Black/disappearing textures? Some bizarre news ...

[Turbine777 13]

I think the sound thing is the issue, or at least part of the solution since a use to always have issues with alt tabbing or switching to window mode via alt + enter. My fix was similiar where I would 1st pause FSX before doing so and never had issue. I didn't think it was sound, but video which is why I did it, I assumed direct draw or something. But since it also pauses the sound processor this makes more sense now why it worked.Lowering the khz makes lots of sense. I just had a couple days of testing and posted in a different thread when I was turned on to this idea from PMDG's Robert S. Randazzo. See my thread @ http://forums1.avsim.net/index.php?showtopic=264413I have tested every combination of my addons and problems remained. THIS IS GREAT!!! Sound quality is Terribad, but my texture or lack there of problem is gone!I am currently using the audio on my motherboard (see sig) since I lost my sound blaster... Does anyone have to adjust there sound so badly with higher end sound cards?Thanks tons for you audio find! This is confusing, yet an incredible breakthrough!

[cniedzi 0]

Hi,my experience here: http://forums1.avsim.net/index.php?showtop...t&p=1657483RegardsCzarek

[jordanal 70]

I would like to report that after I recently upgraded my FSX server rig (below) from WinXP_x64 to Win7 Ultimate_x64 that I was suffering from alt+enter black screens, textures losses, and CTD, especially while using the MD-11. This was probably still occuring on the previous WinXP_x64 install as well, but I have been playing with the JS41 so much recently, that I forgot about my MD-11 woes.I spent the last several days trying to depart from FSDreamTeam's Las Vegas Intl (KLAS) and couldn't even make it off the tarmac without some serious black-screen, texture-loss, and freeze issues. The symptems seemed especially aggrivated when used with all my client applications such FSPassengers, ActiveSky, Radar Contact, and FS Flight Keeper. Very similar to the OOM symptoms we all experienced years ago with the 32bit OS's and the 744, but not as sudden and no OOM message obviously with the 64bit OS.As you will note, I too am running the Asus P6T-Deluxe v2 MB and the rig is purrin' like a kitten on Win7_x64. The earlier recommendation in the this thread seems to have fixed my problems by adjusting the advanced sound properties down to 8000Hz (Telephonic). The flight from KLAS to KATL last night was tested a good number of times with alt-enter, FSP window GUI pop-ups, and the RC ATC window, all without any of the ugly issues shared in this thread. The lower audio setting is hardely noticeable, even when heard through my 5.1 Creative speakers.A warm thank you to Jay for coming up with the audio-tweak fix. :( :( :( B)

[Guest 413X3]

So I guess those of us with onboard sound cards that are unable to lower the sound that much are SOL...I wonder if turning down directx sound acceleration in dxdiag will help? I will try that tomorrow

[jaybird1nyc 24]

I would like to report that after I recently upgraded my FSX server rig (below) from WinXP_x64 to Win7 Ultimate_x64 that I was suffering from alt+enter black screens, textures losses, and CTD, especially while using the MD-11. This was probably still occuring on the previous WinXP_x64 install as well, but I have been playing with the JS41 so much recently, that I forgot about my MD-11 woes.I spent the last several days trying to depart from FSDreamTeam's Las Vegas Intl (KLAS) and couldn't even make it off the tarmac without some serious black-screen, texture-loss, and freeze issues. The symptems seemed especially aggrivated when used with all my client applications such FSPassengers, ActiveSky, Radar Contact, and FS Flight Keeper. Very similar to the OOM symptoms we all experienced years ago with the 32bit OS's and the 744, but not as sudden and no OOM message obviously with the 64bit OS.As you will note, I too am running the Asus P6T-Deluxe v2 MB and the rig is purrin' like a kitten on Win7_x64. The earlier recommendation in the this thread seems to have fixed my problems by adjusting the advanced sound properties down to 8000Hz (Telephonic). The flight from KLAS to KATL last night was tested a good number of times with alt-enter, FSP window GUI pop-ups, and the RC ATC window, all without any of the ugly issues shared in this thread. The lower audio setting is hardely noticeable, even when heard through my 5.1 Creative speakers.A warm thank you to Jay for coming up with the audio-tweak fix. :( :( :( B)

Al,You're quite welcome, I'm thrilled to hear of your success B) I also agree that the lower audio setting has very little effect on perceived sound quality. Although I've read that some users notice the difference, to me it's imperceptable. Add to that is the fact that I have not had a single re-occurence of the issue and it's a total no-brainer.If anyone reading this missed the details of this fix please refer to post #52 of this thread for the gory details.Jay

[Guest 413X3]

I think the only way to fix this issue, is to use your onboard sound card, because only that card allows you to set the sound quality so low. my creative labs does not go lower than cd quality

[damocles 1]

I don't think this is sound or PMDG related. I have just finished a flight from EGLC to LEBL ( with the sound at 'telephonic' setings ) and I had Black blocks on the water on my approach, as I do on my approach to Liverpool and Belfast City. This was using the Wilco Ejet 170 ( I've had the same issue with the Virtualcol Fokker 50 too ). I have had this issue since installing UTX-Europe and I think this is the main suspect. Before I installed this I had no problems. Just wondering how many out there have the UTX add-on and are seeing the blocked out textures. I thought I should mention it as I don't want PMDG's rep to be dis'd for an issue that may not be caused by their code.

