In the Optimized Settings section I made a mistake in Grass Quality , it should be " Medium or High " instead of " Medium or Medium " Sorry . Edit : Patch 4.01 fixed Screen Space Reflection and this setting now shows a difference between Low and High but on the performance side it's so demanding now (going from Low to High can cost up to 34%) , so keep an eye on SSR and turn it off if you're having Low FPS.
Aspiring audio engineer here: First of all, I see you are an up and coming channel, and I like to support people that start off with high quality videos. So here is my tip: I don't know what program for audio you are using, but it doesen't matter which one it is as long as its a DAW (look it up). I would recommend using a plugin called "De Esser" for the sybilants which are through the roof in this video. It will reduce the puncturing effect that happens when you pronounce the sybilants (letters s, t). Anyways good video man keep it up 👍
This update makes me feel so nostalgic, back in the day I couldnt run the game on high above 40fps with my 970 and now I cant run it without stutters on my 3070ti
@@religionlol7323 he didn’t say about high end nor Ray tracing and even then you aren’t correct a 4090 is absolutely not necessary to “run” RT on the next gen update. Assuming by run you don’t mean under some absurd conditions.
@@jaydenhogan507 I ran the next gen update find with my old 2080ti maxed out I said if you want to run it at max with RT on and have an enjoyable experience you will need it.
@@religionlol7323 I suppose that makes more sense but still, isn’t an “enjoyable experience”completely subjective? I’d understand if every other gpu other than the 4090 delivered flip book performance but the truth is they don’t.
This is one of the best optimization guides I have ever seen! No bullshit! Straight to the point with detailed pictures and comparisons. With categories for each setting and a summary at the end. Amazing video! Thank you so much.
I optimized my settings after watching your video. The base game looks much better. However, the graphics for the cut scenes in Blood and Wine are now spectacular. Especially the details you can see on the NPC costumes. It's truly amazing.
This is exactly what I was looking for, concise, explains the settings well with great examples, even had a recommendation summary at the end. Great job, and thank you!
I fired up W3 yesterday to see all the sights, and was immediately confronted by the performance hit. Like moving through syrup. I kept dx12 on but turned ray tracing off and movement was much better. But today I found your vid while searching for optimized pc performance and I am applying your suggestions before I log in. Thank you for so much detail and comparison screens.
I was randomly recommended this video and I'm sure glad I clicked on it! You explain things very nicely while also showcasing the differences in a format that isn't confusing. Thank you and happy holidays.
I’ll admit I underestimated the quality of this channel at first, but you covered everything so well on the video that I don’t even have much to say. But it’s a shame that they messed up ray tracing performance so bad in this game, I waited for this update and it came so broken. It is unacceptable that the performance manages to be much worse than Cyberpunk and it makes me really angry.
Check the Digital Foundry video about witcher. Its DX12 causing FPS drops in locations. It's a wrapped DX12 implementation so its bottlenecked by CPU lots of times. Country side I get like 70-80fps 1440p with my 3080 but only 40fps in novigrad for example or 50-55fps in small villages.
It's mostly a CPU bottleneck due to the implementation of DX12 using just 1 CPU thread for some reason. Hopefully it's fixable down the line. Also this shits free dude. Chill with the "unacceptable" BS
Yeah, since is free i think is ok to deliver a shitty update, we should just forcibly smile while playing at 30 fps or just don't play it.. although what would be the point of the update if most ppl won't play it, lol.
"Level of Detail" controls the distance at which high-quality object meshes pop-in and pop-out, and you're right that the menu slider is broken; you have to change the MeshLODRenderDistance setting in the settings .INI file, inside the Documents folder. Learned this from watching the NX Gamer video. The setting goes from 1.0 to 1.5, though you can set it lower than 1.0 in the file.
Performance wise, stepping back to DX11 was the best decision to me. Was a huge boost and with the right settings the game still looks amazing. Thanks a lot for this video. Was a great help, working through the options.
Try to disable CFG specifically for games. Here are the steps to disable for a specific game: 1.Search and Open Exploit Protection 2. Click On the Program Settings Tab 3. Click On The + Add Programs To Customise 4. Click On Choose Exact File Path 5. Find Game Which You would Like To Try To Remove Stutter. Click Open 6. Programs Settings For Game Opened, Scroll Down To Control Flow Guard (Never Use For Global Setting) 7. Put Check Mark In Override System Settings And Turn From On To Off And Apply 8. Restart May Be Needed Doing that helped a lot.
Thanks a lot man. Trying to run this with all RT settings on 2k resolution at 60FPS. Your guide helped get the most while losing the least amout of graphical fidelity.
The second hotfix fixed most of the stutters for me even with RT enabled. My specs: 3070ti/5800x/16gb 3600/pciex ssd/3440x1440. Thx for such a detailed performance guide, it helped me to make best choice between grafical fidelity and performance.
