Oolite Bulletins

Hum. I finally got a chance to upgrade to 1.82 today and transfer all my OXP's/custom files over. While I do like the new hyperspace mapping systems... my computer doesn't seem to like 1.82 very much at all. It took a bad performance hit-- frame rate and speed have taken a noticeable dive, and looks very choppy now. Since I was already operating in a 'retro mode' with very low-resource ships/stations, etc, it looks like getting things running smoothly will take removing planet textures, dropping my graphics detail, and a lot of other 'downgrades'. 1.82 isn't throwing anything in the way of errors-- though I do note 'Undocumented Launch' doesn't work any longer-- but the slow responses and choppy gameplay are killing it for me.

I think I may be sticking with 1.80 for now, since the performance with my current OXP load is quite smooth and looks good to me.

@Layne: What are your system and OS specs?

another_commander wrote:

@Layne: What are your system and OS specs?

Hey, look! I get an @! I'm a Roguelike!

ASUS laptop. Windows 7 64 bit, 2.13 GHz Intel Processor, 4.0 GB RAM. My graphics driver appears to be a default Intel 8.15.10.2622.

I am also a Scorpio.

Are those gfx drivers up to date, Arnold? They date from early 2012, it seems.

Layne wrote:

I am also a Scorpio.

And I'm a virgin! <smirks>

I'm on Windows 7 64-bit (maximum graphics etc., it's a quad core machine with 512mb graphics card) and have also noticed that it doesn't seem to run quite as smoothly, especially on transitions such as launching and docking, and entry into hyperspace. Launching just seems jerky, docking not quite as bad but a little jerkiness is apparent. Sometimes there's a delay of two or three seconds after zero before the hyperspace graphics appear. I'm wondering if there might be some stub of error checking code left in there that shouldn't be there, or something of the sort. But in other respects it's playing very well, and despite missing my total cloak of invisibility I'm getting on with it quite well.

Cody wrote:

Are those gfx drivers up to date, Arnold? They date from early 2012, it seems.

Layne wrote:

I am also a Scorpio.

And I'm a virgin! <smirks>

That's not what I hear around Riedquat, Cody!

*eyebrow waggle*

ffutures wrote:

I'm on Windows 7 64-bit (maximum graphics etc., it's a quad core machine with 512mb graphics card)

Possibly the issue is running maximum graphics with a relatively low spec card? "Extra Detail" really needs a more powerful card - and has had several moderately expensive quality increases added to it in 1.82 compared with 1.80, so even more so now. Try dropping back to "Shaders Enabled" and see if it helps.

I did the "standard" benchmark run and compared between 1.80 and 1.82. Without OXPs and with v-sync disabled, launched from Lave and stopped the ship immediately after getting control. Then I switched on the FPS counter. I did this test with the laptop sporting the Intel HD card, detail level Extra on both versions.

On 1.80 I had around 45-48 FPS looking at the planet. On 1.82, I had 30. However:
- On 1.80 there does not seem to be any atmosphere (cloud) layer over Lave. On 1.82 there is and moves very nicely when going at 16x TAF.
- On 1.80 the planet textures are a quarter of the size of the textures used in 1.82. In 1.82, both height and width of the generated textures are doubled for Extra Detail. The result is a much better looking planet in the newer version.

There are indeed quite a few quality improvements in graphics and this translates to FPS hit on the lesser cards. Upon setting detail level to Shaders Enabled in 1.82, the FPS counter jumped to 72.

another_commander wrote:

I did the "standard" benchmark run and compared between 1.80 and 1.82. Without OXPs and with v-sync disabled, launched from Lave and stopped the ship immediately after getting control. Then I switched on the FPS counter. I did this test with the laptop sporting the Intel HD card, detail level Extra on both versions.

On 1.80 I had around 45-48 FPS looking at the planet. On 1.82, I had 30. However:
- On 1.80 there does not seem to be any atmosphere (cloud) layer over Lave. On 1.82 there is and moves very nicely when going at 16x TAF.
- On 1.80 the planet textures are a quarter of the size of the textures used in 1.82. In 1.82, both height and width of the generated textures are doubled for Extra Detail. The result is a much better looking planet in the newer version.

There are indeed quite a few quality improvements in graphics and this translates to FPS hit on the lesser cards. Upon setting detail level to Shaders Enabled in 1.82, the FPS counter jumped to 72.

Ahh. Well, that explains the slowdown. Hmm. So, I get to choose between setting a lower detail and playing 1.82 or keeping an older version for the time being. That's... not a good selection.

Idle curiosity that in no way hints at my intention to cobble together an unholy abomination of files from the new version and the old: has the AI format changed? Were a totally innocent bystander, say, to transfer the new ship AI files from 1.82 into 1.80, would they work as they do in 1.82 and provide the new NPC pilot enhancements? Or would it all simply end in tears and the gnashing of garments and rending of teeth?

