Overview
Make Squad (v10) look better and play smoother.
Intro
I’ve created a guide to help you maximize visuals & performance in Squad. This guide is based on my system specs, If you have a comparable system or better, you shouldn’t have issues with these settings.
Asus Z97 Sabertooth Mark 1 MOBO, Intel i7-4790K (OC to 4.5 ghz), 32gb of system ram, PNY XLR8 GTX1080, Nvidia Graphics Driver v388.71
Even slower rigs can benefit from tweaking Nvidia Control Panel settings and locking the frame rate with Nvidia Inspector . You’ll just have to adjust in-game settings to what runs best on your system.
Note: Follow the first two steps in the order below (Creating Nvidia Control Panel game profile followed by Nvidia Inspector).
First things first…
Make sure to clear Squads “datacache” after it updates from ver9 to v10. It’s recommended by the developer and you should do this after major updates or version change. Some performance issues and graphics quirks can be attributed to not performing this first step.
Note: Write down your Sqaud in-game settings, clearing the cache will reset everything (key binds, graphics & audio settings, etc.).
This is the official procedure as posted in Feb 5 news release.
Image Source: Offworld Industries.
[link]
NVIDIA Control Panel Settings
Selecting The PhysX Processor.
(1): Open NVIDIA Control panel.
(2): Select “Configure Surround, PhysX”.
(3): Select your GPU in the pull down menu (right).
Create game profile for Squad.
(1):Select “Manage 3D Settings” (Left).
(2): Select “Program Settings” (Right).
(3): Click “Add”.
(4): Select “Squad” from list, or, “browse” button, direct it to Squad installation & “Squad.exe”.
(5): Click “Add Selected Program”.
Change Squad profile settings.
(1): Make sure Squad is selected in the “Select a program to customize” pull down.
(2): Enter settings based on the 2 images below.
(3): Click “APPLY”.
(4): Close NVIDIA Control Panel.
Setting up Nvidia Inspector.
Download and install Nvidia Inspector.
Download:
[link]
Manual:
[link]
(1): Run Nvidia Inspector and click the small Nvidia logo icon (This opens Profile Inspector). Some people have had issues with icon not working, you can run “nvidiaProfileInspector” instead (from where you installed Nvidia Inspector).
(2): Select Squad in pull down menu (little home icon).
(3): Set frame limiter to 60 fps (most monitors are 60hz) or to your monitors maximum refresh rate if you have higher refresh rate gaming display.
(4): Remember to clck “Apply: (top right).
Note:Leave other settings to default, you can adjust other settings if you know what you’re doing. Otherwise leave them be.
Squad Graphics Options.
These are my in-game graphics settings and It runs a steady 60fps, Sometimes it will drop down a few frames (54-55) during large engagements with tons of particles flying around. However, generally it’s smooth.
If you need a little more performance gain, try turning off ambient occlusion (a big frame hit) and lower shadows one notch.
Turn Off Windows 10 Game DVR & Game Bar
Turn off the dreaded Windows 10 Game DVR & Gamebar. They cause lag & frame drops on so many games, including Squad. There are many other programs to record or steam games with (IE: OBS, Xsplit, Fraps, etc…).
Go to Windows settings and kill these:
Final Notes
(1): Install Squad on a SSD instead of Spindle based hard drive. It will vastly improve loading times (trust me on this).
(2): Close all unnecessary applications (IE: Google chrome, background porn, satellite tracking, etc…).
(3): Temporarily disable all downloads, YouTube videos, etc, and give Squad all the bandwidth you have.
(4): If you have more than 16gb of system ram, enable “Preload Textures” in Squads Graphics Options. It’ll preload textures, thus improve performance (it’ll increase map loading times a bit, but well worth the performance boost).
Basically just run Steam, Squad, Discord/TS.
Meatsac’s System Performance Guide
Checkout my other guide for system performance tips.
[link]