1
Setting Up TSW with a single nVidia card, using nVidia
Control Panel (NVCP) PLUS (optional) nVidia Inspector
(NVI).
Single Standard and GSync Monitor settings.
Setting up DSR in TSW • This is a guide to setting up TSW on a computer equipped with a nVidia
graphics card and Intel CPU.
• Not all the menu items in NVCP will show in your system – any not shown in the
guide - Google their function
• Standard Monitor – any non-GSync Monitor (does not include Free Sync
Monitors).
• Some screenshots differ from current TSW, but they are still applicable.
• SLI video cards not covered nor AMD cards.
Table of Contents
Item Page Nos
Setting Up TSW with a single nVidia card, using nVidia Control Panel
(NVCP) GLOBAL Settings ALL Monitor 2 - 4
NVCP recommended settings for TSW incl GSync 5
Screen Settings in TSW - Graphics settings 6
TSW Settings explained and recommendations 7
TSW Advanced Settings 8-9
TSW Settings in NVCP (incl GSync) 10
TSW Settings in NVI (incl GSync) 11
NVI – TSW Settings Explained 12 - 18
Setting Up TSW for DSR 19 – 20
Optional NVCP Settings 21 - 23
No settings for TV’s but the guide may give general guidelines to follow.
Pages 5 and 11 can be used to set up TSW visuals quickly.
2
Setting Up TSW with a single nVidia card, using nVidia
Control Panel (NVCP)
NVCP open and choose “Manage 3D settings” and then “Program Settings”
If there is NO entry for TSW, then you have to create a profile for TSW by choosing
the Add button.
If we are using the “override” and “enhance” option, we need to set the AA/AF
settings as high as possible in NVCP plus NVI if used. Using “Application Controlled
use minimum settings.
Study http://www.tweakguides.com/NVFORCE_5.html
Note the settings in the pictures below. Some of the options may differ depending on
what components you have in your system. Highlight each option to display what the
setting does.
First: – Setup NVCP GLOBAL Settings Important for best TSW results.
• Anisotropic Filtering AF: AF significantly improves texture quality at oblique
angles. Anisotropic filtering generally comes in 2x, 4x, 8x, and 16x settings,
"AF can function with anisotropy levels between 1 (no scaling) and 16, defining
the maximum degree which a mipmap can be scaled by. Try 4, 8 and/or 16.
• Anti-Aliasing (AA) – FXAA: Fast Approximate Anti-Aliasing – see description
above. Turn ON works well in TSW and improves image quality.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_approximate_anti-aliasing
3
• AA Gamma Correction: Turn ON. This setting is designed to adjust the
brightness level of the image using Gamma Correction, so that any AA edges
display with “best” level of contrast. No performance impacts. (ref tweak guide
above.)
• AA Mode: “Off”; “Application Controlled”; “Enhance the Application Setting”;
“Override any Application” setting. For this example, choose “enhanced”.
• AA Setting: “Application Controlled”; 2x, 4x, 8x; “Custom (using NVI)”.
Choose one to see which suits your card best.
• AA Transparency: “OFF”; “Multi-Sampling”; “2x SS”; “4x SS”, “8x Super
Sample” Best set “OFF” to avoid compatibility issues but also choose one to see
which suits your card best.
• CUDA GPU’s: Best set to ALL This is for a single card remember?
• DSR Factors: Explained below: Tick the higher resolution(s) you wish to use in
a game under the “DSR - Factors setting”. The resolutions are provided as
multiples of your native resolution. See below. Options: OFF, 1.2, 1.5, 1.78,
2.00, 2.25, 3.00 or 4.00. Trial and error for your card. It may not be wise to
use DSR if you intend to use a screen percentage >100 in TSW. If DSR is set
top 4K then no other AA setting is required!
• DSR Smoothness: Simply, 0% on the slider will remove blurring and provide
crisp images, but as we get close to 100% on the slider, the image become
blurry and may lose detail. The default setting is 33% is not too bad, you need
to experiment to see what suits your system. – For TSW try 15 - 20%.
• Maximum Pre-Rendered Frames: “use 3D application Setting”; “1”; “2”; “3”;
or “4”. Note 5, 6 and 7 available in NVI. See the tweak guide above. Windows
default is “3” Note “1-4” reduces input lag and “5-7” smoother frame rates.
