27 replies to this topic

[Oneoone]

I just recently upgraded to VPX 10.8 and was hoping it would solve some of the lag and performance issues on certain tables. I always had flipper lag when the ball is rolling down and I try to hit on the end of the flipper - it never hits correctly with the weight and speed (and lag) of the flipper. I updated to some old favorites and I noticed say on The Machine Bride of Pinbot, it seems to be much better on my laptop then on my cab. On the cab the ball also bounces alot. Are physics all new when upgraded or do they carry over from 10.6 to 10.8?  My laptop is newer with an I7, but the cab has an I5 and an Nvidea graphics card. Debating on updating the video card or the whole system. Was really hoping the new frame pacing setting would solve some issues. Does anyone have any suggestions? 

[deadmanworking]

Oneoone, did you also update VPinMAME in the process? I've had issues with intense stuttering on a handful of tables which were finally solved by updating both Vpx8 an VPinMAME last week.

[digitalarts]

By the way, you can't simply compare "i7" and "i5"
i7 could be Gen3, i5 could be Gen8, or any other generations.
It depends always on the best possible single core Speed.
And what tells us "Nvidia graphics Card" ?
It could be an old GT710 snail, or a 4080ti beast.
Did you updated ALL components to 64bit Versions?
VPinball, b2s, dof, DMDext, Freezy?

[Oneoone]

Yes sorry, I should have put my specs: GeForce GTX 1050 TI, AMD Ryzen 5 2600 six core, 16 GB ram- should be plenty of processing power I would think? I did update VPMame also. I just reset to default physics tonight and that seemed to have helped a bunch. I still have the issue when the ball is rolling down and you try and smack it at the end of the flipper and it goes off to drain or is like a dead hit- going to a side instead of a strong hit like it would in actual pinball.  I have to assume this is flipper lag maybe from my usb button controllers? I came across a video on youtube of some new controllers that have dedicated less lag inputs. Something like that might help or would shortening usb lenth help? I have 2 extenders for the button inputs to reach the back of the pc in the cabinet. Thanks for your replies. I built this cabinet in 2019 and still love playing it! 

[Itchigo]

Yes sorry, I should have put my specs: GeForce GTX 1050 TI, AMD Ryzen 5 2600 six core, 16 GB ram- should be plenty of processing power I would think? I did update VPMame also. I just reset to default physics tonight and that seemed to have helped a bunch. I still have the issue when the ball is rolling down and you try and smack it at the end of the flipper and it goes off to drain or is like a dead hit- going to a side instead of a strong hit like it would in actual pinball.  I have to assume this is flipper lag maybe from my usb button controllers? I came across a video on youtube of some new controllers that have dedicated less lag inputs. Something like that might help or would shortening usb lenth help? I have 2 extenders for the button inputs to reach the back of the pc in the cabinet. Thanks for your replies. I built this cabinet in 2019 and still love playing it! 

That's the same setup as I have. I replaced the 1050 ti just recently though, as I felt it was just barely making it. No VR here though, just good old fashioned 1080p pinball.

[htamas]

Neither the graphics card nor the CPU are too strong for the most demanding tables. It would be worth upgrading both if you can. I'd start with the CPU.

Also, to have the least flipper lag, make sure you are playing in exclusive fullscreen mode. For me, this noticeably decreased the lag.

I'm using a Ryzen 5600 with an RX 6600 in 1080p mode and everything is as smooth as it should be, even though this is a mid-tier (or even lower) setup.

[Oneoone]

Yeah, I guess it's time to upgrade some stuff. The other stuff is 6 years old at this point. Thank you for your specs and replies! 

[Oneoone]

So I did update to a Ryzen 5600 yesterday and it is better, but still sometimes have flipper lag  as the ball is coming down and you try to smack it at the edge of the flipper- it gets a dead hit or goes off in the opposite direction and/ or sometimes drains.(sorry I'm repeating myself)  I took the Virtual Pinball install folder from my laptop and replaced the one on the cabinet with it , just to make sure it wasn't something with the upgrade. Still does it, but not terrible. I was a little surprised that the cabinet stored all my button settings when I did this. Are these locked to the registry? Wondering if another setting causing the issue could be stored as well? Also- Pinball wizard, what graphics card did you go with and did it solve your issues? 

Another thought, can I fully un/ reinstall without too many issues? 

[Oneoone]

I also just installed a RX6600 this weekend and still the lag exists! This is driving me nuts. Can you guys tell me if you are running any special tv/ monitor for your playfield? I've tried two different ones, one with Game Mode but it didn't really make a difference. Both are at 60HZ. Maybe 120 HZ playfield would work? Stil seems a bit laggy using just a Dell monitor as the playfield too. All software is updated, but should I completely un/ reinstall? The most noticeable table issues is with The Machine Bride of Pinbot. I have tried 3 different versions. There are some other games there are skill shot settings that are off too and not sure how to reset the game to defaults. Really trying to avoid a full reload, but at this point I may have to. 

[Emanoel299]

Hi oneone

 

I know what you are feeling

Htamas explained the situation but there more things that you need to think.

My configuration is simple:

I7 - 3770 - 3th generation

MB - H61 LGA1155

DDR3 - 16 GB

SSD - 460 GB

PS - 750W

GPU - GTX 1660 TI 6GB

 

All tables works fine.

But I have a Exclusive desktop for my VPX. Anything not necessary is installed.

I had sometimes a LAG when the cabinet PC explorer is opened by network in my latop.

If is closed, everything is OK

Most of new tables in 64 bits need more GPU power.

EG. GTX 1650 4GB doesn´t run some 64 bits table fine. There is lag. Low FPS.

