[Help] I changed my graphics card ati -> nvida and graphic quality took a plunge

[goldorak]

The title says it all.
I've used for 4 years an ati card and the graphics in dw was decent.
Nothing fancy but not horribile either.
Now I've built a new computer and decided to go Nvidia this time.
The new card is a mid range XFX 7900 GS, and unfortunatley I'm getting banding in every game I have.
And I don't know how to get rid of it or if its even possible with an Nvidia card.
I've tried all settings in the control panel but nothing works.


I need help from some DW players that have an Nvidia card.
What drivers are you using and most important what setting do you have selected in the control panel.
Tell me that banding can be eliminated otherwise I'll have to go back to ati.

For those that don't know : Banding is an effect where instead of having a full color like a band of blue, or green or red etc... you get a band of graduated colors going from clear green to deep green, deep red to light red, and so on.
And it affects visual quality in games.

[TLAM Strike]

I use Starstorm drivers and found them to work good. I don't know where to get them (I got them from a buddy). I'll ask my buddy to post a link here, unless somone else knows where they can be found and posts first.

[Dr.Sid]

It is the bad graphics I talk about all the time. DW runs in 16 bit mode only, which is just absurd these days.

ATI cards use dithering to fake more colors. nVidia cards don't. This banding cannot be disabled in any way, nor dithering can be disabled on ATI cards, as far as I know.

I like nVidia more, since ATI's dithering can create strange patterns and it moves all the time. It brings a lot of stress to the eyes, at least to my eyes.

But all the other things should work in the same way .. reflections, shadows, and so on. Detail textures need some extra video memory, but that should only be problem on some old notebooks, not on recent videocards.

[Dr.Sid]

I use Starstorm drivers and found them to work good. I don't know where to get them (I got them from a buddy). I'll ask my buddy to post a link here, unless somone else knows where they can be found and posts first.

Please post screenshot from 3d view .. I doubt any nvidia drivers can bring dithering, but some could bring foring the 32 bit mode.

[goldorak]

It is the bad graphics I talk about all the time. DW runs in 16 bit mode only, which is just absurd these days.

ATI cards use dithering to fake more colors. nVidia cards don't. This banding cannot be disabled in any way, nor dithering can be disabled on ATI cards, as far as I know.


Oh my thats absurd.
Why can't I have a graphics card that has good rendering and excellent drivers under linux ? :damn:
I knew that Nvidia cards rendered at 16 bit or 32bit but I didn't imagine that would have such a terribile effect on DW or on any other game that uses 16bit color.
I've tried also SH III and Orbiter and these don't use 16 bit graphics but the banding is still present.
What a shame. :down:


I like nVidia more, since ATI's dithering can create strange patterns and it moves all the time. It brings a lot of stress to the eyes, at least to my eyes.


I chose Nvidia this time because I was going to setup a dual boot pc windows xp and freebsd.


But all the other things should work in the same way .. reflections, shadows, and so on. Detail textures need some extra video memory, but that should only be problem on some old notebooks, not on recent videocards.

Yes thats no problem, but I noticed the banding effect almost immediately.
Its true that ATI may not have the greatest drivers on earth, but their cards are second to none when quality of the image is taken onto account.
Oh well, this will be my first and last Nvidia card until they manage to improve visual quality.
Live and learn. ;)

[Dr.Sid]

Post screenshots .. maybe I don't understand what you are talking about ..

I had ATI, now I have nVidia. DW looks better I think, even with banding. But I see no banding in other games, including Orbiter.

I think it is not problem of ATI or nVidia. 16 bits graphic is just obsolete, DW is only game I now which does not support 32 bits.
As a developer I also absolutely see no reason for that.

[goldorak]

I had ATI, now I have nVidia. DW looks better I think, even with banding. But I see no banding in other games, including Orbiter.


Uhm, did you look at the clouds at night in dw ?
Its absolutely atrocious. Way way badder than what you get with an ATI card.
Orbiter as far as I know lets you choose between 16 and 32 bit graphics.
Even if you chosse 32 bit graphics banding is present.
Its not as evident as in DW or SH 3 but its there.
While you're in orbit, try zooming on the atmospheric haze at the maxmium zoom.
You will see a very light banding effect.
You don't notice it without zooming though.



I think it is not problem of ATI or nVidia. 16 bits graphic is just obsolete, DW is only game I now which does not support 32 bits.
As a developer I also absolutely see no reason for that.

I agree, and it was one of the first things I asked about on the forum at the time the game was released.
The answer from SCS was that they couldn't for $$$ reason develop a new 32 bit graphics engine.
So they used a modified (?) version from the engine of sub command.
And that was 16 bit graphics.
Now the irony, is that even if sub command is 16 bit graphics, it doesn't look as bad as dw does.
And thats something I really don't understand. :hmm:

[Dr.Sid]

Hm .. this calls for side by side visual comparison. But I only have nVidia now.

