"Blurred graphics" in NASCAR Heat - info from the developer

Following is a posting that Dave Pollatsek from Monster Games posted in another forum regarding questions people have had about "blurry graphics" in NASCAR Heat: Guys, I've seen a lot of information and mis-information flying about regarding textures and NASCAR Heat. In an attempt to alleviate confusion, I'm going to lay it all out for you all; sorry if this is too long or technical. Many people have posted about blurred textures when running more than X cars, X from 16 to 30 or so. As NASCAR Heat is a modern game, designed to span a P233 up to P800-1000 era computers, we use a lot of textures. We then scale these down to fit on the user's machine. First; we allocate as many textures as we can fit into the texture memory available. If we run out, we "de-rez" textures and try again, and so forth, until we can "fit" everything. If your cars are blurry at some pack sizes and not others, it means that you're right on the edge of what your card can support. Texture memory is a precious resource. Except on old Voodoo2 cards, if you run in higher resolutions, this steals video memory that can be used for textures, so increasing the resolution decreases your available texture memory. Enabling antialiasing on some cards may steal a ton of video RAM as well, depending on the technique used by the card. Texture memory is the sum of available video memory (on the video card) plus the possibility of some system memory available via AGP. The more texture memory you have, the more cars you can run without becoming blurry. Here is a run down of a variety of video card configurations. Voodoo3 (and Voodoo2) These cards have two limitations. 1) They cannot texture from AGP RAM (which is when the card uses some system memory to store textures)--even the "AGP" Voodoo3's. Thus you are limited to the 16 MB or whatever came with your card to store both textures and frame buffers. If you use higher resolutions, you have very little video memory left over for textures. If we let you run in 1024x768, you would have incredibly blurry textures everywhere when racing with a pack. 2) They cannot support hi-res (512x512) textures. However, due to the limited texture memory, there probably wouldn't be enough space for 512x512 textures anyways (512's are four times as big as 256's). True AGP video card. (AGP nVidia TNT/TNT2/GeForce, ATI Rage 128/PRO, etc) These cards are supposed to be able to texture from system RAM as well as video RAM. HOWEVER, there are many cases where this doesn't work, or only a few MB of AGP RAM is available. One reason for this is if the AGP Aperture is set to a low value--this is a setting in the BIOS that limits how much RAM can be used by AGP. For a while, many computers came with this value set to absurdly low values (e.g. 4MB). In other cases, due to driver issues or card/motherboard problems, AGP ram doesn't work. It seems that many Voodoo5's have this problem--the one in our office reports 0 MB of AGP textures. We are confident that this is not a bug in our code, because the standard DirectX diagnostic provides the same result. We have no control over this situation--it is entirely up to the video card, drivers, and motherboard. There is no "fix" that we can do, except to recommend that you upgrade your drivers or adjust your aperture. Even this may not work. Probably, most of the other games on your system targeted the previous generation of systems, and so NASCAR Heat may be the first game that maxes out your texture memory. Soon there will be more games like this. So to sum up, there is no bug, and there is no fix. We can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear, and we can't conjure up video RAM from wishes and dreams, or even Glide. The only option would be to use a texture caching scheme which would make the frame rate drop like a rock, all the time. Caching works great for games like Quake, and horrible for closed-circuit racing games where you can see most of the textures in every frame. MORE STUFF: Another "blurring" issue has to do with the road blurring out as it gets farther away from you. You can most notice it on the yellow line on the side of the road. Near you, it looks sharp. But as you look down the road, the line starts to blur. This is due to mipmapping, which is a technique that improves fillrate and prevents the "sparkle" of distant textures, by picking among a series of smaller and smaller versions of the texture. Unfortunately the card/driver gets to choose which "mipmap" to use, and for polygons that are nearly "edge-on", such as a road, they tend to do a bad job, picking a lower resolution mipmap than we would like (which also lets them score higher on benchmarks, as well). However, there is one tool that we can use to combat this, which is called "MIP LOD bias", which lets us tell the card to bias its choice towards a higher or lower mipmap. Unfortunately, not all drivers support this feature. Most TNT/GeForce cards do, while the Voodoo's have not. Again, we are at the mercy of the video cards and their driver writers. It appears that some Voodoo drivers have a user-controlled knob for texture sharpness (which is most likely the same as MIP LOD bias), so some people can fix this by using their video card control panels, but I don't know why they didn't support this the normal way in the driver. So there you have it, I hope this helps at least somebody... -Dave Pollatsek MGI

On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 09:18:45 -0400, "Ed Martin" <[email hidden]> thus spoke: >In other cases, due to driver issues or card/motherboard problems, AGP ram >doesn't work. It seems that many Voodoo5's have this problem--the one in >our office reports 0 MB of AGP textures. I don't know why he says the above. The V5 doesn't support AGP texturing, just like all the other Voodoo cards. That's why it says 0mb available and is not a driver bug. -- Slacker

On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 14:07:39 GMT, [email hidden] wrote:

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>On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 09:18:45 -0400, "Ed Martin" <[email hidden]> >thus spoke: > > >>In other cases, due to driver issues or card/motherboard problems, AGP ram >>doesn't work. It seems that many Voodoo5's have this problem--the one in >>our office reports 0 MB of AGP textures. > >I don't know why he says the above. The V5 doesn't support AGP >texturing, just like all the other Voodoo cards. That's why it says >0mb available and is not a driver bug.

I was thinking that same thing as well...