There's a popular mod that turns the Hairworks setting off on Geralt, but keeps it for animals. Saves performance, and debatably looks better because Geralt with Hairworks looks a tad odd.
Insane work, straight to the point, reasonable decisions, great comparisons, as someone with an older PC I really appreciate what you have done, I wish I could buy you a beer for that
The ONLY thing that pisses me off is the fact the HQ SSR is locked behind RT GI. It doesn't make sense at all since you can enagle RT reflections anyway. HQ SSR could be a great substitute for those who want 60fps but nicer reflections.
Thank you so much for taking the time to make this kind of video, I really appreciate it, may God bless you for continuing this wonderful work of helping people improve their gaming performance with these tutorials, thank you very much.
This is so helpful. Hopefully they patch RT performance because it does make a huge difference, but I think I will leave it off until then because frames matter.
This is gonna sound super sketch but hear me out: if you’re using DX12 disable control flow guard in the exploitation settings in Windows 10. You will see HUGE improvements in performance and almost no stuttering in the Witcher 3. This also works for the majority of games that use DX12 as well. However, be sure to only turn of Control Flow Guard under the programs tab and not the global one
i tried it and it still stutters. 2080super 1440p ultra setting, no motion blur, blur, dof, RT. AO on, SSreflections high, DLSS set to High Performance and i still only have like low 70fps standing still in Novigrad.
This worked for me. Acer Predator Helios, RTX3080 (laptop version). Stuttering gone, so I enabled all RT options and limited to 60fps even though my screen is g-sync 165Hz (because adventure games don't need high FPS - they need a great looking world that is worth exploring, plus a stable FPS rather than a large one!).
I really wanted to use Ray Tracing for my second playthrough and take advantage of having a 3080 but at 1080p I can't even hold 60fps in most areas. Hopefully a couple more updates will optimize the game better.
Agreed but with a 3090 here. They need to decouple RT GI from the other RT settings at the very least. That said, maxed out cyberpunk runs much better than this so I’m inclined to believe it’s just poorly crafted.
Thank you for this. BTW you sound just fine. Also you talk about DX11 and DX 12, but don't mention which one to use. I assume you mean DX12 with RT off, as DLSS is not available with DX11. Also "Fullscreen" vs. "Windowed Fullscreen" can maybe make a difference I think for the stuttering. I play at 1080P BTW.
This was very helpful actually. Each setting has a small fps cost but it adds up. My game now runs between 50 and 70 fps when out in the wilderness (RTX 3080, 1440p). I have GI on. Big cities are a shitshow though. But that's to be expected.
By shitshow, are you still getting 50fps+? What do you have dlss set at? I’m going to finish up some other games first but plan to replay this with the new update to bounce between my PC, Steam Deck and maybe console if their cloud save system works as well as 2077’s. Hopefully some performance updates by then.
@@FireMrshlBill 50 fps would be amazing in Novigrad. But no, it's more like 30s. Anywhere near npcs will cause fps drops. Even in small villages in Skellige. Dlss in my experience makes little difference. I keep bouncing between quality, balanced, performance. Cloud save works. I'm playing on PS5 too. But sometimes it takes a while to download the save from the cloud.
@@hahahah9527 Thanks! Good to know, will probably bounce between the ps5, pc (3080fe + 5800x3d, 1440p) and the Deck. Would be fine if I could use RT and keep it above 48fps for my monitor's freesync range, but guess that won't happen. Oh well, guess I can just deal with the drops in those areas or just turn off RT. Original play through was on GOG and the Switch version just came out when I finished the last DLC, so I was planning to bounce between them on a NG+ playthrough. Guess I will be transferring that save over to Steam for the update and try to jump into NG+ from there.
Keep in mind that if like me you have a weak CPU you might want to lower the crowd density. It may make more of a difference than what you can see in this video especially in Novigrad. Great video by the way :)
@@Ryzen-gh1en I think you did not understand what I wrote. I said "if you have a weak CPU like me". I'm talking about my i7 6700HQ (quad core laptop cpu from 2015) which is heavily bottlenecking my GTX 1070.
@@MasoMathiou sorry i misunderstood, bdw you are right lowering amount of npc on the screen and as well foliage distance improve fps because your cpu dnt have to calculate so many stuff on the screen, simply math, lowering crowd density helps in CP2077 too
Thanks for the video very informative, you should also mention that using DX12 shows correct HDR(in my eyes) where dx11 tries to use autoHDR which looks washed out and bad.
First of all, excellent work. I think how much any player can get out of this depends on their system. Mine is RTX3080/12600k/1440p monitor. With ray tracing off I get anywhere from 90-144; normally 120-144. That's with DLSS Quality, Hairworks off, character background density low, everything else Ultra+. A weaker system will perform better with the settings in this video a 4090 system could probably run everything on Ultra+ with the proviso *no ray tracing*. Anyway, top drawer work and presentation; enjoyed it and it should prove very useful for countless Witcher 3 players.
