58 replies to this topic

[grapper]

There will be a Non-WHQL version released tomorrow. Looking fwd to hearing back from the ATI users with some reports regarding VP.
http://twitter.com/C...tus/10573311372

Edited by grapper, 17 March 2010 - 07:14 PM.

[epthegeek]

After all, VP is so extremely cpu dependent, never expect graphics cards to give it much of a boost.

Wait, so you're saying I should have loaded the budget much more towards the processor for the computer I just built? Any idea if multiple cores helps VP? I ended up opting for an i5-650 and I still run into jitter/slowdown at some points - like multi-ball on Theatre of Magic. The GPU doesn't have much to do with any of that?

[rob046]

After all, VP is so extremely cpu dependent, never expect graphics cards to give it much of a boost.

Wait, so you're saying I should have loaded the budget much more towards the processor for the computer I just built? Any idea if multiple cores helps VP? I ended up opting for an i5-650 and I still run into jitter/slowdown at some points - like multi-ball on Theatre of Magic. The GPU doesn't have much to do with any of that?

Right. VP is 2D software, so it really runs best with a great cpu & at least a couple gigs of fast RAM can't hurt either. Todays graphics cards are obviously geared toward making the latest 3D technology run great. Also, even the cheapest onboard graphics or even a cheap 6 year old graphics card are already enough to easily run 2D games about as fast as they can do. By todays standards, a hamster in a wheel can generate enough graphics power to run many 2D games! Thus, when it comes to VP, it is more important just to have onboard graphics or a graphics cards that just runs stable with no glitches, as opposed to looking for something with lots of horsepower.

However, I do think VP9 makes a little more use of the gpu than older versions of VP did, but again you still don't need an expensive gpu to max things out. I would think that any card out there today that is selling for $50 or so would definitely do the job for VP. And maybe cabinet setups use a little more of the gpu for the 2nd display, but again it shouldn't be anything a cheap gpu can't handle.

Also, yeah the quad core cpu's, even the dual core cpu's don't help much with VP. VP can't use more than 1 core. But despite this, just the advancements in cpu technology help balance this out. Cuz although VP only uses 1 core, 1 core on todays cpu's are pretty damn fast. Maybe with VP being open source, I don't know if it can be coded to make use of multiple cores or not. Though it would be nice for those that use a 2nd software to run the display if that could run on its own core.

I might even assume that a real fast P4 can still run VP as well as anything like. Say a 3.2ghz-3.6ghz P4. I know for me, that when I had VP running at its best (which was pre-VP9), I was running a 3.2ghz P4 and VP was blazing fast. I remember playing all tables playing great at 1600x1200 with eye candy enabled (ball antialias), maybe just a couple tables like PK's cue ball wizard stuttered just a tad.
And the gpu that ran best for me at that time was simply my Intel onboard graphics. Yup, my onboard graphics gave me like 15% better performance than the graphics cards I had at the time, which were near top of the line cards at the time, like nvidia 6800GT, and I had a nice 7 series card.

That is my experience, at least.
I think that these days, the name of the game is just finding the best worst card for VP. Know what I mean? None of the newer Nvidia or ATI cards are really geared toward 2D gaming & likely still don't beat a lot of onboard graphics (as they seem better designed to handle 2D), so you just wanna find something that is gonna be stable & give nice image quality.
However, what I wrote about the 2D ATI hotfix, if that is coming with this release. ATI just might be the way to go. Like I said, this 5870 gave me a nice boost over my GTX280, which is very unusual for 2 top of the line modern gpu's to give such differing results. But hey, I'll take it. Let's see what this hotfix does.
Maybe ATI cards with their new drivers can make ATI the lesser of two evils for VP!

Lastly, for me, I definitely don't buy expensive gpu's for VP. I buy them for modern games like Crysis and those types of games, and they work great for that. Then for VP, I just cross my fingers & hope the card works well with it. So far my 5870 has.

[grapper]

It would be interesting with some different benchmarks with VP running on different CPU:s and GPU:s... haven´t seen much of that. From what I read all over the net ATI finally got their 2d-performance up to speed after having been dreadful.

Wouldn´t the lack of video ram be what stops onboard from being a serious alternative? Yes, some shared RAM could be used but that path is many times slower than on board GDDR.

[epthegeek]

I'm confused as to why you'd say VP is a 2D game. Sure, the camera doesn't move around, but the table is 3d modeled, with lighting and shadows. The pinmame part of it is 2D, but there's nothing sprite based about Visual Pinball.