On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 09:18:45 -0400, "Ed Martin" <[email hidden]> wrote: >Following is a posting that Dave Pollatsek from Monster Games posted in >another forum regarding questions people have had about "blurry graphics" in >NASCAR Heat: Thank you for this "from the source" info. I have a VooDoo3 AGP and already understood these issues, but hopefully some of the bashers who think there's something insidious or wrong with the lower res available with the V3 will finally understand why it is so. Thanks again Ed, Dave, MGI and the NH team. Warts and all, NH is my favorite sim. ~daxe

On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 14:12:06 GMT, KevinC <[email hidden]> thus spoke: >I was thinking that same thing as well... It also says the Voodoo cards don't support LOD in the drivers and you have to turn some knob thing. LOD is supported since the last couple of versions in the drivers and there is no knob thing. -- Slacker

In article <kYsr5.319$[email hidden]>, "Ed Martin" <[email hidden]> wrote: > Following is a posting that Dave Pollatsek from Monster Games postedin > another forum regarding questions people have had about "blurrygraphics" in > NASCAR Heat: > > Guys, > I've seen a lot of information and mis-information flying aboutregarding > textures and NASCAR Heat. > In an attempt to alleviate confusion, I'm going to lay it all out foryou > all; sorry if this is too long or technical. > > Many people have posted about blurred textures when running more thanX > cars, X from 16 to 30 or so. > As NASCAR Heat is a modern game, designed to span a P233 up to P800-1000 era > computers, we use a lot of textures. We then scale these down to fiton the > user's machine.. . . What about letting us run with a full field, but let us limit the number of cars in view like Nascar 3? I wouldn't mind being limited to 22 cars on the screen at one time, as long as the other 21 cars were out there beyond my vision. It is not enjoyable to me to have to play with 22 cars, but the screen gets very blurry if I go above it. At least in N3 I can run with 43 cars and have 43 cars visible in front and 6 cars behind with very smooth frame-rates on my Voodoo 3. -- Robert Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Before you buy.

On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 09:18:45 -0400, "Ed Martin" <[email hidden]> wrote: >Following is a posting that Dave Pollatsek from Monster Games posted in >another forum regarding questions people have had about "blurry graphics" in >NASCAR Heat:<snip> Great to see this info from the developers, thanks. Andre

So what is the best card to replace my Voodoo 3 3000 agp card

He (Dave Pollatsek) don't know much about voodoo cards. -- Todd S. "KevinC" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]... > On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 14:07:39 GMT, [email hidden] wrote: > > >On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 09:18:45 -0400, "Ed Martin" <[email hidden]> > >thus spoke: > > > > > >>In other cases, due to driver issues or card/motherboard problems, AGP ram > >>doesn't work. It seems that many Voodoo5's have this problem--the one in > >>our office reports 0 MB of AGP textures. > > > >I don't know why he says the above. The V5 doesn't support AGP > >texturing, just like all the other Voodoo cards. That's why it says > >0mb available and is not a driver bug. > > I was thinking that same thing as well...

It sounds like they all suck. :>) -- Todd S "Ken Brown" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:kiwr5.12061$[email hidden]... > So what is the best card to replace my Voodoo 3 3000 agp card > > >

On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 15:33:06 GMT, Robert <[email hidden]> wrote: Exactly! I just posted this same question on the other news group. I bet it would be almost impossible to add now though. (just a guess) I don't mind only being able to see 20 or so cars at a time, as long as I am racing against a full field. Andy

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>What about letting us run with a full field, but let us limit the >number of cars in view like Nascar 3? I wouldn't mind being limited to >22 cars on the screen at one time, as long as the other 21 cars were >out there beyond my vision. It is not enjoyable to me to have to play >with 22 cars, but the screen gets very blurry if I go above it. At >least in N3 I can run with 43 cars and have 43 cars visible in front >and 6 cars behind with very smooth frame-rates on my Voodoo 3.

Please use [email hidden] for all email replies

If you want BACKWARDS compatibility with N99/N3/SCGT etc etc..then the V5 5500 is a great choice. The geforces too are very good cards, althought they have a few idio...idiosy....they have a few oddities. :) Since N4 is taking advantage of the T&L hardware acceleration, then the 3dfx cards will be at a disadvantage. dave henrie "Todd Sorensen" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:JyAr5.117859$[email hidden]...

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> It sounds like they all suck. :>) > > -- > Todd S > > > "Ken Brown" <[email hidden]> wrote in message > news:kiwr5.12061$[email hidden]... > > So what is the best card to replace my Voodoo 3 3000 agp card > > > > > > > >

Great article, I don't experience any graphic problems when running a full 43 car track. I think it may be because I have a plain jane Viper 770 video card (nvidia TNT2) with 32 megs of ram that supports 32bit rendering. I decided that I'd trade my voodoo card in about a year ago for something that didn't suck :-) Ed Martin <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:kYsr5.319$[email hidden]... > Following is a posting that Dave Pollatsek from Monster Games posted in > another forum regarding questions people have had about "blurry graphics"in > NASCAR Heat: > > > Guys, > I've seen a lot of information and mis-information flying aboutregarding

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> textures and NASCAR Heat. > In an attempt to alleviate confusion, I'm going to lay it all out for you > all; sorry if this is too long or technical. > > Many people have posted about blurred textures when running more than X > cars, X from 16 to 30 or so. > As NASCAR Heat is a modern game, designed to span a P233 up to P800-1000

era > computers, we use a lot of textures. We then scale these down to fit onthe > user's machine. > > First; we allocate as many textures as we can fit into the texture memory > available. If we run out, we "de-rez" textures and try again, and soforth, > until we can "fit" everything. If your cars are blurry at some pack sizes > and not others, it means that you're right on the edge of what your cardcan > support. > > Texture memory is a precious resource. Except on old Voodoo2 cards, ifyou > run in higher resolutions, this steals video memory that can be used for > textures, so increasing the resolution decreases your available texture > memory. > Enabling antialiasing on some cards may steal a ton of video RAM as well, > depending on the technique used by the card. > Texture memory is the sum of available video memory (on the video card)plus > the possibility of some system memory available via AGP. > > The more texture memory you have, the more cars you can run withoutbecoming

