Low FPS in unmodded Fallout 4

[Sarcasm]

Hi, I decided it was time to play Fallout 4 for the first time, however I am shocked to see the game is completely unplayable due to low FPS. This is despite the fact that the game auto-assigns me max ultra settings and my computer is far in excess of what is necessary to run Fallout 4. I have mod organizer installed so there are no mods in my Data folder, and running the game through the normal executable yields <30 fps outdoors with no graphics mod at all.

 

I haven't played FO4 before so I don't want to spoil the world. I tested FPS outdoors with "coc ctest" and took the door to Charlestown. That area gives ~25 fps. Ctest, an indoor cell with nothing but a few doors, gives a measely 48 fps when it should be no less than 60. The skybox in qasmoke is messed up, and I get awful ~30 or <30 fps there. Examples of the messed up skybox: One Two

 

There were a number of tips to fix fps by reducing shadow quality and whatnot, but they made no difference at all. I have read that shadows greatly affect performance, but changing shadow quality from ultra to low made no difference in fps, which should not make sense. In 15 years of Bethesda games, I've never encountered this. It's like Fallout is rejecting my computer.

 

My computer is a few years old, but so is Fallout 4 and it should be able to run this game no problem at 60 fps. I have:

 

Windows 10 64 bit

i7 5820K

Geforce GTX 980Ti 6GB RAM

16GB RAM

1920x1080

 

I'd very much like to play some Fallout 4 to see what I've missed, but this makes it impossible. I hope someone can help.

 

edit: Also, why is my game FPS capped at 48fps when my monitor is 144hz and I have my refresh rate set to 144?

[jones177]

Hi

 

When the game came out I used a GTX 980 ti & played at 4k resolution. My frame rate was 60fps 90% of the time.

Now after the patches, spector patches & DLCs it takes a GTX 1080 ti to do the same thing.

 

Fallout 4 does not like anything but 1080, 1440 resolution 60hz monitors. I have to jump through hoops to get it to run on my 4k & wide screen monitors.

To be safe set your refresh rate in the Nvidia control panel to 60 or 75hz. Make sure vsync is off in the games inis.

 

Some counters false report in Fallout 4 & Skyrim SE. Use Fallout 4 Performance Monitor to test. Also use Fallout 4 Performance Monitor to check your CPU usage. A 6 core should have about 17% CPU usage. Using more will drop your frame rate.

 

After a few levels with settlement building the game produces lots of CPU heat. I got temps up to 95c on an intel tower cooler with my i7 6700k. I now use a Noctua NH-D15. I need it only for this game.

 

You don't need to mod this game to run into trouble. As you settlement build you add more content to the game. At some point it will become unplayable.

 

Later

[Sarcasm]

Hello, I fixed this issue with an ini edit. iPresentInterval=1 was the traitor. I had read in a few places to set this to 0 in FalloutPrefs.ini but none mentioned that it is also in Fallout.ini, and whichever one is not set to 0 will reset to other back to 1. After setting both to 0 I went from ~25 fps in Qasmoke to over 300 fps. ~25-30 fps in ctest to 350fps. ~25 fps in Charlestown to 90fps. Now I actually need an fps limiter because my character runs faster for each frame over 60, and indoors with 300fps I am the Flash.

 

I haven't run into any of those things you've mentioned yet, and I hope not to. I'm just flabbergasted as to why there is an ini setting that when turned on completely destroys the game and makes it unplayable, and this setting is on by default. Gigantic smh @ Bethesda, how do they even get their games to release state anymore?

 

How does the refresh rate affect the game? Refresh rate is supposed to also function as an FPS cap, but I'm getting 300+ fps indoors with 144hz refresh set in my control panel which should be capping my fps at 144 like it does in every other game. Looks like I'll have to play around with some more settings, thanks.

[jones177]

Hi

 

iPresentInterval=1 should cap the frame rate to 60. It dose on both my computers. It also causes long load in times going through doors so I don't like to use it.

 

I have 2 gaming computers that have basically the same hardware. One is connected to a 3440 X 1440 WS monitor and the other computer is connected to a 4k monitor. They both run the same mods & I can use the same saves on both of them. On the computer that uses the wide screen monitor all the vsyncs in the Nvidia control panel do not work. The computer that uses the 4k monitor all the vsyncs work. They both use EVGA GTX 1080 tis & use the same driver versions. I have no clue why this is.

 

This also affects Skyrim SE.

 

My monitors are both 60hz. Any frames over 60 are not displayed. Since vsync doesn't work on one of my computers I use ENB/Reshade to control frame rate. If my average frame rate is to high I raise the quality of the ENB or Reshade. I like to run Fallout 4 between 60 and 80fps.

Anti aliasing and DSR are so bad in this game that I can't use them to control frame rate. I was shocked when I found that my game looked better with them off. It is supposed to be the other way around.

 

Later

[payl0ad]

You might have better experience setting it to 0 and using ENBs frame limiter set to 61. ENB is still part of the application so it shouldn't cause you funky physics issues you might experience when trying to cap frames using vsync.

[wogz187]

Check out my post from today on "ipresentinterval". You may find helpful.