[Rawd]

I'm confused as to why you'd say VP is a 2D game. Sure, the camera doesn't move around, but the table is 3d modeled, with lighting and shadows. The pinmame part of it is 2D, but there's nothing sprite based about Visual Pinball.

As far as I know VP9 is 2D. The authors create the illusion of 3D models. There is no 3D lighting or shadow environment.

FP is 3D based. That is why you can change angles, and fly around the table to view the models in 3D.

[epthegeek]

In other non-confusing news - the 10.3 drivers are 'officially' out as a preview.

http://sites.amd.com...-3-preview.aspx

[epthegeek]

After all, VP is so extremely cpu dependent, never expect graphics cards to give it much of a boost.

Wait, so you're saying I should have loaded the budget much more towards the processor for the computer I just built? Any idea if multiple cores helps VP? I ended up opting for an i5-650 and I still run into jitter/slowdown at some points - like multi-ball on Theatre of Magic. The GPU doesn't have much to do with any of that?

Just for the sake of anyone reading this later ... I noticed that I had Visual Pinball in 32 bit color mode. Then a mighty cocktail of: changing that setting to 16 bit, installing the 10.3 preview drivers (instead of beta), and adding a second 5770 in crossfire all happened at the same time. So I don't know how much affect each thing had on the end result; but man does it run great now. Super smooth.

[TheMcD]

I just got finished installing the drivers (yeah, I'm back on Vista for whatever reason) and holy friggin' dooly. Preformance is picture perfect, ungodly, unbelievable, etc, etc. Wow. I guess this seals the dominance of NVIDIA in VP9.

The McD

[rob046]

I just got finished installing the drivers (yeah, I'm back on Vista for whatever reason) and holy friggin' dooly. Preformance is picture perfect, ungodly, unbelievable, etc, etc. Wow. I guess this seals the dominance of NVIDIA in VP9.

The McD

Ungodly! Now that is a new word to describe new drivers! They must be good!

I might get a chance to try these on my 5870 today or tomorrow. What is your card?
And by the sounds of it, this 10.3 must have the 2D hotfix.
But I will be doing some benchies, see what I got compared to 10.2 and nvidias latest with a GTX280.

And performance is great, but we might need a little time to see just how consistent that performance is. Also, quality and stability is very important. How is that gonna hold up as different tables get tried. Will stupid little glitches start popping up?
I can say that with Nvidia, I never saw a glitch in VP in my entire life, at least nothing that was entirely the gpu's fault, as VP itself is usually most to blame. So I hope I can say the same for ATI.

And maybe this 2D improvement will be good for everybody, as its sure to get Nvidias attention and hopefully Nvidia can keep up, put out some more 2D friendly drivers.

[TheMcD]

I've got a crappy little Radeon HD 3450 - notebook graphics.

The McD

[rob046]

I've got a crappy little Radeon HD 3450 - notebook graphics.

The McD

Well at least we know the 3xxx should be good. r u 64bit or 32?
I have a hard time playing VP on my laptop. Unless you got a real nice laptop that can do high rez at more than 968px tall (or 1050x). Otherwise, with a standard laptop like my own, it does like 1280x800 rez. So I can either play in that rez & have a stretched out wide screen. Or play in 4:3 ratio, which means I need to dip rez down to 1024x768, which is kinda ugly.
Then of course displays usually aren't too great on laptops, nor are the controls very comfortable.

Though my cuz has a real nice laptop that does 1680x1050, a dell. And my bro has the latest & greatest core i7 laptop that does 1080p, the damn thing is faster than most high end desktops. makes me want to toss my laptop in the can, although its actually decent.
But I'm all about putting all my money into my desktop, where I can upgrade whenever I want. Plus I have a Dell Ultrasharp 24" monitor, very expensive but very worth it, the color is astoundingly accurate and the screen has nearly zero washout even at the most extreme angles. Its like having a CRT, but its an LCD. Just doesnt have the response time of a CRT, but no LCD does, probably never will. & I can easily rotate it into portrait mode, though I usually don't bother.

[TheMcD]

I've got a 1280x800 display and I'm sittin' on a 32 bit OS.

The McD

[grapper]

Can someone running cab with dual monitors comment on how it performs on multi screens? Or do all cab owners run Nvidia?

