Well, I've tried everything here to fix the graphics for SH4. I'm running two EvGA GeForce 8800GTS 512s in SLI, and the only way I can get the sun flare and other things to look right is to turn off AA completely. Which then looks like **censored**. It really sucks as I built this rig with SH4, SH3, BoBII, and CFS3+O.F.F. in mind. The other three games work fine except SH3 which looks kinda weird on the 28 inch LCD widescreen, as I can't get the widescreen workaround to work right.

I had been running the stock 169.44 drivers that came on the disk for the vidcards, and updated to the 178.13 drivers today. The drivers work fine but seem to cap the frame rates at about 60 fps no matter what screen I'm in.

So if I play with AA on, the screen looks like a 16bit application running on a 32 bit monitor. As the colors look blocky, like Red Baron 3D on a modern system without glide mode. Or I guess the best way to explain it, as the sets below the horizen, you can see the colr bands in the sky as it changes from light to dark. As an example, there's a patch of light grayish blue then a darker band, and a darker band, and so on until the black of night. About 10 to 12 bands of color, as opposed to the smooth transition of color as some pics show.

Any other suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks.

I assembled my rig in Sep 2007 just for SH4. Everything was great.
I dont know anything about SLI systems-- i have a single nvidia 8800 GTX. Just 2 comments:

:know::know:
1.) The Monitor thing is easy to explain. If you are like me the owner of a digital monitor, no matter if LCD or TFT, the FPS are limited to the monitors manufactured refresh rate which is always 60 hertz. If you would have a low budget graphic card you may see 25fps or so but you could use the worlds best graphic card---60 fps is the limit.


2.) Since 1.5 (U-Boat Misssions) i always had a crappy ingame graphic when i activate a mod. Sometimes i had CTD, sometimes the game was frozen, sometimes no chance to load a savegame. :damn::damn: I installed EVERY nvidia driver that was released no matter if it was only beta. And four weeks ago i hit the jackpot, the beta driver 177.79 solved my problems. I sweare as long as i have this graphic card or the SH4 game i will never change this driver. :up:

My advice: Download all nvidia drivers you can get and test them one by one. If you have Vista use the option to remove all driver software in the deinstall window before you test the next driver. I wish you all luck.

I will say exactly the same...though in my case it was the 177.26 drivers, released a couple/few months ago, which solved ALL my problems. I've not tried any drivers since then..no need to do so!

I also agree that a Set FPS rate (usually 60 FPS, as in my case) is what you'll get with LCD...(I have a 24" Samsung widescreen Monitor). Actually, I've never understood why people insist on having FPS above 60 anyway, other than for benchmarking bragging rights. Does it really make a difference in any game? In an academic sense, I'm curious.

You'll lose the sun flare, etc, if you go above 4X AA....but I don't find any significant improvement above 4X anyway.

My other suggestion is to run SH4 with SLI disabled. I've read somewhere that SLI is not all it was expected to be, doesn't work well with some games (SH4??), and that the new cards (8800, 9800) match or even exceed SLI visuals.

And to me the main joke is the following: Disable the vertical sync option in SH4 and hit ctrl+F8 and if you system is strong enough u may see 100 fps+ but that is only the number of frames the card sends to the monitor. The monitor is still limited to 60 hertz what means max 60 fps. Beleaving in any higher number of fps displayed on LCD is just self-deception. ;)

Thanks for the replies! FPS isn't that big an issue to me, as long as I'm not looking at a slide show. Too there is a maximum of how many fps the human eye can actually "see" anyways.

I will try the 177.xx drivers, and I will also try the disabled SLI configuration too. This is also my first LCD setup with a powerhouse graphics system, and enough horsepower to push it along at a nice poke. So I was just thinkin' when I bought all these cool components, and assembling them, that I'll finally for the first time have a powerful enough rig and not have to cut back on anything, or say well, that's good enough, when it really isn't.

Thanks again guys! I'm off to test some stuff!

Well fellas I tried about 10 different driver versions, and I get the same issue, the only time the sun has that nice corona around it is when I disable the darn AA. If I set it to 2x, 4x, 8XQ, 8x, 16X, or 16XQ, I lose the nice lighting effects, and the rest of the picture looks like it's running in 256 color mode.

So it's a tossup, nice picture with jaggies, or substandard picture with no jaggies.

What a pain.:damn: :damn: :damn: :damn: :damn: :damn:

Do you have nhancer? if so limit your AA to 4x Multisampling and make sure that your gamma correction box is unchecked; these two maintain your sun halo and also a good smoke effect. Also try the 20000000: EA Strategy Games on AA compatibility to have a better overall AA.
All these three are the main settings to have the best AA possible on Sh3/Sh4 for nvidia cards (well, i tested them only on a single 8800GT512 since the first post date).

If this don´t work on a SLI, then, #$%@, nvidia really needs to look at their drives.:nope:

Somebody knows if the new ATi 48x0 series also have these problems with AAxsun halo&smoke?:hmm:

Cheers,

Rubini.

Anybody using the NVIDIA 178.13 geforce?
 