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> blurry. > > Here is a run down of a variety of video card configurations. > > Voodoo3 (and Voodoo2) > These cards have two limitations. > 1) They cannot texture from AGP RAM (which is when the card uses some > system memory to store textures)--even the "AGP" Voodoo3's. Thus you are > limited to the 16 MB or whatever came with your card to store both

textures > and frame buffers. If you use higher resolutions, you have very little > video memory left over for textures. If we let you run in 1024x768, you > would have incredibly blurry textures everywhere when racing with a pack. > 2) They cannot support hi-res (512x512) textures. However, due to the > limited texture memory, there probably wouldn't be enough space for512x512 > textures anyways (512's are four times as big as 256's). > > True AGP video card. (AGP nVidia TNT/TNT2/GeForce, ATI Rage 128/PRO, etc) > These cards are supposed to be able to texture from system RAM as well as > video RAM. HOWEVER, there are many cases where this doesn't work, or onlya > few MB of AGP RAM is available. > One reason for this is if the AGP Aperture is set to a low value--this isa > setting in the BIOS that limits how much RAM can be used by AGP. For a > while, many computers came with this value set to absurdly low values(e.g.

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> 4MB). > In other cases, due to driver issues or card/motherboard problems, AGP ram > doesn't work. It seems that many Voodoo5's have this problem--the one in > our office reports 0 MB of AGP textures. > We are confident that this is not a bug in our code, because the standard > DirectX diagnostic provides the same result. > > We have no control over this situation--it is entirely up to the video

card, > drivers, and motherboard. There is no "fix" that we can do, except to > recommend that you upgrade your drivers or adjust your aperture. Eventhis

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> may not work. > Probably, most of the other games on your system targeted the previous > generation of systems, and so NASCAR Heat may be the first game that maxes > out your texture memory. Soon there will be more games like this. > > So to sum up, there is no bug, and there is no fix. We can't make a silk > purse out of a sows ear, and we can't conjure up video RAM from wishes and > dreams, or even Glide. The only option would be to use a texture caching > scheme which would make the frame rate drop like a rock, all the time. > Caching works great for games like Quake, and horrible for closed-circuit > racing games where you can see most of the textures in every frame. > > > MORE STUFF: > > Another "blurring" issue has to do with the road blurring out as it gets > farther away from you. You can most notice it on the yellow line on the > side of the road. Near you, it looks sharp. But as you look down the

road, > the line starts to blur. > This is due to mipmapping, which is a technique that improves fillrate and > prevents the "sparkle" of distant textures, by picking among a series of > smaller and smaller versions of the texture. Unfortunately thecard/driver

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> gets to choose which "mipmap" to use, and for polygons that are nearly > "edge-on", such as a road, they tend to do a bad job, picking a lower > resolution mipmap than we would like (which also lets them score higher on > benchmarks, as well). > However, there is one tool that we can use to combat this, which is called > "MIP LOD bias", which lets us tell the card to bias its choice towards a > higher or lower mipmap. Unfortunately, not all drivers support this > feature. Most TNT/GeForce cards do, while the Voodoo's have not. Again,

we > are at the mercy of the video cards and their driver writers. > It appears that some Voodoo drivers have a user-controlled knob fortexture > sharpness (which is most likely the same as MIP LOD bias), so some people > can fix this by using their video card control panels, but I don't knowwhy

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> they didn't support this the normal way in the driver. > > So there you have it, I hope this helps at least somebody... > > -Dave Pollatsek > MGI > > > > > >