Hypothetically. Of course.

cim wrote:

ffutures wrote:

I'm on Windows 7 64-bit (maximum graphics etc., it's a quad core machine with 512mb graphics card)

Possibly the issue is running maximum graphics with a relatively low spec card? "Extra Detail" really needs a more powerful card - and has had several moderately expensive quality increases added to it in 1.82 compared with 1.80, so even more so now. Try dropping back to "Shaders Enabled" and see if it helps.

Except I was mistaken, it's a 1gb card. However, I tried shaders enabled and didn't notice a huge amount of difference then went back to maximum detail. Weirdly, things seem to have improved slightly - there's still a biggish drop in frame rate in the launch tunnel and in hyperspace, down from 50-60 to 20-30 in those two situations, but it feels a little less jerky. Maybe there was something else going on that made it more more obtrusive previously.

Some further investigation indicates that the commit responsible for the 20 fps hit I am seeing is 5d0586b4 and was inserted a few days before release as a tentative bug fix for an atmosphere display inconsistency that was reported. We need to sort this out, but I think that the issue will be visible mainly with low end gfx cards, while medium to higher end ones should not be affected in a noticeable way, hopefully.

Layne, mixing files from different releases (especially when they are one year apart from each other) is not recommended. It is possible to give it a try of course, but then any support in case of a problem will be from very difficult to impossible.

Edit: Also, split to own thread since this discussion has changed subject.

ffutures wrote:

there's still a biggish drop in frame rate in the launch tunnel and in hyperspace, down from 50-60 to 20-30 in those two situations, but it feels a little less jerky. Maybe there was something else going on that made it more more obtrusive previously.

If you're using BGS, the launch/hyperspace shaders are some of the heaviest in the game, and reduced frame rate is expected. If you're not using BGS, then I would suspect it's not graphics which are causing the frame rate drop there.

Layne wrote:

So, I get to choose between setting a lower detail and playing 1.82 or keeping an older version for the time being. That's... not a good selection.

The only differences between "shaders enabled" and "extra detail" at the moment are:
- extra detail has more detailed explosions
- extra detail has more complex explosions (new in 1.82)
- extra detail has bigger planet textures (new in 1.82)
You shouldn't notice a huge difference from 1.80's graphics by going back to "shaders enabled"

I don't know if this is relevant or helpful, but I have been seeing a few stutters over the last few weeks with both v1.80 and v1.82 trunk. Nothing serious, but noticeable things like stations pausing their rotation for a split second and also on the (BGS) docking and hyperspace tunnels.
The good news is that I've just updated trunk to v1.83.0.6557.... and things all look good - no stutters anywhere as far as I could see on a quick flight, and excellent frame-rates, often over 100 which I don't think I've ever seen before.

Details:-
Linux Mint v17.1
AMD quad-core CPU
8GB Ram
nVidia GTX550-ti based graphics card (with 4GB on-board RAM).
Extra detail set in game options.
plus my Classic Ships which are probably quite demanding being rather large image files.
I don't know about v-sync settings - I don't know what setting I use as I'm not sure where to find/change it

Smivs wrote:

I don't know if this is relevant or helpful, but I have been seeing a few stutters over the last few weeks with both v1.80 and v1.82 trunk. Nothing serious, but noticeable things like stations pausing their rotation for a split second and also on the (BGS) docking and hyperspace tunnels.
The good news is that I've just updated trunk to v1.83.0.6557.... and things all look good - no stutters anywhere as far as I could see on a quick flight, and excellent frame-rates, often over 100 which I don't think I've ever seen before.

Stutters have always been there and there are still in the latest trunk, you just haven't happened to notice them yet. Sometimes the system will be more densely populated, other times less. Sometimes a texture will be requested that will take a while to load - even if on a separate thread - and other times it will not. All these, and not only these, could be reasons for stutter. Plus, I don't see how you can possibly have stutters in 1.82 and not in 1.83 trunk, given that the only change between the two so far is the version number displayed on screen and log.

I don't know about v-sync settings - I don't know what setting I use as I'm not sure where to find/change it

V-sync is enabled by default so unless you actively change it in .GNUstepDefaults (key is "v-sync" = YES/NO;), it will always be requested. Then it's up to the system to provide it or not. If the frames per second you see in empty space are the same as the refresh rate of your monitor, then it is enabled, otherwise it is not. You can edit logcontrol.plist and change the display.initGL = no; key to yes and then it will report the V-sync status and any unsuccessful attempt to set it in the log.

@ Guys with performance issues: I have uploaded an experimental 64-bit build of 1.82 Test Release that hopefully will boost performance a bit to at least 1.80 levels. Would you like to try it and give us feedback on it? Download here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwG6R5 ... sp=sharing

Smivs wrote:

The good news is that I've just updated trunk to v1.83.0.6557.... and things all look good - no stutters anywhere as far as I could see on a quick flight, and excellent frame-rates, often over 100 which I don't think I've ever seen before.

The only thing that's gone into trunk since 1.82 is the version number change. I wish all bugs were that easy to fix!

Maybe the number change has disabled some OXP that was causing the stutter?