Im using Forceware 177.26 on my Nvidia 8800 gts (640 MB). Thanks to this forum. But once in a while I see a flickering while running TMO, PE4 and some smaller mods. Everything else is running smoothly. Should I consider the new 178.13 drivers to get rid of this?

I'm hesitating, maybe it is to much to ask and maybe I should live with the occasional and rare flickering of the sea :nope: :hmm: anybody?

Go for it. With every new driver you should see an improvement in performance, satbility and compatibility. That's the purpose of improving the things. Of course this is a (very) idealistic view. :roll:

The 177.xx drivers saw some changes, particularly under XP they changed the way shaders were handled. AFAIK the 178.xxs should be building on that and offer an improvement.

Only way to find out is try them. Easy enough to roll back. ;)

Ok thanks. convincing!! I'll go for it. Like I did last time, Large Task Force in the Sea of China, only 4 DD's. Had to roll back to a saved game then. Didnot stand a change :rotfl:

happy hunting,

Aniuk

I've tried nhancer twice, but I didn't really care much for it. I was hoping to find a solution without it. Can't say why I don't care for it other than all the extra tweaking to get it going, and then changing it for my other simulators needs, I guess would be the best reason.

I still have it in my downloads folder, so I may have another go at it later.

178.13
 

Installed the new forceware and it is running smoothly with the preferred setting mentioned earlier in this thread. 60 fps all the way, exploding torps, etc. no flickering of the sea so far. Thanks Arclight.:up:

Some people say that games that simulate physics do a better job at a higher frame rate. Increasing the frame rate above the sync rate of your monitor will result in tearing of the display when moving the camera, especially noticable when rotating the camera sideways. It's not a good look.

You're welcome Aniuk. :)
Not that I really did anyting. :lol:


Playing games at 60fps or higher also gives you a bit of a buffer for framedrop without introducing stuttering. Say you're playing a first person game and you're getting low 30s fps. You quickly turn around, the video card quickly needs to render an entire new scene and the fps drops. Not always desirable.

Just that little bit extra can make sure it's smooth all the way. fps above 60 won't make any visual difference, but it can smooth out the general experience.

Personally I can't resist cranking up the quality. I don't play games where that "super-silky-smooth" stuff is needed anyway. (like a first person shooter) :D

Hey guys / girls,

Well, of all the stupid little things to have to do, is turn off the gamma control only in the nvidia display settings. All other settings are default settings except AA which is set to 4x, which is fine for my other simulators too. And it doesn't interfere with my other games or require any other tweaking between games. Yeah!

Soooooooooooooooooo, if this ever happens to anyone else, going through what I did, have them try turning off the gamma control only, and go from there. It requires no other video programs.

nHancer
 

:D Hi everyone:D
I see somebody is complaining 'bout "nHancer":o
I don't understand why? It works 100% on my game:yep:
If you all read and follow those instructions that Rubini wrote
is not gonna be any problems.
I tryed it out on my SH4+add-ons and it worked 100%
But I uninstalled it, and installed SH3 instead:smug:
I have NVIDIA GE force 8600 GT 512MB Ram , it works 100%
with that card:lol: So somebody do something wrong I guess:hmm:

basic Navidia question
 

I deleted my question after rereading the original post. The first time I followed the instructions the map was unreadable and the sonar and hydrophones where to dark to see. Then I tried an alternate recommendate posted above and I got the same result. Then I went back the orignal post and followed it. I may have selected different options than previously used when the instructions provided more than one choice. It worked. The pictures are fantastic!! WOW! Now I know how the great copyies of screen shots get posted. Major thank you for this contribution to my game!

Turning of Gamma correction is detailed in the first post, the option will interfere with SH4 for some reason. I'd also advice setting AA to "application controlled" and use profiles for individual games that need AA through the drivers. AA generated by the game engine generally looks/works better at less of a performance hit.

Also, when forcing AA through drivers on a game that has AA itself, use "enhance ingame setting" mode and enable AA in the game (doesn't matter what you set it to, the driver will override the setting). That way you get the AA you want while still using the games "AA method" (better performance/compatibility).

Dunno if its the right place but as its an Nvidia 8800gtx with nVidia 180.43beta driver giving me this screwy display:

http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/3...2246ws0.th.jpghttp://img139.imageshack.us/images/thpix.gif

http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/8...2300cj9.th.jpghttp://img246.imageshack.us/images/thpix.gif

http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/7...2301xq0.th.jpg

It seems to be a double 'halo' around the camera. The inner shows more sea surface transparency than the outer with no surface transparency outside of the halo (see the first shot). It disappears with height above the sea resulting in no surface transparency at all. These shots are from the training and single missions.

I've tried all the tips with nHancer and reinstalled from scratch with the same results using stock 1.5 or any MOD.



Thanks in advance for the HELP!?

I have an alpha OC 8800GT and with the same version on nforce I don't get that result.

Try the latest stable nforce version. Also did you disable everything in nhancer before you updated drivers? In some cases nhancer will effect driver installs due to the changes they make in the registry.