[Herra Tohtori]

I think (and hope) the purpose of that shot was not a support request per ce but instead to show that the issue isn't limited to ATi hardware/drivers, but rather to older GPU's in general. ShadowGorrath had the same issue with Intel integrated graphics, if I recall correctly (might've also been some older nvidia card), so it seems more dependant on the age of the hardware than the manufacturer.

Nevertheless, we've isolated the cause and distributed the fix to the issue, even though we still don't quite know what exactly is the reason some GPU's fail at using these files; they should be DDS standard-compliant (otherwise I don't think we could even save them as DDS files) so it leads me to think that some old GPU's don't fully support all the modern features of DDS specification, or some jazz like that. Screen resolution doesn't have anything to do with it, but the texture resolution does - original 4x1024 resolution beam haze textures caused problems on some GPU's, while the 16x512 resolution files I provided in the fix... fix it.

Isn't there a Common Issues thread that common issues could go in?

[Jeff Vader]

Isn't there a Common Issues thread that common issues could go in?

Yes. But not on this board.

 

[sfried]

All these disco Shivan beam cannons make me want to make a groovy mode mod.

[Commander Zane]

I think something like color changing rainbow beams would be epic for a JAD addition.

[ssmit132]

If I recall correctly, someone made a Rainbow Lucifer with Rainbow beams, during that time someone (who escapes me for the moment) made VPs that made the Shivan ships all a different colour.

[Commander Zane]

True, they have, and the blue Shivans look really cool, but the rainbow version wasn't that great, I was speaking more in the line of constantly changing color.

[SF-Junky]

All these disco Shivan beam cannons make me want to make a groovy mode mod.

Did you btw do any technical changes to those shivan weapons, or did you just take the specs of their Terran originals and change their names and .pofs?

[pecenipicek]

I think i have a possible answer for you all with rainbow beams...  somewhat.

i remember that when normal maps were introduced they were for SM3.0 capable cards only. someone afterwards added some simplification of the code that would allow SM2.0 capable cards to render normal maps too. (this basically marked the engine switch from OpenGL 1.2 to OpenGL 2.0 or 2.1, not too sure bout that...)

it might be related to that particular shader code. i will test on my other pc if the disco beams of doom happen or not. (this pc has a geforce 9600GT, the old one has geforce 5700)

[Vasudan Admiral]

Well apparently this fix already works - from the previous page:

Yeah it's been looked into and appears to only affect some ATI cards with certain drivers. Here's the current fix:

POTENTIAL FIX FOR SHIVAN BEAM ISSUES

I would like to request anyone experiencing problems with the Shivan beams to download these 16x512 resolution textures and paste the three files (SBeamAB, SBeamAD and SBeamAE) into ..\FreeSpace2\mediavps\data\effects\. If that folder doesn't exist, create it.

This will be in the upcoming patch, so you'd be best deleting these files again once the patch is out.

Seems to have worked for everyone who's tried it thus far.

[sfried]

I think i have a possible answer for you all with rainbow beams...  somewhat.

i remember that when normal maps were introduced they were for SM3.0 capable cards only. someone afterwards added some simplification of the code that would allow SM2.0 capable cards to render normal maps too. (this basically marked the engine switch from OpenGL 1.2 to OpenGL 2.0 or 2.1, not too sure bout that...)

it might be related to that particular shader code. i will test on my other pc if the disco beams of doom happen or not. (this pc has a geforce 9600GT, the old one has geforce 5700)

Wait, I thought normal mapping was only for Shader Model 3.0 cards?  'Cause my video card is Shader Model 2.0+ and I don't want to be let out from the normal mapping goodness. How exactly does it work in this game?

[Renegade]

Thanks a lot for the Texture fix. It works properly.
I already use a ATI X800 Pro Card (SM2.0) and the Graphics are now awesome.

Greetings Peter

[pecenipicek]

I think i have a possible answer for you all with rainbow beams...  somewhat.

i remember that when normal maps were introduced they were for SM3.0 capable cards only. someone afterwards added some simplification of the code that would allow SM2.0 capable cards to render normal maps too. (this basically marked the engine switch from OpenGL 1.2 to OpenGL 2.0 or 2.1, not too sure bout that...)

it might be related to that particular shader code. i will test on my other pc if the disco beams of doom happen or not. (this pc has a geforce 9600GT, the old one has geforce 5700)

Wait, I thought normal mapping was only for Shader Model 3.0 cards?  'Cause my video card is Shader Model 2.0+ and I don't want to be let out from the normal mapping goodness. How exactly does it work in this game?

it was, but wanderer or someone tweaked the code to work with sm2 cards too.

[General Battuta]

Man, all of High Max's posts vanished. Not just in this thread, but, apparently, everywhere. He's gone from 2^10 to 2^4.

Odd. Some kind of glitch? He was kind of charming, in a weird way.

[eliex]

Yeah I noticed that. Is it another example of mass post recalculation through a glitch? Someone (forgot the name) had something similar. 4 000 posts reduced to 2 000.

[Grimper]

Man, all of High Max's posts vanished. Not just in this thread, but, apparently, everywhere. He's gone from 2^10 to 2^4.

Odd. Some kind of glitch? He was kind of charming, in a weird way.

Censorship maybe? From what i can glean from the replys he wasn't very flattering.

[ssmit132]

A LOT of censorship, if that's the case.

[eliex]

A LOT of censorship, if that's the case.

Indeed. He has lost virtually all his post history.

[ssmit132]

  Now I feel rather awkward...

For the record, I never said anything bad about you, even though that's not the point. I probably wouldn't have noticed anyway without anyone pointing it out. No offense, I just don't remember postcounts usually, except my own.

Back then I wasn't so grown up and I felt disgusted with myself as I was deleting the posts and reading them.

I posted something on Trainz's forums a while ago that makes me cringe now. 

[sfried]

Just to be on the safe side, the Tech Room should display the normal map effects on ships, right? I still wondered why the Briefing Room models (the ones which appeared when you clicked on the icons during Briefing) and targeting system display the model but stripped of any effects. I know it's for performance reasons, but now the colors on the bare-bones models look screwed up.

Perhaps they could simply implement a simple lighting effect to "correct" the problem?

[Droid803]

Is it just me, or did the Typhon get De-HTLized in the 3.6.10 release? It was HTL in 3.6.10 betas...