[Castout]

Err what about some screenshots? What the hell is banding btw:88)?

Thx for the info that DW is supposed to be played at 16 bit. I had some minor graphics glitches with 32 bit desktop.

[Dr.Sid]

Err what about some screenshots? What the hell is banding btw:88)?

Thx for the info that DW is supposed to be played at 16 bit. I had some minor graphics glitches with 32 bit desktop.

It should not be related to desktop settings. As far as I know you can't play in windowed mode when desktop is in 32 bits.

DW just always runs in 16 bits.

[Dr.Sid]

http://roger.questions.cz/other/dump00063324.jpg

Look at the light reflection. You can see individial bands of colors. That is called banding. nVidia 7300 go.

[TLAM Strike]

I use Starstorm drivers and found them to work good. I don't know where to get them (I got them from a buddy). I'll ask my buddy to post a link here, unless somone else knows where they can be found and posts first.

Please post screenshot from 3d view .. I doubt any nvidia drivers can bring dithering, but some could bring foring the 32 bit mode.
http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/1576/dump00285173zn5.th.jpg (http://img242.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dump00285173zn5.jpg)http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/3645/dump00528511hd2.th.jpg (http://img242.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dump00528511hd2.jpg)

[goldorak]

@ TLAM Strike : those are very nice images.
You would be so nice as to post 2 more images : one at night with the clouds and one during day underwater.

The quality in those images rivals those of my old ATI card. :sunny:

What Nvidia drivers are you using by the way ?
I'm using XFX latest drivers, 94.xx something.

[Dr.Sid]

Those images are dithered using 4x4 regular pattern. Which is pretty good algorithm. Unfortunately ATI uses error diffusion, which results in very different patterns with just a slight change in part of the image.

Now how do I turn this on !?

Please post card type, and more drivers info. Also check if you can switch dithering somewhere in settings.

[TLAM Strike]

@ TLAM Strike : those are very nice images.
You would be so nice as to post 2 more images : one at night with the clouds and one during day underwater.

The quality in those images rivals those of my old ATI card. :sunny:

What Nvidia drivers are you using by the way ?
I'm using XFX latest drivers, 94.xx something.
As I posted in my first post I'm using Starstorm drivers. I'll find the exact type tonight and try to post it along with a night screen shot and underwater day screen shot tomorrow if I have time.

Please post card type, and more drivers info. Also check if you can switch dithering somewhere in settings.
I'll try and do that tomorrow.

[Dr.Sid]

I found starstorm drivers, it's easy with google .. but I could not download them. Will try later.

Anyway I googled even more. It seems older nVidia cards (6xxx) used this dithering. Newer 7xxx and even 8xxx does not seem to bother with dithering at all. I found many complains about it with no solution.

It does not seem to be driver related, but I can't tell for sure.

Edit: latest Starstorm drivers I found (but was not able to download) are from 2004 !! Are we talking about RECENT nVidia cards and drivers ?

Edit 2: btw. the method nVidia uses for dithering is called ordered dithering.

[TLAM Strike]

Here a couple of pics as requested:
http://img160.imageshack.us/img160/8876/dump00166110us9.th.jpg (http://img160.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dump00166110us9.jpg)http://img160.imageshack.us/img160/664/dump00245138co1.th.jpg (http://img160.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dump00245138co1.jpg)http://img267.imageshack.us/img267/2162/dump00295116yq9.th.jpg (http://img267.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dump00295116yq9.jpg)


Yea I don't think starstorm drivers have been updated in a while but they are still sound drivers IMHO.
Anyways here is my Card and Driver info:
http://img267.imageshack.us/img267/3098/gpuinfoza1.th.jpg (http://img267.imageshack.us/my.php?image=gpuinfoza1.jpg)
EDIT: I was not able to find any Dithering controls for my video card.

[goldorak]

Thanks for posting the pictures TLAM Strike. :yep:
The quality is on the par with what I had on the old ATI card.
I tried a new forceware version today but the quality is very very low, its nothing like the pictures you posted. :damn:
Oh well, I'll give a try on the starstrom drivers and report back but I don't have high hope.
I thind Dr. Sid is correct in assuming that old Nvidia cards used dithering whereas the new generation 79xx,88xx don't. :cry:

[Dr.Sid]

That is my final conclusion, based on two days of googling, driver changing and registry hacking. New cards simply don't support that. At least all 7xxx a 8xxx line.

Some cards seems to force 32 bit mode when antialiasing is forced.
My card doesn't. But try it .. :|\\