If you aren't using ray tracing or dlss then just use dx 11 and you will get way more performance. Also when rt shadows are on I didn't notice a visual difference with the shadow slider, but there is a performance difference.
@user-lk7cv8vg7r no, but I really don't like how fsr looks to be honest, and if you can run the game at native and dx11 at a higher fps but have to use fsr in dx 12 to match then dx 11 at native is the way to go.
@user-lk7cv8vg7r the biggest problem with this game in dx 12 is CPU usage, that's why the framerate is higher in 11. If your CPU bound the upscaling won't matter much in terms of framerate. They have recently patched it twice so I havnt tested again yet
The game has gotten so much better than before now. DX12 is working great for me. I am getting 130+ FPS on Rx6600 + i3 12th Gen (Much weaker CPU & GPU than your computer). One thing I noticed that, if I set FPS limiter to "Unlimited" (in game), I get 20+ FPS lesser than when I set FPS limit to 144 (my monitors refresh rate). The extra FPS didn't come free, I noticed texture detail being reduced. Well, I'll never notice that if I am not standing still and staring at my screen from 2 inches away. Good video
Even with the performance hit DX12 is the superior option for me (3060ti) as you get DLSS, Reflex (drops render latency from to 90ms to 40ms) and HDR support.
I have a 3060ti too and was getting a render latency of 90-150ms, Reflex really helped with latency, sometimes I see the latency almost at 90 but it immediately drops to 40-50ms. I really wanted to use RT, even if it was only RTGI, but it drops the fps to 35-40 :/
Does anyone find that in dx12, at random, the game will up gpu usage to 100% and drop like 30 frames and just stay like that till you reload a save or the game? This is only when RT is enabled though.
For me, Vram usage slowly creeps up until it maxes out my 10gb card and causes the frame rate to drop dramatically. Remedied by reloading/ restarting. Frustrating.
Yup, it's got a memory leak, I'm sure of it now. I'll start playing with around 5.5gb vram usage and it keeps creeping up to 7.8 and then suddenly I'm from 42-55 fps to 5-15 and have to restart. Annoying as hell, at least the game boots fast af.
@@wayneh6356 its disappointing because it does look incredible while it is running well for the first 10 minutes or so. Crossed fingers for a patch soon.
cant remember if I commented here, but thank you for these - I managed to get this running nicely with your recommendations and with raytracing GI & AO on on my 3080 in 2k. anything else turns it into a bit of a slideshow nightmare.
Hi thanks for taking the time for this .I went full ultra +with no rt . Huge fps no doubt. After the Dec hot fixes I went back to your optimized settings and then switched on rt .I'm now getting 40/48 fps with no stutter adding in your settings.I'm totally okay with this now .I have 3090ti and 13 gen card ,I should be getting more I know but since I've played it already I'm only interested in re playing it with rt on as I have a bunch of other games that are seriously performing now , cyberpunk, GTA,Doom,rdr2 are all very impressive.The Witcher will get more hot fixes also. Thanks 👍
The original game also had HBAO+, which looks WAY better on its own than the default "RTX-Off" lighting in the Next Gen version. I wish they'd have kept that in for "RTX-Off" mode. Seems like a silly decision to remove it.
While I'm not experiencing any problems with this update, it still makes me very happy to know that future CDPR-Games will run Unreal 5. It just shows again how difficult the red engine is to handle.
@@christophervanzetta Well it still gave me two of the best games i've ever played, so there's that. I'm eager to see what they can do without being hold back by the engine.
Thank you so much for these optimised settings guide. Digital Foundry used to do this but stopped in recent years. I'm glad I have another channel to check on this.
Thank you, Witcher 3 has been my favourite game for sometime. The update gives it new life, and your research and video gives me a guide to replaying it without too much grief, thanks.
Thanks man. Went from 70 avg fps to 90 without the game looking different to my eyes. You're the king of optimization guides. One thing I would add is to manually update the DLSS files. Using the latest one makes the performance mode look identical to the default quality mode. So you can either stick to quality for same fps and much more beautiful image, or keep same visual quality but add more fps.
Great content, underrated channel. hope you keep going, looking forward to more optimisation videos and curious if you'll go back to some older games with recent updates and do optimisation vids on those (cyberpunk for example)
In case anybody is not aware, when a new DLSS 2.x update is available, you don't need to wait for CDPR to patch the game. Techpowerup has the file available for download when a new one is released. It's just a dll file you replace in your game folder. You can also have Techpowerup notify you when there's an update if you give them an email address. So far there have been 2 updates to DLSS since the game was released.
