Unsatisfactory performance on Counter-Strike 2 with the Arc B580

[De_Marchi]

I recently purchased an Arc B580, and although I really like how it performs in almost all games I tried, I was quite disappointed by its performance on CS2. The card has a significant performance drop when using DX11 compared to other cards and when compared to using Vulkan as the game's API, which you can opt into by using the launch command "-vulkan". In my tests, using DX11 as the API for the game made the game run 20% slower than Vulkan, and almost 30% slower when Low Latency mode is enabled.

This is not the case with any other card from Nvidia and AMD; using Vulkan on those cards will actually make your performance slightly worse. My fear is that CS2 running on DX11 is such a nightmare for the Arc B580 that using Vulkan will make the card appear to run the game better, but in reality, it's just because the card delivers bad performance on DX11, which maybe is related to a possible CPU overhead issue in CS2 since I saw many people reporting that using Vulkan in other games that presented the overhead problem helped the performance.

My thoughts seem to make sense when compared to my friend's PC, which is identical to mine except for the GPU, as we bought the parts for our PCs together.  My old GPU results also seem to indicate the same.

Compared to his 8GB RTX 3060, the B580 was around 22% slower in the scenario I tested, and it only could match the RTX 3060's performance using Vulkan. The problem is that CS2's implementation of Vulkan is not ideal; it's very unstable, with constant crashes and users mentioning latency issues with the game. I agree with those claims; even though Vulkan should be smoother, the game just feels laggy when using Vulkan compared to DX11, which feels better, especially when using the Low Latency mode. So using Vulkan in just not ideal for competitive players. 
Apart from comparing the results with my friends 3060, I can also compare it with my old card, the GTX 1650. ( I did use DDU before installing the Arc B580 just to make that clear).
My 1650 gave me 322 average fps on the same settings my friend and I tested (all low, no FSR, 1280x960). The B580 almost looses compared to the 1650 when using Low Latency, which in the test I used to measure the performance with the 1650, Nvidia reflex was enabled. So these are awful results considering the GTX 1650 is a 6 year old low-end GPU, it should be notable better than the RTX 3060. Most of the tests I saw the support team doing were made with the game on ultra/high settings and also at 1080p, which are useless to me or to most competitive players as no one really plays with those settings.

I'd like to ask for this seemingly unexplained performance drop the Arc B580 has with DX11 on CS2 to be investigated further, if possible. I'll attach my full specs, data, explain how I gathered the data presented, and how to reproduce the results.

PC Specs:

• Processor: AMD Ryzen 5 5600X 6-Core Processor.
• Maxsun Intel Arc B580 Milestone 12G (driver version 32.0.101.8136)

• Motherboard: TUF GAMING B550M-plus.

• Memory: Corsair Vengeance RGB RS 16GB DDR4 3200MHz (2x8).

• Storage: Game and OS are installed on a NVMe M.2 drive.

• OS: Windows 10.

• Note: Rebar is turned on and PCIe is set to 4.0 in the BIOS settings.

Rebar is turned on and PCIe is set to 4.0 in the bios settings.
To make the benchmark averages I used the Steam Workshop map CS2 FPS BENCHMARK DUST2, using CapFrameX to record the average of 3 runs then making an average out of the results. On the end of each run, the map displays the average fps results on the developer console Window. I reached the conclusion that those results are accurate, because they are always really close to the averages CapFrameX registers. Knowing this, I asked my Friend to do 3 runs using specific video settings, then I did an average of the results, and compared said results with mine. His RTX 3060 made an average of 479.5 fps compared to the B580's 375.9 on DX11, making the Arc Card 21.61% slower compared to the 3060.

How to reproduce the results:

Settings used: Fullscreen, 1280x960, 4:3 aspect ratio (it may sound crazy, but most CS players play the game using this video resolution).

Low settings preset, set both FSR and boost player contrast to disabled.

Open the Dust 2 benchmark map using the workshop maps tab, and start capturing the performance as soon as the countdown is over and the game itself shows up. End the capture as soon as the game starts to fade out to display the results. 

That should be all. Thank you for your time and attention. I hope I've been informative so far and I look forward to any potential updates in this matter. If any extra info is needed, please, let me know.

[gasoline]

Do you know what Intel does?
They start replying to old threads to close them.
So the thread doesn't end up on the main page of their forum, so it's on page 2 or 3. So other people don't see obvious problems with Intel graphics cards. And there are a lot of them right now.
I've noticed they've been doing this for quite some time.

[gasoline]

For this reason, I constantly put my threads on the main page.
But Intel suddenly responds to old threads by saying they should be closed.

It's simply magical!))))

[Felipe_Intel]

Hello all, this issue is still under investigation. We appreciate your patience while we work on it. 

About the VRAM behavior, does it happen just by having the game open and "idling" in the main menu? or is it needed to be playing? Which game mode is used when seeing this: matchmaking, practice, workshop maps (I only use the CS2 benchmark map)? competitive, wingman, casual, deathmatch... Is it spiking and going back to normal or is it more like a leak or sustained high VRAM consumption?

If this VRAM issue is something consistently reproducible, I'd recommend to open a new case. I played and ran the benchmark with the newest driver 101.8724 and I don't see the VRAM issue (I open task manager and set the always on top option to monitor this). 
See some guidance on how to make the report here: https://community.intel.com/t5/Intel-Arc-Discrete-Graphics/Need-help-Reporting-a-bug-or-issue-with-Arc-GPU-PLEASE-READ-THIS/m-p/1494429#M5057 

[CrilAR]

As another user who's experiencing vram leak on cs2 i can confirm it happens while playing both deathmatch or competitive and casual as they're the only ones im playing with. 

