Installing Linux for X-Plane

[RXP 2,338]

@mSparks Do you mind posting the LAT/LON/ALT of this screenshot, along with the actual screen res it was rendering?

[Humpty 751]

1 hour ago, mSparks said:

I still dont see GPU/CPU times here, this is why they matter

CPU TIME, GPU Time, FPS

0.1 , 0.001, 10

0.1 , 0.01, 10

0.1 , 0.1, 10

0.01 , 0.1, 10

0.001 , 0.1, 10

0.01 , 0.001, 100

0.001 , 0.001, 1000

______

Ignoring the CPU/GPU times it is really easy to be left thinking a change had no effect, when actually the change reduced the potential FPS from 1000 frames a second to 10 frames per second, compounded by sometimes a change not actually kicking in until the next time you restart (and some changes hitting both).

This FPS is more than just the result of using Linux

 

Its from fairly precise tuning of CPU/GPU load to evenly balance the times and cutting out things that I found to be unnecessarily hitting performance.

WOuld be interested in knowing this. DO you mean tunables  ?  

[mSparks 2,086]

2 hours ago, RXP said:

@mSparks Do you mind posting the LAT/LON/ALT of this screenshot, along with the actual screen res it was rendering?

Same place I always am, LYBE, my local RL VFR haunt,

I also recently swapped my building textures for

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/52000-beautiful-autogen-buildings-for-europe-x-plane-113/&page=2&tab=comments

screen res (mostly) changes GPU time, I usually fly VR with a small XP window to maximise my available GPU time, and also lower the vis of the buildings (increase reno/LOD_bias_rat) to free up CPU time (which works fine in VR, because they fade into the orthophoto)

The tower in the distance to the right is

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avala_Tower

you can see genex tower the left

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_City_Gate

and the new Ada bridge about in the center

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_Bridge

The last of which I pulled off 3D warehouse and (did a terrible, lazy job of) exported from sketchup, mostly because just after that into the city is restricted airspace.

Rest is X-Europe and LVL16 ortho (LVL16 Ortho is one of the best things I've found to reduce CPU time)

My three monitors are all 1920x1080, VR headset also (so 960x1080 per eye).

In all the shots I posted here I've still been CPU limited, for example if I crank AA way up (requires manually restarting XP) the above shot becomes

identical CPU usage, but nearly double GPU usage, and FPS changes from 1/CPU time to 1/GPU time, barely noticeable - until VR ~triples my GPU time, and multiple EC cloud layers doubles it again and VR is then unusable, for what to me, look otherwise identical.

I also hack the tree settings to make them closer to "min world objects" when set to "max world objects", because they are pretty rubbish anyway and they gobble CPU time.

2 hours ago, jarmstro said:

Pointless though? My monitor only refreshes at 70hz and I can't detect any difference above about 24fps?

Well, for starters, in VR you can definately "detect" 24fps

Anything less than 60fps and you get

Its not about getting "really high fps" its about getting stable times between frames at as high quality settings as possible, and doing so in such a way that even under the worst conditions FPS says high.

All this is one of the reasons I have my doubts about XP12, I still see <60FPS in VR (like literally see) even with those settings, so what room is there to do more on current hardware?

Edited March 2, 2021 by mSparks

[jarmstro 2,403]

6 hours ago, mSparks said:

Its not about getting "really high fps" its about getting stable times between frames at as high quality settings as possible, and doing so in such a way that even under the worst conditions FPS says high.

I take your point re VR from what I've read. Another way to get better fps is to simply upgrade ones hardware.

[mSparks 2,086]

1 hour ago, jarmstro said:

I take your point re VR from what I've read. Another way to get better fps is to simply upgrade ones hardware.

