Help with flickering squares on lcd

[bert8for3]

All of a sudden, I've got flickering squares in the sky on my lcd monitor. Sorry but no screenshot. I'm running in 1280x1024 with the res fix. Never had this before and haven't a clue what to check. In case it might have anything to do with it, it's sunset, there's a target visible off my portside toward the sunset and the sun is just over the horizon. I say this 'cause the flickering almost seems to centre on the sun, although it extends about 180 degrees with the sun in the middle. The sky in the 180 degrees on my starboard side doesn't seem to be affected. The flickering squares are sort of all over the place without any pattern as far as I can see. It's as if the monitor is lagging behind on redrawing. But it's not affecting anything else and it's only happening in-game. What should I look at?

[bert8for3]

Ugh. Reminder note to self:

1. Computer problems, like s**t, happen as a fact of life. :damn:

2. There's no point running around the house screaming repeatedly "there's a problem with my sh3!". SWMBO will simply call in the little men in white uniforms to take me away. From previous experience, the food at the asylum is not as good, and they don't have Guinness.

3. Be calm and think things through, it may take time, but there's probably a solution.

4. With any luck, it may be possible to identify the problem before hell freezes over.
5. See the whole thing as a learning experience. :know: Right.

So here's my troubleshooting plan (including what I've looked at so far) in case anyone can suggest (and knowing not a heck of a lot about monitor/display stuff, would sure appreciate) that something is pointless to check or maybe it's more efficient in another sequence:

1. Running on a P4 2.5 GHz with 1Meg RAM and ATI Radeon x1650Pro vid card (512M), while not at all high-end, the game has always run pretty smoothly. However, could be a memory issue. RAM is maxed out on 1G. Thought occurred to check page file size, it was set at default from recent re-install, so I upped page file to 4096 from default 1500, but no effect.

2. What did I change since things were last ok a couple of days ago? I was fiddling with some of the monitor settings on this new Samsung 223BW lcd. So I checked and reset as far as I could remember to previous settings, but no effect.

3. Wondering if it's some sort of lag with the visual sighting, one thing I'm scratching my head about is that I'm not sure if this is the first time I've come into visual contact with a target since I got the new monitor. 'Cause it did occur immediately after I acquired visual on this new contact. Thing is I'm not sure, because I was on TC, believe 64 or 128, when the ship was spotted. So it was on automatically dropping to 1x with the sighting and hitting F4 that the problem was there. Racking my brain, I think I've had earlier visual contacts using this monitor. So I'm not sure that it's actually linked to the visual sighting. Is it linked to the sunset?

4. I have the res fix on, so checked that res setting matches res setting in d3d9 cfg file. yes.

5. Have to try another res or two to see if still have the problem. In particular, try 1280x960 which I'd been playing on recently. One change I did make sometime last week was to change to 1280x1024. Although even if another res is ok, that doesn't id the problem and the 1280x1024 res is real nice.

6. A monitor driver problem? Would be surprised since it's been fine up to now, but could try this. There is a more recently dated driver, so suck it up and try it at some point, hoping it doesn't cause problems that aren't there now. Chances are that the monitor will not blow up and that I'll be able to roll back the driver if necessary. Being optimistic is good.

7. Monitor refresh rate. On 1280x1024, the default refresh is showing 60Hz, but seems it can go to 75Hz. Can try adjusting this. SH3 synchronize setting is on, so don't see that the game "refresh" would be faster than the monitor's though. Is it possible that the monitor is too fast on refresh for the game? Wouldn't think so.

8. Installed the monitor with the digital cable rather than the analog. Does this make a difference somehow?

9. Oh, right. Yes, checked the monitor manual troubleshooting section. Nothing there that helps id problem.

10. Scratching head a bit about the res fix d3d9cfg file which reads:
;
; DX9res Settings
; by Kegetys <kegetys@dnainternet.net>
;
; Note that this config is reloaded on device reset, so you can task switch out
; of the game, change settings from this file and then return
;
[config]
; ResX: Horizontal resolution setting
; ResY: Vertical resolution setting
; useFiltering: Use linear filtering for UI elements
; enableScreenshots: Hook printscreen keypress to save TGA screenshot
resX=1280
resY=1024
useFiltering=1
enableScreenshots=1
screenshotPath=.
[gamma]
; setGamma: Override gamma ramp
; gammaRed: Red channel gamma (1.0 = normal, decrease to add brightess, increase to darken)
; gammaGreen: Green channel gamma (1.0 = normal, decrease to add brightess, increase to darken)
; gammaBlue: Blue channel gamma (1.0 = normal, decrease to add brightess, increase to darken)
setGamma=0
gammaRed=1.0
gammaGreen=1.0
gammaBlue=1.0
...don't know what the heck the usefiltering=1 setting is or if this might somehow be conflicting with monitor settings? Likewise the setGamma=0 setting?

