Scenery Detail Setting

[Panama Red 22]

What is the main difference between Scenery Detail "4" and Scenery Detail "5" ???

 

I know it drops my FPS by about 10 FPS using "5" versus "4", but I can not really tell what the main difference in the game is that is causing the drop in FPS using "5".

 

Is it the distance that trees appear in the distance or what ???

 

Thanks;

Panama Red

 

 

[+Stary 2,426]

I think it sets the highest number of trees and other ground cluster..?

[Hellshade 110]

I believe the difference is the 10 FPS.

 

Okay sorry. My understanding is 5 does have more detail than 4 and I believe also stretches scenery all the way to the horizon. However as you have found out, there is a cost in performance associated with it and for the vast majority of players, it's not usually worth the trade off. It's significantly more taxing on your video card for not that noticeable of an eye candy upgrade unless you have some fairly serious gear in your rig.

 

Hellshade

[Panama Red 22]

Hellshade:

Even though I have an OC'ed i7 975 and a ATI 6970, the 10 FPS is not worth it from a "4" to a "5", so I went back to the "4" for the little bit of horizon trees that you really do not notice.

 

Thanks

[Panama Red 22]

Stary and Hellshade:

Thank you,.

 

BirdDogICT over at SHQ gave me the most detailed answer as to the difference between a "4" and a "5", and I am coping his answer below in case someone ever does a search for this topic in the future:

 

Keep in mind that the CFS3 engine is DirectX 8 (8.12, I think), the first DirectX version to allow programmable pixel shaders. FWIW a Pixel Shader is a graphics function that calculates effects on a per-pixel basis. Depending on resolution, millions of pixels may need to be rendered, lit, shaded, and colored for each frame, at 60 frames per second. That in turn creates a tremendous computational load, especially for surface detail. Some early Microsoft flight sim products bragged about the number of "meters per pixel" of ground scenery, and it wasn't until DirectX 10 that Microsoft was able to claim "1 meter per pixel" for it's flight sims.

 

As Uncle Al mentions, early ATI cards, and nVidia cards, as well, even if they supported DirectX 8 pixel shading, struggled with OFF scenery settings on high. That's still a problem, even with modern cards due to the huge computational load (CPU and GPU) imposed by high scenery settings. This load increases dramatically near airfields, in large furrballs, and over the fromtlines due to the number of objects that must be rendered with high surface detail.

 

It's always been my impression that the scenery setting in OFF increases the demand for pixel shading over a longer distance, and the number of ground objects that must be rendered grows geometrically (not completely sure about how it works...developers chime in here....). A lower scenery setting doesn't negatively effect the visuals all that much, since the much of the rendered detail is far in front of you, and if definitely reduces the lags one can experience in furrballs, over airfields, and at the front. A higher scenery setting is largely wasted when you are at altitude, because you are rendering details that you may no longer be able to see clearly at height.

 

[Panama Red 22]

For further reference, Polovski gave an excellant explanation to this question over at SHQ as to what the Terrain Detail and Scenery Detail sliders do in the game:

 

 

In OFF Phase 3 (Between and Hell and "Hat in the Ring!"):

 

Scenery slider increases the density of all scenery objects, trees, houses, etc. i.e. more of them and more dense patches. They don't go further out from slider 4 to 5. Between 1-4, it does mean they go further out to the horizon.

 

If you do not see a difference leave it on 4 of course. There is just a few percent extra, 8% or something, more from 4 to 5. Different people look for different things.

 

Terrain slider higher resolution tiles to further out- CFS3 uses rings of detail basically. Often looking directly down you will see super high res etc at higher settings.

 

Note they are totally different to CFS3.