Dude I have sat there many times switching on n off settings looking at the changes and performance hits or gains. So I know it took a while to make this video, u have to try all kinds of combinations then go run around test the effects out then switch em up and do it again and again. My system is a hp vitcus the cheaper option with a 2050 4gvram ryzen 5 and 32 g ram . Anyone who has similar specs I run everything on medium and a few settings on high ( I don’t remember the specific settings on high) and I use the dlss . It runs pretty smoothly except every once in awhile in the big city it’s gets over loaded and I have to turn off ray tracing, it’s weird though sometimes it doesn’t lag and sometimes it does in the city idk y but just just switch off the ray tracing if it starts acting a fool. Good video man I wish I had it when I was trying to figure out what worked best could have save me alot of time
your channel has helped me optimize nearly every game in my library and i can’t thank you enough for it. You’re the king of graphics optimization on youtube ❤
Great and informative video, Mr. BenchmarKing. Straight and to the point, while keeping things simply described and highlighted. Thank you so much for this.
wtf??? I have a 2070s and a better processor than you and I can't run it at all, I always get low GPU and CPU usage, no matter the setting, resolution, etc.
@@Gadottinho What the heck? Did you mess with the nvidia control panel at all? I leave it stock except for preferred refresh is at highest available and my texture filtering is at high performance.
each graphics settings breakdown and explained very well. so we know how effects system. and THE BEST optimisation ideas in this channel. thank you King! Also need a mini v4.04 guide or ideas. Long live the BencmarKing!
Great video!! Definitely deserved a sub. My 7900 xtx is crashing this game on full ultra+ with no RT because it's bugged or not good at all. However, I will still use your settings because they just make sense.
In the Optimized Settings section I made a mistake in Grass Quality , it should be " Medium or High " instead of " Medium or Medium "
Sorry .
Edit : Patch 4.01 fixed Screen Space Reflection and this setting now shows a difference between Low and High but on the performance side it's so demanding now (going from Low to High can cost up to 34%) , so keep an eye on SSR and turn it off if you're having Low FPS.
Same with DX12 vs DX12
you've done an amazing job
Dx12 and dx11
you have mistake in yt bar dx 12 vs dx 12 while is dx 11 vs dx 12
Aspiring audio engineer here:
First of all, I see you are an up and coming channel, and I like to support people that start off with high quality videos. So here is my tip: I don't know what program for audio you are using, but it doesen't matter which one it is as long as its a DAW (look it up). I would recommend using a plugin called "De Esser" for the sybilants which are through the roof in this video. It will reduce the puncturing effect that happens when you pronounce the sybilants (letters s, t). Anyways good video man keep it up 👍
This update makes me feel so nostalgic, back in the day I couldnt run the game on high above 40fps with my 970 and now I cant run it without stutters on my 3070ti
Lol a 3070ti isn't high end you need a 4090 to run this with RT
@@religionlol7323 Neither was my 970 back then so your point?
@@religionlol7323 he didn’t say about high end nor Ray tracing and even then you aren’t correct a 4090 is absolutely not necessary to “run” RT on the next gen update. Assuming by run you don’t mean under some absurd conditions.
@@jaydenhogan507 I ran the next gen update find with my old 2080ti maxed out I said if you want to run it at max with RT on and have an enjoyable experience you will need it.
@@religionlol7323 I suppose that makes more sense but still, isn’t an “enjoyable experience”completely subjective? I’d understand if every other gpu other than the 4090 delivered flip book performance but the truth is they don’t.
I was looking for a deep comparison like this for so long, thank you mate
This is one of the best optimization guides I have ever seen! No bullshit! Straight to the point with detailed pictures and comparisons. With categories for each setting and a summary at the end. Amazing video! Thank you so much.
So to make Geralt's hair look better I have to spend 1600+ Doller. Even my human hair doesn't cost that much.
What?
🤣 lol
Hair works looks like shit don’t worry about it.
Damn u right better get a hair transplant in real life 😂🤝
At 4K looks good
I optimized my settings after watching your video. The base game looks much better. However, the graphics for the cut scenes in Blood and Wine are now spectacular. Especially the details you can see on the NPC costumes. It's truly amazing.
You're truly amazing.
@@aj9777 No you
@@An4kinskyw4lker No you
@@brendonou1 No you
@@yogayunandar3040 No you
This is exactly what I was looking for, concise, explains the settings well with great examples, even had a recommendation summary at the end. Great job, and thank you!
You put a ton of work into this video and the settings comparisons are very clear and useful. TYVM and great job.
I am really happy that channel like you exists. I know only you and one another person who makes such detailed settings videos. Thx
Amazing work as always bro. Keep the optimizations going, you`re the best channel for it. Even better than Digital Foundry
Thanks for this breakdown!! Super informative, may be using some bits for my next video, i'll be sure to tag and mention you if I do!
