FTX Global 1.2 is out but...

[Alan_A 1,650]

Testresults: I couldn't acknowledge your findings, Alan. On my PC the drop in fps when I turn on volu-fog is the exact same with or without FTXG. I even restarted the PC between each test but I don't see a difference. Without volu-fog fps was near my max of 34 and with volu-fog fps was around 24/25, with and without FTXG.

 

Yeah, same here, unfortunately.  I loaded Opus weather (latest version, beta 3.38.4), once again using the Maule in the Washington DC area.  Real world conditions are low overcast with mixed rain, snow and sleet.  Without volumetric fog, frames held around 30 (locked at 33).  As soon as I switched volumetric fog on, frames dropped to maximum 17, usually lower, with heavy stutters.  All of this was with default terrain.  So I was wrong - FTXG isn't the issue when it comes to the impact of fog, volumetric fog has its own independent (and heavy) impact on frames.  Additional tuning was as expected - some microstutters on the heaviest settings, curable by reducing autogen and by reducing or eliminating shadows.

 

One lesson - the Major Thunderstorms theme isn't a good volumetric fog test.  Maybe other themes are more stressful.  Opus definitely is, in heavy weather.  Side note about Opus - as expected, the handling of the haze/visibility layer is much better than default, no "shower curtain" effect, everything looked quite natural.

 

Additional good news - since FTXG is off the hook, I can go ahead and reinstall it - with the caveat that I'll be seeing white boxes 'til that issue gets solved, or until volumetric fog gets easier to handle.  But on balance I can live with that for the much better overall look and feel of FTXG.

 

Apologies for the false alarm, but I think it's better to explore these things and then eliminate false leads.  

 

EDIT: Just saw the other thread about JV's post over at the Orbx forums, and about their new, slower timeline for P3D development.  Good to have the acknowledgement of problems, I suppose.  Maybe I'll hang with my near-default setup after all and just let things evolve at their own pace.  I wish some of the developers (not only ORBX by any means) had been a little more measured in their enthusiasm in the run-up to release... or that LM hadn't changed the maze at the last minute... or that whatever happened, hadn't happened.  A promising product, yes, but not the world's smoothest entrance.  

Edited December 14, 2013 by Alan_A

[mganz121 159]

Interesting ... I'll have to try and test volumetric fog On/Off again -- I tested this early on (day 1 of release) and didn't notice a difference with Volumetric fog on or off ... and I've done plenty of video's with lots of clouds/ligthening ... cloud draw distance will make a slight impact -- going from 80mi to 110mi I get about 2 fps hit.  But will give it another test tonight.

 

 

That's probably because you have a Titan and I have a GTX580. Alan has a GTX680. Seems like only the GTX780 and Titan are strong enough to cope with the volumetric fog?

 

 

And this is where I am getting very confused. I currently run a GTX560Ti (lowest card being compared) and volumetric fog has no impact for me????? Go figure! My frame rates are the same regardless of whether volumetric fog is enabled or not ..... light clouds, heavy thunderstorms. It makes no difference (apart from the visual aspect) .... on my particular lower end system.  :Thinking:

[mganz121 159]

 

 

Additional good news - since FTXG is off the hook, I can go ahead and reinstall it - with the caveat that I'll be seeing white boxes 'til that issue gets solved, or until volumetric fog gets easier to handle.  But on balance I can live with that for the much better overall look and feel of FTXG.

 

Alan, could I make a suggestion to help you find that balance that has worked for me. As FTXG provides better base textures for the overall world, rather than stock, AND P3Dv2 provides a higher density of vegetation autogen than FSX, I have turned down vegetation autogen to sparse. This still gives me better than FSX. Now see if you can find a balance to allow you to live with volumetric fog enabled. 

[Alan_A 1,650]

Alan, could I make a suggestion to help you find that balance that has worked for me. As FTXG provides better base textures for the overall world, rather than stock, AND P3Dv2 provides a higher density of vegetation autogen than FSX, I have turned down vegetation autogen to sparse. This still gives me better than FSX. Now see if you can find a balance to allow you to live with volumetric fog enabled. 

 

Very interesting.  I've mainly been moving the two autogen sliders together (it's hard to break FSX habits).  I'll give that a try and see what happens.  Many thanks for the suggestion!

[Guest]

 

 

Thats 100% true! I had more CTD's, r205 error, Black screens, Scenery popping, Terrain blurries, stutters in 1 week With P3D than I had in 4 years with FSX.

 

What version, FSX, SP1 or SP2 or Acceleration?  hehe  ... yeah FSX was perfect out of the box, just ignore those SP's they don't really exist.

 

I just did the volumetric fog on/off, no impact at all and the FTX Global lights are working fine.  I did manually remove FTX EU Ireland (but Europe still shows in FTX Central) which seems to have solve the OOM and vertical spikes problem.

[laserit 93]

FSX worked so good for me on release day, that I shoved it in the closet for a year and spent $2400 on a new rig before I could revisit it. It also remains as the only software I own that I have to OC my I980X to get acceptable performance with anything other then a stock installation.

 

It's amusing how short our memories can be.

