NTsync (aka Winesync+Fastsync) - feedback topic

[Iglu47]

NTsync (title not approved) is more "Correctness" and "Robustness" alternative implementation of synchronization primitives in Wine from Zebediah Figura (the author of "Esync" and "Fsync").

This requires changes on the Wine side (usually patches are called - fastsync ) and corresponding changes on the kernel side (implemented as a kernel module - winesync. Unlike Fsync, the winesync functionality cannot be used anywhere except Wine).

More details about what problem NTsync solves and what is "implementation of synchronization primitives in Wine" can be found here: https://lkml.org/lkml/2021/1/17/312 and here: sync2022.pdf

Some plans and wishes for tests from @zfigura:

• Find or get good, convincing data vs server sync. Benchmarks of esync are hard to find and a lot of them are not exactly very convincing (on the order of 50 -> 54 FPS).

• Test ntsync with applications that break with fsync or esync:

  • [21142] Planet Zoo crashes when selecting a friend's avatar
  • [20155] Ubisoft launcher hangs on "looking for patches"
  • [17625] Yakuza 0 hangs on exit
  • [19072] Yakuza 0/Kiwami manual save fails
  • [21194] GTAV hangs or something. This issue: Grand Theft Auto V (271590) ValveSoftware/Proton#37
  • [20444] System Shock: Enhanced Edition hangs on exit

• Add this information to the document. I intend to submit this upstream along with the cover letter.

• Submit kernel patches upstream.

CALL FOR TESTS: anyone who can test games from the "breaks with esync/fsync" list, that would be quite appreciated. Note there's a lot more that break simply because of PulseEvent(), and we've had a couple tested already and they work so I'm not worried about those. All of the above break because of subtler timing problems and I'd like to see if they work with ntsync.

ALSO CALL FOR TESTS: I need good, convincing data comparing winesync vs server side sync. I don't have application names because in the 3-4 years since I wrote esync I've completely forgotten what the most important applications even are.

How to get NTsync working on TkG builds?

1. you need set _winesync="true" in .cfg for linux-tkg, build, install and loading on it
2. when you need set _use_fastsync="true" in .cfg for wine-tkg and build it
3. if you did everything correctly, then when you start the game in the output of the terminal or in the logs will appear
   wine: using fast synchronization.
4. to disable NTsync, set env var WINE_DISABLE_FAST_SYNC=1.

*Please don't post conflicts with other patches, versions of Wine, or other things related to building or installing kernel or Wine in THIS thread - this is a place intended for developers and other players to see other people's NTsync test results and determine if there are any significant performance deviations (both up and down) compared to wineserver-sync, esync, fsync. And any issues are saved or added compared to esync/fsync/wineserver-sync only.

[ms178]

I've got some numbers for you from the in-game-benchmark in Total War: Troy in 1080p / Ultra.

With NTSync:

Scene 1: 75,2 fps
Scene 2: 119,4 fps
Scene 3: 102 fps

WINE_DISABLE_FAST_SYNC=1:

Scene 1: 74,0 fps (-1,6 %)
Scene 2: 116,4 fps (-2,5 %)
Scene 3: 101,5 fps (-0,49 %)

Analysis: Scene 2 is the most CPU-bound of the three. As you see, there is quite a pronounced impact from the change.

My test system:

❯ inxi -GSC -xx
System:
  Host: klx99 Kernel: 6.1.5-3.2-cachyos-bore-lto arch: x86_64 bits: 64
    compiler: clang v: 16.0.0 Desktop: KDE Plasma v: 5.26.80 tk: Qt v: 5.15.8
    wm: kwin_x11 dm: SDDM Distro: CachyOS
CPU:
  Info: 18-core model: Intel Xeon E5-2696 v3 bits: 64 type: MT MCP
    arch: Haswell rev: 2 cache: L1: 1.1 MiB L2: 4.5 MiB L3: 45 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 2312 high: 3790 min/max: 1200/2301 boost: enabled cores:
    1: 2301 2: 2301 3: 2301 4: 2301 5: 2301 6: 2301 7: 2301 8: 2301 9: 2301
    10: 2301 11: 2301 12: 2301 13: 1241 14: 2301 15: 2301 16: 2301 17: 2301
    18: 2301 19: 2301 20: 2301 21: 2301 22: 2301 23: 3790 24: 2301 25: 2301
    26: 2301 27: 2301 28: 2301 29: 2301 30: 2301 31: 2301 32: 2301 33: 2301
    34: 2301 35: 2301 36: 2301 bogomips: 165744
  Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Graphics:
  Device-1: AMD Vega 10 XL/XT [Radeon RX 56/64] vendor: Micro-Star MSI
    driver: amdgpu v: kernel arch: GCN-5 pcie: speed: 8 GT/s lanes: 16 ports:
    active: DP-3 empty: DP-1,DP-2,HDMI-A-1 bus-ID: 05:00.0 chip-ID: 1002:687f
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.99 with: Xwayland v: 22.1.7
    compositor: kwin_x11 driver: X: loaded: amdgpu unloaded: modesetting
    alternate: fbdev,vesa dri: radeonsi gpu: amdgpu display-ID: :0 screens: 1
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 2560x1440 s-dpi: 96
  Monitor-1: DP-3 mapped: DisplayPort-2 model: HP X27q res: 2560x1440
    dpi: 109 diag: 685mm (27")
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6 Mesa 23.1.0-devel (git-267dd1f4d5) renderer: AMD
    Radeon RX Vega (vega10 LLVM 16.0.0 DRM 3.49 6.1.5-3.2-cachyos-bore-lto)
    direct render: Yes

