Problems with ATI Radeon 8500 ...

[Guest]

Hello Mac usersa few days ago I've got the new ATI Radeon 8500 for my G4/400 Mac and I hoped to see a notable increase of frame rates. While in Fly2k the frame rates vary now between 10 - 20 fps, the improvement in Fly!2 is near to zero compared with my old ATI 16 mb RAGE card, - that is fps between 5 and 15 fps, ... and the new card has 64 mb!! (By the way, I alloted about 800 MB RAM to Fly!)On OSX, the card is recognised as "ATI RADEON 8500" but the fps do not exceed 5 fps (!?), on OS9.2.2 it is recognised as "ATI 3D Rage Open GL Engine" inFLY2 and as"Rave compatible" in Fly2k. Does anybody know if this is correct?My biggest problem however is that in Fly 2k the airplanes have become semi-transparent, and sometimes there are coloured triangles moving on the plane ....I'm dreaming of the day when Fly! will function decently on Macs too...Any help will be greatly appreciated!Max

[Guest ftessler]

Max,To use this card in Fly! 2k, I'm pretty sure that you need special vcf and dll files, which don't exist. You should get better results with Fly! II, however. Are you certain that you have the latest drivers?-Franklin------------------------------Franklin TesslerG4/500Fly! for Mac Forum Co-moderator

[Guest]

Hello Franklinyes: I installed the latest ATI driver update which had been released two weeks ago.Concerning Fly2k: I cannot understand why the sceneries, airplane panels and interior views are o.k., but not the exterior shape of the airplanes. Where is the difference? The planes are kind of translucid/pale ... strange!!Max

[Guest]

Max,I've had a similar problem. I discovered I had a couple of other applications running in the background at the time. With 300 MB's allocated to Fly! II, there wasn't enough system resources remaining to properly render external views of any aircraft. Shapes of them appeared as just white textured shells of themselves.Make sure you don't tax your system too heavily with other apps that are open. Fly!II, OpenGL, and ATI cards can be very demanding to even the best of systems. This might not be the perfect solution for you, but it worked for me. Rich@KLEWBeige G3 233 MHz DT rev.1 G4 400 MHz NewerTech upgrade OS 9.2.2 384 MB RAM ATI Radeon Mac (PCI) Thrustmaster FCS/WCS

[Guest Allan Jones]

Max,I think you may have misunderstood what Franklin was saying about Fly 2K. He wasn't talking about Mac system resources or ATI drivers -- he's talking about those little files in Fly 2Ks system folder called .vcf files. There is one for every possible video card that existed when Fly2K was introduced. That means that even the original Radeon Mac card isn't supported.However, Rob McMinnis at TRI released an "unofficial" vcf file for the Radeon Mac edition sometime later. Look in the AVSIM library; I think searching by 'radeon" would find it. That .vcf file might greatly help your 2K problems even though it was written for the 32MB PCI version.I agree with Rich Plourde, I don't think you need so much memory assigned to either Fly 2K or FlyII. IMHO, 200MB for Fly 2K and 300-400MB for Fly II should be enough.The discussions around here is that rates with OSX are bad regardless of video card. Try running Fly II under 0S9 until TRI gets a Mac patch out.

[Guest]

Hey Rich and Allenit's two o'clock in the morning and I'm just coming back from a Bob Dylan Concert in Zurich/Switzerland ... Thank you for your suggestions. I'll try when I'll be back from school this evening, now it's time to go sleeping ...Max

[Guest]

Hello Rich and Allentoday I had a few minutes to install Rob Minnis' vcf file and I noticed an improvement of frame rates going up to 30 fps in the exterior views. I decreased the allocation for Fly! to 240 MB which leaves at least 500 MB for the card, system .. (There are no other apps running).However the semi-transparent shapes of the airplanes didn't change, beside the fact that the moving triangles have effectively disappeared. So there must be another reason for this phenomenon, but what ...?Anyway, thank you for your help, at least I managed to improve the performance!Max

[Guest]

Max,You might also want to check and see if you have the most current version of OpenGL. Don't know if that's the answer, but it might be worth a try. Rich@KLEWBeige G3 233 MHz DT rev.1 G4 400 MHz NewerTech upgrade OS 9.2.2 384 MB RAM ATI Radeon Mac (PCI) Thrustmaster FCS/WCS

[Guest Allan Jones]

Max,A Dylan concert -- nice! Let me make sure I'm understanding. Are the rates and artifacts you are reporting from Fly 2K or Fly! II?Sounds like you're on the road to success. That vcf for a Radeon is the closest one to the card you have, but may need some minor user adjustments (the vcf is a text file and therefore editable).Here's something to try: set you Mac desktop res and color depth to exactly match the settings for Fly! Example: if running Fly at 1024x768 and 32-bit color, set the desktop to the same size and choose "millions of colors." May not make a difference but it's easy to try.What I'm unsure about is how the newer Macs handle AGP functions. From reading on the "other" forum, there is a "window" between the memory on the video card and the RAM on the motherboard. They refer to it as the AGP aperture. The peecee guys can vary the size of the aperture by setting it in the BIOS. Smaller is apparently better. I don't know how it's handled on the Mac. Just look at my system specs below -- were it an airplane, it would have been built by the Wriight Brothers! :-hahFly 2K may not support the AGP system, but Fly II should. If you have tried the new card with Fly II, can you please post the contents of your render.ini file. That might help us fine-tune things. Hopefully, someone with more knowledge of AGP Macs can jump in!

