I76 (DirectX)

I downloaded Interstat 76 last night and thought it was pretty cool, it reminded me of a 2D combat flight sim. However, on my system (P150 2x75 w/ Hercules String 64/V 16MB Sound Blaster 16) I noitce a horrible slow down in the framerate mostly when audio is playing. I've also seen this with other DirectX games (Winter Race 3D and Rocket Jockey). What's the cause? Could it be my Video card or my sound card? I hope this behavior isn't normal.

> I noitce a > horrible slow down in the framerate mostly when audio is playing. I've > also seen this with other DirectX games (Winter Race 3D and Rocket > Jockey). What's the cause? Could it be my Video card or my sound card? > I hope this behavior isn't normal. I've found that there are significant performace hits when using DirectSound over some other sound packages - on the order of a 15-20% hit. Of course, these were only tests. But based upon my testing, it doesn't seem all that strange to me that you'd have a performance hit of somekind. Can you add more detail to your analysis of the slowdown other than "horrible"? I'd love to test out Direct3DSound as soon as it supports 3D sound hardware - that'd be a real thrill. Ryan Smart, a Papyrus employee, but not speaking as a Papyrus employee and all the standard employee/employer disclaimer stuff.

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>> I noitce a >> horrible slow down in the framerate mostly when audio is playing. I've >> also seen this with other DirectX games (Winter Race 3D and Rocket >> Jockey). What's the cause? Could it be my Video card or my sound card? >> I hope this behavior isn't normal. >I've found that there are significant performace hits when using >DirectSound over some other sound packages - on the order of a 15-20% >hit. Of course, these were only tests. But based upon my testing, it >doesn't seem all that strange to me that you'd have a performance hit of >somekind. Can you add more detail to your analysis of the slowdown >other than "horrible"? >I'd love to test out Direct3DSound as soon as it supports 3D sound >hardware - that'd be a real thrill.

Thanks for the response. I'll try to describe it a little better. The game seems to be very smooth until the audio starts playing, it then almost stops for a split second and then goes back to smooth. It looks like the screen jumps after the brief stop and has to update things to their new location. For example, if I was turning right when audio starts playing it would stop for a split second and then I would be facing right instead of seeing it pan to the right.

What version of DirectX are you using 3.0 or 3.0a?

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> Thanks for the response. I'll try to describe it a little better. The > game seems to be very smooth until the audio starts playing, it then > almost stops for a split second and then goes back to smooth. It looks > like the screen jumps after the brief stop and has to update things to > their new location. For example, if I was turning right when audio starts > playing it would stop for a split second and then I would be facing right > instead of seeing it pan to the right.

Without the benefit of knowing just exactly how they implemented their sound, a good guess would be that you are suffering from problems inherent to Win95, rather than DirectSound specifically. The behavior you specified can also be noticed when using the Win95 native sound playing routines (not-DirectX - DirectX is a package of which DirectSound is a subset). My advice would be to call up Activision and ask 'em if the problem you have seen is normal for your platform - I've only seen/heard I76 once or twice, and it was on my friends new P200. ryan

>What version of DirectX are you using 3.0 or 3.0a? I'm not sure, how do I check this? Jim Harmon

> >What version of DirectX are you using 3.0 or 3.0a? > I'm not sure, how do I check this? > Jim Harmon Jim, Run DXSetup.exe that is on your I-76 CD -- that will tell you what components are installed and at what rev level. Also, Activision has posted a patch for I-76 to v1.05 -- when you start I-76, if it doesn't say v1.05 at the bottom, you should patch. I'm not sure exactly what the patch fixes though ... Doug -- ===== Are you concerned about the high cost of Long Term Care for your parents, a friend, a family member or yourself? You probably should be ... the average cost of a 3 year LTC stay is over $150,000 !! Have you ever considered private Long Term Care Insurance? Visit the

The patch fixes some multiplayer issues