Are you sure you just haven't seen a "clear" dashboard so you don't know what it looks like? I have seen it in the demo and with smaller fields but with 43 cars it's blurry. I know a Viper 770 could not possibly outperform a V5 5500 so my guess is you've never seen a crisp dash so don't know you're missing it. Not a flame, just a fact. -- Joe Marques Please remove "NO SPAM" to e-mail me. "Mark Smith" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:bGDr5.50199$[email hidden]... > Great article, > > I don't experience any graphic problems when running a full 43 car track. I > think it may be because I have a plain jane Viper 770 video card (nvidia > TNT2) with 32 megs of ram that supports 32bit rendering. I decided that I'd > trade my voodoo card in about a year ago for something that didn't suck :-) > > > Ed Martin <[email hidden]> wrote in message > news:kYsr5.319$[email hidden]... > > Following is a posting that Dave Pollatsek from Monster Games posted in > > another forum regarding questions people have had about "blurry graphics" > in > > NASCAR Heat: > > > > > > Guys, > > I've seen a lot of information and mis-information flying about > regarding > > textures and NASCAR Heat. > > In an attempt to alleviate confusion, I'm going to lay it all out for you > > all; sorry if this is too long or technical. > > > > Many people have posted about blurred textures when running more than X > > cars, X from 16 to 30 or so. > > As NASCAR Heat is a modern game, designed to span a P233 up to P800-1000 > era > > computers, we use a lot of textures. We then scale these down to fit on > the > > user's machine. > > > > First; we allocate as many textures as we can fit into the texture memory > > available. If we run out, we "de-rez" textures and try again, and so > forth, > > until we can "fit" everything. If your cars are blurry at some pack sizes > > and not others, it means that you're right on the edge of what your card > can > > support. > > > > Texture memory is a precious resource. Except on old Voodoo2 cards, if > you > > run in higher resolutions, this steals video memory that can be used for > > textures, so increasing the resolution decreases your available texture > > memory. > > Enabling antialiasing on some cards may steal a ton of video RAM as well, > > depending on the technique used by the card. > > Texture memory is the sum of available video memory (on the video card) > plus > > the possibility of some system memory available via AGP. > > > > The more texture memory you have, the more cars you can run without > becoming > > blurry. > > > > Here is a run down of a variety of video card configurations. > > > > Voodoo3 (and Voodoo2) > > These cards have two limitations. > > 1) They cannot texture from AGP RAM (which is when the card uses some > > system memory to store textures)--even the "AGP" Voodoo3's. Thus you are > > limited to the 16 MB or whatever came with your card to store both > textures > > and frame buffers. If you use higher resolutions, you have very little > > video memory left over for textures. If we let you run in 1024x768, you > > would have incredibly blurry textures everywhere when racing with a pack. > > 2) They cannot support hi-res (512x512) textures. However, due to the > > limited texture memory, there probably wouldn't be enough space for > 512x512 > > textures anyways (512's are four times as big as 256's). > > > > True AGP video card. (AGP nVidia TNT/TNT2/GeForce, ATI Rage 128/PRO, etc) > > These cards are supposed to be able to texture from system RAM as well as > > video RAM. HOWEVER, there are many cases where this doesn't work, or only > a > > few MB of AGP RAM is available. > > One reason for this is if the AGP Aperture is set to a low value--this is > a > > setting in the BIOS that limits how much RAM can be used by AGP. For a > > while, many computers came with this value set to absurdly low values > (e.g. > > 4MB). > > In other cases, due to driver issues or card/motherboard problems, AGP ram > > doesn't work. It seems that many Voodoo5's have this problem--the one in > > our office reports 0 MB of AGP textures. > > We are confident that this is not a bug in our code, because the standard > > DirectX diagnostic provides the same result. > > > > We have no control over this situation--it is entirely up to the video > card, > > drivers, and motherboard. There is no "fix" that we can do, except to > > recommend that you upgrade your drivers or adjust your aperture. Even > this > > may not work. > > Probably, most of the other games on your system targeted the previous > > generation of systems, and so NASCAR Heat may be the first game that maxes > > out your texture memory. Soon there will be more games like this. > > > > So to sum up, there is no bug, and there is no fix. We can't make a silk > > purse out of a sows ear, and we can't conjure up video RAM from wishes and > > dreams, or even Glide. The only option would be to use a texture caching > > scheme which would make the frame rate drop like a rock, all the time. > > Caching works great for games like Quake, and horrible for closed-circuit > > racing games where you can see most of the textures in every frame. > > > > > > MORE STUFF: > > > > Another "blurring" issue has to do with the road blurring out as it gets > > farther away from you. You can most notice it on the yellow line on the > > side of the road. Near you, it looks sharp. But as you look down the > road, > > the line starts to blur. > > This is due to mipmapping, which is a technique that improves fillrate and > > prevents the "sparkle" of distant textures, by picking among a series of > > smaller and smaller versions of the texture. Unfortunately the > card/driver > > gets to choose which "mipmap" to use, and for polygons that are nearly > > "edge-on", such as a road, they tend to do a bad job, picking a lower > > resolution mipmap than we would like (which also lets them score higher on > > benchmarks, as well). > > However, there is one tool that we can use to combat this, which is called > > "MIP LOD bias", which lets us tell the card to bias its choice towards a > > higher or lower mipmap. Unfortunately, not all drivers support this > > feature. Most TNT/GeForce cards do, while the Voodoo's have not. Again, > we > > are at the mercy of the video cards and their driver writers. > > It appears that some Voodoo drivers have a user-controlled knob for > texture > > sharpness (which is most likely the same as MIP LOD bias), so some people > > can fix this by using their video card control panels, but I don't know > why > > they didn't support this the normal way in the driver. > > > > So there you have it, I hope this helps at least somebody... > > > > -Dave Pollatsek > > MGI > > > > > > > > > > > > > >

Hi Joe, I played the demo with the smaller fields and the dashboard that I've seen there looks crisp and clear and exactly like the dashboard I see with the full version when I play with 43 opponents. The only "blurring" I see is with the lines on the pit lane when I'm driving past the 43 (detailed) cars during practice. I liked this article because it stated the fact that the graphics are adjusted during certain heavily polygonated times in the game, like the lines on pit lane for me, but it has never affected my dashboard or my driving for that matter. Note that I have all graphics settings maxed in NH and that I'm using a 600mhz Athlon cpu with a 64meg graphic aperture (bios setting). I also have 256meg of ram but I doubt that matters. I'd think you'd need at least 64 meg to have the graphic aperture of that size. Cheers Joe Marques <Joe"NO_SPAM"[email hidden]> wrote in message news:EoEr5.34880$[email hidden]... > Are you sure you just haven't seen a "clear" dashboard so you don't know > what it looks like? I have seen it in the demo and with smaller fieldsbut > with 43 cars it's blurry. I know a Viper 770 could not possiblyoutperform > a V5 5500 so my guess is you've never seen a crisp dash so don't knowyou're

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> missing it. Not a flame, just a fact. > > -- > Joe Marques > > Please remove "NO SPAM" to e-mail me. > "Mark Smith" <[email hidden]> wrote in message > news:bGDr5.50199$[email hidden]... > > Great article, > > > > I don't experience any graphic problems when running a full 43 car

track.

