Square nav lights: is this a bug?

[Icarus 0]

Out of the blue - I've made no changes of any kind - the nav lights on all my aircraft, including AI, have turned into large squares, as have runway marker lights. Help!amd 4000+geforce 6800GT2 gig RAMFSX SP1

[Guest Nils79]

Perhaps your effect files have been "optimized" by an add-on.

[Guest wjotten]

On a computer system, I don't think there's any such thing as "out of the blue" because there are constant changes going on. Programs loading in and out of the background, memory swapping, different processing functions, etc. but something has to have changed to have this happen.Have you installed a new add-on? A new plane? What other add-ons are you using now? Any recent upgrades? A change in video driver? Some new piece of hardware? More information would be needed for the helpful here to assist.There are some other posts to be found about similar occurrences. You might want to do a forum search in the last month or so.bill

[Guest radialronnie]

like this attachment? I had to reinstalled fsx to fix it :)

[Icarus 0]

>like this attachment? I had to reinstalled fsx to fix it :)>Like your attachment 1, yes. See mine! But I don't want to reinstall if I can avoid it. How about Repair: did you try that?

[n4gix 4,947]

The problem is, as mentioned on another forum where you asked the same question, that something has overwritten your default texture files used for those effects.Check your ..Effectstexture folder for the fx_2.bmp file. It should be dated 07/26/2006...It is a 16bit compressed DXT1 w/alpha bitmap.

[Guest dwaohio]

I am having the same problems with square lights. Does anyone have a solution?Dave

[Guest PPSFA]

After SP2, I get almost the same thing, but they are black, and only last a split second.Personally Im darn glad there isnt going to be a SP3, cause FSX has managed to finally drive me nuts, one step forward, 3 steps back.

[bkeske 0]

I believe Bill has provided you with the solution above. It isn't FSX, or SP2, it is third party aircraft, or other programs, that have 'taken over' the default FSX lighting effects. Check your effects files.Bill can clarify, as he is 'the master' of such things, but you can change your .cfg to use the default effects, thus not have the issue.

[Icarus 0]

Thanks, Bill, for your specific reply. I've checked FSX Effectstexture. There is no fs_2.bmp file. In fact, no fs.bmp files. They're all fx. Of those, there's no fx_2 : just fx-1 and fx_3.I think I may have found the source of the problem. A piece of scenery whose Effects folder is "for lights that appear in the scenery" and contains seven files. I have to admit to being pretty clueless about these things: what's the best thing to do? Perhaps restore the default files? But how? Bkeske suggested making a change in the CFG. What would I do? I'm not worried about losing fancy lighting effects: I just want to get rid of the wretched square lights wrecking my FSX, and your advice would be much appreciated.

[Guest steve43]

Yes, I also get this problem after SP2, it's a bit annoying and as you say 1 step forward 3 steps back is the way things seem to have gone with FSX for me.Steve

[bkeske 0]

I was speaking mostly about third party nav/beacon lighting effects that may be tied to a particular aircraft, or may be provided by a third party program, and may also be incompatible with FSX-SP2. There are defaults for the above, and those defaults could always be used in the lighting section of the aircrfat.cfg vs the third party files. With programs or scenery, the solution would have to be done elsewhere.One thing is for sure, the default files always seem to work in FSX.Bill can explain it better than I, and he was also (I'm sure) talking about something else too. Bill has a way of stating/hinting just enough to hopefully get you to 'dig into' the issue yourself, and in the process learn a bit more about the structure of the program so you may be able to resolve things in the future ;)

[Guest tcable]

The only time I've personally seen this is with driver issues.

[Guest Nick_N]

Bill is correct. This was asked and answered in another forum. The OP said he had not installed anything however the aircraft being displayed with the issue is in fact a 3rd party aircraft installation of 3rd part origin and as such those can do as much damage as scenery or other improperly made files.One of my biggest pet-peeves with developers is sometimes they do not respect the default fine name tree and include files that either overwrite or uninstall originals when their product is installed or removed. Default FX and other files should NEVER be included with a package and if a developer wishes to include such files they should be renamed to ensure the integrity of a default install.In this case the FX file FX_2.bmp is either missing or corrupt, or the FX file call is trying to locate an texture that does not exist. I have seen this happen with many products, payware and freeware alike. Lights are FX_2.bmp located in the Effectstexture folder, and, and Halo.bmp located in the main texture folder. If those files are missing or damaged the lights will display the blocks.If the problem is local to one plane, its thier custom FX files that are the issue. If it affects all aircraft then something screwed up you default install.Now, as for flashing "black" boxes, that is something that was introduced with SP2 and Nvidia drivers. That is not a FSX issue. it is seen more on slower systems but even my over-the-top high performance Nvidia systems displays that from time to time as the lights load. Its similar in nature to a slow texture load but certain criteria null the transparancey as it is rendering the texture. You can see this as you change views (pan around the aircraft) or as you come into sight of a airport, or as you leave an airport and place distance between yourself and the runway. As your system loads new textures it dumps some unless you are running a massive amount of memory (system + VC) and when you pan around a distance from the airport you just left, the light textures reload, displaying a black box for a split second. Flashing black or coloured spikes when a flight is first loaded and you pan around the aircraft is another Nvidia driver issue. Once you pan around the plane 2-3 times the black flashes and spikes stop. There are an entire list of Nvidia driver related issues, most are not FSX and are Nvidia problems. Some are seen by both ATi and Nvidia because of older hardware and poor driver development with erespect to the new standards however the ATi R680 card I am testing shows none of the problems the Nvidia cards show and in a few cases, older Ati cards.

[Guest PPSFA]

>Now, as for flashing "black" boxes, that is something that was>introduced with SP2 and Nvidia drivers. That is not a FSX>issue. it is seen more on slower systems but even my>over-the-top high performance Nvidia systems displays that>from time to time as the lights load. Its similar in nature to>a slow texture load but certain criteria null the>transparancey as it is rendering the texture. You can see this>as you change views (pan around the aircraft) or as you come>into sight of a airport, or as you leave an airport and place>distance between yourself and the runway. As your system loads>new textures it dumps some unless you are running a massive>amount of memory (system + VC) and when you pan around a>distance from the airport you just left, the light textures>reload, displaying a black box for a split second. >>There are an entire list of Nvidia driver related issues, most>are not FSX and are Nvidia problems. Some are seen by both ATi>and Nvidia because of older hardware and poor driver>development with erespect to the new standards however the ATi>R680 card I am testing shows none of the problems the Nvidia>cards show and in a few cases, older Ati cards. >I have to take the opposite view on this. I am running the same drivers for my 8800GTS card that have worked perfectly with FSX RTM and SP1... this issue only arose after SP2, so if it is a driver issue, it was introduced by SP2. I would think that someone at Aces or the beta team would have tested this, since the 8800 series cards were touted as the best at the time. Its not a show stopper but it sure is annoying, much like many other bugs that made it through the process and out the door.