ATI Rage 128 Users

[Skuzzy]

Okay, I said I would start posting info about video cards and drivers.  Here is the first.

If you are using an ATI Rage 128 based card, which encompasses most of the current generation of ATI products and only have 8MB of ram, here is some suggestions.

NOTE: here is my system config
550Mhz PII
Super Micro P6SBA motherboard
128 SD100 RAM
Adaptec AHA-2740AU SCSI Host Adapter
Seagate SCSI Barracuda 4GB Drive
Toshiba 40X SCSI CDROM
DEC based 10/100 PCI Ethernet Adapter
Microsoft Sidewinder PRO (3.02 Drivers)
Microsoft IntelliMouse (stock Win 98 drivers)
Windows 98SE with all MS updates installed
DirectX 7.0a
SB AWE64 Sound Card

The video card is the ATI Xpert@Play 99.
Driver Version: 4.11.6263

This driver was released 2/2000 and is not the most current driver.  The current driver has some type of mouse pointer related problems and should not be used.

I have tested the above driver with the previous release of the sim, and will be testing 1.02 today.

The results:  This driver works well with the sim.  Using 800x600x16bit yeilds 60fps or so for most conditions.  1024x768x16 cuts the frame rate to about 30 to 35, but works well.
I used the hires patch as well for this tests.

One thing, do not use the 32 bit mode as there is not enough memory on this card to keep it from swapping textures.  If you have more than 8MB of video ram, then 32 bit mode should work well.

I will be testing the Rage Fury PRO, Rage Fury MAXX, and the GeForce DDR next, so keep a watch.

------------------
Roy "Skuzzy" Neese
President, AppLink Corp.
http://www.applink.net
skuzzy@applink.net

[bloom25]

I have an ATI Expert@work 8mb, using driver version 4.11.2474.  I can NOT recommend this card with the game.  For some reason the card does extremely poorly when a propellor is in view, absolutely killing my framerate.  In cockpit view (800 x 600 24 bit color) I get 18 fps and about 35 fps looking any other direction.  Another problem, icons being painted causes the screen to freeze for a second.  Also, firing bullets makes everything jump around from side to side.

(Note:  I have another computer using a V770 Ultra and it has none of these problems.  It also gets 70 fps almost constantly at 1080 res, 32 bit color.  For this game I'd say the V770 is a wonderful card.)

My only hope is that a new driver will be released that fixes this.  Unfortunately the last driver for this card was released in May of 99, and is even worse than the one I'm using.  In fact just today I was considering ripping out this card and putting a real graphics card in.  Come on ATI, even DIAMOND has better drivers than you!

System specs:
Cel 366 on Se440Bx-2 Intel board
128 Mb ram
CL SB16 soundcard
Dx7.0a

[Skuzzy]

 

Originally posted by bloom25:
I have an ATI Expert@work 8mb, using driver version 4.11.2474.  I can NOT recommend this card with the game.  For some reason the card does extremely poorly when a propellor is in view, absolutely killing my framerate.  In cockpit view (800 x 600 24 bit color) I get 18 fps and about 35 fps looking any other direction.  Another problem, icons being painted causes the screen to freeze for a second.  Also, firing bullets makes everything jump around from side to side.

Turn the number of bits down to 16.  The board does not have enough memory to hold the textures and that is probably causing the effects you are seeing.

Also, 4.11.2560 is the latest driver for this board.

Understand, I do not make any recommendations about any video card.  I am just going to be passing info along as I test each card to help out.

Generally, if you only have 8MB of video memory, you should not set the resolution beyond 1024x768x16bits.  There is simply not enough memory for texttures to be loaded and will cause rather jerky effects.



------------------
Roy "Skuzzy" Neese
President, AppLink Corp.
http://www.applink.net
skuzzy@applink.net

[bloom25]

I threw the xpert98 away (sort of) and put in an xpert128.  Of course, typical of my experiences with ATI, auto driver install installed drivers for a Magnum 128.  So I had to download the 4 MB file for the Rage 128 chip and do a manual install.  Windows, not to be left out of the fun, installed drivers for an All-in-wonder-128, so I made it redo and install the drivers for the xpert128.  All seemed fine, so I thought I'd try AH.  Ah, I see there is a new patch I thought, great, installed it too.  Finally, I got to try it.  It seems I've exchanged one set of problems for another.  On the plus side, the prop looks like it should and frame rates doubled.  On the down side, all planes have "holes" in them.  Ie panels missing, textures hanging in the air, etc.  (I'll post a screen shot later.)  Also, when I exited, the clipboard turned baby blue with the buttons still visible.

Let me guess - driver problem (if ATI doesn't start making better drivers, they will soon have 2 video cards coming back to them for a refund.)  I'm using driver version 4.12.6069, the newest available.  Should I use .6063, and if so, how can I get them as I could not find them on their website.  (One good thing about the graphics problems is that I can see ahead of me and below my plane.  You will just need to see the screen shot, kind of funny really.)

bloom25
THUNDERBIRDS

[bloom25]

I'm posting the screen shot in the tech support forum.  I don't want to make you all download a 79k pic when trying to view this thread.

Topic will be called "ATI 128 driver bug"

bloom25
THUNDERBIRDS

[Skuzzy]

Yes, the newest drivers do have some problems.  The version I am using is one step behind the latest driver and appears to work fine.  Textures are and graphics quality are top notch.  Again, be sure to use the 16bit mode.

ATI keeps the earlier drivers on thier website.

Here is the URL for the previous rage 128 drivers.  Just scroll to the end of the page and you will see them.
 http://support.ati.com/drivers/win98_4126269_issues.html

------------------
Roy "Skuzzy" Neese
President, AppLink Corp.
http://www.applink.net
skuzzy@applink.net

[bloom25]

Last night I switched to the 4.11.6063 drivers.  After doing this AH worked flawlessly.  IMO, using this driver version the ATI Xpert 128 is a great card for AH.  It has good performance at 800 x 600 32 bit color.  (Mind you my other computer with a V770 Ultra is faster, but only by about 20%.  Also remember, the Viper 770 Ultra is $100 more expensive than this card.)
For the money, this card can only be described as excellent.  Drivers, however, are poor currently.

(Thank you for the help Skuzzy!)

bloom25
THUNDERBIRDS

[Skuzzy]

No problem bloom25.  Glad to it all worked for ya.
I noticed you are still using 32 bit mode though, and you can probably get away with it at 800x600 without the hires patch to the sim.
Testing in 1024x768x16 bit mode with the hires textures makes a really nice display.  Although the frame rate drops to about 30.

The card really does well at 800x600, but the gauges in the cockpits are sometimes difficult to read.

Currently I am using a Sony 17" monitor and will sonn be switching to a 19" NEC Pro monitor.  The 800x600 mode may be more legible with the NEC 19" monitor, but I will let ya know.

------------------
Roy "Skuzzy" Neese
President, AppLink Corp.
http://www.applink.net
skuzzy@applink.net