Hello,
I'm new to the forum but have been downloading MAIW for two years and have nearly every package, with my thanks.
I have found that my PC over time is now taking a long time to start up FS9 and sometimes CTD occours in some places due to the amount of textures that need to be loaded. Not just aircraft textures but also ground scenery, etc.
I was wondering if a lighter texture version may come available in the future to help reduce memory loading issues. While it is very nice to have every aircraft numbered and identified for each feild, not much time is really spent looking at those aspects and perhaps a version with tail colours and special attributes is enough for a lighter texture version and cut down significantly in the amount of texture files used for any given airbase or type of aircraft.
Please don't jump down my neck for asking this question as it is a legitiate question. One that could make MAIW packages more friendly for some who really enjoy the packages and lots of them, including full airbases, but have memory or slow loading issues.
I have repainted the MIAW orion and hawk package, removing the numbers and brought the texture files down to just a few and it does make a big difference in loading and I think frame rates / jerking as well without really effecting my veiwing pleasure.
Anyway just a throught for Grahame and the crew.
Will there or is there plans for a light texture version?
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fishlips
Hello Dan,
It was just a thought due to the amount of packages now available and the ever growing amount of texture files from around the world.
At last count, it now takes me 7 minutes to start FS9, and I don't have slow PC. Its CTD's that can be annoying.
Keeping in mind ground scenery, smesh and other packages for commercial and GA aircraft. Perhaps I may need to cut out some of the packages that I see very often or do a bit more repainting.
Never mind, it was just a thought.
It was just a thought due to the amount of packages now available and the ever growing amount of texture files from around the world.
At last count, it now takes me 7 minutes to start FS9, and I don't have slow PC. Its CTD's that can be annoying.
Keeping in mind ground scenery, smesh and other packages for commercial and GA aircraft. Perhaps I may need to cut out some of the packages that I see very often or do a bit more repainting.
Never mind, it was just a thought.
Fish it's always a compromise to keep the loading time in check. Every couple of weeks I force myself to get rid of aircraft folders that I don't use or see on a regular basis. I figure I can always get them back if needbe.
Also the amount of addon scenery you have enabled affects the loading time. Recently I have also gotten rid of quite a bit of scenery that while nice to have, I don't ever really use.
You can also as you've already done, make the packages "lite" yourself. We do not have enough interest from out users to justify the time it takes to make and release a normal and a lite version of the bigger packages.
After one of the bigger releases recently, I created a lite version for myself and offered to share it with anyone who wanted it, therebye saving them the work and time. I only have 5 people ask me for the lite version. Our packages get thousands of downloads each so you can see that there just isn't enough justification for us to produce lite packages for each release.
I know that means more work for you, but it means less work for us. And trust me, we already have enough on our plates.
Also the amount of addon scenery you have enabled affects the loading time. Recently I have also gotten rid of quite a bit of scenery that while nice to have, I don't ever really use.
You can also as you've already done, make the packages "lite" yourself. We do not have enough interest from out users to justify the time it takes to make and release a normal and a lite version of the bigger packages.
After one of the bigger releases recently, I created a lite version for myself and offered to share it with anyone who wanted it, therebye saving them the work and time. I only have 5 people ask me for the lite version. Our packages get thousands of downloads each so you can see that there just isn't enough justification for us to produce lite packages for each release.
I know that means more work for you, but it means less work for us. And trust me, we already have enough on our plates.
Last edited by MIKE JG on 04 Nov 2008, 13:23, edited 1 time in total.
-Mike G.
Recovering flight sim addict, constant lurker.
Check out my real life RV-8 build here: RV-8 Builder Log
Recovering flight sim addict, constant lurker.
Check out my real life RV-8 build here: RV-8 Builder Log
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fishlips
No worries Mike.
As an Aussie, I often fly the U.S. skies just to see something different and enjoy the bussier skies. I am a scenery developer for OZ and quite often get some great ideas from US scenery developers hence why I have a lot of scenery activated.
But your right, I probally do need to knock out a lot of dead wood, if I may, that I don't use very often.
As for aircraft, I probally have well over 1000 models now so that needs to be trimmed down. It's just so hard to choose which ones need to go.
