I know there is that other thread but I thought this may be more specific.
So after playing for the past few days with low settings, 512px (instead of 1024px) shadows on a 1920x1080 windowed. I get about 20~30 or so fps. You can check your frame rate by clicking on the gear icon beside the chat window, or was it the system config window? I forget. it's one of them, the FPs is on the top right.
I've not yet had to do huge 24 man raids, my archer is only 16 but there are some nice huge crowds in the forests around Gridania. I initially had all PC names and HP bars showing and that slowed things down a bit. I've now cleaned it up to show PC names as First name + Last name initials, HP bar only during a battle (I like healing people at random). This has made things a lot nicer.
There's this part around level 15 when you get to speak to Kanna E. Senna at the round table in the huge pond (whatever it's called in English). The water effects look really pretty even at my beyond low settings. I tried maxing the settings out just to see how they'd look and I got 5~6fps ....
Let's just say it was a very pretty
slide show.
Anyway, the only time I get lag is when initially logging into the game. Give it a couple minutes for the contents to load and the processor to 'warm up' and it becomes smooth, even when running at 1920x1080. I don't have problem sprinting or when riding a chocobo across heavily populated zones.
The most crowded FATE I've done is the one in the east forest where you have to escort an old man across a dangerous zone. I'm guessing 20~30 people just crowded around him. As well as the monsters already in the area, the constantly spawning mobs and the lush vegetation in that section. No problems whatsoever.
I've also heavily modified my HUD, most items are at 80% size, I don't know if that contributes to performance, but a clear and tidy screen makes me feel better. Here's a screenshot from a couple days back.
I'm playing as Qu Redd on the Atomos server if anyone is interested. There's a rather large (30+) english speakers LS that anyone is welcomes to join.
http://eu.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/linkshell/19140298416326816
I'll try to get some screenshots sometime tomorrow in a crowded area with the FPS numbers as well as my settings to give a better view of things. My win8 is also pretty basic now. Only thing I've installed are all the important windows updates, FF14, chrome, logitech gamepad drivers and gtalk. I don't plan on installing anymore software.