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> I > > think it may be because I have a plain jane Viper 770 video card (nvidia > > TNT2) with 32 megs of ram that supports 32bit rendering. I decided that > I'd > > trade my voodoo card in about a year ago for something that didn't suck > :-) > > > > > > Ed Martin <[email hidden]> wrote in message > > news:kYsr5.319$[email hidden]... > > > Following is a posting that Dave Pollatsek from Monster Games posted

in

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> > > another forum regarding questions people have had about "blurry > graphics" > > in > > > NASCAR Heat: > > > > > > > > > Guys, > > > I've seen a lot of information and mis-information flying about > > regarding > > > textures and NASCAR Heat. > > > In an attempt to alleviate confusion, I'm going to lay it all out for > you > > > all; sorry if this is too long or technical. > > > > > > Many people have posted about blurred textures when running more than

X > > > cars, X from 16 to 30 or so. > > > As NASCAR Heat is a modern game, designed to span a P233 up toP800-1000 > > era > > > computers, we use a lot of textures. We then scale these down to fiton

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> > the > > > user's machine. > > > > > > First; we allocate as many textures as we can fit into the texture > memory > > > available. If we run out, we "de-rez" textures and try again, and so > > forth, > > > until we can "fit" everything. If your cars are blurry at some pack > sizes > > > and not others, it means that you're right on the edge of what your

card > > can > > > support. > > > > > > Texture memory is a precious resource. Except on old Voodoo2 cards,if > > you > > > run in higher resolutions, this steals video memory that can be usedfor > > > textures, so increasing the resolution decreases your availabletexture > > > memory. > > > Enabling antialiasing on some cards may steal a ton of video RAM as > well, > > > depending on the technique used by the card. > > > Texture memory is the sum of available video memory (on the videocard)

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> > plus > > > the possibility of some system memory available via AGP. > > > > > > The more texture memory you have, the more cars you can run without > > becoming > > > blurry. > > > > > > Here is a run down of a variety of video card configurations. > > > > > > Voodoo3 (and Voodoo2) > > > These cards have two limitations. > > > 1) They cannot texture from AGP RAM (which is when the card uses some > > > system memory to store textures)--even the "AGP" Voodoo3's. Thus you > are > > > limited to the 16 MB or whatever came with your card to store both > > textures > > > and frame buffers. If you use higher resolutions, you have very

little > > > video memory left over for textures. If we let you run in 1024x768,you

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> > > would have incredibly blurry textures everywhere when racing with a > pack. > > > 2) They cannot support hi-res (512x512) textures. However, due to the > > > limited texture memory, there probably wouldn't be enough space for > > 512x512 > > > textures anyways (512's are four times as big as 256's). > > > > > > True AGP video card. (AGP nVidia TNT/TNT2/GeForce, ATI Rage 128/PRO, > etc) > > > These cards are supposed to be able to texture from system RAM as well > as > > > video RAM. HOWEVER, there are many cases where this doesn't work, or > only > > a > > > few MB of AGP RAM is available. > > > One reason for this is if the AGP Aperture is set to a low value--this > is > > a > > > setting in the BIOS that limits how much RAM can be used by AGP. For

a

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> > > while, many computers came with this value set to absurdly low values > > (e.g. > > > 4MB). > > > In other cases, due to driver issues or card/motherboard problems, AGP > ram > > > doesn't work. It seems that many Voodoo5's have this problem--the one > in > > > our office reports 0 MB of AGP textures. > > > We are confident that this is not a bug in our code, because the > standard > > > DirectX diagnostic provides the same result. > > > > > > We have no control over this situation--it is entirely up to the video > > card, > > > drivers, and motherboard. There is no "fix" that we can do, except to > > > recommend that you upgrade your drivers or adjust your aperture. Even > > this > > > may not work. > > > Probably, most of the other games on your system targeted the previous > > > generation of systems, and so NASCAR Heat may be the first game that > maxes > > > out your texture memory. Soon there will be more games like this. > > > > > > So to sum up, there is no bug, and there is no fix. We can't make a > silk > > > purse out of a sows ear, and we can't conjure up video RAM from wishes > and > > > dreams, or even Glide. The only option would be to use a texture > caching > > > scheme which would make the frame rate drop like a rock, all the time. > > > Caching works great for games like Quake, and horrible for > closed-circuit > > > racing games where you can see most of the textures in every frame. > > > > > > > > > MORE STUFF: > > > > > > Another "blurring" issue has to do with the road blurring out as it

gets > > > farther away from you. You can most notice it on the yellow line onthe > > > side of the road. Near you, it looks sharp. But as you look down the > > road, > > > the line starts to blur. > > > This is due to mipmapping, which is a technique that improves fillrate > and > > > prevents the "sparkle" of distant textures, by picking among a seriesof > > > smaller and smaller versions of the texture. Unfortunately the > > card/driver > > > gets to choose which "mipmap" to use, and for polygons that are nearly > > > "edge-on", such as a road, they tend to do a bad job, picking a lower > > > resolution mipmap than we would like (which also lets them scorehigher > on > > > benchmarks, as well). > > > However, there is one tool that we can use to combat this, which is > called > > > "MIP LOD bias", which lets us tell the card to bias its choice towardsa

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> > > higher or lower mipmap. Unfortunately, not all drivers support this > > > feature. Most TNT/GeForce cards do, while the Voodoo's have not. > Again, > > we > > > are at the mercy of the video cards and their driver writers. > > > It appears that some Voodoo drivers have a user-controlled knob for > > texture > > > sharpness (which is most likely the same as MIP LOD bias), so some > people > > > can fix this by using their video card control panels, but I don't

know

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> > why > > > they didn't support this the normal way in the driver. > > > > > > So there you have it, I hope this helps at least somebody... > > > > > > -Dave Pollatsek > > > MGI > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >

Sorry guys, I was misinformed about the V5. It doesn't support AGP texturing. My apologies for the confusion. I stand by everything else, though. (ducks ripe tomatos) -Dave P. MGI