[CrilAR]

(I haven't played long enough on 8724 to see the issue)

[gasoline]

Hi

8735 already exists, but I don't see any major changes in the description of this driver.

[Felipe_Intel]

The details can be found in the release notes. 

[gasoline]

Hey, buddy!
We seem to have a communication gap.
But your managers are to blame for that.
Here's the thread I started, but as usual, I haven't received a response:

Re: The new driver breaks CS 2. - Intel Community

Memory fills up in any mode.
But it happens fastest in deathmatch on the following maps: Alpine, Warden, and Stronghold.
After 10-20 minutes of play.

[gasoline]

If you need tests and frame captures and would like to review them, I can do that.
But I don't see any interest from the Intel team.

[bangus]

About a month ago, I noticed when I play CS2, I could see the VRAM slowly get up to 8-9GBs while the graphic settings were turned to low, this would happen in the active duty map pool (dust2, mirage, etc) in deathmatch or casual, I noticed too is that it mostly happens with the server being full with players, not with server bots, but now when I play, the VRAM doesn't go up to 8GBs, stays around 4-5 but now the same problem, where the game FPS will just start fluctuating, with horrible Frametime spikes, sometimes down to 40fps from a locked 120fps will happen usually after 10 mins of playing, even with the new animgraph 2 update that is supposedly supposed to help with CPU performance, it always happens on multiplayer matches, it never happens with bot matches or with a couple players, it feels like the Skins/cosmetics are to blame but either way, its still a ARC issue because I tested with my old GTX card and this problem never occurs, its getting to the point I might just keep using my old card if I feel like playing this more seriously.

[De_Marchi]

@Felipe_Intel 

Just playing for a little while (an hour or two) will already spike the VRAM usage for me, no matter what setting. Like I said before, just playing for a couple of hours on low settings @ 1280x960 I see the VRAM go up to 10GB. But you can speed up the process by using the high/very high settings preset, and playing on 1080p or more. Search a death match game on the community map group (Alpine, Stronghold and Warden). Just 10 minutes of gameplay and the VRAM usage is already hitting 11.5-12GB for me, stutters start to occur and the FPS drops to around 50-70 FPS. 
I didn't report this issue yet because I don't know if this behavior happens in other GPUs. 

[gasoline]

Hi Felipe

I don't like installing beta driver versions, as even certified drivers aren't exactly perfect these days. I ran my tests on driver version 8629.

I've also attached screenshots of the graphics settings in this game below.
I monitor video memory buffer overflows using the built-in Steam overlay. There you can choose which data you want to monitor; it's not just the FPS counter.
As the creator of this thread, De_Marchi, pointed out, the higher the graphics settings, the faster the video memory overflow will occur.
I also recommend choosing community maps: Alpine, Warden, and Stronghold.

 

Below I've attached screenshots showing my game settings, what the extended overlay looks like in Steam, and how to enable it.

 

     

[gasoline]

The recommended set of cards on which the video memory buffer overflow occurs the fastest.

 

[Felipe_Intel]

Thanks all for the feedback. Let me check internally about that other case and get back to you. 
How do you check for the VRAM issue? I assume you are using some tool (or even Task Manager) but most likely have 2 screens (one with the game and the other with the monitoring tool). So far I've been testing with just one and at low resolution (1280x960). 

[De_Marchi]

I use rivaturner or steamoverlay. I have two monitors.

[Felipe_Intel]

One thing I forgot to ask. Is this VRAM issue seen only with DX, only with Vk or is it seen with any of them? 

Check out this gameplay of mine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAvd3YtXZOo I didn't see the spike in VRAM usage. This is with DX. 

[bangus]

Felipe, what is your CPU? 

The VRAM issue seemed to be from one of the last CS2 updates and ARC driver, I wish I had a screenshot or recording when it happened but it's no longer the case right now, however the performance is still really terrible. Here's mine with a Ryzen 5 3600 (resizebar on, latest bios, dual channel ddr4 3200, sata ssd) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3A63-kho7vc

and look at the frametime graph with MSI Afterburner, it fluctuates like crazy after 1-2 mins in match, this has never been a problem with ARC even on a older mid range CPU like mine. 

[Felipe_Intel]

Video was taken with a 14900 with cores turned off to simulate a 14400.  
For the perf issue I tested with 4 different systems: R7 5800X, R7 5700G, R5 3600 and the "14400" and is under investigation. 

All, please check if the VRAM issue is still there with 101.8735. If so, I would need to create a new case for it. If not, we can end that conversation here and just focus on the perf issue. 

[gasoline]

Felipe, not much has changed.
I described everything above; continue ignoring it; you're doing a great job of it.
The other people who bought your product will also be pleased with how you treat them, including them.

[gasoline]

Hi

Just above, my reply was addressed to you, but it turned out I somehow responded to someone else. Please review it and comment.
A little later, I'll install driver version 8735 and run some tests.

[gasoline]

As I expected, no miracle happened.
The FPS drops aren't as severe now, but they're still there.
The video memory still fills up. After that, unpleasant stuttering appears.

Driver 8735 tested :

 

Here's what Intel does:

Your login or registration attempt is not allowed. Please contact administrator for help