11. Bump up post for help. A bit presumptuous since just posted yesterday, but a necessary evil perhaps as otherwise could risk the little men in white coats scenario. Maybe just maybe someone on the forum will have an idea what the problem is and save the day.

12. Go get a Guinness. :rock:

13. Move #12 to #1 in sequence. :up:

Sorry for the long post.

[Subject]

:hmm: I've seen strange artifacts in the sky too a couple of times. It's only when looking at the sky? and everything else looks fine?
Then my guess is, it's the thing that can happen, when SHIII shifts from one weathersetting to another... if you let it run for a while, it should settle again.

[bert8for3]

:hmm: I've seen strange artifacts in the sky too a couple of times. It's only when looking at the sky? and everything else looks fine?
Then my guess is, it's the thing that can happen, when SHIII shifts from one weathersetting to another... if you let it run for a while, it should settle again.

Tks, certainly worth a try seeing if it settles. Tks also yr mention of the word artifacts, which rang a bell in terms of seeing some past posts. Searching "artifacts" produces a number of posts which I'm scanning, talking about eg black artifacts. eg here: http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=127154&highlight=artifacts .Mine aren't black, they're sky texture, but roughly squares frozen briefly and flickering/dancing around, as if the screen is redrawing but not keeping up. Mine is more like the screenshot in post #30 in http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=103715&highlight=artifacts, although mine are smaller squares all over the place. So now I'm wondering if it's GPU cooling or the DVI connection which I'm using rather than analog, as suggested in post #33 in that thread. Have to add to the diagnostic list :cry: . Unless the vidcard itself is going downhill.

[johnno74]

Whatever it is, its not your monitor or refresh rate. Or your monitor driver. Analog or digital (dvi) doesn't matter either. Your monitor is a very dumb device, it doesn't actually "draw" anything, it just displays an image 50 (or 65, or whatever your refresh rate) times a second.

The acutal "drawing" is done by your video card. It sounds to me like either your video card drivers or your video settings (AA etc) are causing the problem. Ensure your video card drivers are up to date... If you are using nhancer or other video tweaker (BTW what video card make - ATI or nvidia?) then reset the profile for SH3 to default.

[bert8for3]

@johnno74. Tks, I'll look at that.

[Schwuppes]

You're not overclocking are you? :lol:

[bert8for3]

You're not overclocking are you? :lol:

No, but I'm checking GPU overheating as a possibility. I've installed SensorsView which I think shows the GPU as "Aux", in which case it shows about 32 deg C at standstill. But the temp monitor in Catalyst was showing 51 at standstill, which would be too high I believe. However, I'm not sure which one is right. And of crse it's operating temp that really matters. Trouble is with the res fix on, I can't AltTab out of game to see the operating temp. Even uninstalling the res fix, I still can't AltTab out.

Last night, I did try taking the side panel off the case and blew a bedroom fan directly on the GPU. Not surprisingly with that kind of airflow, the standstill temps went down to about 26 deg in SensorsView and 41 in Catalyst. But in-game it was still the same, UNTIL ... lo and behold when the sun went below the horizon, it suddenly stopped and things were normal. So it seems to be linked to the sun (low on the horizon only?), but my present theory is that that's a trigger or symptomatic and that the real cause may be overheating. Continuing the detective (Clouseau) work, although RL interfering weekdays. Tks for yr reply.

[onelifecrisis]

I get this whenever the weather is about to change. It's always happened to me. There's a relatively brief period between weather types (maybe 10 minutes at 1x TC - I never timed it, though) where the sky flickers. Then the weather "finishes" changing, and it goes away. It only happens when the weather is changing in such a way that affects the clouds e.g. going from no cloud to overcast.

Could this be the same problem you're having? I though it was a stock bug.

[bert8for3]

I get this whenever the weather is about to change. It's always happened to me. There's a relatively brief period between weather types (maybe 10 minutes at 1x TC - I never timed it, though) where the sky flickers. Then the weather "finishes" changing, and it goes away. It only happens when the weather is changing in such a way that affects the clouds e.g. going from no cloud to overcast.

Could this be the same problem you're having? I though it was a stock bug.

I don't think I've had that, or at least I've never noticed it (which would be more likely). But trying to recall times I've been at 1x with changeable weather, I don't recall it. This seems to be different, i.e. I'm not noticing any actual or impending weather change but I'll stay in 1x for a while now to see if it's going to change. What had me dialing 911 was that I'd never had this before, and no system or game changes. Maybe I won't see it again, although I think for good measure I'm going to pop in a couple of extra case fans for better cooling.