As an Aussie, I often fly the U.S. skies just to see something different and enjoy the bussier skies. I am a scenery developer for OZ and quite often get some great ideas from US scenery developers hence why I have a lot of scenery activated.
But your right, I probally do need to knock out a lot of dead wood, if I may, that I don't use very often.
As for aircraft, I probally have well over 1000 models now so that needs to be trimmed down. It's just so hard to choose which ones need to go.
Fish,
I can sympathize with the problem, about a year ago I had to be quite ruthless about clearing out flyable aircraft, that I don't use, I also merge all my AI aircraft into single type folders, saves time on loading, even MAIW packs.
I also went through and rebuilt old traffic files. This saved me 8gb of space and must have decreased my load time. This was caused by the airports.txt files having all the airports in and not reduced to just those that are used.
On the scenery front, this I have found is nearly always the cause of CTDs, especially on loading. CTDs whilst flying I have found to nearly always be due to effects that were not designed for AI being employed for AI aircraft.
Some CTDs I have never found out the cause, the biggest headache for me happens to be VOZ, I have never got FS9 to load with it installed, but when I have only the military bases manually installed its fine. Its annoying as its a fine package, I believe.
These tips are not a miracle cure, but may make a visible difference to you loading time. For example mine takes about 5 minutes to load and I have one of those turbo nutter Quad Core thingies installed, but it was a lot worse before.
I can sympathize with the problem, about a year ago I had to be quite ruthless about clearing out flyable aircraft, that I don't use, I also merge all my AI aircraft into single type folders, saves time on loading, even MAIW packs.
I also went through and rebuilt old traffic files. This saved me 8gb of space and must have decreased my load time. This was caused by the airports.txt files having all the airports in and not reduced to just those that are used.
On the scenery front, this I have found is nearly always the cause of CTDs, especially on loading. CTDs whilst flying I have found to nearly always be due to effects that were not designed for AI being employed for AI aircraft.
Some CTDs I have never found out the cause, the biggest headache for me happens to be VOZ, I have never got FS9 to load with it installed, but when I have only the military bases manually installed its fine. Its annoying as its a fine package, I believe.
These tips are not a miracle cure, but may make a visible difference to you loading time. For example mine takes about 5 minutes to load and I have one of those turbo nutter Quad Core thingies installed, but it was a lot worse before.
Steve
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VulcanDriver
- MAIW Staff
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I had a CTD which happened at teh same time on Sunday (FS time). By a lengthy process I found out t it was a French air force KC-135 flying over the English Channel. Once I deleted it the CTDs stopped.
Good hunting
John
Good hunting
John
John
"That is the biggest fool thing we have ever done. The A-bomb will never go off, and I speak as an expert in explosives." - Admiral William Leahy
"That is the biggest fool thing we have ever done. The A-bomb will never go off, and I speak as an expert in explosives." - Admiral William Leahy
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Rotten Ralph
- Captain
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- Location: Farnborough, Hants
lightening the AI load
Fish,
To keep my AI to a minimum, when I get the MAIW packs, I usually bin a lot of the textures to a certain aircraft in a squadron as the aircraft look the same and its just the registration that is different, this saves hell of a lot of hard drive space due to the amount of MAIW packs available. I know it is a bit of a pain having to change the numbers of the aircraft in the traffic file, but I find that it is worth it.
Dave
To keep my AI to a minimum, when I get the MAIW packs, I usually bin a lot of the textures to a certain aircraft in a squadron as the aircraft look the same and its just the registration that is different, this saves hell of a lot of hard drive space due to the amount of MAIW packs available. I know it is a bit of a pain having to change the numbers of the aircraft in the traffic file, but I find that it is worth it.
Dave
When we first started this little organization way back when, this was one of the things we debated back then. Just the thought of including EVERY texture for some packages was daunting. But since the majority of them are just differences in serial numbers, it was deemed as something that was feasible to do and something that could always be changed by our users once they had the package.
We chose to include all the paints and let our users decide if they wanted to use them all as opposed to only including certain ones which would have certainly disappointed some people.
