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appraiserfl

SoftTH problems with a 5870 :(

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I know that this really isnt an OFF problem, but my OFF gaming is now suffering as a result... maybe the collective minds can help me on this one.

 

Ok, I just got the 5870 today and I love it. Here is a sexy screen shot of it posing in the nude with my old 8800 ultras.

110520098011.jpg

And after installing it and playing with it for a while, I have packed up the ultras and put em on ebay. Apparently I am an ATI man now, and I am getting almost double the FPS in my favorite game, "Over Flanders Fields," at 2560x1600... went from 5-15fps to 25-40fps with all of the eye candy turned up! 5s on everything!!!

 

Unfortunately, I have a problem. Since Eyefinity does not support my PLP 20x30x20 =4960x1600 setup, I figured that I would just use SoftTH and enjoy the power of the 5870 with my setup.

 

I had no problem gettin SoftTH to work with my 8800 ultras, however, it does not work with my 5870. I even went out and bought a crappy 4670 to use as a second card but I get the same exact result with the second card as I do when I just push out all three displays from the 5870! It will not let me set my resolution in the CFS3Config file and hard locks my computer when I try and fly a mission.

 

Im running Vista ultimate 64, and a 20x30x20 =4960x1600 display setup.

 

I specifically play over flanders fields and it will not let me open the cfs3config file at all to set my resolution. It let me open the file prior to adding the SoftTH files, but once I got those files in the directory it does not bring it up. What is supposed to happen is CFS3config will open and let you change your resolution, but I cannot get to that step with the 5870 like I was able to with the ultras.

 

Can anybody help me? Has anybody got SoftTH to work with a 5870?

 

 

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Firstly, for the moment pull those cards off Ebay

 

Are you attempting to configure thru Workshop ?

 

Need Sleep to be continued

 

No, I really don't need the ultras anymore. Its time to sell em, regardles of whether they support SoftTH or not versus the new ati card, I don't need em anymore. They are great cards, but the 90nm tech just runs too hot for me and the 5870 is really more powerful than both of em put together. Besides, this is the final point for the Ultras as there is still a market for them now, but come another year from now, they will be completely worthless. So I sell em now and recoup some of my upgrading money, while I can.

 

I am planning on getting a 5870x2 when it comes out (supposed to be this month) and then running it in Trifire with my 5870. My plan is to continue on with my watercooling from my processor and watercool the cards as well! I have a q9650 and a quadfire capable mobo on the way, should get here Monday. I am planning on pushing the q9650 to 4ghz a core on water.

 

Im aware that I will have to move sliders down if I get SoftTh working, thats fine. With the Ultra I had to move everything except planes to 2, which sucked and even with both ultras in SLI, I could not go over 3 for terrain and the other one. The 5870 is an exceptional card. It reminds me of the 9700pro days!

 

I have tried to do the config in the workshop and also in windows explorer and no dice. When I try in workshop nothing happens it just stays in the workshop, when I try in windows explorer it comes up with the hourglass (which shows loading) and then the hourglass dissapears and then nothing!

 

I looked over the ATI link you put up, but honestly when I ran on my single display, I had none of those problems!

 

Thanks for your help! And please get some sleep, we need you fresh for your next sortie!

Edited by appraiserfl

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When doing the configuration thru workshop ( the accepted method) It may be all automatic, but it can sit there ( apparently accomplishing schitt) for a full 90 seconds. Until the configuration is completed, and it will state same, you can't get to the resolution, for all the tea in china.

 

As far as not needing to roll back to 4 on the Terrian - - - GOOD LUCK PAL - - - you won't be the first, to learn the hard way

 

lOOK I know all about the terrian lol. If I get tripple screen working I am aware that I will have to dock that down to 4 or 3, because 4960x1600 is an insane resolution. HOWEVER, I can leave it at 5 while I play at 2560x1600 resolution because the 5870 actually is quite the beast.

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Some progress has been made here. I have found that the 1.7 version works but not too well (versions 1.9 & 1.8 dont work at all). For some reason it only recognizes my 2560x1600 monitor as being 1600x1200 and it forces my 1200x1600 monitors to a 1200x1200 resolution. Instead of giving me 4960x1600 + 300 for borders = 5260x1600 resolution option it only allows me these choices:

110620098018.jpg

 

And here is how crappy the 5100x1200 option looks... its all distorted :(

110620098015.jpg

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I got it working. Basically I had to stick with beta 1.7 and had to add the 2560x1600 resolution at the bottom of the list and then put auto after it. Then I had to subtract the difference of 2560-1200 and make that negative adjustment so sideExtraWidth=-1360. Then I told it to half the display of the side monitors to 600x800, which surprisingly gives a decent quality while keeping the main at 2560x1600. With these settings I'm able to run at 5,4,4,4,4 and get 35fps on average for 4960x1600 running on a single 5870!

