GTX260 is worse then 8800GT
 

Title says it all... I have been playing this game for over a month (only pc game i have) with my old 8800GT using medium settings but i wanted all the eye candy this game offers so i went out today and bought a new BFG Geforce GTX 260 OC with 896 GDDR3 plus a 650w ps thinking i was taking a big step up. Well what a waste of $300. Whats this game need to run perfect? Is there a way to see what my framerates are while playing? Thanks for any ideas anyone has before i try to return this card.

I will try to answer you just to the first question, I don't know the correct answer for the second one. Unfortunately, it seems that one of this game problems (not mentioning now DRM and the critical bugs related strictly to gameplay) is the fact that the game graphical engine is not optimized in the best way possible, so probably even if you will have one NASA computer, you won't still be able to play this game like you can play for example Bioshock 2 with a good system available on the market today. I think it's not Nvidia's fault this time ...

Ctl-F8

Yep, the game has some performance issues. its not your gpu. If you slapped a new 480 on it it would still probably lag.

5870 seems to run ok . AAX4 AFX16 1920x1080 . All SH5 graphic settings set to max . All options ticked except vertical sync .

I have noticed that if i put the card in control panel to optimal settings , the picture will be better and i get around 35fps average . If i put the standard settings to high quality and then bump the aa up 4x and af up to 16x and leave the other settings then i get around 120 fps average .
http://img717.imageshack.us/img717/7771/fpsu.jpg

I run SH 5 on my Duo 6850 4gigs ram with 8800GT as well maxed without AA and Shadows at 1440x900 with no magor pblem exept some mouse lag on interior no big deal.

There is no way I am going to upgrate my GT for this game when I run the majority of the latest games on max settings at DX9 without problems. GTX260 even if it stocked and not OC edition is a magor upgrate from a 8800GT. As Task Force and Stronghold wrote problem comes with game not with gfx cards.

New 1GB GTS250 - a lower end $150 model. Running HDMI into 32" 1080i monitor at 1280x720, 60MHz refresh (it's somewhere in there, anyway. Running 5:4 unwindowed as 16:9 doesn't work at all well!) No problems and only lag is in interior - which I rarely use (a nice novelty, but talking to the crew does nothing for the unmodded morale issue, so, why bother? Grows old...FAST!)

I have a GTX275 and SHV flies on it with no major glitches. So i dont see why the 260 would specifically have issues.

Its the fact its not optimized, I'm running a 5870 and with maxed settings or lowest settings the control room always stutters, and the mouse lags about. ANYWHERE else on the sub its smooth as you would imagine a monster gpu like the 5870 would run.

Edit: I would like to mention that with vsync off the game runs just fine on any settings High, Med, Low, Custom. So I'm inclined to think the vsync is the issue.. as the shadows make no difference on my system.

The prior posters are correct in that for whatever reasons, SH5 (and 4 too) are more GPU-demanding than other high-end graphics games.

Check the temperature - your card may be getting too hot. I have a fully water-cooled system and my 2-year-old 260 runs SH5 butter smooth at max settings, 1900x1080 (Samsung 37" :DL). That is, except for a little bit of hesitation mousing around in the control room which seems to afflict everyone regardless of GPU. Shadows on/off makes no difference in frame rates.

I have a 5770 and everything maxed, but have to turn off vsync as well.
Everything runs great. I upgraded from an 8800 GT, which ran the game ok, except for shadows. Maybe the patch will take care of some of these issues.

Hmm, try setting the nvidia contorl panel choose the settings if your haveing issues with Nvidia, I knoticed a improvement with that.
game runs nice with a smaller resolution with everything on high on my 8800gts.

Here are some details of my problem. I have been playing with this now for 24 hours. Pc specs are Intel Q6600 step, 4 gig ddr2@1066, 650w ps, Rez@1920x1080, Win7 64 . I have been using the second on the list of historical missions called "in site of everything" as my testing scene, using the first few minutes of the mission to look at my fps. As some as you know the first part has no shooting or explosions but has plenty of ship movement so alots going on:). After many hours of peaking my old 8800GT i was getting 32fps outside on bridge, main map i got 59fps, if i stepped down to the attack periscope i got mid 40's i believe (Both hatches closed). I told myself "not bad..playable.... but i want more". Hence the new GTX260...now comes the fun part... same setting/scene with only difference being the card swap i am getting at best 14fps outside on bridge, at attack periscope with hatches closed i get 14fps yet at main map (heres where i want to pull my hair out) i get 75fps. So 50% improvement at map and 50% loss everywhere else. Does that make any sence to anyone? Hell i was just looking for a 20-30% increase but nothing like this. Any ideas would be great :)

Game settings are set to high except shadows and uncheck v-sync and 3d clouds.

hmm, strange, have you checked your drivers?

Yes i used 197.45 for both cards which are the latest.