I fired up W3 yesterday to see all the sights, and was immediately confronted by the performance hit. Like moving through syrup. I kept dx12 on but turned ray tracing off and movement was much better. But today I found your vid while searching for optimized pc performance and I am applying your suggestions before I log in. Thank you for so much detail and comparison screens.
I was randomly recommended this video and I'm sure glad I clicked on it! You explain things very nicely while also showcasing the differences in a format that isn't confusing. Thank you and happy holidays.
I’ll admit I underestimated the quality of this channel at first, but you covered everything so well on the video that I don’t even have much to say. But it’s a shame that they messed up ray tracing performance so bad in this game, I waited for this update and it came so broken. It is unacceptable that the performance manages to be much worse than Cyberpunk and it makes me really angry.
Check the Digital Foundry video about witcher. Its DX12 causing FPS drops in locations. It's a wrapped DX12 implementation so its bottlenecked by CPU lots of times. Country side I get like 70-80fps 1440p with my 3080 but only 40fps in novigrad for example or 50-55fps in small villages.
It's not unacceptable because it's free and if you don't like it then don't use it
It's mostly a CPU bottleneck due to the implementation of DX12 using just 1 CPU thread for some reason. Hopefully it's fixable down the line.
Also this shits free dude. Chill with the "unacceptable" BS
Cry more, it's free, just dont play it. Lmao
Yeah, since is free i think is ok to deliver a shitty update, we should just forcibly smile while playing at 30 fps or just don't play it.. although what would be the point of the update if most ppl won't play it, lol.
"Level of Detail" controls the distance at which high-quality object meshes pop-in and pop-out, and you're right that the menu slider is broken; you have to change the MeshLODRenderDistance setting in the settings .INI file, inside the Documents folder. Learned this from watching the NX Gamer video. The setting goes from 1.0 to 1.5, though you can set it lower than 1.0 in the file.
how many increments? .1?
Is this still something I should be worrying about? Has the slider been fixed/updated yet?
Thank you for taking the time to make this for us.
Will be using your tips to stream this tonight 😃
Follow up…I streamed this the other day and it was absolutely gorgeous with your recommendations! Thanks again
Performance wise, stepping back to DX11 was the best decision to me. Was a huge boost and with the right settings the game still looks amazing. Thanks a lot for this video. Was a great help, working through the options.
Try to disable CFG specifically for games.
Here are the steps to disable for a specific game:
1.Search and Open Exploit Protection
2. Click On the Program Settings Tab
3. Click On The + Add Programs To Customise
4. Click On Choose Exact File Path
5. Find Game Which You would Like To Try To Remove Stutter. Click Open
6. Programs Settings For Game Opened, Scroll Down To Control Flow Guard (Never Use For Global Setting)
7. Put Check Mark In Override System Settings And Turn From On To Off And Apply 8. Restart May Be Needed
Doing that helped a lot.
Dx11 is visually inferior to Dx12. Dx11 lacks shadowing and ambient occlusion in the visuals
It's not that much compared to the performance loss.@@ashank9856
Thanks a lot man. Trying to run this with all RT settings on 2k resolution at 60FPS. Your guide helped get the most while losing the least amout of graphical fidelity.
The second hotfix fixed most of the stutters for me even with RT enabled. My specs: 3070ti/5800x/16gb 3600/pciex ssd/3440x1440. Thx for such a detailed performance guide, it helped me to make best choice between grafical fidelity and performance.
What is the second hotfix?
I have the same specs, how much fps do you get around white orchard? I hover around 60ish
Thank you so much for this help.
Was looking for it so long. Finally we got a useful comparison for the optimal settings in Game.
Much love :)
Using DX11 with these settings and game runs and looks beautiful 👍
There's a popular mod that turns the Hairworks setting off on Geralt, but keeps it for animals. Saves performance, and debatably looks better because Geralt with Hairworks looks a tad odd.
Insane work, straight to the point, reasonable decisions, great comparisons, as someone with an older PC I really appreciate what you have done, I wish I could buy you a beer for that
The ONLY thing that pisses me off is the fact the HQ SSR is locked behind RT GI. It doesn't make sense at all since you can enagle RT reflections anyway.
HQ SSR could be a great substitute for those who want 60fps but nicer reflections.
Thank you so much for taking the time to make this kind of video, I really appreciate it, may God bless you for continuing this wonderful work of helping people improve their gaming performance with these tutorials, thank you very much.
This is so helpful. Hopefully they patch RT performance because it does make a huge difference, but I think I will leave it off until then because frames matter.
did they patch it?
@@LaMartiniquee no. They have not patched the PC version in over a month.