 

This is what my softTH config looks like for anybody that ever has the same situation.

 

;

; SoftTH configuration file

; by Kegetys <kegetys[ät]dnainternet.net>

;

 

[config]

; deviceIDLeft/right: Direct3D device ID's of left and right monitor, or 'auto' for automatic

; secondaryWidth/Height: Left & right monitor resolution, or 'auto' to use same as middle screen resolution

; secondaryRefresh: Refresh rate of left & right monitors, or 'auto' for automatic

; secondaryFormat: Secondary device image format, 'RGB32', 'RGB16' or 'YUV12'.

; antialiasing: Level of forced anti-aliasing

; anisotropic: Level of forced anisotropic filtering

; borderSize: Size in pixels of frame border between monitors that is discarded

; noHotkeys: Set to 1 to disable all hotkeys

deviceIDLeft=auto

deviceIDright=auto

secondaryWidth=600

secondaryHeight=800

secondaryRefresh=auto

secondaryFormat=rgb32

antialiasing=0

anisotropic=0

borderSize=150

sideExtraWidth=-1360

noHotkeys=0

 

[Direct3D]

; ** Advanced setting for Direct3D games **

; cylindicalCorretionAngle: Amount of cylindrical correction done, use with sideExtraWidth

; hideNondefaultDevices: Hides all but the default adapter from the game

; forceHorizontalFOV: Forces horizontal FOV to be three times as wide

; forceResolutionWidth/Height: Forces device to be created with this resolution

; force16bitDepth: Force game to use 16bit depth buffer, can improve performance and reduce memory use

; sleepBeforeRead: Time in ms to sleep before reading back buffer data from video card

; useMultihead: Uses multihead features of primary card if available, can increase performance and reduce memory use

; Set to 2 to force multihead initialization even if game doesn't create device with TH resolution

; delayedPresent: When useMultihead enabled, delay primary monitor present to sync with secondary head

; swapOrder: Swap order at which the frame contents are copied

; autoSquash: Automatically squash output to middle monitor if only pretransformed (GUI) elements are drawn

; d3d8dll: Path to D3D8.dll/D3D9.dll to use or auto for automatic (system32 dir)

cylindicalCorretionAngle=0

hideNondefaultDevices=0

forceHorizontalFOV=0

forceResolutionWidth=0

forceResolutionHeight=0

force16bitDepth=0

sleepBeforeRead=2

useMultihead=1

delayedPresent=0

swapOrder=0

autoSquash=0

d3d8dll=auto

 

[hooks]

; Win32 API hooking settings - Used for some extra compatibility and game-specific fixes

; doHooking: Enable/disable hooks in Direct3D, with OpenGL hooks are always enabled

; doScaleMouseCoordinates: Scale mouse coordinates for getCursorPos to fix games which do not handle negative screen coordinates properly

; doScaleFromLeftScreen: Spread out mouse coordinates from left screen to full width

; doScaleWindowRects: Scale game window rectangle to triplehead size

; mouseXoffset: Number of pixels to offset mouse cursor position in X axis, to fix misplaced cursor due to negative screen coordinates. auto = use X resolution

doHooking=1

doScaleMouseCoordinates=0

doScaleFromLeftScreen=0

doScaleWindowRects=0

mouseXoffset=auto

 

; Triplehead screenmodes to add to resolutions list (width multiplied by 3 and border added)

; Must be last in this file

[modes]

640x480x60

640x480x75

640x480x85

800x600x60

800x600x75

800x600x85

1024x768x60

1024x768x75

1024x768x85

1200x1600x60

1280x960x60

1280x960x75

1280x960x85

1280x1024x60

1280x1024x75

1280x1024x85

1600x1200x60

1600x1200x75

1600x1200x85

2560x1600x60

auto

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due to past nasty experiences with unexplainable video anomolies, it's highly advisable to set your terrian slider maximum of 4. It might look fine now, but it won't shortly.

 

Puts me in mind of the FRAM oil filter, TV commercial spot, where the mechanic says "You can pay now, or you can pay me later"

 

 

 

You insist on propogating this absolute BULL$#%^ theory of your's about having terrain (yes, that's the correct spelling) sliders on 5 resulting in video abnormalities increasing over a period of time. Well, just to put your claim to the test, I've been running mine on 5 for the last 8 days. The only difference in performance levels or IQ is noticeable immediately after the slider adjustment. My FPS decrease, but not by much. I still haven't seen any pink elephants, purple zeppelins or big white squares. There are NO anomalies......graphically or otherwise.

 

If you're going to offer advice to people in here, please try to base it on something you either have experience with, understand, or can at the very least offer an informed opinion about. It's pretty evident you don't even come close to meeting the criteria in this instance. Let it go......it's starting to get really annoying.

 

 

Cheers,

 

Parky

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