We chose to include all the paints and let our users decide if they wanted to use them all as opposed to only including certain ones which would have certainly disappointed some people.
-Mike G.
Recovering flight sim addict, constant lurker.
Check out my real life RV-8 build here: RV-8 Builder Log
Recovering flight sim addict, constant lurker.
Check out my real life RV-8 build here: RV-8 Builder Log
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VulcanDriver
- MAIW Staff
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- Joined: 11 Aug 2006, 20:58
- Version: FSX
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Hi SteveFirebird wrote:Might be worth checking to see if there was an effect linked to that plane, John. If there was that was probably the cause there.
I believe it had refuelling hoses deployed. Not got it any more on my system but it may well have been that effect which caused the CTD.
John
John
"That is the biggest fool thing we have ever done. The A-bomb will never go off, and I speak as an expert in explosives." - Admiral William Leahy
"That is the biggest fool thing we have ever done. The A-bomb will never go off, and I speak as an expert in explosives." - Admiral William Leahy
-
Rotten Ralph
- Captain
- Posts: 317
- Joined: 16 Jan 2007, 18:16
- Version: FS9
- Location: Farnborough, Hants
You and me both my friend. I'm waiting on mine to go up in smoke any day now.david lock wrote:I have quite an old computer which is getting a bit slow now.
-Mike G.
Recovering flight sim addict, constant lurker.
Check out my real life RV-8 build here: RV-8 Builder Log
Recovering flight sim addict, constant lurker.
Check out my real life RV-8 build here: RV-8 Builder Log
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fishlips
Thanks guys for the info.
Seems like a lot of time is spent doing numbers in textures for little gain in veiwing pleasure with some loss to PC perforance and hard drive space, going off what I just read. At least I think that what I read. Never mind, I love the packages anyway and just wish there was a PC affordable enough to run it all smoothly. I am slowly converting the textures to generic, leaving only those aircraft with special or different eye catching markings alone. It will take months at my speed but it does make a huge difference in high AI areas.
I have also found CTD's often revolve around effects like contrails on the FA/18. Some poorly made AI and scenery brought over from 2002 are also offenders as with scenery made with a heap of texture files and saved in large pixel format. I've also found CTD's where Scenery textures were not compressed to the correct format.
Vista Oz is a fabulious scenery program and I am proud to be apart of. I have never heard of anybody not being able to load it. One of the major developers did a lot of work on an out dated lap top and all ways kept frame rates in check so that he could run it smoothy.
There were some issues a few years ago with leaking memory but those issues were resolved.
Seems like a lot of time is spent doing numbers in textures for little gain in veiwing pleasure with some loss to PC perforance and hard drive space, going off what I just read. At least I think that what I read. Never mind, I love the packages anyway and just wish there was a PC affordable enough to run it all smoothly. I am slowly converting the textures to generic, leaving only those aircraft with special or different eye catching markings alone. It will take months at my speed but it does make a huge difference in high AI areas.
I have also found CTD's often revolve around effects like contrails on the FA/18. Some poorly made AI and scenery brought over from 2002 are also offenders as with scenery made with a heap of texture files and saved in large pixel format. I've also found CTD's where Scenery textures were not compressed to the correct format.
Vista Oz is a fabulious scenery program and I am proud to be apart of. I have never heard of anybody not being able to load it. One of the major developers did a lot of work on an out dated lap top and all ways kept frame rates in check so that he could run it smoothy.
There were some issues a few years ago with leaking memory but those issues were resolved.
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fishlips
Hi Mike G,
Yes I can see where your coming from. Just suggestion though. If just changing numbers, would it not be feasable to add a generic (non numbered texture) just for that purpose as it adds no additional work on the authors load. That way, only the traffic file needs to be changed to make it all work as not all that many simmers no how to paint but do know how to make simple trafic changes.
Just a thought.
Yes I can see where your coming from. Just suggestion though. If just changing numbers, would it not be feasable to add a generic (non numbered texture) just for that purpose as it adds no additional work on the authors load. That way, only the traffic file needs to be changed to make it all work as not all that many simmers no how to paint but do know how to make simple trafic changes.
Just a thought.
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james84