[ms178]

Company of Heroes 2 - WQHD, Higher preset

With NTSync (2nd run):

Min: 56,00 fps
Avg: 79,84 fps
Max: 127,87 fps

WINE_DISABLE_FAST_SYNC=1:

Min: 56,99 fps (+1,7 %)
Avg: 80,44 fps (+0,75 %)
Max: 129,22 fps (+1,06 %)

Notes: There is a performance regression with NTSync in this older game. The first run with NTSync showed even worse numbers (77 fps avg) - but that might have been due to the shader compilation, hence I took the numbers from the second run which did show some improvements. I wouldn't read too much into this result as it is still in the range of normal deviation in this benchmark. Maybe still something worth to investigate?

[Tk-Glitch]

Maybe still something worth to investigate?

With only 2 runs it's hard to say if it's more than margin of error considering such minuscule differences. If the average on 10 runs leads to a similar gap, then that could be considered as an actual perf drop.

Now and that being said, if the WINE_DISABLE_FAST_SYNC=1 runs are with server-side sync, the difference should be much higher if you're CPU bound (>20% is quite common). If that's with fsync it's in line with what is to be expected from winesync, which is pretty much equal perf to fsync.

[Iglu47]

thanks for trying to look into this. I have access to the EGS-version of A Total War Saga: Troy so I did a couple of tests with "campaign_benchmark" at Ultra preset settings - there seems to be a difference between regular wineserver-sync and ntsync at least.

screenshots of the in-game "campaign_benchmark" result

server-side sync:

ntsync:

UPD. another run I made mangolog https://flightlessmango.com/games/26979/logs/3576

please make sure the terminal output or log show wine: using fast synchronization. before posting resault here (we want the test results to be valid)

[Tk-Glitch]

Those results are making much more sense @Iglu47 . Thanks.

[ms178]

I have no control over the build process, I simply used the proton-winesync binary packages ptr1337 provided in CachyOS for testers. That means by deduction that my numbers are highly likely just as valid as Iglu47's, as I've used the defaults even if they look different. Our hardware and software setup is very different after all.

I will leave more testing to others as I spend enough of my time with this experimental version that has other issues - even if Tk-Glitch considers these expected behavior. .

[Tk-Glitch]

@ms178 The proton build isn't enough for NTsync to work. Unless @ptr1337 added similar patches and handling to what we're doing in linux-tkg, you would need both winesync-dkms and winesync-udev-rule packages to begin with, and then either manually loading the module or adding it to your modules-load.d for it to be loaded on boot.

You didn't confirm you were seeing wine: using fast synchronization. in your wine output which would tell us if your results are indeed valid and everything was done correctly (either by you or the CachyOS maintainers), or not. You are talking with devs here, please try to understand we're expecting you to follow our guidelines if you participate in testing.

[ms178]

Please have mercy with me, I am not a programmer and just wanted to help you guys. :) Admittedly I had missed that crucial part of the process.
winesync-dkms / winesync-udev-rule were also installed. I assume ptr1337 handled all the neccesary patches, as he has seen NTSync working correctly with his binaries on other machines. The modules-load.d info is new to me though, I am deferring to prt1337 if that was handled automatically with his packages. If not, that could be a source for the deviation in the numbers. On the other hand, with a 1080Ti, the better result from Iglu47 with 140+ fps is also not too distant from mine with 119,4 fps and my Vega 56.

[FuzzyQuils]

Hello, your resident Overwatch player reporting in!

Soon as I have time I can get performance numbers vs server sync but I am glad to report Battle.net crashing wineserver in some cases with fsync doesn’t happen with winesync. (A reliable repro for the fsync issue is to also run Battle.net via Feral’s Gamemode with fsync enabled, such thing doesn’t happen using Winesync!)

[Iglu47]

[20155] Ubisoft launcher hangs on "looking for patches"

Still present with NTsync for me. Using "wineserver sync" helps as workaround.

[LethalManBoob]

i get hangs on ea's new game app

[csutcliff]

Battle.net client struggles with fsync (fails to launch 1/2 the time). So far it hasn't had an issue starting with winesync. In-game performance (WoW) appears to be the same or better than fsync but being an MMO it is fairly subjective.

[csutcliff]

Again not a perfect comparison as it's protonified vanilla wine vs actual proton with valve wine but Hogwarts Legacies is running better (10-15 fps at 4k ultra no RT) with fastsync than fsync and hasn't crashed on me yet which was frequently happening on load screens.

[ptr1337]

Again not a perfect comparison as it's protonified vanilla wine vs actual proton with valve wine but Hogwarts Legacies is running better (10-15 fps at 4k ultra no RT) with fastsync than fsync and hasn't crashed on me yet which was frequently happening on load screens.

You can also compile a fsync protonfied vanilla wine, then you would have a better comparison.
Also you can disable NTsync/Winesync with your current running wine/proton with:
WINE_DISABLE_FAST_SYNC=1

[LethalManBoob]

winesync tkg is gone from aur