How to increase load distance for airports in P3Dv4?

[Julkensen 47]

With all the memory in the world available in v4 it really bugs me that  airport sceneries still only load at a 15nm distance.

Is there a way to increase that distance ?

 

[Cai Zicheng 171]

Do you mean default airports or addon ones?

[Julkensen 47]

addons.  I checked  in the configurators for  fly tampa and aerosoft  and none have the load distance as a  parameter

[Manny 1,293]

I don't mind paying for add-on airports ported over to P3Dv4  if they do the following since OOM is not an issue anymore

1) remove or modify the LOD parameters for airport objects or LM could disable this feature so even if objects have these LOD  parameters to behave differently in V4 (Not sure if it's technically possible).

2) Display the airport (make it active) a long way out... like the OP mentions.

3) get rid of building popups.... the Freeware for Taiwan/Tapei has done this. Payware now needs to do this so the buildings don't disappear and pop up right in front of our eyes. 

4) Black textures when you look away... Buildings losing their textures when you change views and then when you return, it has to reload these textures.

New York City X - Drzewiecki Design has all these issues which were understandable for P3Dv3 due to OOM. IF they fixed these things, DD's NY City X would be amazing and I wouldn't mind paying for this addon again. 

 

[Breene 2]

very interested if there is a way to change this as well. some times looking for the field in v4 is just looking for where the autogen is blank - its odd.  didnt annoy me so much before when the detail was very little if anything that far away

[vgbaron 3,590]

I think a lot of what is being said is the result of pushing your hardware beyond it's capabilities. I do not have any of the problems described. No black textures when looking away and I can see the scenery to the horizon. In some cases it's actually better than I can see in real life.

Vic

[sidfadc 1,344]

6 hours ago, vgbaron said:

I think a lot of what is being said is the result of pushing your hardware beyond it's capabilities. I do not have any of the problems described. No black textures when looking away and I can see the scenery to the horizon. In some cases it's actually better than I can see in real life.

Vic

Hmmm can you prove this with a video?  I think what the OP describes is out of the box experience.

[vgbaron 3,590]

Don't need to prove common knowledge. What the op describes is caused generally by stressing your hardware with too high settings. There are other factors like heat, etc that can cause the hardware to under perform but generally settings for the hardware and addons are too high.

 

Vic

[WillsB3 1]

You have to remember that the addon manufactures can only work with the platform. It may be an engine limitation that prevents airport objects loading beyond 15nm. There may be hacks around it but those will likely cause other issues or have other side effects.

Additionally, it's not just about VAS, it's also about FPS and reducing the rendering workload as much as possible in order to keep FPS up.

[sidfadc 1,344]

1 hour ago, vgbaron said:

Don't need to prove common knowledge. What the op describes is caused generally by stressing your hardware with too high settings. There are other factors like heat, etc that can cause the hardware to under perform but generally settings for the hardware and addons are too high.

 

Vic

Hi Vic

I respectfully disagree.  Show me a video on your system where the airport loads in greater than 15 miles and where your textures are never black and once loaded, stay loaded permanently.

If you prove me right then fair enough.  I just think posts like yours can cause other users to go hunting for miracle tweaks to make their system do what yours does.  When in fact its the core engine of the sim affecting these things and nothing you can do about it.

Thanks

[pegruder 65]

I have a fairly high-end system that is in line with Vics it seems and I occasionally get the black textures looking away myself.  My frame rates are usually 40s and above with sliders fairly high out of the box.  It's rare but I still get the occasional airport loading late and black textures.  Vic if its not too much trouble could you share your settings and (if any) customer tweaks or settings?  Or are you strictly out of the box settings?

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

On 8/20/2017 at 11:04 AM, Manny said:

1) remove or modify the LOD parameters for airport objects or LM could disable this feature so even if objects have these LOD  parameters to behave differently in V4 (Not sure if it's technically possible).

One of the main reasons that a SimObject tends to "disappear" as the user viewpoint  becomes farther away from the SimObject is that the model itself has multiple LODs and the lowest LOD has an empty model. This is was done commonly in the FSX days to ease the demands on the hardware.

Since FlyTampa was mentioned, I checked a few of their "V4" airports. Midway for example, only has single LOD models (LOD=100), so that is not the issue being reported here. That does not mean that other 3rd party sceneries don't still take advantage of the LOD "cheat".

[pmb 5,137]

34 minutes ago, sidfadc said:

Hi Vic

I respectfully disagree.  Show me a video on your system where the airport loads in greater than 15 miles and where your textures are never black and once loaded, stay loaded permanently.

Sorry, I have to disagree in this point, too. At least concerning the black buildings issue (not only, but also w.r.t. airports), LM (Beau Hollis) have confirmed they have a ticket open on the black buildings issue (his #9)

http://www.prepar3d.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6315&t=124932&p=158940&hilit=black#p158940

Kind regards, Michael

[vgbaron 3,590]

2 hours ago, pmb said:

LM (Beau Hollis) have confirmed they have a ticket open on the black buildings issue (his #9)

Yes, and all he's saying is that they are trying to improve texture load times. If your hardware isn't up to it, you will get black buildings. LM is trying to improve their load times to help those who have the issue. I'm not saying the issue is not real - I'm saying exactly what Beau said the textures do not load fast enough. Which is essentially saying that the hardware is not loading the textures quickly enough ergo - hardware problem. I think we're saying the same thing except that *I* do not have the problem. I have always run my TBM at 120M since early days of FSX. Perhaps that is the issue.

@sidfadc - as I said - I don't do videos and feel no need to "prove" what I am saying. Take it or leave it - I have a motto I have followed all of my life and I see no reason to change it now.

"Never explain - your friends don't need it and your enemies won't believe you anyway"

I've made my statement - you can easily ignore it and if you think it's bull - that is your right.

Vic

[pmb 5,137]

20 minutes ago, vgbaron said:

"Never explain - your friends don't need it and your enemies won't believe you anyway"

Vic

You hopefully don't consider me an enemy. I could't stand that.

Kind regards, Michael