[jordanal 70]

That sounds more like a corrupted UTX load or texture issue which should be solveable with resetting all the UTX defaults or getting some trouble-shooting help over in the UTX forums. I have never had any UTX USA, CAN or EUR textures go black on me, water or otherwise, just alt-enter blackscreens and freezes which wasn't nulled until I lowered my sound quality. I'm sure it's a driver/architectural issue, amplified by the heavy load the PMDG aircraft place on the box and not specific to any kind of scenery.

[damocles 1]

Cheers, I shall look in to that Jordanal.It does appear to be an issue when I approach the Ram limit of FSX on Vista x64......But actually, yeah, I forgot this was about the blank fullscreen issue. Apologies if I was OT.

[jordanal 70]

Well, after numerous trans-Atlantic flights over the past week or so, I don't beleive turning down the sound quality or hardware acceleration solves the problem, which still seems specific to the MD-11 on my Rig. When I attempted these flights from KATL to EDDF, at various places along the flightplan, usually 6 to 8 hours into the flight, I would once again start getting texture loss, black screens, and a eventual CTD. I honestly believe the lowering of the sound-quality just reduces the strain the MD-11 presents, but doesn't really solve the problem. My gut tells me it's a memory or user-address space related issue. Or, perhaps it just doesn't play well with one of my addons such as Simconnct-cleint, FSUIPC/WideFS, Radar Contact, ActiveSky, or FlightSim Flight Keeper. Yet all of these addon's are used with other complex aircraft, including the 744X, with no issues noted.I think I've just about given-up with this bird. A couple of differnt rigs, WinXPx64 and Win7x64, and I still have the same problems, only with this plane and no other. Whether it's a coding issue or a preformance/envelope issue I don't know. But I don't have time to further research this issue without some serious assistance from PMDG support, which probably isn't going to happen. I wish I had some sort of PMDG debugger to figure out what exactly is going on. With the sound-quality back to normal, I can black-screen and CTD the MD-11 before leaving a complex departure airport such as the FSDreamTeam's Las Vegas or ImagineSim's Heartsfield Atlanta. With the sound quality at Telephonic, the same thing happens, only a few hours later.I spent several more hours yesterday unisntalling and reinstalling the MD-11, applying only the second MD-11 patch, and all the liveries to no avail, same thing. Oh BTW, have I complained about the livery uninstall and install method lately? Well, this is where a common utility to quickly uninstall and reinstall all the liveries at once would to a great advantage. Running through some 50+ livery installers, twice, is troublesome to say the least. Please for goodness sake, take a cue from the LvL-D method of installing liveries and be done with it.I feel pretty disappointed right now because I really would like to use the MD-11 for my long-haul flights; it's one of my favorite addons. But at the same time, I refuse to change my enviornment to suite a specific, unresolved issue with regard to a single addon. :(

[MMartinov 48]

Guys, I have had this problem for a while now.My previous system with Vista x64 (and nearly the same specs as the ones below) started having the black textures issue a few months down the line. I had it first with PMGD MD11, than J41 when it was released, and Captain sim 767 had it as well. I tried to solve the problem radicaly after few unsicessful tries. I added some RAM. Put SSD in, Liquid cooling and on top brand new Windows 7 x 64. In short here is what I discovered:Initialy fresh FSX + Accel pack and PMDG J41 did not give me any problems. Further on adding MyTraffic 2010 and Scenery seemed like giving hard time to the system. Then I put the nHancer and then the problems with the black textures started once again.I decided to take different approach and overckloced the CPU up to 3,7 GHz. Same time I changed the RAM timings and frequency as well. I was pleasantly surpized that the problem was gone for the hours of flight I did since then.Please check my post athttp://forums1.avsim.net/index.php?showtopic=265863for more details.I start to have feeling that this problem is more RAM related that any other possible leads (sound, driver etc.)

[MMartinov 48]

OK, this is a little update on what I said above...After hours testing now I am 99% sure that my problem is gone.Flying J41 with Active Sky Advaned, FSGlobal + Photoreal Scenery and Traffic + sliders almost @ max gives me 20-40% reduction in the frame rates - with this system, latest driver nvidia 191 and nHancer (Nick's settings) averaging 15-25 FPS. Before I could say when the black screen problem will show up - exactly when flying into densly populated area and when I start experiencing heavy frame rates drop. Now - I have the frame rates drop but all the Alt+Tabbing and digging through the menus, even doing stuff with programs in the background does not give me any signs of corruption in the graphics. So far......Again, the only changes I did were in the hardware - overclocking the CPU up to 3,7 GHz and what was more inportant I beleve - for first time I changed manually the clocks of the RAM. I am not an OC expert but some Googly gave me idea of what should I do - now the system is running stable and with good temperatures. And the graphic problem with FSX is gone.So - the RAM clocks - on my system I managed to get it to the magic numbers from teh BIOS 7-7-7-20 (by default they were absolutely different numbers).... I will mention again the Nick's FSX Guide has section concerning exactly this and as I said before I did not pay much attention to it. Now going back to this guide I see the role of the RAM in the whole process.Guys, whoever has this problem and can play with the BIOS and do some OC, please let me know whether that idea gives you good results.Ah, and by the way I haven touched anything related with the sound...