I have really had difficulty deciding between a Geforce and a Voodoo 5. It seems that the geforce is the obvious choice for FPS like Quake III, SOF, etc, but that the V5 may be better for racing sims and , like you said, backwards compatibility. I opted for the V5 yesterday, partly because of the FSAA visual quality. Come on UPS, get that card to me! -- Todd S "Dave Henrie" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:MTCr5.42510$[email hidden]... > If you want BACKWARDS compatibility with N99/N3/SCGT etc etc..then the V5 > 5500 is a great choice. The geforces too are very good cards, althought > they have a few idio...idiosy....they have a few oddities. :) > Since N4 is taking advantage of the T&L hardware acceleration, then the > 3dfx cards will be at a disadvantage. > dave henrie > "Todd Sorensen" <[email hidden]> wrote in message > news:JyAr5.117859$[email hidden]... > > It sounds like they all suck. :>) > > > > -- > > Todd S > > > > > > "Ken Brown" <[email hidden]> wrote in message > > news:kiwr5.12061$[email hidden]... > > > So what is the best card to replace my Voodoo 3 3000 agp card > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >

Mark, Thanks for the info. Now I'm wondering if the lack of true AGP texturing from my V5 prevents it from using my Ram to load more textures whereas your AGP card is using your system Ram to help out. My lack of AGP texturing, coupled with FSAA and only 32 MB of video ram PER video chip (not true 64 MB of texture ram as other boards) may be causing the sometimes blurry dash. Starting to see some weaknesses with the V5 and I'm not happy about it. Can anyone confirm my non-expert theory? -- Joe Marques Please remove "NO SPAM" to e-mail me. "Mark Smith" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:6xFr5.50618$[email hidden]... > Hi Joe, > > I played the demo with the smaller fields and the dashboard that I've seen > there looks crisp and clear and exactly like the dashboard I see with the > full version when I play with 43 opponents. The only "blurring" I see is > with the lines on the pit lane when I'm driving past the 43 (detailed) cars > during practice. > > I liked this article because it stated the fact that the graphics are > adjusted during certain heavily polygonated times in the game, like the > lines on pit lane for me, but it has never affected my dashboard or my > driving for that matter. > > Note that I have all graphics settings maxed in NH and that I'm using a > 600mhz Athlon cpu with a 64meg graphic aperture (bios setting). I also have > 256meg of ram but I doubt that matters. I'd think you'd need at least 64 > meg to have the graphic aperture of that size. > > Cheers > > > Joe Marques <Joe"NO_SPAM"[email hidden]> wrote in message > news:EoEr5.34880$[email hidden]... > > Are you sure you just haven't seen a "clear" dashboard so you don't know > > what it looks like? I have seen it in the demo and with smaller fields > but > > with 43 cars it's blurry. I know a Viper 770 could not possibly > outperform > > a V5 5500 so my guess is you've never seen a crisp dash so don't know > you're > > missing it. Not a flame, just a fact. > > > > -- > > Joe Marques > > > > Please remove "NO SPAM" to e-mail me. > > "Mark Smith" <[email hidden]> wrote in message > > news:bGDr5.50199$[email hidden]... > > > Great article, > > > > > > I don't experience any graphic problems when running a full 43 car > track. > > I > > > think it may be because I have a plain jane Viper 770 video card (nvidia > > > TNT2) with 32 megs of ram that supports 32bit rendering. I decided that > > I'd > > > trade my voodoo card in about a year ago for something that didn't suck > > :-) > > > > > > > > > Ed Martin <[email hidden]> wrote in message > > > news:kYsr5.319$[email hidden]... > > > > Following is a posting that Dave Pollatsek from Monster Games posted > in > > > > another forum regarding questions people have had about "blurry > > graphics" > > > in > > > > NASCAR Heat: > > > > > > > > > > > > Guys, > > > > I've seen a lot of information and mis-information flying about > > > regarding > > > > textures and NASCAR Heat. > > > > In an attempt to alleviate confusion, I'm going to lay it all out for > > you > > > > all; sorry if this is too long or technical. > > > > > > > > Many people have posted about blurred textures when running more than > X > > > > cars, X from 16 to 30 or so. > > > > As NASCAR Heat is a modern game, designed to span a P233 up to > P800-1000 > > > era > > > > computers, we use a lot of textures. We then scale these down to fit > on > > > the > > > > user's machine. > > > > > > > > First; we allocate as many textures as we can fit into the texture > > memory > > > > available. If we run out, we "de-rez" textures and try again, and so > > > forth, > > > > until we can "fit" everything. If your cars are blurry at some pack > > sizes > > > > and not others, it means that you're right on the edge of what your > card > > > can > > > > support. > > > > > > > > Texture memory is a precious resource. Except on old Voodoo2 cards, > if > > > you > > > > run in higher resolutions, this steals video memory that can be used > for > > > > textures, so increasing the resolution decreases your available > texture > > > > memory. > > > > Enabling antialiasing on some cards may steal a ton of video RAM as > > well, > > > > depending on the technique used by the card. > > > > Texture memory is the sum of available video memory (on the video > card) > > > plus > > > > the possibility of some system memory available via AGP. > > > > > > > > The more texture memory you have, the more cars you can run without > > > becoming > > > > blurry. > > > > > > > > Here is a run down of a variety of video card configurations. > > > > > > > > Voodoo3 (and Voodoo2) > > > > These cards have two limitations. > > > > 1) They cannot texture from AGP RAM (which is when the card uses some > > > > system memory to store textures)--even the "AGP" Voodoo3's. Thus you > > are > > > > limited to the 16 MB or whatever came with your card to store both > > > textures > > > > and frame buffers. If you use higher resolutions, you have very > little > > > > video memory left over for textures. If we let you run in 1024x768, > you > > > > would have incredibly blurry textures everywhere when racing with a > > pack. > > > > 2) They cannot support hi-res (512x512) textures. However, due to the > > > > limited texture memory, there probably wouldn't be enough space for > > > 512x512 > > > > textures anyways (512's are four times as big as 256's). > > > > > > > > True AGP video card. (AGP nVidia TNT/TNT2/GeForce, ATI Rage 128/PRO, > > etc) > > > > These cards are supposed to be able to texture from system RAM as well > > as > > > > video RAM. HOWEVER, there are many cases where this doesn't work, or > > only > > > a > > > > few MB of AGP RAM is available. > > > > One reason for this is if the AGP Aperture is set to a low value--this > > is > > > a > > > > setting in the BIOS that limits how much RAM can be used by AGP. For > a > > > > while, many computers came with this value set to absurdly low values > > > (e.g. > > > > 4MB). > > > > In other cases, due to driver issues or card/motherboard problems, AGP > > ram > > > > doesn't work. It seems that many Voodoo5's have this problem--the one > > in > > > > our office reports 0 MB of AGP textures. > > > > We are confident that this is not a bug in our code, because the > > standard > > > > DirectX diagnostic provides the same result. > > > > > > > > We have no control over this situation--it is entirely up to the video > > > card, > > > > drivers, and motherboard. There is no "fix" that we can do, except to > > > > recommend that you upgrade your drivers or adjust your aperture. Even > > > this > > > > may not work. > > > > Probably, most of the other games on your system targeted the previous > > > > generation of systems, and so NASCAR Heat may be the first game that > > maxes > > > > out your texture memory. Soon there will be more games like this. > > > > > > > > So to sum up, there is no bug, and there is no fix. We can't make a > > silk > > > > purse out of a sows ear, and we can't conjure up video RAM from wishes > > and > > > > dreams, or even Glide. The only option would be to use a texture > > caching > > > > scheme which would make the frame rate drop like a rock, all the time. > > > > Caching works great for games like Quake, and horrible for > > closed-circuit > > > > racing games where you can see most of the textures in every frame. > > > > > > > > > > > > MORE STUFF: > > > > > > > > Another "blurring" issue has to do with the road blurring out as it > gets > > > > farther away from you. You can most notice it on the yellow line on > the > > > > side of the road. Near you, it looks sharp. But as you look down the > > > road, > > > > the line starts to blur. > > > > This is due to mipmapping, which is a technique that improves fillrate > > and > > > > prevents the "sparkle" of distant textures, by picking among a series > of > > > > smaller and smaller versions of the texture. Unfortunately the > > > card/driver > > > > gets to choose which "mipmap" to use, and for polygons that are nearly > > > > "edge-on", such as a road, they tend to do a bad job, picking a lower > > > > resolution mipmap than we would like (which also lets them score > higher > > on > > > > benchmarks, as well). > > > > However, there is one tool that we can use to combat this, which is > > called > > > > "MIP LOD bias", which lets us tell the card to bias its choice towards > a > > > > higher or lower mipmap. Unfortunately, not all drivers support this > > > > feature. Most TNT/GeForce cards do, while the Voodoo's have not. > > Again, > > > we > > > > are at the mercy of the video cards and their driver writers. > > > > It appears that some Voodoo drivers have a user-controlled knob for > > > texture > > > > sharpness (which is most likely the same as MIP LOD bias), so some > > people > > > > can fix this by using their video card control panels, but I don't > know > > > why > > > > they didn't support this the normal way in the driver. > > > > > > > > So there you have it, I hope this helps at least somebody... > > > > > > > > -Dave Pollatsek > > > > MGI > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >

