Dark Souls 3 Optimization Guide

I've discovered some pretty simple ways of increasing overall FPS and smoothness in Dark souls 3 so i thought i would share them.

Unparking CPU

What is CPU unparking ?

Cores are unparked by default. Parking is something that an operating system can do to put a core to sleep when there's not enough work to do to justify keeping it powered up.
When threads (and/or processes depending on the operating system's model) become ready for execution the operating system has a decision to make. If one or more cores are parked it can wake them up and load the thread/process onto the logical processor representing that core. However, this causes the microprocessor to consume more power. Alternatively it can keep the cores parked and simply throw the thread/process onto the ready queue. This causes the thread/process to wait longer in the queue than it would normally, but avoids waking the core.

I'm not certain what mathematical model Windows uses by default to determine when to unpark cores, but it's most likely some sort of moving average of utilization or queuing delay. In fact, it may be faster to simply wait in the queue and run on a logical processor that's already unparked rather than wait for one that is parked to be awoken. Once the utilization level rises above a certain threshold (where utilization is the fraction of time spent running processes other than the idle process) or the mean time spent in the ready queue exceeds a certain value it would make sense to wake a core up. Various power settings most likely just move these setpoints around. It is possible to configure the operating system to never park cores at all but it already does a very good job of handling this on its own.
Source - http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-2166508/unparking-cpu-cores.html#13425539

Using software like CPU core parking manager will Unpark your CPU cores for you but you can do it manually though it can be a little difficult for non-techsavy people.

How to use CPU core parking manager:

YouTube™ Video: How to unpark cores on your PC to get better FPS when gaming! | BananaGaming
Views: 297,110
How to unpark cores. Unparking Program: http://www.coderbag.com/programming-c/disable-cpu-core-parking-utility Search in regedit: 0cc5b647-c1df-4637-891a-dec35c318583 This will help in all games, not...


Unparking your CPU cores give you a small but worthy FPS boost as shown here:
Parked(47.7FPS) http://i.imgur.com/JeHnrxo.jpg
Unparked(53.6FPS) http://i.imgur.com/bjtc5cU.jpg

Unparking your CPU cores definitely increases FPS at least on AMD CPU's. Remember FPS increases will wary depending on your system but primarily your CPU. Some report getting higher increases on AMD CPU's and Intel CPU's so keep this in mind.
Keep in mind that Unparking your CPU's will only help if your CPU is bottlenecking the games performance.

CPU core parking manager: http://coderbag.com/programming-c/cpu-core-parking-manager


Overclocking your CPU and/or GPU

Overclocking your CPU/GPU can be scary but it's actually quite enjoyable of a task when you do it right and see the performance gains from it. I won't go into too much details on overclocking because making a guide on how to do that is frankly just stupid since there are a lot better overclocking guides out there than i can possible make. Just be careful when overclocking it can/will reduce the lifespan of your CPU/GPU. There is also the risk of permanently destroying your CPU/GPU though these are uncommon they do happen from time to time if you're not careful.
Intel CPU focused overlocking guide http://lifehacker.com/a-beginners-introduction-to-overclocking-your-intel-pr-5580998
AMD CPU focused overlocking guide http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/phenom-overclock-athlon,2161.html

For GPU's the guides are pretty similar on both the Nvidia and AMD end so thiswill do: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/faq/id-2749337/safe-gpu-overclocking-guide-2015.html


Game "Boosters"
No just don't. Yes they can be beneficial for systems with 4-6GB of RAM but the effects are pretty minor. I've personally tested Razer Cortex and it's decent though it messes with the Steam overlay FPS counter and doubles the original value which is strange. It doesn't install any malware/spyware as far as i could tell.
Keep in mind that you have to register an account to be able to use the boost function.
Razer Cortex - http://www.razerzone.com/cortex


Capping the game at 30 FPS
If you can't reach the golden 60 FPS mark in Dark Souls 3 and are experiencing stuttering you should consider capping the game at 30 FPS. This is most likely reduce the stuttering you experience dramatically since your CPU/GPU don't have to work overtime do get the next frame ready. This will make the game appear less choppy and hopefully smoother. Since Dark souls 3 doesn't support capping the FPS we will need to "Trick" it into that we're running a 30Hz monitor. This can easily be done in your GPU provider's control panel.


For Nvidia users:
Go to Nvidia Control Panel(Search for it in the start menu) then Manage 3D Settings then click on Program settings. Find darksoulsiii.exe and click add. Now find the feature Maximum pre-rendered frames and set it to "2" . For the last setting scroll all the way down until you find Vertical Sync set it to "Adaptive half refresh rate". Next click the apply button and you're done.


For AMD users:
AMD users can cap their FPS to 30 FPS by Radeon program and go to the Tweaks tab. Set VSync control to "Always On (Double Vsync)".

-Thanks to Void of Entity for pointing that one out.-

My system
CPU: AMD FX-8320(4.4GHz)
GPU: GTX 960(4GB, +200 Core, +200 Memory)
Dark Souls 3 on SSD: Yes
RAM: 14 GB(1688 MHz)
Post below if you have any questions or tests i can do.

Unparking CPU

What is CPU unparking ?

Originally posted by Pinhedd:

Cores are unparked by default. Parking is something that an operating system can do to put a core to sleep when there's not enough work to do to justify keeping it powered up.
When threads (and/or processes depending on the operating system's model) become ready for execution the operating system has a decision to make. If one or more cores are parked it can wake them up and load the thread/process onto the logical processor representing that core. However, this causes the microprocessor to consume more power. Alternatively it can keep the cores parked and simply throw the thread/process onto the ready queue. This causes the thread/process to wait longer in the queue than it would normally, but avoids waking the core.

