rec.autos.simulators

Here is a test of the frame rates on my computer using the
reg/rend/rendma

settings
--------
Track: Dega
Field Size: 30
Drawn: 11 ahead
        1 behind
Min frame rate: 27
Max frame rate:30

Smoke/dirt: on
Fence: on
skids/paint:auto

skids stay on entire time

In rend

Smoke/dirt:on
car text:on
fence:on
wall:on
skids paint:auto

Skids stay on entire time. The rendma is slightly smoother but still
cannot turn on objects.

I would say the reactor enhanced the graphics noticably, but since I
cannot run with alot of graphics on I really don't get the full benefit
from this aspect of the card. However I did pick up a pretty good number
of fps allowing me to turn on more graphics in the renddma version. If
it will make this much difference on my
stinkin Packard Bell MB, it should be worth the $150 for anyone with a
decent MB.

Mick in Tampa
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Mike:
        I am told that the cpu time taken to decide about the auto features is
large. Try turning your features eithe on or off, with nothing set to
auto. I think that then the Rendition card will let you run all but
grass/asphalt at a pretty good frame rate.

Mark
--------------------------------------------------

I did a test last night on all modes and found out that the Rendition
card doesn't seem to be doing much.

At Phoenix

All options with On-Off-None-Automatic were set to Off
All options with On-Off-Automatic      were set to Off
Car textures were set to Auto.

Cars drawn ahead was 12
           behind was 3

Cars heard is 3

graphics off threshold is 25
graphics on  threshold is 25

The way this is set, all objects are drawn but not textured.  This is
similar to the way I ran NCR1.  The car textures gave me an idea about
frame rate.

nascar2.exe (high res)    gets 24-25 fps
nasrend -dma              gets 24-25 fps
nasrend                   gets about 2 fps, you can count them!!

If anybody has any answers, I would sure like to hear them.

David Martin

On Wed, 18 Dec 1996 09:52:14 -0500, David Martin

   I did the same test (same machine specs) and got similar results.
NASREND reported around 10 fps, but that's still too slow.  Since we
have DMA, we don't have to worry about that.  However, if I was buying
a Verite card for ICR2 or NASCAR2, I'd want to be *darn sure* that DMA
worked on my machine before I bought the card!

   I'd say that your test didn't really put much of a graphics load on
the Reactor, so it didn't show any improvement.  I did a second test,
the only change being that all textures were ON (except asphalt/grass
off and cars on auto).  My results:

NASCAR2 SVGA    14 fps (-44% speed hit)
RENDDMA         19 fps (-24% speed hit or 35% improvement over SVGA)

   I think this is more representative of what the Reactor does for
you.  It doesn't provide raw speed, but allows you to have more
graphics without as much of a loss of performance (similar to how N1
and N2 SVGA seem to have similar frame rates, but the world of N2 is a
lot more grapically rich).

   As a side note, IMHO, Rendition NASCAR2 isn't a quantum leap over
the SVGA version (certainly nothing like ICR2 vs. ICR2-3D).  It looks
like the Rendition version is closely tied to the SVGA version,
perhaps without much time spent to optimize it.  Rendition's hands-on
work on Quake can make us hopeful that similar improvements can be
made with NASCAR2.  Unfortunately, Papyrus doesn't have a good history
regarding quick updates once the product is released.  Yes, crippling
or obnoxious minor bugs gets fixed at some point, but major rewrites
(which this sort of optimization might be on a par with) are more of
the "wait two years and send us $50" variety.  :(

Pick one or more: Model Rockets (competition-NERCB) / PCs (even Atari!) /
Papyrus ICR-ICR2-NCR / Who needs a life when you have multiple non-lives?