• Monitor Technology: It only shows if you have a GSync Monitor. Not
important.
• Multi-Frame Sampling AA MFAA: only for >GTX 900 cards. Options: “ON or
“OFF”. TSW probably does not support MFAA so leave OFF!
• Open GL Rendering GPU: Not applicable to TSW – leave at Auto-Select.
• Optimize for Compute Performance: “OFF”; “ON” - Not applicable to TSW
leave “OFF”
• Power Management Mode: Options “Optimal Power”; “Adaptive” or “Prefer
Maximum Performance”. I use “Prefer Maximum Performance” because of
my GSync monitor, but “Optimal” is the default choice. Note: Set power
options under Windows.
• Preferred Refresh rate: (may not be present in all systems). There are two
options: "Application controlled" and "Highest Available". Try both.in
some games application controlled gives better results.
4
NVCP Global Settings TSW Continued:
• Shader Cache: “OFF”; “ON” – use ON for TSW and store on fastest drive i.e.
SSD
• Texture Filtering Anisotropic Optimization: “OFF”; “ON” – use OFF.
• Texture Filtering – Negative LOD Bias: “ALLOW or “CLAMP choose
“ALLOW” – clamp no longer supported.
• Texture Filtering – Quality: Best use “High Quality”.
• Texture Filtering – Trilinear Optimization: “OFF”; “ON” – use OFF.
• Threaded Optimization: Settings “AUTO”; “ON”; “OFF”. Use AUTO in global
settings but “OFF” in TSW
• Triple Buffering: “OFF”; “ON” – use OFF in Global & TSW - does not apply to
DirectX games like TSW.
• Vertical Sync: Options: “use the 3D application Settings”; “OFF”; “ON”;
“FAST”; “ADAPTIVE” “ADAPTIVE HALF REFRES RATE”. GLOBAL Set Vertical
Sync to Use the 3D Application Setting. TSW try the various settings for
your system – “Adaptive” and limit fps via STEAM to say 30 fps – possibly best
option.
For TSW using a GSync Monitor using “FAST” can give good results, but still
probably best to “use 3D application setting” in Global.
• Virtual Reality Pre-Rendered Frames: Options: “use the 3D application
setting”, 1, 2, 3 or 4. Set Global and TSW “Use the 3D application setting”
or anything. This setting only affects those who have Virtual Reality hardware
and is beyond my pay grade.
5
NVCP recommended settings for TSW incl GSync First add TSW to Program settings in NVCP:
Navigate to \Steam\steamapps\common\Train Sim World\WindowsNoEditor\
TS2Prototype.exe
TSW Resolution Settings in NVCP
To your preference – Windows default best
6
Screen Settings in TSW - Graphics settings
Screen Resolution - Native resolution is the same as Windows default (e.g.
2560x1440)
Windows Mode
Graphics pre-set
Anti-Aliasing
VSync
Screen percentage 200% TSW DSR type option - use with higher card
Always “SAVE” – “APPLY” “E” key, any settings
TSW Graphics settings
7
TSW Settings explained and recommendations
• Screen Resolution: If NOT using DSR always choose the Windows Default Resolution.
It takes less CPU resources. Choose a lower resolution if frame rates are poor.
• Windows Mode: Best is full-screen but try Windowed and Windowed Full Screen to
see which is best.
• Graphics Preset: “ULTRA”, “HIGH”, “MEDIUM”, & “LOW”
Use Ultra and/or High with any card > GTX 960/970
Low with GTX 950 and lower.
Start with Low move up in steps for best frame rates and quality. very demanding on
PC.
• Antialiasing: “TAA”, “FXAA”, “NONE”
Antialiasing: It's a method that can smooth jagged lines or textures by blending the
colour of an edge pixel with the colour of the immediate pixels around it. The result is
usually a smooth realistic appearance, with little or no flickering. AA Anti-Aliasing can
be quite demanding, and you could turn down/off if TSW is not running smoothly.
4K resolution usually does not require anti-aliasing, due to the pixels being extremely
small, hence, any aliasing effect applied has no benefit.
Turn off AA settings in NVCP and/or TSW (“NONE”) when running DSR at 4K or using a
4K monitor.