@@Seanbbn thank you for the Update. That sucks 🫠
Was waiting for a video like this
Thank you for putting all this work in! This will definitely help me tune the game for my PC.
probably the best in depth explanation for each setting given. Exactly what I was looking for. TYVM
you love in depth explanations, don't you
This is gonna sound super sketch but hear me out: if you’re using DX12 disable control flow guard in the exploitation settings in Windows 10. You will see HUGE improvements in performance and almost no stuttering in the Witcher 3. This also works for the majority of games that use DX12 as well. However, be sure to only turn of Control Flow Guard under the programs tab and not the global one
i tried it and it still stutters. 2080super 1440p ultra setting, no motion blur, blur, dof, RT. AO on, SSreflections high, DLSS set to High Performance and i still only have like low 70fps standing still in Novigrad.
This worked for me. Acer Predator Helios, RTX3080 (laptop version). Stuttering gone, so I enabled all RT options and limited to 60fps even though my screen is g-sync 165Hz (because adventure games don't need high FPS - they need a great looking world that is worth exploring, plus a stable FPS rather than a large one!).
exactly what i was looking for, great work!
Is there a updated settings guide for this game? Because most issues have been fixed I guess
holysh** this is probably the most underrated channel on YT, thanks YT for recommending. Thank you for your great works, subbed.
I really wanted to use Ray Tracing for my second playthrough and take advantage of having a 3080 but at 1080p I can't even hold 60fps in most areas. Hopefully a couple more updates will optimize the game better.
Agreed but with a 3090 here. They need to decouple RT GI from the other RT settings at the very least. That said, maxed out cyberpunk runs much better than this so I’m inclined to believe it’s just poorly crafted.
Was looking for a guide like this. Thank you.
Thank you for this. BTW you sound just fine. Also you talk about DX11 and DX 12, but don't mention which one to use. I assume you mean DX12 with RT off, as DLSS is not available with DX11. Also "Fullscreen" vs. "Windowed Fullscreen" can maybe make a difference I think for the stuttering. I play at 1080P BTW.
I preferred this video over Digital Foundry's PC Witcher 3 update video, excellent work and keep it up!
Grass Density: Medium or Medium
Great video nonetheless
Thanks for pointing out the error , I didn't notice it until now
This Is what i call a tutorial. Clean, detailed, straight ti the point. Thanks a lot
This was very helpful actually. Each setting has a small fps cost but it adds up. My game now runs between 50 and 70 fps when out in the wilderness (RTX 3080, 1440p). I have GI on. Big cities are a shitshow though. But that's to be expected.
By shitshow, are you still getting 50fps+? What do you have dlss set at? I’m going to finish up some other games first but plan to replay this with the new update to bounce between my PC, Steam Deck and maybe console if their cloud save system works as well as 2077’s. Hopefully some performance updates by then.
@@FireMrshlBill 50 fps would be amazing in Novigrad. But no, it's more like 30s. Anywhere near npcs will cause fps drops. Even in small villages in Skellige.
Dlss in my experience makes little difference. I keep bouncing between quality, balanced, performance.
Cloud save works. I'm playing on PS5 too. But sometimes it takes a while to download the save from the cloud.
@@hahahah9527 Thanks! Good to know, will probably bounce between the ps5, pc (3080fe + 5800x3d, 1440p) and the Deck. Would be fine if I could use RT and keep it above 48fps for my monitor's freesync range, but guess that won't happen. Oh well, guess I can just deal with the drops in those areas or just turn off RT. Original play through was on GOG and the Switch version just came out when I finished the last DLC, so I was planning to bounce between them on a NG+ playthrough. Guess I will be transferring that save over to Steam for the update and try to jump into NG+ from there.
I subscribed cause I like that you give optimized settings and explaining them
Keep in mind that if like me you have a weak CPU you might want to lower the crowd density. It may make more of a difference than what you can see in this video especially in Novigrad. Great video by the way :)
5600x is a weak cpu lol okay , sure 5600x cant handle a 3060ti -_-
@@Ryzen-gh1en just the nex gen update is optimized with toes
Do you think an i5 12400 bottlenecks a 3079
@@Ryzen-gh1en I think you did not understand what I wrote. I said "if you have a weak CPU like me". I'm talking about my i7 6700HQ (quad core laptop cpu from 2015) which is heavily bottlenecking my GTX 1070.
@@MasoMathiou sorry i misunderstood, bdw you are right lowering amount of npc on the screen and as well foliage distance improve fps because your cpu dnt have to calculate so many stuff on the screen, simply math, lowering crowd density helps in CP2077 too
Best video out there, short, straight forward, informative, hats off to you good sir!
Thanks for the video very informative, you should also mention that using DX12 shows correct HDR(in my eyes) where dx11 tries to use autoHDR which looks washed out and bad.
true
First of all, excellent work. I think how much any player can get out of this depends on their system. Mine is RTX3080/12600k/1440p monitor. With ray tracing off I get anywhere from 90-144; normally 120-144. That's with DLSS Quality, Hairworks off, character background density low, everything else Ultra+. A weaker system will perform better with the settings in this video a 4090 system could probably run everything on Ultra+ with the proviso *no ray tracing*. Anyway, top drawer work and presentation; enjoyed it and it should prove very useful for countless Witcher 3 players.