[epthegeek]

Can someone running cab with dual monitors comment on how it performs on multi screens? Or do all cab owners run Nvidia?

Well, I kind of did earlier on in the thread. I'm in the process of building a cabinet. Running on 2 monitors right now. So far, it's running great for me on an ATI 5770 (first with the beta 10.3 drivers, and now the 'preview' version). Both Future Pinball in /arcade render mode and Visual Pinball launched from HyperPin (or straight without a front end) work fine. No glitches or problems to report. DMD position saves fine, games play well, no graphics messed up.

[Mitchell]

If I haven't said anything about the Visual Pinball and give the link out over at their forum. This may not happen at all.

I'm glad they done something about the 2D part.

Installing this driver right now since it out from their website.

[bigraceusa]

Can someone running cab with dual monitors comment on how it performs on multi screens? Or do all cab owners run Nvidia?

Well, I kind of did earlier on in the thread. I'm in the process of building a cabinet. Running on 2 monitors right now. So far, it's running great for me on an ATI 5770 (first with the beta 10.3 drivers, and now the 'preview' version). Both Future Pinball in /arcade render mode and Visual Pinball launched from HyperPin (or straight without a front end) work fine. No glitches or problems to report. DMD position saves fine, games play well, no graphics messed up.

You made my day!
Must wait only some days, then buy me a 5770 or 5750 with 1 GB. Then I will test it with my own cab.
A video of VP and FP with your 5770 from your cab is that possible? What would be

[epthegeek]

Can someone running cab with dual monitors comment on how it performs on multi screens? Or do all cab owners run Nvidia?

Well, I kind of did earlier on in the thread. I'm in the process of building a cabinet. Running on 2 monitors right now. So far, it's running great for me on an ATI 5770 (first with the beta 10.3 drivers, and now the 'preview' version). Both Future Pinball in /arcade render mode and Visual Pinball launched from HyperPin (or straight without a front end) work fine. No glitches or problems to report. DMD position saves fine, games play well, no graphics messed up.

You made my day!
Must wait only some days, then buy me a 5770 or 5750 with 1 GB. Then I will test it with my own cab.
A video of VP and FP with your 5770 from your cab is that possible? What would be

I'll see if I can get a decent video with my digital camera. Not sure how well that will come out, but I'll try. The real test will be when my DP to DVI active adapter gets here and the third monitor gets added. That will be a few days yet.

[rob046]

Can someone running cab with dual monitors comment on how it performs on multi screens? Or do all cab owners run Nvidia?

If I get a chance, I do have 2 monitors, windows 7 64bit, and a 5 series card (5870). Since my OS & gpu are the latest & greatest tech right now, it would be great news for now & the future if I get some good results here. Also, I think I remember reading that the worst of the 2D problems were in the 5850 and 5870 cards.
Btw, I of course know what a beta driver is, but what the hell are these "preview drivers"? Are they an official release? Why are they called "preview". I'm used to Nvidia drivers, & they never had anything like that, they just had beta drivers and official drivers.
So I'd like to know if these preview drivers are the actual official drivers or not.

I don't have a cab, so when you talk about dual monitors, do you mean playing the table on one screen and having the score display on the other screen? I've been wanting to utilize both my monitors with VP, just haven't been sure how to go about doing it.
I'd like to get a display on monitor 2. I also thought I saw a thing where you can get the backglass image & display on monitor 2.
Can somebody tell me how I can set all that up?

I'm gonna be running some benchmarks anyhow, but I'd also like to run those benchmarks running VP on 2 monitors using whatever setup you guys use for a cab. & both my monitors can do 1920x1200, so that should be a pretty nice VP stress test with these new drivers.
But yeah, any info on how I might get the dual thing setup would be appreciated, or some links.

Edited by rob046, 18 March 2010 - 09:06 PM.

[epthegeek]

Btw, I of course know what a beta driver is, but what the hell are these "preview drivers"? Are they an official release? Why are they called "preview". I'm used to Nvidia drivers, & they never had anything like that, they just had beta drivers and official drivers.
So I'd like to know if these preview drivers are the actual official drivers or not.

The 10.3 beta leaked out early, then the catalyst team released the 10.3 drivers yesterday without having them pass the Windows quality certification process - so, they're production drivers, just not through the MS testing process. The link I posted yesterday is straight to their site to get them from the source. They're the ones that called it a 'preview' release -- so I'm just going with that.