• TAA: Temporal AntiAliasing is a very quick method that sadly results in blurriness
particularly in TSW. TAA can reduce temporal aliasing (crawling and flickering seen in
motion when playing games). It uses a down-sampling method so there may be
interactions when using DSR. It displays better in 4K mode if your monitor supports it!
It uses more resources than FXAA. looks good on fences and foliage as a train is
passing.
Note: I used “enhance the application” in NVCP/NVI and use SSAA options which
seems to help.
• FXAA Fast-Approximate Anti-Aliasing: FXAA uses very little computing/video
resources and it simply applies extensive blurring to obscure the jagged edges. The
end result is unnoticeable performance impact but a generally blurrier image. Quite
useful on low end PC’s. SSAA better on high end systems.
• None: can result in flickering of edges. In that case try using the higher Screen
Percentage 200% - my help.
• VSync (Vertical Synchronization) Stops tearing when panning around.
For Standard Monitors Use Fast in NVCP and off in TSW.
For GSync monitors, the VSync option in the NVIDIA Control Panel is a special type of
G-Sync-aware VSync, which only kicks in at high framerates. NVIDIA has optimized
this to work well with G-Sync. The best option is: to enable VSync in the NVIDIA
Control Panel but disable it in TSW. I set this to FAST Sync in NVCP and turn off in
TSW.
• Screen Percentage: A sort of “TSW down-sampling”, usually getting a better image
approaching 200%. (Set lower on most mid-range system). A good ball park figure is
150 to 200%. If using NVCP DSR set at 100%.
8
TSW Advanced Settings
Figure 5
TSW Advanced Settings explained and
recommendations:
Note: High and Medium Settings may work just as well as “Ultra” so be prepared to
experiment on your rig.
1. Foliage Quality “ULTRA”, “HIGH”, “MEDIUM”, & “LOW”
Use Ultra and/or High with any card > GTX 960/970
Low with GTX 950 and lower.
Low/Medium Foliage settings not too much impact on image quality. Displays
trees, leaves, grass etc. This setting affects performance (frame rates), we
need a mid/high end video card and enough video memory, for your screen
resolution. Hence, reduce it on lower-spec machines.
2. Shadow Quality “OFF”, “HIGH”, “MEDIUM”, & “LOW”
Use High and/or Medium with any card > GTX 960/970
Low/Off with GTX 950 and lower.
Setting the shadow quality high for your PC can affect performance. It is best
to work from a low setting and increase it to monitor any performance effects.
3. Effects Quality “OFF”, “HIGH”, “MEDIUM”, & “LOW”
Use High and/or Medium with any card > GTX 960/970
Low/Off with GTX 950 and lower.
This displays the amount of detail you see on the game surfaces, e.g. both on
9
consists and on the landscape. It is processor dependent so start off low and
work your way up to High. Low end PC’s turn OFF.
4. Post Process Quality “ULTRA”, “HIGH”, “MEDIUM”, & “LOW”
Use Ultra and/or High with any card > GTX 960/970
Low with GTX 950 and lower.
This is used to process certain graphical effects such as fog and bloom. PPQ
needs good on video card performance and memory (VRAM), and the resolution
of your monitor. On lower end PCs, it is probably best set to LOW. It cannot be
turned off in TSW.
Setting this to low can remove motion blur or use the following
Navigate to: Documents\My
Games\TS2Prototype\Saved\Config\WindowsNoEditor
Open Engine.ini in your favourite text editor
Add these two lines to the bottom:
[/script/engine.renderersettings]
r.DefaultFeature.MotionBlur=False
Save the file. Now, when you load the game, motion blur is disabled
completely.
5. View Distance Quality “ULTRA”, “HIGH”, “MEDIUM”, & “LOW”
Choose the best for your system.
This option sets how far ahead of your consist is displayed. This option needs
mid to high system performance, so users of less powerful PCs should reduce it
to ‘Medium’ or ‘Low’.
The value in the engine .ini file is a round 2, change to 3 – better quality good
fps, 4 to 20, good v little popping, but has an effect on fps/
From a post on the DTG Forums by Daniel Bloch: Apparently you can change
this in the engine.ini add these 2 lines and the popping sleepers are gone:
\Documents\My Games\TS2Prototype\Saved\Config\WindowsNoEditor
[/script/engine.renderersettings]
r.ViewDistanceScale=4
6. Texture Quality “ULTRA”, “HIGH”, “MEDIUM”, & “LOW”
Use Ultra and/or High with any card > GTX 960/970
Low with GTX 950 and lower.
