WOFF - Just a Thought

[Mike Dora 171]

Afternoon All,

 

Knowing that WOFF is only two weeks away (right?), I have to ask the honourable devs whether they've been able to deal with the white triangles that appear in OFF at the edge of the screen when turning one's head quickly with TrackIR?

 

While I have fiddled & fettled around with the graphics settings and with the TrackIR settings in an attempt (multiple attempts actually) to minimise this, I have never actually managed to make it go away altogether (except in simulated filthy weather, which suggests that limiting the visibility distance somehow helps). It therefore remains for me the only real immersion-killer in what is otherwise probably the most immersive sim I have ever immersed myself in.

 

If the great & good devs are able to make this issue go away in WOFF (without the user having to buy a 2012+ top of the range (performance and price) machine), that would be absolutely terrific.

 

What about it, chaps?

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[tranquillo 10]

I used to get those but for some reason they went away without me doing anything - strange. By the way, the Official OFF forum is now over at Simhq so might be worth posting the question over there, Mike.

[Olham 164]

Mike Dora, what are your system specs?

 

Try "Ground object density" on "Medium" or "Low" in "Workshops";

and in "GraphicsConfig" keep "Terrain Detail" on 3 or 2, and "Scenery Detail" on 2 or 1.

 

Important are also some settings in the graphic card manager;

perhaps we can help you, when we know what card you use.

[Mike Dora 171]

Mike Dora, what are your system specs?

 

Try "Ground object density" on "Medium" or "Low" in "Workshops";

and in "GraphicsConfig" keep "Terrain Detail" on 3 or 2, and "Scenery Detail" on 2 or 1.

 

Important are also some settings in the graphic card manager;

perhaps we can help you, when we know what card you use.

 

 

OK Olham,

 

It's a Dell XPS 630i, with Intel Core2 Duo CPU E8500, 3.16GHz, 3.35Gb RAM. Graphics card is an NVidia GeForce 9800 GTX+, 512Mb Ram, Driver version 296.10.

 

My CFS3/OFF config settings are 4-4-4-3-4-4. These give me a very nice graphical visualisation (apart from the white triangles), so I'd be very reluctant to have to lower these settings to get rid of the triangles.

 

Now I see under "Parameter Editor for Texture Info" a setting for "Fog Start". I was guessing that this would define the distance to the visible horizon (based on the observation that there is no white triangle problem in heavy cloud/fog, when the visible distance is correspondingly reduced), so tried reducing its value. It regularly shows a value of 100000.00, I tried setting this to a lower value, such as 70000.0 or 80000.0, but it doesn't hold - when I close OFF Config and then reopen, it's back to 100000.0.

 

So, any suggestions for measures that can kill the triangles while maintaining the quality of graphics?

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[Olham 164]

Well, CPU and Memory should do fine IMHO. I don't know the card, but it should also do the job well.

 

Your "GraphicsConfig" settings are partly too high though - please try these just for a test, and report:

 

 

Overall slider: 5

Aircraft: 5

Terrain Detail: 3

Scenery Detail: 2

Effects Quality: 4

Clouds: 5

 

If this works well, except in or near Clouds, you should lower them.

For my ATI card, lowering Clouds slider never helped anything much; 5 was always best.

Terrain on 3 still looks great; and Scenery detail seems to "eat" quite some performance, when higher than 3.

You should try these settings and come back here with the results.

 

FOR SETTING UP THE VIDEO CARD

I don't know the NVidia control panels/managers, so someone else should help you here.

But if you know how to open it (in my case a right-click on the desktop, then I can select it),

you should look for "3D Settings" or "Settings for 3D Applications".

 

There select Anti-Aliasing (AA) no higher but 8. You could also try 4.

(The AA smoothens the jagged edges of 3D models)

 

If there is Anisotropic Filtering, put it no higher but 4.

 

If there is "Mipmap Detail", put it on the medium setting.

 

If there's "Wait for vertical refresh", put it to "Always on" (important against jaggies AFAIK)

 

If there is "Anti-Aliasing Mode", put it to "Adaptive AA"

 

 

I hope, a NVIDIA crack will show up here to help you better.

Edited June 1, 2012 by Olham

[Olham 164]

PS: the values in "Texture Info" should not be touched. But please see my "Graphics Setup Help" in the Stickies.

See here:

 

http://combatace.com/topic/60374-graphics-setup-an-easy-pictorial-guide/page__view__findpost__p__452080

Edited June 1, 2012 by Olham

[Mike Dora 171]

Well, CPU and Memory should do fine IMHO. I don't know the card, but it should also do the job well.

 

Your "GraphicsConfig" settings are partly too high though - please try these just for a test, and report:

 

 

Overall slider: 5

Aircraft: 5

Terrain Detail: 3

Scenery Detail: 2

Effects Quality: 4

Clouds: 5

 

If this works well, except in or near Clouds, you should lower them.

For my ATI card, lowering Clouds slider never helped anything much; 5 was always best.

Terrain on 3 still looks great; and Scenery detail seems to "eat" quite some performance, when higher than 3.

You should try these settings and come back here with the results.

 

FOR SETTING UP THE VIDEO CARD

I don't know the NVidia control panels/managers, so someone else should help you here.

But if you know how to open it (in my case a right-click on the desktop, then I can select it),

you should look for "3D Settings" or "Settings for 3D Applications".

 

There select Anti-Aliasing (AA) no higher but 8. You could also try 4.

(The AA smoothens the jagged edges of 3D models)

 

If there is Anisotropic Filtering, put it no higher but 4.

 

If there is "Mipmap Detail", put it on the medium setting.