[tfm 196]

OK, this is a little update on what I said above...After hours testing now I am 99% sure that my problem is gone.Flying J41 with Active Sky Advaned, FSGlobal + Photoreal Scenery and Traffic + sliders almost @ max gives me 20-40% reduction in the frame rates - with this system, latest driver nvidia 191 and nHancer (Nick's settings) averaging 15-25 FPS. Before I could say when the black screen problem will show up - exactly when flying into densly populated area and when I start experiencing heavy frame rates drop. Now - I have the frame rates drop but all the Alt+Tabbing and digging through the menus, even doing stuff with programs in the background does not give me any signs of corruption in the graphics. So far......Again, the only changes I did were in the hardware - overclocking the CPU up to 3,7 GHz and what was more inportant I beleve - for first time I changed manually the clocks of the RAM. I am not an OC expert but some Googly gave me idea of what should I do - now the system is running stable and with good temperatures. And the graphic problem with FSX is gone.So - the RAM clocks - on my system I managed to get it to the magic numbers from teh BIOS 7-7-7-20 (by default they were absolutely different numbers).... I will mention again the Nick's FSX Guide has section concerning exactly this and as I said before I did not pay much attention to it. Now going back to this guide I see the role of the RAM in the whole process.Guys, whoever has this problem and can play with the BIOS and do some OC, please let me know whether that idea gives you good results.Ah, and by the way I haven touched anything related with the sound...

Good luck and please keep us updated. Way back when I started looking more-or-less systematically into this problem, the first culprit I thought of was the stability of the overclock, including RAM. But although different settings would give different results, my "acid test" flight could always trigger the disappearing textures until I used the sound fix. Try this: I assume you're using pretty high scenery settings. Load up the MD-11 and fly a LAM3 approach into 27L at Heathrow (EGLL) coming in over London at dusk, with the Aerosoft Heathrow X scenery, MyTrafficX at about 50%, UTX Europe night lighting, Active Sky Advanced with 15 layers of cloud, Extreme Environment X clouds (NOT the daft 4096-bit textures), in rainy/ overcast weather. About 8 miles out, in the virtual cockpit, hold down the "A" button to cycle through the views. Hold it down for about 10 seconds. Then press "S" to switch to an external view. Hold down the "A" button and cycle through the views for another 10 seconds. Press "S" again and cycle through the next set of views for 10 seconds. Then switch to the AI Aircraft view (this is a menu option if you right-click with the mouse). Press the "A" button and cycle through all the AI Aircraft views for about 10 seconds. Then press ALT+ENTER to shrink FSX to windowed mode. Then go through the same routine in windowed mode. Then press ALT+ENTER To get back to full screen mode. Keep doing this routine for a while, alternating between windowed and full screen mode. Pretty quickly - if you are like me - you will trigger the disappearing textures, UNLESS you've used the sound fix.Obviously this is an "extreme" test: but I've had too many flights become unflyable at the last moment, sometimes after a long time of "flying", and sometimes on VATSIM, to embark on any virtual journey without knowing that my setup will pass this test. TimPS: If your problem originally related to ALT+TAB rather than ALT+ENTER, then it is probably DIFFERENT from the one described in my first post. ALT+TAB triggers a known problem - known in the sense of being documented in the Nvidia driver release notes.

[MMartinov 48]

PS: If your problem originally related to ALT+TAB rather than ALT+ENTER, then it is probably DIFFERENT from the one described in my first post. ALT+TAB triggers a known problem - known in the sense of being documented in the Nvidia driver release notes.

Actually I did not know that Alt+Tab and Alt+Ent are different problems. I just don't use Alt+Tab often because getting back in the sim is quite weird (I'll have to do it through task manager).Well, your Acid test brought via the Alt+Tab a graphic problem.On the opposite, the the Acid test and Alt+Ent plus FSX menu usage did not spoil anything. :( Hell......

[Guest Peertjeheavyjet]

Hello fellowsWell i have read this evening a lot of this issue. I had this problem also many many times. See pict. of today (EGKK to KLAS)">So i read al the post and reactions. And for different people different solutions are working.But through all the post and reactions i can not find a list of what to do step by step. Anybody? I can not found for example how to change exactly the soundquality. Regards peter Edit:I try another quick flight but like many times i can not play it in FULL SCREEN MODE. Screenshot above is in not full screen mode. The screenshot below is mad in FULL SCREEN.This happends when you are at desktop and want to return to FSX. It is not possible without Taskmanager. So after a lot of fighting and clicking finally back at FSX and what you see is a screenshotso that is what happends..... FSX recorder did not record anything our was not able to show what went wrong. Mayby this will help in future? ">that is why i fly in dock mode and not in FULL screen mode. It is not possible!!