[Guest]

Hello Rich and Allenthank you for your continous help!First: The most current version of OpenGL (1.2.1)is installed.Second: My desktop res and color depth matches exactly the settings for Fly! (1024x768 and millions of colors/32 bit).Now - just a few minutes ago I started to get crazy ... I suddenly had the idea to replace my ATI 8500 64MB with my old ATI Rage 16MB and compare the performance. Shocking results: With the same settings (1024x768 with 32mb, the fps in Fly!2k and Fly!2 are virtually the same!!:Fly!2k between 8 - 28fps, Fly!2 between 9 - 14 fps. How is that possible:-eek ?? The only difference: In Fly!2k the airplane shapes are normal and not semi-transparent as with ATI 8500 ...Allen, you asked for the render.ini contents. Here they are:[Textures]maxTextures32=0maxTextures64=0maxTextures64_565=16maxTextures128=64maxTextures128_565=999maxTextures256=40maxTextures256_565=32maxTextures512=6maxTextures512_565=6maxTextures1024=1mipMapFlag=896[Graphics]mipLevelCount=8directTextureFlag=0allowAutoMipMapping=0premultiplyColorAndAlpha=0#windowMode=1[OpenGL]useWritePixels=1nonlocalBuffer=0allowFrameBufferLocking=1[MacOS]useLinearFog=1[NonAGP]maxTextures256_565=32[AGP]maxTextures256_565=32I must confess that I understand virtually nothing about it, so any suggestions and help will be highly appreciated.Max

[Guest]

Max,Actually, then most current version of OpenGL is 1.2.2. There are many variables such as extension conflicts, drivers, and the settings you

[Guest]

Hello Richwhere did you get OpenGL 1.2.2? On the Mac support center they offer only 1.2.1 (the version I have already.Here are two screenshots of two airplanes in Fly!2k.Perhaps they give you some hints where to look at!?Max

[Guest]

Max,My work Mac has OpenGL 1.2.2, my home Mac has OpenGL 1.2.4 It's part of the Mac OS 9.2.2 update.I see your problem clearly now. I don't use Fly!2K anymore. My best guess is that it's not hardware related, but probably an extension or driver issue. A lot of extentions and ATI drivers have changed since Fly!2K was built. There could be some mismatch.Good luck.Rich@KLEWBeige G3 233 MHz DT rev.1 G4 400 MHz NewerTech upgrade OS 9.2.2 384 MB RAM ATI Radeon Mac (PCI) Thrustmaster FCS/WCS

[Guest Allan Jones]

Max,Thanks for posting the shots.In Fly2K, select "graphics' form the options menu and see if "environmental mapping" is checked. If it is, uncheck (deselect) it. The shots look like environmental mapping is working too hard. Some a/c look better with it, others without it. There are some that take on that "too bright, washed-out" look when EM is on.As for the Fly II render.ini, you posted, it looks identical to mine (I have the Rage 128 Orion 16MB). It must have been generated while the Rage 128 card was installed. If you put the Radeon back in, I think Fly will write an new render.ini that is tuned to the better card. We were told that II auto-detects video hardware and sets the program dynamically.It might be interesting to drag the above render.ini file to the desktop (don't trash it), reinstall the Radeon, and then start Fly II to see if it really writes a new render file that is different from the one above. You might get a crash to desktop at worst but, if it works, you'd have a fresh render file that should reflect the capabilities of the Radeon.What version of CarbonLib is in your extensions folder?

[Guest]

Hello Rich and Allenyes!! it was the environmental mapping :-) :-) Thank you for your continous help!!As I have installed OS 9.2.2, my OpenGL version is definitely 1.2.4 - I checked it in the extension folder.Now for the render.ini file, I realize that nothing has changed after the reinstallation of Radeon 8500 - it's the same version I have shown above ... Is there a way to change settings "by hand"?I'm really happy that at least Fly!2k works again well.You helped me a lot, - so, if you would like to taste some nice swiss chocolate, just send your address to maxfe@freesurf.ch.As Rich Harvey manifested today with some very good news,I'll tell him about my fps problems with Fly!2. Who knows, perhaps he is able to find a solution!?Max