Ive been performance problems with blitz3d, mainly the slow down problem reported in the bugs forum. I just updated my graphics card to a x1950pro (found one going cheap) and what ever driver i use i get poor performance against what i got with my 9800pro. This must effect the Blitz3d sdk too. Is there work being done to correct this or is it just because Direct x 7 is getting holes in it dew to updates to drivers etc?
Blitz3d on new hardware
Miscellaneous Forums/General Discussion/Blitz3d on new hardware ..I cant say anything about B3D SDK becouse im not using it, but Blitz3D here pointing performance boost on my new hardware..
Pete,
I am really tasking B3d here with my latest project. I am currently speccing the playback PCs as duo core (2GB Ram) with an nVidia 8800gts with 320MB on board.
For your info the Duo Core is quite a bit faster than my P4 3.2Ghz (2GB RAM) PC and ATI card (XT800XL).
I am still only using XP Home on each PC.
Not sure what your guys are suffering from, maybe too many MSN/Skype/Yahoo/AOL messengers and such open? (lol)
IPete2.
I am really tasking B3d here with my latest project. I am currently speccing the playback PCs as duo core (2GB Ram) with an nVidia 8800gts with 320MB on board.
For your info the Duo Core is quite a bit faster than my P4 3.2Ghz (2GB RAM) PC and ATI card (XT800XL).
I am still only using XP Home on each PC.
Not sure what your guys are suffering from, maybe too many MSN/Skype/Yahoo/AOL messengers and such open? (lol)
IPete2.
Naughty Alien:Really? what graphics card have you got?
The animated mesh slow down problem does seam to be mostly on new ATI cards. but that is a fair amount of the market.
my main reason for posting here is to try and get some statement from Mark or some one, to what the problem is and if theres anyway round it?
in the bug forum Doiron posted that mark said this in an email to him
If this is the case i would like to know for sure because this performance drop on my hardware and other ati users completely destorys my project, it runs great on old drivers and a 9800pro, but on new ati hardware it kills the frame rate to about 8fps every time i get a few enemys on screen.
The animated mesh slow down problem does seam to be mostly on new ATI cards. but that is a fair amount of the market.
my main reason for posting here is to try and get some statement from Mark or some one, to what the problem is and if theres anyway round it?
in the bug forum Doiron posted that mark said this in an email to him
Hi,
The problem is due to weird bugs in d3d7 drivers, for which I have found no solution.
The 'fast', pre-1.88 version of b3d started displaying weird 'glitching' artifacts when playing anims (around when d3d8 came out?) despite the fact that b3d followed the d3d specs for fast vertex buffer updates.
To fix the glitches, we had to use a different way to update vertex buffers - which unfortunately turned out to be slower.
Mark
The problem is due to weird bugs in d3d7 drivers, for which I have found no solution.
The 'fast', pre-1.88 version of b3d started displaying weird 'glitching' artifacts when playing anims (around when d3d8 came out?) despite the fact that b3d followed the d3d specs for fast vertex buffer updates.
To fix the glitches, we had to use a different way to update vertex buffers - which unfortunately turned out to be slower.
Mark
If this is the case i would like to know for sure because this performance drop on my hardware and other ati users completely destorys my project, it runs great on old drivers and a 9800pro, but on new ati hardware it kills the frame rate to about 8fps every time i get a few enemys on screen.
oldest card I have is 7600GT wich really working nice and very smooth...another comp is on 7900 and its gaining about 20FPS more in comparison with 7600GT (scene about 75K polys and 6 animated meshes, particles, etc)...I tested same thing on 8800GT and its blowing away both of my cards with 45FPS boost in comparison with 7600GT
If you are having ATI problems: make sure you don't have omega drivers and the like installed.
Those "optimized" drivers optimize for DX9 by cutting down DX7 stuff which results in instant crash or strange slow downs.
But there is another thing in your system setup potentially causing the problem:
Radeon 9800 was AGP centric
X1950 Pro isn't really meant for that anymore
So don't look at the benchmarks for the X1950 to compare performance unless you get a PCIe board and a PCIe card, because you will never get up to that performance as you cut the cards capabilities (by 15-40%)
Those "optimized" drivers optimize for DX9 by cutting down DX7 stuff which results in instant crash or strange slow downs.
But there is another thing in your system setup potentially causing the problem:
Radeon 9800 was AGP centric
X1950 Pro isn't really meant for that anymore
So don't look at the benchmarks for the X1950 to compare performance unless you get a PCIe board and a PCIe card, because you will never get up to that performance as you cut the cards capabilities (by 15-40%)
So don't look at the benchmarks for the X1950 to compare performance unless you get a PCIe board and a PCIe card, because you will never get up to that performance as you cut the cards capabilities (by 15-40%)
15-40% sorry but where did you pluck that from? my business partner has almost the same pc as me but pci express and he gets a small maybe 3 frames per second boast over my card. I know it should be a bigger gap but it doent show in benchmarks or in games performance. i have noticed you get a bit more of that jumping when levels first load in halflife 2. but thats it.
ive tried all the official driver avalable in order. uninstalling as i go. its not just my system, read the post in bugs forum
http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=68476
Naughty Alien: like i said above, I think its just ATI cards that have the problem.
I have ATI X1950XTX and it works perfectly with B3D and B3D SDK. Also, it does not matter if I am using it on XP or Vista. The numbers are roughly the same, which I expected as it's all run on the same computer. I am using the latest ATI Catalyst drivers and I am not overclocking anything. Blitz3D definitely works well with new hardware.
Barney
Barney
My new 2GB, E6600 Core 2 Duo, 8800GTX runs Blitz3D like a sausage flying a Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird.
I love my switch to nVidia - haven't yet stopped touching.