This issue isn't about the V770 "outperforming" the V5, it's about NH using huge amounts of video memory per car at high resolution - and not using texture compression. So us V5 owners are shown hideous "de-rezed" textures when running with full fields, because 3dfx doesn't support the almost never used because it's slow, unstable (especially when overclocking) and unnecessary (with texture compression, or the N3/GPL style options of turning off unnecessary textures like crowds) feature of AGP texturing. The V770, or any other card that supports AGP texturing, won't see this problem. Not a flame, just a fact. "Joe Marques" <Joe"NO_SPAM"[email hidden]> wrote in message news:EoEr5.34880$[email hidden]... > Are you sure you just haven't seen a "clear" dashboard so you don'tknow > what it looks like? I have seen it in the demo and with smallerfields but > with 43 cars it's blurry. I know a Viper 770 could not possiblyoutperform > a V5 5500 so my guess is you've never seen a crisp dash so don'tknow you're > missing it. Not a flame, just a fact.

I believe that you are correct Joe. I still can't believe that they can't fit all of the textures in a 32 MB card. I have tested this and even at the lowest resolution with FSAA turned off I still get the blurred dash with larger field sizes. Kyle Joe Marques <Joe"NO_SPAM"[email hidden]> wrote in message news:%QFr5.34919$[email hidden]... > Mark, > > Thanks for the info. Now I'm wondering if the lack of true AGP texturing > from my V5 prevents it from using my Ram to load more textures whereasyour > AGP card is using your system Ram to help out. My lack of AGP texturing, > coupled with FSAA and only 32 MB of video ram PER video chip (not true 64MB > of texture ram as other boards) may be causing the sometimes blurry dash. > Starting to see some weaknesses with the V5 and I'm not happy about it.Can > anyone confirm my non-expert theory?

