General Question Freezing / slow framerate when landing = CRASH LAND

[JohnE82]

Hi All,

Not the most IT literate person in the Orbiter community but I would like some help with a problem I can’t seem to resolve.

I have the latest orbiter 2010 version and have a few addons, which include, skins for DGIV, better atmosphere, high res level 9, high res KSC, a 3 - 4 other bases around the globe. I am running this off a new Toshiba laptop, Intel Core i3 CPU M 370 @ 2.40GHz, 4.00GB RAM, 64 bit operation system.

The problem is that every now and then the screen will freezes for a couple of second and comes live again. When it comes live it is as it the computer didn’t freeze because the manoeuvre i was completing at the time will have progressed for as long as the screen freezed. ( I hope that makes sense)

When on auto pilot in space this not much of a problem but when coming into land it is obviously catastrophic and extremely annoying to complete an hour or longer mission only to crash land at the end because the screen freezes.
I presume this is a frame rate issues but not 100% sure if it’s anything else or how to resolve it.

Any help you could offer would be much appreciated:thumbup:

Thanks

John

 

[Grover]

depending on the system, checking "Disable Hardware Pageflip" in the video tab of the Orbiter Launchpad (the first window to open when you run orbiter.exe) can fix some issues relating to screen freezes (it fixes my "white flash" problem, and it MIGHT work for freezes as well)

 

[N_Molson]

What I can tell you is that the "checks" (like vertical velocity when you touch the ground") are mostly framerate-dependant. So, when your framerate is very low, it becomes very inaccurate (because of the lack of data).

If you want Orbiter and addons to work flawlessly, try to get a 30 FPS framerate (you can display the framerate by pressing "F", provided you've activated the "framerate" module), even at the price of graphical quality.

 

[JohnE82]

Great, thanks for the advise so far.

I turned the frame rate on and have noticed that when it freezes the frame rate has dropped to around 12 when the picture starts moving again. I take it that this means it is a framerate issue?

Secondly how do I decrease the graphics, and what graphics are best to decrease taking into account the framerate and not reducing the gameplay and realistic feel.

Thanks,

 

[PeterRoss]

What is your common framerate? And what is your OS exactly? If it is Windows 7 try D3D9 client by jarmonik (http://www.orbiter-forum.com/showthread.php?t=18431)

P.S. One more thing - how often these freezings happens and haven't you noticed any system behind that freezings? There is a known problem with Orbiter when freezes exactly as you've described happens when you're approaching the visible range of any high-detailed ground base.

 

[martins]

• Does this problem also occur in a vanilla orbiter installation without any addons or highres texture packs?
• Are there any CPU-intensive jobs in running in the background?
• Is there any disc IO going on during the freezes?
• Do the freezes also occur on a static picture (e.g. camera on a landed spacecraft), or are they related to new terrain/new bases coming into the field of view?

 

[JohnE82]

There doesnt seem to be any pattern to the freezes. It can happen over highres KSC or orbiting over the Pacific.

If the ship is sat idle at KSC the frame rate in between 30 - 40 and the freezes dont seem to happen

There are no other programes running while I play and I have put Norton on slient mode and put Orbitor as high rpiority in task manager

I dont know what Disk IO is?

I havent tried it without the addons. Would it be advisable to download a orginal copy and play that or would that just take up too much space having two copies?

Many thanks

 

[orb]

I dont know what Disk IO is?

Disk reading or writing. You can quickly check it if you have a blinking LED on your computer indicating the disk usage.

 

[martins]

I dont know what Disk IO is?

IO = input/output: your hard disc being read from or written to.

I havent tried it without the addons. Would it be advisable to download a orginal copy and play that or would that just take up too much space having two copies?

Depends on what what you consider "too much space". It will probably take around 200MB.

Other things to try:

• Do the freezes occur if you disable all options in the visual effects tab and set the maximum resolution level to 8?
• Do the freezes occur if you remove all bases from Config\Earth.cfg?

 

[N_Molson]

You could also try Jarmonik's D3D9 Client, if you have a D3D9-compatible graphic card, that should really boost your fps.

 

[Loru]

Have you enabled correct rendering card in "video" tab in Orbiter Launchpad?

It's the first drop down menu in this tab and should display Direct3D T&L HAL(name of your GFX chipset)

On this picture you can see setting for my "low performance test rig" which is Celeron 600MHz, 384 MB Ram and 128 MB Radeon 9250 GFX chipset. And it has around 12 FPS at hi - res KSC with 11-14 level textures in Orbiter 2010.

 

[PeterRoss]

• Do the freezes occur if you remove all bases from Config\Earth.cfg?

Martin meant bases located in Config\Earth\Base\ folder, the Earth.cfg file doesn't have any real base info stored in it for a few years already (there is only the link to that folder i've specified). Try to temporarily remove all the files from that folder and see what will happen. There are at least three fps-heavy bases in Pacific that I know: SRC, Spaceport Pacifica and Overton Island. Freezes happens not when you're flying over it but when you're in a few thousand kilometers away from that base, so you may not always see it's connected.

HINT: If you delete those files you'll pretty sure have CTD with most scenarios. You will have to manually delete all vessels landed on ground bases on Earth leaving only orbiting vessels first.