I'm on amd5900X, RTX3070 - there isnt much to upgrade, esp. when being cpu limited more frames would need a more powerful CPU, and there isnt....

everything is a trade off, for example, greazer complaining he sees stutters when panning around, you'll see that even in 2d at less than about 45fps.

sat up at fl350 not looking around as long as you are above 20fps at all times (less than which an xp starts to "bend time") and there is literally no difference compared to 200fps

coming in to land 40fps may not be enough for an accurate flight model if some frames are taking longer than 0.05 seconds.

in the helo you notice every frame greater than 0.05 seconds while hovering, because the response to control inputs goes whacky. (wasted a lot of time on not knowing this when I first got xplane.)

[Humpty 751]

OpenGL Linux 😩  @msparks EC.

 

 

[Bjoern 1,157]

@HumptyDumpty So does the compiled original Enhanced Cloudscapes plugin work in Vulkan?

[Humpty 751]

14 minutes ago, Bjoern said:

@HumptyDumpty So does the compiled original Enhanced Cloudscapes plugin work in Vulkan?

Nop.

When there is an OC condition you would notice a gray sky (no clouds) and still see the sun , when there is a scattered condition it seems that its trying to draw the clouds but the sky will be clear . 

Wish that it would work. 

What exactly is the cause of this  ? Is it the drivers ? 

Works fine in Opengl in Linux but the performance is down.

[mSparks 2,086]

13 hours ago, HumptyDumpty said:

Nop.

When there is an OC condition you would notice a gray sky (no clouds) and still see the sun , when there is a scattered condition it seems that its trying to draw the clouds but the sky will be clear . 

Wish that it would work. 

What exactly is the cause of this  ? Is it the drivers ? 

Works fine in Opengl in Linux but the performance is down.

do you have hdr on?

[Humpty 751]

37 minutes ago, mSparks said:

do you have hdr on?

Ofc

[mSparks 2,086]

56 minutes ago, HumptyDumpty said:

Ofc

better if you didn't then it could've been that 😞

How they work is fairly simple 

get depth buffer from xplane (how far away things are)

use a gpu program (aka shader) to draw clouds that are nearer than things in the depth buffer (pure magic and fairy dust)

give the result to the screen.

(simplified language so its easier for everyone to understand)

everything is opensource, perhaps try building it 

if you change the weather do you get "new weather" in the console?

is the smooth_weather.lua running?

[Humpty 751]

18 minutes ago, mSparks said:

better if you didn't then it could've been that 😞

How they work is fairly simple 

get depth buffer from xplane (how far away things are)

use a gpu program (aka shader) to draw clouds that are nearer than things in the depth buffer (pure magic and fairy dust)

give the result to the screen.

(simplified language so its easier for everyone to understand)

everything is opensource, perhaps try building it 

if you change the weather do you get "new weather" in the console?

is the smooth_weather.lua running?

It's the same with Biological's code and yours. 

I am using NOAA , but I don't think even by changing the weather it does anything at all.  THough If I setup Scattered formation then I get just  big blob of cloud that's it. 

I just feel its a draw issue probably something on the Linux AMD drivers.

 

[mSparks 2,086]

6 minutes ago, HumptyDumpty said:

I just feel its a draw issue probably something on the Linux AMD drivers.

it does sound like that, but its a strange one to have, Id expect something about the shaders failing to compile.

15 hours ago, HumptyDumpty said:

When there is an OC condition you would notice a gray sky (no clouds) and still see the sun ,

is xplane changing its sky colors.

The actual "draw" isnt that complex, its just filling the screen with shades of white and the rest is simple black magic mathematics.

does the old one work?

https://github.com/mSparks43/Volumetric-Clouds

[Humpty 751]

14 minutes ago, mSparks said:

it does sound like that, but its a strange one to have, Id expect something about the shaders failing to compile.

is xplane changing its sky colors.

The actual "draw" isnt that complex, its just filling the screen with shades of white and the rest is simple black magic mathematics.

does the old one work?

https://github.com/mSparks43/Volumetric-Clouds

When I get back to home will try .

 Do i need to compile the old one ?

[mSparks 2,086]

40 minutes ago, HumptyDumpty said:

When I get back to home will try .

 Do i need to compile the old one ?

i only ever built it for linux, it was built on centos7, iirc bjoern needed to compile it against the arch libraries.