[eminyilmaz 17]

FSX worked so good for me on release day, that I shoved it in the closet for a year and spent $2400 on a new rig before I could revisit it. It also remains as the only software I own that I have to OC my I980X to get acceptable performance with anything other then a stock installation. It's amusing how short memories can be.

Couldn't agree more, same happened to me as well:) However, while it was heavy, FsX didn't give me all sorts of crashes, black screens out of the box. Before even coming to the stage to see how it performs, there're still lot of people out there who couldn't even install P3d v2 (registry error at installation). Some people (those managed to install) facing instant crush at opening screen. I've discovered the other day that P3dv2 doesn't work properly at non-English OS. FsX and P3dv1.4 had no problem with non-English OS.

 

Bashing certain 3rd party developer doesn't make any sense to me at this stage. If I were developer I would wait for LM to fix these initial bugs before I do anything about my product. God knows only, how v2.1 will look like.

[FaxCap 13]

FSX worked so good for me on release day, that I shoved it in the closet for a year and spent $2400 on a new rig before I could revisit it. It also remains as the only software I own that I have to OC my I980X to get acceptable performance with anything other then a stock installation.

 

It's amusing how short our memories can be.

 

That was my exact experience.  I had a state of the art AMD based PC at the time. I bought FSX the first day it was released.

Came home....loaded it up....flew out of KSEA and saw a bleak desert looking Seattle. Shut down the flight, moved the autogen

slider over to very dense and started the flight again.  Stutters.

 

I clearly remember the anger directed at Microsoft those first 2 or 3 months. People were p*ssed and I feel rightly so.

 

Ken

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

God knows only, how v2.1 will look like.

 

 

"God knows only, how v2.1 will look like. "

 

​It will look pretty much like 2.0 looks minus some of the reproducible bugs which will be fixed by both LM and 3rd party developers.

 

And the people who couldn't get 2.0 to run properly  due to either pilot error or bad luck won't have any better luck with 2.1. Some people set their sliders too high for their hardware. Others installed incompatible add-ons. And even others had something about their hardware/software mix that caused P3d2 to not perform properly or in some cases not even run at all.

 

It's the latter category to probably won't be resolved for a while, if ever. Fortunately, that seems like a very small category. This category is probably the result of having an extensible app like P3d2, combined with various OS flavors and hardware setups.

[ErichB 3,643]

No, FTX Global itself is not causing the OOM's; many are running it without any problems, including myself.

 

 

I have not had one OOM, either with or without FTXG.  But then my flights havent been that long ...longest is about 40 mins, and around smaller urban areas.  Not sure if this is why.

[Guest]

Unfortunately for me, FTXG 1.2 has seemed to be generating OOMs.  Posted over at Orbx ... trying to figure this out as the default P3DV2 doesn't produce any OOMs.

 

 

 

Not sure if this is why.

 

Could I see your Display setting details (and FXT Central settings)?  I'm using Vegetation  "cast shadows" (not receive) and I have a hunch that this setting in combination with FTXG 1.2 trees (Uses Orbx Trees checked in FTX Central) might be the cause ... need to test more because I really enjoy FTXG - fantastic product.

 

Thanks, Rob.

[mganz121 159]

Rob, wasn't your first OOM right after you installed Orbx Ireland? You had everything running so smoothly up until then.

 

Sent from my GT-N7100 using Tapatalk

 

 

[Guest]

 

 

Rob, wasn't your first OOM right after you installed Orbx Ireland?

 

I had installed FTXG 1.2 and Orbx Ireland together, then I started getting the OOMs.  I've since manually removed Orbx Ireland per Alex instructions over at Orbx forum, leaving just FTXG 1.2 but still had OOMs (very repeatable very frequent).  So I uninstalled everything and wiped P3DV2 and started over with base P3DV2, no OOMs (same display settings).  Added FTXG 1.1 and 1.2 patch and the OOMs started again.  

 

What I missed in my testing was just installing FTXG 1.1 (without 1.2 patch).  Since FTXG 1.1 was missing files I figured I should not test with that "alone" -- but I regret not doing that now because I can't confirm if it's a 1.2 patch problem.

 

I also did some testing in Minnesota (St.Paul) just to remove Ireland as a possibility it is location specific ... got the same OOM results (frequency) as Ireland.

 

Sadly I've gone thru so many iterations and combinations of installs/uninstalls, I need to make a spreadsheet.  The only conclusion I can make so far is that P3DV2 "alone" (with NO add-ons) doesn't OOM.  So obviously it's something specific to FTXG, exactly what I don't know ... trying to figure out a "work around" that's less visually drastic -- in other words I'm doing my best to make FTXG work without compromising it too much.  It's very possible that LM/P3DV2 has an issue that's only apparent with FTXG which further adds to the complication ... so not trying to point fingers ... really just trying to find a reasonable work around.

 

Rob

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

 

 

I'm using Vegetation  "cast shadows"

 

I have that set. with FTXG 1.2, no problems.

[Guest]

 

 

I have that set. with FTXG 1.2, no problems.

 

Could you list out your P3DV2 Display settings (all of them)?  And also your FTX Central settings?  Please.

 

Would allow me to do Apples to Apples testing.

 

Thanks, Rob.