Some quick testing with my V5 5500 AGP, the numbers in the columns are the number of cars that cause the textures to "de-res" as the guys from MGI call it. The numbers fluctuate by 1 or 2 cars sometimes and I found it odd that the lowest res was generally a car lower. Another strange thing is that moving the detail level, draw distance, and effects level sliders all the way to the left doesn't increase the number of cars that can be used at all. I don't understand this, since on the lowest detail setting a lot of objects are not drawn. You would think that this would free up some texture memory. I think that the V5 could handle running the game at a decent speed with all of the textures. Prove me wrong MGI. I wish I could force the game to try to run with all of the textures. IMHO the end user should have the choice to do this. If using all of the textures makes the game run at a low fps on the V5(which I seriously doubt it does), it should still be the users choice. Tally Mville Glen 640x480 29 34 34 800x600 30 36 34 1024x768 30 35 35 1280x1024 26 27 28 Joe Marques <Joe"NO_SPAM"[email hidden]> wrote in message news:%QFr5.34919$[email hidden]... > Mark, > > Thanks for the info. Now I'm wondering if the lack of true AGP texturing > from my V5 prevents it from using my Ram to load more textures whereasyour > AGP card is using your system Ram to help out. My lack of AGP texturing, > coupled with FSAA and only 32 MB of video ram PER video chip (not true 64MB > of texture ram as other boards) may be causing the sometimes blurry dash. > Starting to see some weaknesses with the V5 and I'm not happy about it.Can > anyone confirm my non-expert theory?

On Fri, 01 Sep 2000 03:59:55 GMT, "Joe Marques" <Joe"NO_SPAM"[email hidden]> thus spoke:

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>Mark, > >Thanks for the info. Now I'm wondering if the lack of true AGP texturing >from my V5 prevents it from using my Ram to load more textures whereas your >AGP card is using your system Ram to help out. My lack of AGP texturing, >coupled with FSAA and only 32 MB of video ram PER video chip (not true 64 MB >of texture ram as other boards) may be causing the sometimes blurry dash. >Starting to see some weaknesses with the V5 and I'm not happy about it. Can >anyone confirm my non-expert theory?

Yes, that is probably what's happening. But, if you turn off FSAA it should lessen the problem because FSAA takes up a lot of video memory. Same for high resolutions. Try various resolutions and FSAA settings to see what effect it has.Personally, I prefer FSAA. -- Slacker

On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 23:31:51 -0500, "Tracey A Miller" <[email hidden]> thus spoke: >So us V5 owners are shown hideous "de-rezed" textures when running >with full fields, because 3dfx doesn't support the almost never used >because it's slow, unstable (especially when overclocking) and >unnecessary (with texture compression, or the N3/GPL style options of >turning off unnecessary textures like crowds) feature of AGP >texturing. Wow. That's a run on sentence if there ever was one. :-) I agree though, they could have used texture compression which the V5 supports to alleviate this problem. -- Slacker

On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 22:49:31 -0500, "Dave Pollatsek" <[email hidden]> thus spoke:

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>Sorry guys, I was misinformed about the V5. It doesn't support AGP >texturing. >My apologies for the confusion. I stand by everything else, though. (ducks >ripe tomatos) >-Dave P. > MGI > >

So, you still don't think LOD bias is supported in the Voodoo drivers? Hmm, lets' see...goes to 3DFX hub/advanced options. Hmmm...sure enough there it is, Level Of Detail Bias, I can adjust from -30 to +30. :-) -- Slacker

Ok, the confusion is cleared up, but my dash board is still blurred beyond recognition with a complete field - at any resolution, with or without FSAA. This isn't 20 car F1, if you can't read the dashboard with 43 cars in a NASCAR sim, it's broke. This would be like EA releasing Madden 2001 where you couldn't read the numbers on the jerseys with more than 6 players on the field. "Dave Pollatsek" wrote > I hope this clears up any confusion.

And that's with a V5 5500? wow. -- Don Burnette Dburn in N3 and Legends ICQ# 74084566 "Tracey A Miller" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:39b113b5$0$99045$[email hidden]... > Ok, the confusion is cleared up, but my dash board is still blurred > beyond recognition with a complete field - at any resolution, with or > without FSAA. > > This isn't 20 car F1, if you can't read the dashboard with 43 cars in > a NASCAR sim, it's broke. This would be like EA releasing Madden 2001 > where you couldn't read the numbers on the jerseys with more than 6 > players on the field. > > > "Dave Pollatsek" wrote > > I hope this clears up any confusion. > > > > > > > > > > >

The solution to all of these video texture memory problems is so obvious and has been mentioned many times before here. Just give us the option to limit the number of "viewable" cars. If this is not an option that can be addressed in a patch, then let us know so we will stop whining about it... And make sure it is an option in future versions (NH 2.0, etc...). If it is a simple enhancement, please let us know that you are working on it for an upcoming patch. Thanks, Patrick In article <39b03d18$0$72524$[email hidden]>, "Dave Pollatsek" <[email hidden]> wrote: > To clarify, MIP LOD bias is a DirectX API call, where the game makes a > function call to adjust the bias. The drivers did not support this,at > least circa a month ago or so. If you'll re-read my original post, Isaid > that > > "It appears that some Voodoo drivers have a user-controlled knob fortexture > sharpness (which is most likely the same as MIP LOD bias), so somepeople > can fix this by using their video card control panels, but I don'tknow why

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> they didn't support this the normal way in the driver." > > I hope this clears up any confusion. > > -Dave P. > > <[email hidden]> wrote in message > news:[email hidden]... > > On Thu, 31 Aug 2000 22:49:31 -0500, "Dave Pollatsek" > > <[email hidden]> thus spoke: > > > > >Sorry guys, I was misinformed about the V5. It doesn't support AGP > > >texturing. > > >My apologies for the confusion. I stand by everything else,

though.

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> (ducks > > >ripe tomatos) > > >-Dave P. > > > MGI > > > > > > > > > > So, you still don't think LOD bias is supported in the Voodoo

drivers? > > Hmm, lets' see...goes to 3DFX hub/advanced options. Hmmm...sureenough > > there it is, Level Of Detail Bias, I can adjust from -30 to +30. :-) > > > > -- > > Slacker > > Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Before you buy.