[htamas]

My playfield is a cheap 27" 60 Hz 1080p LG monitor, backglass is a really old 20" 1600x1200 monitor and the third screen is a 7" 1024x600 LCD screen.

With the Ryzen 5600, RX6600 and exclusive fullscreen mode, all tables are running smoothly. I don't see any flipper lag and F11 doesn't show any significant lag either, but maybe you're more sensitive to it than me?

[Oneoone]

Htamas, that's very interesting. By any chance do you have The Machine - Bride Of Pinbot (Williams 1991)2.1 VPX? If I hit alot of ramps and stuff the whole game still stutters where the the frames go a little crazy. I've tried 2 other versions of this game. Some are a little better, but on one the ball hops a little coming down the lane to the flipper (it's not flat). All these games play great on my Dell Inspiron 7420, which is no gaming PC but ....... 12th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-1255U   1.70 GHz, 32 GB ram with Intel UHD graphics. I keep my cabinet offline, for in the past some updates seem to mess up certain games. Could be Windows or the drive it's on which is a regular SSD (not an M2). 

[htamas]

Not sure which version is that. I only play the VPW release of that table.

I just checked, and F11 says 'Latency 0.00 max 0.2'. No sign of stuttering for me, not even in multiball or when many flashers are active.

I even have 200% supersampling turned on and frame pacing, maximum framerate 0 and max. pre-rendered frames set to 1.

Edited by htamas, 11 March 2025 - 04:02 AM.

[Oneoone]

As much as I hate to do it, I'm going to try a fresh image of Windows 11 on an M2 drive. Currently have 2 sata drives. What sucks is I don't have a way to copy the drive from sata to M2 and I fear alot of set up issues- especially for pinball X. Not sure if the game manager will come back by just copying files and I did alot of my own videos and stuff. I'll start with just an image and this table and see if it improves, I guess. 

[scutters]

What specific monitors/tv's did you try?.. there are online databases with input lag data. You want as low as you can, 40 or 50 ms would be laggy, <10 would be great.

Note that even though some TV's have game mode (which should help), some need you need to us a specific hdmi input or even change the input type to 'PC' in TV settings for lowest lag.

 

 

(i doubt you'll see much benefit from switching from SSD to M2 other than maybe reducing table load times)

[htamas]

Going from an SSD to an M2 drive will not help with table performance by itself. As scutters mentioned, it may make table load faster, but I doubt the effect will be significant. It's almost certain that during gameplay, you won't see an improvement just because of that.

I'm not saying that a brand new Windows installation could not clean up some hidden setup issue causing a performance problem, but I wouldn't expect it to be a magic bullet either.

If that is the table you are interested in when tuning, I would suggest trying this version.

[Oneoone]

Cool thanks. The reload seems to be helping the PC performance issues for some reason. Oddly enough, I noticed that the flippers were better with a keyboard so I started playing around. To my surprise the buttons seem more like the keyboard with less latency when plugged into usb 2 over usb 3. I realize this makes no sense, beings that usb 3 is a much faster port. I have 2 controllers boards- one for the left side of the cab and one for the right. The cables are 6 foot usb cables. Not finding anyone else with these findings so far on line, but I swear it's better! 

[gtxjoe]

You can buy a USB to M.2 interface if you want to clone your existing drive to the new drive

[zebulon]

I doubt that USB cable length is an issue for you, original specs on the USB 1.0 bus were cables up to 15 feet (if memory serves and that's a big if these days) and electron movement works much the same as a garden hose full of ping pong balls, push one in on one end and one comes out the other.

I'm fairly confident your lag issues aren't from the atomic level.

 

From my limited experience (I don't play with this stuff as much as I used to anymore) I think it's more a case of the core software requirements leaning more and more toward the 'bleeding edge' hardware specs rather than general purpose hardware specs.  The assumption is just there that you have more horsepower available in the system than older systems generally have.  That's not something limited to vp alone, and it's certainly not a shot at the developers.  The entire computer gaming industry as a whole has run on this model since the beginning, newer/more features = increased requirements.

 

This hobby specifically has migrated far and away from the initial "I have all this stuff laying around that I can use" to "here's the brand new stuff that I need to buy to accomplish this" mindset and what is being produced to run on that new hardware is outpacing the abilities of the older.  I remember the joy of discovering this hobby back in the day and my amazement of what had been developed to that point to make it possible to play that variety of pinball tables at home on the computer.  Our expectations were much lower back then regarding realism, that bar seems to have been raised considerably higher now.

 

Hell, I still think the ball looked more realistic on my 19" crt monitor than it does on an led monitor ....  but my eyes aren't what they used to be either .... lol

[Thalamus]

Cool thanks. The reload seems to be helping the PC performance issues for some reason. Oddly enough, I noticed that the flippers were better with a keyboard so I started playing around. To my surprise the buttons seem more like the keyboard with less latency when plugged into usb 2 over usb 3. I realize this makes no sense, beings that usb 3 is a much faster port. I have 2 controllers boards- one for the left side of the cab and one for the right. The cables are 6 foot usb cables. Not finding anyone else with these findings so far on line, but I swear it's better! 

I can't confirm how the situation is now comared to 5-6 years back when I first built the cab. I was then on a different operating system and many of the hardware parts have change since. But, I remember that I had issues with DOF and the solution was change some USB option together with finding the god damn most shitty USB2 hub available. And, I'm still one that setup wthen it comes to the PC itself and the USB hub. BUT, all this has changed by a lot. DOF is 64bit, Pinmame, VP, OS ... everthing almost. Except from the previous mentioned.