I'm not certain what mathematical model Windows uses by default to determine when to unpark cores, but it's most likely some sort of moving average of utilization or queuing delay. In fact, it may be faster to simply wait in the queue and run on a logical processor that's already unparked rather than wait for one that is parked to be awoken. Once the utilization level rises above a certain threshold (where utilization is the fraction of time spent running processes other than the idle process) or the mean time spent in the ready queue exceeds a certain value it would make sense to wake a core up. Various power settings most likely just move these setpoints around. It is possible to configure the operating system to never park cores at all but it already does a very good job of handling this on its own.

Source - Source[www.tomshardware.co.uk]

Using software like CPU core parking manager will Unpark your CPU cores for you but you can do it manually though it can be a little difficult for non-techsavy people.

How to use CPU core parking manager:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fKxZ1mq9KA

Unparking your CPU cores give you a small but worthy FPS boost as shown here:

Parked(47.7FPS)

Unparked(53.6FPS)

Unparking your CPU cores definitely increases FPS at least on AMD CPU's. Remember FPS increases will wary depending on your system but primarily your CPU. Some report getting higher increases on AMD CPU's and Intel CPU's so keep this in mind.
Keep in mind that Unparking your CPU's will only help if your CPU is bottlenecking the game's performance and not your GPU(Video Card).

CPU core parking manager[coderbag.coCPUm]

Overclocking your CPU and/or GPU

Overclocking your CPU/GPU can be scary but it's actually quite enjoyable of a task when you do it right and see the performance gains from it. I won't go into too much details on overclocking because making a guide on how to do that is frankly just stupid since there are a lot better overclocking guides out there than i can possible make. Just be careful when overclocking it can/will reduce the lifespan of your CPU/GPU. There is also the risk of permanently destroying your CPU/GPU though these are uncommon they do happen from time to time if you're not careful.


Intel CPU focused overlocking guide[lifehacker.com]
AMD CPU focused overlocking guide[lifehacker.comhttp]

For GPU's the guides are pretty similar on both the Nvidia and AMD end so this will do: Safe GPU Overclocking Guide 2015[www.tomshardware.co.uk]

Game "Boosters"

No just don't. Yes they can be beneficial for systems with 4-6GB of RAM but the effects are pretty minor. I've personally tested Razer Cortex and it's decent though it messes with the Steam overlay FPS counter and doubles the original value which is strange. It doesn't install any malware/spyware as far as i could tell.
Keep in mind that you have to register an account to be able to use the boost function.
Razer Cortex[www.razerzone.com]

I would give this article a read before you decide to use any form of game "boosters" a try
Benchmarked: Will a “Game Booster” Improve Your PC Gaming Performance?[www.howtogeek.com]

Capping the game at 30 FPS(Half Refresh Rate)

If you can't reach the golden 60 FPS mark in Dark Souls 3 and are experiencing stuttering you should consider capping the game at 30 FPS. This is most likely reduce the stuttering you experience dramatically since your CPU/GPU don't have to work overtime do get the next frame ready. This will make the game appear less choppy and hopefully smoother. Since Dark souls 3 doesn't support capping the FPS we will need to "Trick" it into that we're running a 30Hz monitor. This can easily be done in your GPU provider's control panel.


For Nvidia users
Go to Nvidia Control Panel(Search for it in the start menu) then Manage 3D Settings then click on Program settings. Find darksoulsiii.exe and click add. Now find the feature Maximum pre-rendered frames and set it to "2" . For the last setting scroll all the way down until you find Vertical Sync set it to "Adaptive half refresh rate". Next click the apply button and you're done.




For AMD users
AMD users can cap their FPS to 30 FPS by RadeonPro program and go to the Tweaks tab. Set VSync control to "Always On (Double Vsync)".

-Thanks to Void of Entity for pointing that one out.-

(If anyone could contribute by making a GIF on how to change Vsync on the radeon software please PM or post below. You can use ShareX if you're unsure how to make GIF's.)

My system

CPU AMD FX-8320(4.4GHz)
GPU GTX 960(4GB, +200 Core, +200 Memory)
Dark Souls 3 on SSD Yes
RAM 14 GB(1688 MHz)
Post below if you have any questions or tests i can do.

[Creepdimensions]

Sorry if I wasn't clear on what I was talking about.

[Creepdimensions]

The Maximum Pre rendered rate you mentioned however does work. I have it set to 2 just as you instructed its just the vertical sync

[Creepdimensions]

In the control panel it does offer information on the settings seen in that gif of yours however as stated before it does not offer those options regardless only descriptions of it.

[Creepdimensions]

By the by I got Gtx 940M. Its old about 3 years prior I believe probably older

[Creepdimensions]

Hello its 2019 and this severely needs an update. The Nvidia gif is no longer "useful". The control panel has changed in such a way that it does not have the amount of options thats seen in the gif. I only have three options: Yes, No, and Use Global settings.

[Zurreal]

Now I only need to find any thread on the bloody internet about my problem with Dark souls 3 creating memory leaks that always crashes the game after creating a character, have yet to find any fucking info on the subject, its been days.....help meeee

[Sir Asian Von Preeze]

@Dangerous Beef I'm kinda tired of putting my stupid self out there to be ridiculed publicly when it comes to questions I have about this. Would you mind me messaging you some really dumb questions about how to increase the performance on my hardware.

[SpacePirate]

@Father Sad

Thanks :)

[Brother Warren]

Very nice info. Thank you for the help. Your humor is also fun to read.

[SpacePirate]

@Orhan
Well you can try but it's quite dangerous, better not have a beef with ur pc.