I love my switch to nVidia - haven't yet stopped touching.
Barnabius: your first person i know of not to get these problems with a x series card could you please run the two small test programs at the start of this thread and tell me your frames per second for version 1.98. thanks
http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=68476
Puki: we know nvidia works, but i guess you have to show off you system specs again. :OP
http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=68476
Puki: we know nvidia works, but i guess you have to show off you system specs again. :OP
Pete Carter: take a look at my comment on the thread about the bug and see if you notice any difference when using Skidracer's workaround or a compiled exe from v1.88.
Also, the frame drop should be visible on a 9600pro or 9800pro as well, and not only on the next generation of videocards.
Judging from what you said, it could well be an issue with your system or configuration (maybe AGP is disabled from the bios?).
Also, the frame drop should be visible on a 9600pro or 9800pro as well, and not only on the next generation of videocards.
Judging from what you said, it could well be an issue with your system or configuration (maybe AGP is disabled from the bios?).
Doiron: Just tried Skidracers work around, it works i get a much better frame rate. but i use copyentity alot in my game and its a real pain try to live without it.
I know what it is, like everyone else in your thread that has an ATI card, if i used an older driver i would get 45 ish frames per second, but with new drivers i got 7-8 on all version. the problem being that i cant use those old drivers with my new card because they dont support it. the oldest drivers that support my card still have the problem.
so no using copyentity on animated meshs and everythings fine.
I know what it is, like everyone else in your thread that has an ATI card, if i used an older driver i would get 45 ish frames per second, but with new drivers i got 7-8 on all version. the problem being that i cant use those old drivers with my new card because they dont support it. the oldest drivers that support my card still have the problem.
so no using copyentity on animated meshs and everythings fine.
@Pete Carter: Sorry, I've just read your request. Here are the results on my office computer, which I don't use much to play with B3D. Will test it at home later.
The card is ATI X1800XL, latest Catalyst driver.
B3D test
================
v1.88 = 34 FPS
v1.89 = 3 FPS
v1.98 = 3 FPS
MD2 test results are the same
Obviously there's a problem with this particular set of circumstances but when I said I don't have problems I was referring to an overall picture, not specifics. So far I did not have any problems with the B3D stuff I tried and/or developed myself. CopyEntity is something I rarely use.
Barney
The card is ATI X1800XL, latest Catalyst driver.
B3D test
================
v1.88 = 34 FPS
v1.89 = 3 FPS
v1.98 = 3 FPS
MD2 test results are the same
Obviously there's a problem with this particular set of circumstances but when I said I don't have problems I was referring to an overall picture, not specifics. So far I did not have any problems with the B3D stuff I tried and/or developed myself. CopyEntity is something I rarely use.
Barney
Peter,
This is an obvious thing but just in case you are using video anywhere - earlier versions of B3d had a memory leak with video, so if you decide to backtrack to an earlier verison of B3d, then be aware of that issue.
IPete2.
This is an obvious thing but just in case you are using video anywhere - earlier versions of B3d had a memory leak with video, so if you decide to backtrack to an earlier verison of B3d, then be aware of that issue.
IPete2.
Hi Pete (Carter) - if you're not using copyentity does that mean you are using 'loadanimmesh' for every single character in your syndicate styled game? I would hate to think what the load time would be to have to do that for every unit in the game as opposed to simply using copyentity. I remember the vertex glitches we used to get in v1.88 an earlier - there may be some screenshots of it around on the forums somewhere with what looks like vertices being stretched and distorted so even if you do go back and use the old v1.88 then on some cards it won't work.
Could you create two exes one with 1.88 and one with 1.9x versions of blitz3d?
Could you create two exes one with 1.88 and one with 1.9x versions of blitz3d?
Finally got home so I can test it on X1950XTX. Here are the results.
B3D test
================
v1.88 = 37 FPS
v1.89 = 3 FPS
v1.98 = 3 FPS
MD2 test results are the same
but when I compile the source with the latest (beta2) version of Blitz3D runtime.dll, I get 25 PFS in windowed and 29 FPS in full-screen mode.
Barney
B3D test
================
v1.88 = 37 FPS
v1.89 = 3 FPS
v1.98 = 3 FPS
MD2 test results are the same
but when I compile the source with the latest (beta2) version of Blitz3D runtime.dll, I get 25 PFS in windowed and 29 FPS in full-screen mode.
Barney
Matty at the moment i am using copyentity Havent really thought about how to get round it yet as like you said load time would be long.
Barnabius: like i said there is a problem with ati card drivers and blitz3d, with the card which is better than my card by some way should get about 60-65 FPS in all tests. if you change the code to load animmesh instead of copyentity the test will run at the right speed. oh and thats odd news about the beta version?
Pete
Barnabius: like i said there is a problem with ati card drivers and blitz3d, with the card which is better than my card by some way should get about 60-65 FPS in all tests. if you change the code to load animmesh instead of copyentity the test will run at the right speed. oh and thats odd news about the beta version?
Pete
Just tried those MD2Demo and B3DDemo on my laptop which has an ATI Mobility Radeon 9700 (Win XP Pro).
The B3D Demos ran at around 25-28FPS for all 3 executables.
The MD2 Demos ran at around 30FPS for the 1.88 executable and about 55-60FPS for the 1.89 and 1.98 executables.
Doesn't look like my machine has the issue.
The B3D Demos ran at around 25-28FPS for all 3 executables.
The MD2 Demos ran at around 30FPS for the 1.88 executable and about 55-60FPS for the 1.89 and 1.98 executables.
Doesn't look like my machine has the issue.
Matty: what drivers you got on your laptop? if you havent updated them in a while that could be why even 8 month old drivers didnt have the problem. I dont have the option of going back to those old drivers because they pre date my card.