Low/Medium Texture Quality not too much impact on image quality
Note: Texture quality generally enhances TSW quality by rendering better
textures. Ultra-Texture is the highest setting requiring a high-end system and
will probably change all the textures in TSW. Ultra/High should give sharper and
less-blurry images.
7. Max FPS: Choose between 20 and Unlimited to obtain smooth results.
GSync Monitors use Unlimited with i5/i7 processors with SSD’s.
That’s it now re-open TSW and see if the settings are to your liking?
pH Sept 2018
10
TSW Settings in NVCP (incl GSync)
NVCP – TSW Settings Upper
NVCP – TSW Settings Lower
11
TSW Settings in NVI (incl GSync)
Note NVI available from: https://www.guru3d.com/files-details/nvidia-inspector-
download.html Reference: http://wiki.step-project.com/Guide:NVIDIA_Inspector
Important Note: Make any changes to TS 2018 settings in nVidia Control Panel
First NVI will override those settings - any changes to TS 2018 settings must be
made in NVI last, otherwise they will be lost.
Part 2 cont . . .
12
NVI – TSW Settings Explained:
NVI – TSW Frame Rate Limiter
NVI TSW GSync Requested & Application States
13
NVI TSW Max Pre-Rendered Frames
NVI TSW Refresh Rate
14
NVI – TSW VSync
NVI – TSW Behaviour Flags
15
NVI - TSW AA Gamma
NVI – TSW AA Mode
16
NVI – TSW – AA Settings
NVI-TSW AA Transparency & Multi-Sampling
17
NVI-TSW AA Transparency SS
NVI – TSW MFAA & FXAA Settings
18
NVI – TSW Texture Filtering
Note: Quality: TF - Anisotropic Sample Optimization is set to Off, & TF - Trilinear Optimization is set to
On.
High Quality: TF - Anisotropic Sample Optimization is set to Off, & TF - Trilinear Optimization is set to
Off (it shows as being On but is ignored by the driver).
NVI – TSW - Common
19
Setting Up TSW for DSR
Needs reasonable spec nVidia card (GTX 970 upwards with at least 2GB VRAM
onboard up to 24” monitor (more VRAM for larger monitors). Use 100% or less
Screen Percentage in Screen settings TSW.
Right click on the desktop and choose “nVidia control Panel” – see below.
Open NVCP and first use “Manage 3D Settings” and “Global Settings”. The
settings her can be anything that suits you. We are going to concentrate on DSR
Factors and smoothness.
DSR – good article here: https://techreport.com/review/27102/maxwell-dynamic-
super-resolution-explored and
https://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3587/~/how-to-enable-
dynamic-super-resolution-in-games.
Steam article: nVidia:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=926768944
and AMD https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=907171634
20
Setting up DSR –
This can only be done in “Global Settings” –
DSR smoothness set to 12 – 18% i.e. the lowest % that eliminates shimmer as higher
smoothing (>65%) settings tend to blur textures.
If using 4.00x and/or 4K monitor, try 0% in DSR Smoothness
Note DSR factors range from 2x default/native resolution of your monitor to 4x (4K).
Also, Google Downsampling. https://www.tested.com/tech/pcs/454383-aliasing-be-
gone-how-downsample-pc-games/
pH August 2018
21
Nvidia Control Panel Miscellaneous settings
These settings are optional but may make a difference depending on your Monitor,
Video card, etc.
Adjust Video Image Settings
Ref https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/hqv-2-radeon-geforce,2844-3.html
Use the nVidia Setting
Option Effect Setting
Edge enhancement Sharpens the detail of edges 0 - 25%
Noise reduction Reduces speckles 25 – 60%
De-interlacing - Inverse telecine Smooth Accurate Playback Enabled
22
NVCP TSW Adjust Video Colour Settings
Dynamic Range: Monitor: 0 - 255 range.
NVCP TSW Adjust Desktop Colour Settings
23
NVCP – TSW Display Change Resolution