If you aren't using ray tracing or dlss then just use dx 11 and you will get way more performance. Also when rt shadows are on I didn't notice a visual difference with the shadow slider, but there is a performance difference.
But HDR/DLSS/RT are not there, DX12 runs smoother on my System und it perform better on DLSS.
@@MrLOLFRATZE I know that, but I'm talking about for people that don't have or want to use those features
@user-lk7cv8vg7r no, but I really don't like how fsr looks to be honest, and if you can run the game at native and dx11 at a higher fps but have to use fsr in dx 12 to match then dx 11 at native is the way to go.
Or you can revert back to 1.32 in steam like I did. Even better performance than next-gen dx11 and working mods
@user-lk7cv8vg7r the biggest problem with this game in dx 12 is CPU usage, that's why the framerate is higher in 11. If your CPU bound the upscaling won't matter much in terms of framerate. They have recently patched it twice so I havnt tested again yet
The game has gotten so much better than before now. DX12 is working great for me. I am getting 130+ FPS on Rx6600 + i3 12th Gen (Much weaker CPU & GPU than your computer). One thing I noticed that, if I set FPS limiter to "Unlimited" (in game), I get 20+ FPS lesser than when I set FPS limit to 144 (my monitors refresh rate). The extra FPS didn't come free, I noticed texture detail being reduced. Well, I'll never notice that if I am not standing still and staring at my screen from 2 inches away. Good video
Even with the performance hit DX12 is the superior option for me (3060ti) as you get DLSS, Reflex (drops render latency from to 90ms to 40ms) and HDR support.
I have a 3060ti too and was getting a render latency of 90-150ms, Reflex really helped with latency, sometimes I see the latency almost at 90 but it immediately drops to 40-50ms. I really wanted to use RT, even if it was only RTGI, but it drops the fps to 35-40 :/
You can turn on reflex (low latency mode) for any game in nvidia control panel
@@Averageenjoyer-br1zm thanks wasn't aware of that
Holy what a good ass video, actually really informative and precise
3:31 They removed HBAO+, with only SSAO the game without ray tracing looks worse than the original.
Thank you so much sir. I was using TAUU without knowing DLSS looked just as good and got almost 2x the frames 🙌🏻
Does anyone find that in dx12, at random, the game will up gpu usage to 100% and drop like 30 frames and just stay like that till you reload a save or the game? This is only when RT is enabled though.
For me, Vram usage slowly creeps up until it maxes out my 10gb card and causes the frame rate to drop dramatically. Remedied by reloading/ restarting. Frustrating.
@@Adam-hn2iw It's so broken. Should be fine on a 3080. Should also use a whole cpu not just 2 cores
Yup, it's got a memory leak, I'm sure of it now. I'll start playing with around 5.5gb vram usage and it keeps creeping up to 7.8 and then suddenly I'm from 42-55 fps to 5-15 and have to restart. Annoying as hell, at least the game boots fast af.
@@wayneh6356 its disappointing because it does look incredible while it is running well for the first 10 minutes or so. Crossed fingers for a patch soon.
@@Adam-hn2iw right? And running it without rt doesn't feel like a substantial enough improvement.
cant remember if I commented here, but thank you for these - I managed to get this running nicely with your recommendations and with raytracing GI & AO on on my 3080 in 2k. anything else turns it into a bit of a slideshow nightmare.
Hi thanks for taking the time for this .I went full ultra +with no rt .
Huge fps no doubt. After the Dec hot fixes I went back to your optimized settings and then switched on rt .I'm now getting 40/48 fps with no stutter adding in your settings.I'm totally okay with this now .I have 3090ti and 13 gen card ,I should be getting more I know but since I've played it already I'm only interested in re playing it with rt on as I have a bunch of other games that are seriously performing now , cyberpunk, GTA,Doom,rdr2 are all very impressive.The Witcher will get more hot fixes also. Thanks 👍
I was shocked when my 3080 was giving me very low fps with Ultra + RT on. Didn't know it had so much perf impact. This game needs RT optimization
The original game also had HBAO+, which looks WAY better on its own than the default "RTX-Off" lighting in the Next Gen version.
I wish they'd have kept that in for "RTX-Off" mode. Seems like a silly decision to remove it.
Its still there in the DirectX 11 version i guess
You are the really the benchmark king 👏
While I'm not experiencing any problems with this update, it still makes me very happy to know that future CDPR-Games will run Unreal 5. It just shows again how difficult the red engine is to handle.
Shows how garbage the engine is 🤣
@@christophervanzetta Well it still gave me two of the best games i've ever played, so there's that. I'm eager to see what they can do without being hold back by the engine.
