City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

ATI Catalyst 10.8 and FSAA

Back_Blast

By Back_Blast,
Posted on: 2010-08-25 14:34 in ALL ACCESS Gameplay Technical Issues Bugs

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Warp_Factor View Post
The FSAA option in game still gives me a huge performance hit, unfortunately. I can force it in the CCC (RadeonPro actually, but it amounts to the same thing) and get good performance, but then bloom and other HDR effects still don't work. For now I'm going without the HDR, as I really can't handle the jagginess of CoH without at least FSAA x4.
Prior to Ultra Mode the HDR effects (high water, bloom, dof, and desaturation) would completely break FSAA. With Ultra Mode it no longer breaks, but the performance hit is massive, at least for 4-series cards.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Fabulous View Post
Prior to Ultra Mode the HDR effects (high water, bloom, dof, and desaturation) would completely break FSAA. With Ultra Mode it no longer breaks, but the performance hit is massive, at least for 4-series cards.
Yea, I have a 4870x2. I run all UM settings at max except shadows, which are medium, and 130% draw distance and have a good framerate (+-20fps in GV center, Aion City, Imperial City,... 30-40fps just about everywhere else). But I can't turn on FSAA at all without diving towards +-10fps at the lowest setting, no matter what other gfx options I have turned on/off.

@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by TrueMetal View Post
Yea, I have a 4870x2. I run all UM settings at max except shadows, which are medium, and 130% draw distance and have a good framerate (+-20fps in GV center, Aion City, Imperial City,... 30-40fps just about everywhere else). But I can't turn on FSAA at all without diving towards +-10fps at the lowest setting, no matter what other gfx options I have turned on/off.
Draw distance is what's killing you. I have mine set at 75%. Make sure water is off or on low and that bloom, dof, desaturation, and ambient occlusion are all off. You should then be able to turn FSAA to 4x and get decent framerates.

 

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The 10.8 Linux drivers fix the AO/FSAA and DoF/FSAA problems for me, but they've got their own problem: they'll crash on X startup if there's a CRT monitor plugged into the upper DVI port. A CRT plugged into the lower port works just fine.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Fabulous View Post
Draw distance is what's killing you. I have mine set at 75%. Make sure water is off or on low and that bloom, dof, desaturation, and ambient occlusion are all off. You should then be able to turn FSAA to 4x and get decent framerates.
I'd rather have all those other options than FSAA really.

Draw distance below 100% is not acceptable to me, I don't like things popping up when I'm right next to them, (before Ultra Mode I had it at 200%) and all the other effects don't seem to affect the FSAA performance on my machine.

It's been a couple of driver versions since I tried though, I might tinker with it some more, see if it makes a difference.

@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.

 

Posted

Draw distance seems to be hammering the CPU as much as the GPU. I need my i7 at 3.6GHz to keep up with my 5850. Lots of memory bandwidth also helps. On the bright side, this lets me use a world detail of 300%/400% in most areas. (I don't recommend you do that.)

WEIRDLY, when I look at how my cores are scaling to demand, they aren't rising above 2.4GHz, even though CoH is definitely getting a boost. Other programs cause cores to rise to 3.6GHz as needed.

Necrobond - 50 BS/Inv Scrapper made in I1
Rickar - 50 Bots/FF Mastermind
Anti-Muon - 42 Warshade
Ivory Sicarius - 45 Crab Spider
Aber ja, nat�rlich Hans nass ist, er steht unter einem Wasserfall.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Fabulous View Post
Prior to Ultra Mode the HDR effects (high water, bloom, dof, and desaturation) would completely break FSAA. With Ultra Mode it no longer breaks, but the performance hit is massive, at least for 4-series cards.
Yeah, I know about how FSAA used to be broken. I am on a 4890; anyone on a similarly powered 3- or 5-series card have the same problem? I remember even before ultra mode was patched in I got a much larger performance hit with the in-game FSAA than when forcing it in the drivers, but it's been a while and I don't remember if the hit was this big.

 

Posted

I have an ATI 5870.

The newest 10.8 drivers do seem to make things better, FPS is higher, etc.

However, it looks to me as if the FSAA actually got worse in the way it looks. I notice far more 'jaggies' than I did before.

I had been messing with my Direct X install for a another game and I re-installed that as well, no difference.

I can tell FSAA is working because moving the slider is making a difference, it just seems as if it's just not working as well.

Has anyone else seen this?

"The side that is unhappy is not the side that the game was intended to make happy, or promised to make happy, or focused on making happy. The side that is unhappy is the side that is unhappy. That's all." - Arcanaville
"Surprised your guys' arteries haven't clogged with all that hatred yet." - Xzero45

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by MajorPrankster View Post
I have an ATI 5870.

The newest 10.8 drivers do seem to make things better, FPS is higher, etc.

However, it looks to me as if the FSAA actually got worse in the way it looks. I notice far more 'jaggies' than I did before.

I had been messing with my Direct X install for a another game and I re-installed that as well, no difference.

