FPS drop when using fullscreen AND the small output window

[blackdot]

At some point the small output window was added in addition to the fullscreen output. while it's a useful feature I noticed quite the fps drop, when I'm using it. it's not a problem, as it can be turned off, i wanted to ask however if i'm using it incorrectly. I could deduce that two outputs use more resources, then again the contents of both outputs are exactly the same. Is there another way around this, or do i just really need to buy a new gpu?

[Magic]

Hmm, well it does take more VRAM to have both windows open, and I guess it's possible that some GPUs don't have enough. But, I haven't heard any other reports of significant drops in fps. On average, the difference in performance should be small enough that it wouldn't even be noticeable. How much of a drop are you experiencing? Does the situation improve if you lower the graphics resolution (Window > Magic Window Options > Graphics Resolution)? Also, what kind of GPU do you have?

[blackdot]

i have a gtx 660 with 2gb of vram. the drop happens in a scene with 3 overlapping video loops , the whole scene runs in 1280x720. If i only use one fullscreen output it has nice 60fps. if i use the small output aswell it drops to about 36 fps. it says i still have 1.7 gb of vram free though. if i reduce the output by half, it's still 36 fps.

if i remove 2 videos, the drop goes only to 44fps. is it possible it has to do with the vidos? they itself are 960x540 and 24 fps and the video png codec, without alpha channel though.

This is both the case in 1.54b and 1.53.

Wait now this is weird. i wanted to show off what i was actually doing and turn on Aero again (because shadowplay only works if aero is enabled), now the drop is gone and it's a steady 58-60 fps. Does this even make any sense? I usually have Aero turned off (it looks all classic then), because i was under the impression that Aero was a *waste* of resources not an unlocker. i'm stumped.

[Magic]

Hmm that's strange! I'll have to think about what might be going on there.

I usually have Aero turned off (it looks all classic then), because i was under the impression that Aero was a *waste* of resources not an unlocker. i'm stumped.

I've seen similar kinds of strangeness with Aero. I think it's better to have it on -- I always have it on myself (in Windows 7). It seems to make GPU apps run more smoothly. I'm not exactly sure why though . I'm pretty sure you can't even disable it in Windows 8+.