 

If there's "Wait for vertical refresh", put it to "Always on" (important against jaggies AFAIK)

 

If there is "Anti-Aliasing Mode", put it to "Adaptive AA"

 

 

I hope, a NVIDIA crack will show up here to help you better.

 

 

Thanks Olham, I'll try those tonight. BTW, what is the difference between "Terrain" and "Scenery"? The two words tend to mean much the same thing in non-technical use.

 

Mike

[Olham 164]

As far as I understand,

 

- the "Terrain Detail" slider controls the resolution of the terrain "tiles" (bitmaps)

 

- "Scenery Detail" controls, how many scenery objects (trees, houses, hedges etc.) appear, and in which quality

 

The devs may put that right, if I was wrong here.

Edited June 1, 2012 by Olham

[BirdDogICT 3]

Mike,

 

There has been a lot of discussion about the white triangles with TrackIR, with ATI cards (see this thread http://combatace.com...st-version-112/). Whether using ATI or Nvidia, it all boils down to video fill rates.

 

There are a number of settings that can reduce the workload of your video card: the most obvious ones are reducing terrain and scenery sliders and Workshop settings, as Olham mentioned.

 

You can also try using VSync and/or reducing TrackIR panning speed (set to .7 or .8 from within the TrackIR software), or switch to post-process AA (Morphological AA is an ATI feature...NVidia is working on it, I believe, but not supported by your card)

 

You can probably improve performance with an older card like yours by setting AA to 2X or 4X within the game and turning off AA and AF in the NVidia Control Panel. You don't need very much AA in BHaH to make it look great.

Edited June 2, 2012 by BirdDogICT

[Olham 164]

I used to have a great visual OFF with my old ATI HD4870 (1 GB), which should be much like Mike's.

I did not use the ingame AA settings, but 8x AA and 4x Anisotropic Filtering - and it worked great.

 

Make sure that "Wait for vertical refresh" is "Always on" or at least "On". That should fight the tearing.

[Mike Dora 171]

Thanks All,

 

I've tried variations of all those tweaks, and now seem to have a bit of a reduction of the white triangles. They're still appearing, but not to the same extent and not for as long.

 

I do have one further question though, for BirdDog. You say to try "setting AA to 2X or 4X within the game". How do I do that, I can't seem to see that option anywhere?

 

Whatever, I'm starting to think that the ultimate solution will be to throw dollars at it and upgrade my graphics card.. need to be ready for WOFF after all :-)

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[Olham 164]

You can set the AA in the "Workshop's" in "Graphics Config": "Change display options".

 

But I don't think this is even used by modern graphic cards. Both my new and my previous card

did not care about hose settings; I always recommend to make these settings in the graphic

cards setup menue/manager.

 

One last thing we could look at is your screen resolution and the resulting "Field of View".

Perhaps it is set up wrong, and causes some tearing by that.

If you like, send me the resolution of your monitor, and I can send you how to set FoV up.

[Mike Dora 171]

You can set the AA in the "Workshop's" in "Graphics Config": "Change display options".

 

But I don't think this is even used by modern graphic cards. Both my new and my previous card

did not care about hose settings; I always recommend to make these settings in the graphic

cards setup menue/manager.

 

One last thing we could look at is your screen resolution and the resulting "Field of View".

Perhaps it is set up wrong, and causes some tearing by that.

If you like, send me the resolution of your monitor, and I can send you how to set FoV up.

 

 

I wondered if that was where to find the in-game AA change, Olham, because for some reason I can't get that "Graphics Config" option to work. I always get the error message "CFS3 could not detect any DirectX8-capable video cards. CFS3 requires a DirectX8-capable video card" (yet my card is clearly compatible). I wonder if that is part of my problem, and how to fix it? (short of a complete reinstall..)

 

On the other point, my monitor resolution is 1280x800, and current OFF FOV is 28 x 16. I just noticed that it says default FOV is "23x16", but is that for a 4:3 screen not widescreen?

 

Thanks

 

Mike

[Olham 164]

I wondered if that was where to find the in-game AA change, Olham, because for some reason I can't get that "Graphics Config" option to work.

I always get the error message "CFS3 could not detect any DirectX8-capable video cards. CFS3 requires a DirectX8-capable video card"

(yet my card is clearly compatible). I wonder if that is part of my problem, and how to fix it? (short of a complete reinstall..)

Mike, I'm not a specialist on DirectX stuff, but there was a problem with Windows and DirectX some time ago,

which seemed to result from the fact, that they had not added all DirectX updates contents.

Perhaps someone with real knowledge can help here.

 

In my case, I downloaded and installed the stuff new, but I was guided, and cannot pass the knowledge on;

it is just beyond my capabilities. I can only say, that my problem was gone after that.

 

On the other point, my monitor resolution is 1280x800, and current OFF FOV is 28 x 16.

I just noticed that it says default FOV is "23x16", but is that for a 4:3 screen not widescreen?

- You have a screen ratio of 16:10, which you should select at the left in "Workshops".

- The OFF default is rather for 4:3 ratio screens.

 

I give you 3 possible "Field of View" settings here. They all have the right ration of height to width, and they

only differ in being more zoomed in or more remote to everything - your choice, which you like better.

Best to try them all.

 

24 : 15

26 : 16

27 : 17

[Herr Prop-Wasche 7]

Go to Microsoft.com and download the latest version of DirectX to your computer. That may fix some of your problems.

 

Before you do that, go to the start menu, click inside the search bar, type "Run" and hit enter. In the box, type "DXDiag.exe" This will allow you to see if DirectX is working correctly.