I havent tried it without the addons. Would it be advisable to download a orginal copy and play that or would that just take up too much space having two copies?

I've used to have three or four Orbiter copies simultaneously for all kinds of tests and stuff, it is common practice here. Having clean install is always a good idea since it's the best way of debugging addons.

 

[Loru]

There are at least three fps-heavy bases in Pacific that I know: SRC, Spaceport Pacifica and Overton Island. Freezes happens not when you're flying over it but when you're in a few thousand kilometers from that base, so you may not always see it's connected.

You have to add Jarvis SC to that. 2048x2048 surface tile can cause freezing sometimes.

 

[Tommy]

One thing that can help is when you see the screen "freeze", hit the "r" key to slow time down to 0.1x. This will minimize the effect of the "freeze", but not eliminate the problem and it's a pain in the but to have to do it.

I suspect that part of the problem is integrated graphics using "shared" memory - combined with hi-rez add-on bases.

Wideawake International doesn't cause this problem for me - because it "preloads" textures rather than "load-on-demand".

 

[coffeene]

seems a little silly but I have a minor sugestion. press f9 to get rid of the ground suqares, if there is a lot of ground clutter then getting rid of them might improve framerate, it does for my anyways (UMmu is a nice addon but if you have a lot of them in a small space framerate detoriates quickly)

 

[JohnE82]

Hi all, Thanks for the suggestions but after much trying nothing seems to have worked.

I have just loaded a clean version of orbiter 2010 and I get the same problems even with the basic delta glider flying over a low res KSC. I have even tried getting rid of all the visual effects, which did increase the average frame rate, but I still got the sudden drops in frame rate to almost 0..... I’m really confused but it makes me think that my computer can handle the graphics etc but something else within the computer is causing the sudden frame rate drops??!!

I presume my Pentium i3 processor and 4Gb of RAM is enough to run Orbiter so i have no idea why the frame rate keeps dropping down to almost zero?

Thanks for the suggestions of reducing the time to 0.1 as I think that will help but it sadly not a long term solution.

All the other suggestions seemed to be based around getting rid of graphics and bases etc but I don’t think that is the problem now....however, N Molson recommended getting "Jarmonik's D3D9 Client"...what is this, and does anyone technically minded think this could resolve my issues?

I appreciate this is probably really boring by now so thanks for all the advice so far

Cheers

John

 

[PeterRoss]

D3D9 client: http://www.orbiter-forum.com/showthread.php?t=18431

You can find its latest build and instructions there.

It can help you - maybe. Orbiter graphics core is based on DirectX7, and it is not fully supportable by Windows 7. D3D9 client is DirectX9-based, it works perfectly under Windows 7. It have some limitations though and that's why I prefer to use Orbiter genuine graphics (for now, at least); but it can be succesfully used to test if your freezes are caused by graphics/DirectX or not.

I appreciate this is probably really boring by now so thanks for all the advice so far

C'mon, debugging Orbiter is the one of the most interesting things you can do with it (after flying it, of course)

 

[Loru]

You're running windows 7 ??? Try Vista Boost: [ame="http://orbithangar.com/searchid.php?ID=3891"]http://orbithangar.com/searchid.php?ID=3891[/ame] It may help.

Also in Orbiter Launchpad in "Extra" tab you got "Planet Visualization Options" and there you can try option "Preload at session start" - it may increase Orbiter's loading time but all planetary textures will be loaded at start up and no other things except "add-on spawned meshes" would be loaded during simulation.

One more question. Do you encounter similar freezing in other win appplications - especially HDD heavy (that reads a lot from hard drive). If that's the case you may check your HDD for logical errors.

 

[JohnE82]

Loru thanks for the advice. I installed the vista boost but it didnt make any difference to the frame rate...I dont know what my graphics card is, but if it low appartently it doest make much difference. I also selected the pre load at start. this actually didnt increase the load time at all and also did seem to make any difference.

---------- Post added 06-13-11 at 11:32 AM ---------- Previous post was 06-12-11 at 06:22 PM ----------

Hi and thanks for the info. I think I have loaded this on to my orbiter folder but on there was only very limited instructions on how to download it and I am not sure I have done it correctly... It hasn’t made a difference so I have some questions if that is ok?

The instructions starts by saying delete all existing D3D9 file for orbiter before extracting these files. Do I have any existing files? and if so how do I know which are the correct files to remove?

In the known problems list, it says the software doesn’t work with the DGIV. What does this mean? does this mean I won’t be able to fly the DGIV or I will just get the same framerate drops I am currently experiencing?..( I have tested this flying the DGIV and I still got framerate drops)..Is the Orbiter Lauch pad meant to look any different with this software, and is there anything noticeable to see if I have downloaded this software correctly?

Many thanks,

John

 

[PeterRoss]

You don't need to delete anything since you've never installed this client earlier. After you've installed it you need to run orbiter_ng.exe and enable everything about D3D9 in the list of modules (it's one or two modules, I don't remember right now). Now try to start any standard scenario.

You will see difference when you'll start D3D9, believe me.

Doesn't work with DGIV means, well, exactly that. It will CTD if you'll start scenario with DGIV or it will be invisible, I don't know exactly.
P.S. I hope you know that standard Deltaglider MK4 and DGIV is two different vessels.