resolution whatever you want on here:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=5246

Cheers,
Doc.

[arizonachris]

Bard, make sure you get all your Win 7 updates, along with current Win 7 drivers for the video card and even the motherboard. Win 7 should grab the board drivers for you.

I have a lot of Win 7 tips and tricks and a few links on my website: http://www.abithelp.com/open-discussion/topic878.html Or just ask questions here in the Geek section.

It's always best to run you screen at it's native resolution. You can try higher, but I just go with what Windows thinks is right, in my case it's 1920x1080. Print is kinda small but what an amazing picture.

[railbard]

arizonachris,

1600x900 is the native, and I must say it looks spectacular now, I assume some due to all RAM being available and some more to Win7-64. Frame rates continue to be good, though I haven't tried any of the "RAM eaters" yet (i.e. WCML). All settings are medium except for the density setting at 10 and I like a good long view so view distance is at high. Oh yes, I'm still wary of shadows so I still have them off and Low Quality Shadows checked.

The tiny print in any resolution is one of the reasons i wish RSC could give us the ability to change that, at least in the messages that tell us we can't run this scenario because we're missing rolling stock. :)

I downloaded all the 64-bit stuff and upgrades that I could access before I installed 7-64. Glad I bought that 2TB external now! It took me a while, even using EasyTransfer, to get everything back in and running but I'm done now except for going through my freeware stuff to select what i want to reinstall in RW.

[Machinist]

Oh yes, I'm still wary of shadows so I still have them off and Low Quality Shadows checked.

Even in my crawling rig I let Shadows Quality on High Detail. What really impacts fps is the Shader Quality, setting it on Low gives me a surprising smoothness even in the dark fps zone (under 14). Give a try

If I got it right, Shadows Quality "off" gives many weird lighting effects, especially when using headlights and "zoomming out" in external views.