I can tell FSAA is working because moving the slider is making a difference, it just seems as if it's just not working as well.

Has anyone else seen this?
Yes, it doesn't seem to be applying AA to anything whenever it's against distance fog.

Necrobond - 50 BS/Inv Scrapper made in I1
Rickar - 50 Bots/FF Mastermind
Anti-Muon - 42 Warshade
Ivory Sicarius - 45 Crab Spider
Aber ja, nat�rlich Hans nass ist, er steht unter einem Wasserfall.

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Shadow Wail View Post
Will this new driver cause my system to restart completely?
you will be asked to reboot after installing yes.

@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by TrueMetal View Post
you will be asked to reboot after installing yes.
I'm sorry, what I mean is that with this driver after playing for a couple of seconds...at a crawling rate might I add...my system just restarts automatically.

This happened the last time I updated to the new drivers also and had to roll back to the previous drivers.

http://s305.photobucket.com/albums/n...stumes%202011/

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by TrueMetal View Post
you will be asked to reboot after installing yes.
I never have to restart after updating ATI drivers.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Shadow Wail View Post
I'm sorry, what I mean is that with this driver after playing for a couple of seconds...at a crawling rate might I add...my system just restarts automatically.

This happened the last time I updated to the new drivers also and had to roll back to the previous drivers.
You might want to do a clean install. Completely uninstall the old drivers, reboot, and then install the new ones. You might also want to try a driver cleaner after the reboot but before the new install (this will wipe out any custom settings tho, so be forewarned).

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Fabulous View Post
I never have to restart after updating ATI drivers.
really? Afaik it always asks you to reboot.

@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by TrueMetal View Post
really? Afaik it always asks you to reboot.
Nope. Never. It unloads the current driver during the install process, replaces it with the new one, and loads it on-the-fly. At least on Win7. I have no idea about XP. I seem to remember reading something about how Vista and Win7 can unload drivers whereas XP can't.

 

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I always do it manually.
download driver -> Uninstall driver manually-> reboot -> install driver -> reboot.

It always asks for a reboot after uninstalling/installing.

@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by TrueMetal View Post
I always do it manually.
download driver -> Uninstall driver manually-> reboot -> install driver -> reboot.

It always asks for a reboot after uninstalling/installing.
I just download and run the installer in express mode.

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Necrotron View Post
Yes, it doesn't seem to be applying AA to anything whenever it's against distance fog.
Thanks, that make perfect sense based upon what I am seeing.

Would anyone mind watching a grown man cry now? I hate me some jaggies...

"The side that is unhappy is not the side that the game was intended to make happy, or promised to make happy, or focused on making happy. The side that is unhappy is the side that is unhappy. That's all." - Arcanaville
"Surprised your guys' arteries haven't clogged with all that hatred yet." - Xzero45

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by MajorPrankster View Post
Thanks, that make perfect sense based upon what I am seeing.

Would anyone mind watching a grown man cry now? I hate me some jaggies...
You could try turning FSAA off in-game and on in CCC, but no idea how well that will play with the HDR effects. Worth a shot tho.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Fabulous View Post
You could try turning FSAA off in-game and on in CCC, but no idea how well that will play with the HDR effects. Worth a shot tho.
If you get the same results I do, water effects will work on low but not any higher. Everything else won't work, or rather it'll work but it'll break FSAA as soon as you turn it on. AO seems to work fine for me with FSAA, though.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Fabulous View Post
You could try turning FSAA off in-game and on in CCC, but no idea how well that will play with the HDR effects. Worth a shot tho.
If you use that with AO, it disables fog altogether, and doesn't actually seem to draw AO. CCC AA settings are unwise.

Necrobond - 50 BS/Inv Scrapper made in I1
Rickar - 50 Bots/FF Mastermind
Anti-Muon - 42 Warshade
Ivory Sicarius - 45 Crab Spider
Aber ja, nat�rlich Hans nass ist, er steht unter einem Wasserfall.

 

Posted

It all works great for me.

I somehow got rid of my CCC and can't get it back it always errors out when I try to install it.

but the good news is I don't have the CCC trying to override the game and it looks beautiful.

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by The_Coming_Storm View Post
Repeat thread is repeat. You should close this thread :P

ALSO of note (as found out by yours truly) is that FSAA and SSAO now work together.
Not for nothing, but old news is old news. As far as many of us could tell... 10.7 already fixed most of the issues already. I've been using both those options together since the end of July. Version 10.8 seems to just polish the overall performance and fix a couple other minor issues with the FSAA in general.

 

Posted

I have experienced something along these lines but its not water based, im having trouble seeing anything but aura's, toggle powers with aura like effets and environmental fire. Everything else is just blank brownish gray space characters, walls, floors etc. Its now day 4 and tech support is slowing down on their replies to help fix this problem. Has any one ever had this problem or herd of it? If so any clues or ideas as to how i fix it? Tech support already had me update my drivers 2-3 times and its making no difference, safe mode doesnt work either and ive played it on this laptop once before and never had any problems.