Thank you so much for these optimised settings guide. Digital Foundry used to do this but stopped in recent years. I'm glad I have another channel to check on this.
Then there is no point in a new version. It's easier to download the old one and install mods.
Thank you, Witcher 3 has been my favourite game for sometime. The update gives it new life, and your research and video gives me a guide to replaying it without too much grief, thanks.
Time consuming setting optimisations and experimentation done so we don't have to. Much appreciated👍
it differs each machine though
This is exactly what I needed. Thank you so much for the work you put into making this :)
Thanks man. Went from 70 avg fps to 90 without the game looking different to my eyes. You're the king of optimization guides. One thing I would add is to manually update the DLSS files. Using the latest one makes the performance mode look identical to the default quality mode. So you can either stick to quality for same fps and much more beautiful image, or keep same visual quality but add more fps.
thanks, I was so troubled
Great content, underrated channel. hope you keep going, looking forward to more optimisation videos and curious if you'll go back to some older games with recent updates and do optimisation vids on those (cyberpunk for example)
In case anybody is not aware, when a new DLSS 2.x update is available, you don't need to wait for CDPR to patch the game. Techpowerup has the file available for download when a new one is released. It's just a dll file you replace in your game folder. You can also have Techpowerup notify you when there's an update if you give them an email address. So far there have been 2 updates to DLSS since the game was released.
Dude I have sat there many times switching on n off settings looking at the changes and performance hits or gains. So I know it took a while to make this video, u have to try all kinds of combinations then go run around test the effects out then switch em up and do it again and again. My system is a hp vitcus the cheaper option with a 2050 4gvram ryzen 5 and 32 g ram . Anyone who has similar specs I run everything on medium and a few settings on high ( I don’t remember the specific settings on high) and I use the dlss . It runs pretty smoothly except every once in awhile in the big city it’s gets over loaded and I have to turn off ray tracing, it’s weird though sometimes it doesn’t lag and sometimes it does in the city idk y but just just switch off the ray tracing if it starts acting a fool. Good video man I wish I had it when I was trying to figure out what worked best could have save me alot of time
your channel has helped me optimize nearly every game in my library and i can’t thank you enough for it. You’re the king of graphics optimization on youtube ❤
Very well covered mate, thanks for the efforts
Pretty well done, good video.
Thank you for your time.
Can’t wait to use these settings once I get back home! You got a new subscriber, thank you so much
Great video! This is one of those channels that I can easily see going above 500K+ subscribers with consistency!
Great and informative video, Mr. BenchmarKing. Straight and to the point, while keeping things simply described and highlighted. Thank you so much for this.
Amazing stuff bro, easy and fast to understand
turned some stuff down to high and got around 15-20% boost with negligible visual difference.
thanks
great video, I was having optimization problems, and it helped me a lot
You got a new subscriber man. Keep em coming. Thanks alot fellow brother
Vid was 7 months ago but thanks man straight to the point and fast while still hittin the 10 min mark
Not bad g
Much better than the Digital Foundry video. Subscribed.
Thanks for the vídeo as always! I Will try this settings tomorrow
Great video! Thanks for your research!
This is my go to channel for looking at optimization videos, thanks for another great video
Thanks for your great content man ❤👏🏻
Thank you for this! Amazing video. Helped me get way more fps without sacrificing visual quality!
Exactly what I was looking for. Thank you!
With your settings and DLSS on balanced I pull 120-144 on my 2070 super/ 8700k. Thanks bubba.
wtf??? I have a 2070s and a better processor than you and I can't run it at all, I always get low GPU and CPU usage, no matter the setting, resolution, etc.
@@Gadottinho What the heck? Did you mess with the nvidia control panel at all? I leave it stock except for preferred refresh is at highest available and my texture filtering is at high performance.
Where were you all my life this channel is hidden gem
Great video! Well explained and detailed, thanks a lot!
Thanks really needed this (I've never played the witcher in my life)
thanks, the witcher 3 has been my favourite game for sometime
Ton work here man, thank you so much for this video.
Saved me a lot of time :D
Appreciate it a lot! such detailed comparison is so helpfull!
Subscribed G. Lots of effort is put in your videos. Take care.
Pretty cool video, analyzing systematically. Thanks!
each graphics settings breakdown and explained very well. so we know how effects system. and THE BEST optimisation ideas in this channel. thank you King! Also need a mini v4.04 guide or ideas. Long live the BencmarKing!
What a gold mine channel!!!! Love your work ❤️❤️❤️
Damn , didnt even know i needed this. Thank you!
Great video!! Definitely deserved a sub. My 7900 xtx is crashing this game on full ultra+ with no RT because it's bugged or not good at all. However, I will still use your settings because they just make sense.
You're the real MVP. Give the man his roses 🌹
Eiiii it happening !!
Thank you
Good content as usual
I will enjoy my holiday being a witcher