What does it take to run Arkham Knight smoothly on PC?

[Administrator]

Is it actually possible to run the current, hobbled version PC of Batman: Arkham Knight at 60fps at any resolution? Indeed, is it actually capable of matching the 30fps performance profile of the console versions without investing a small fortune in hardware? Rocksteady and PC port developer Iron Galaxy are currently working on substantially improving the lacklustre performance, and the game itself is currently withdrawn from sale. But for those of us lumbered with the existing code, what can be done to get a decent experience?
The community is doing its part to improve matters, of course. This particularly impressive deep dive into the .ini variables offers up some improvements, but we still measure dips below 40fps in problematic areas, producing a sub-optimal experience that doesn't match the sheer consistency of the console versions. For those that aren't so sensitive to the stutter we experienced, Kaldaien's tweaks could serve you well, but it's fair to assume at this point that if the game could be fixed by replacing a bunch of .ini files, the developer would probably have done so. After all, easy fixes - like restoring the rain effects and ambient occlusion missing in the original release - were deployed in a patch released on June 27th.
Arkham Knight has severe problems on PC, which appear to derive from a sub-optimal approach to memory management. On console, developers have 5GB of memory that can be used at will for game and graphics. On PC, memory is split - divided between system RAM and your GPU's VRAM. The evidence suggests that the game struggles to effectively stream fast enough from one pool of RAM to the other, and clearly struggles with graphics cards with 2GB of memory or lower (spectacularly so when it comes to certain AMD cards, as you'll see later). On top of that, there are other issues: the CPU requirement is quite high despite relatively low measured utilisation, and transparent textures - smoke, explosions etc - inflict a heavier impact on GPU resources than we would expect.
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