P3D v4 Maximum polygon limit

[euroastar350]

Hi guys,

Just a curious question, what is the maximum polygon limit can P3DV4 handle? I've read somewhere (here maybe) that the compiler is able to spit out models with a polygon count in excess of 500,000+, but can the platform handle more without it bringing down framerates? Of course I do have one helicopter project that has in excess of 1.3 million polygons, but I don't want to throw that into platform if it's going to hurt performance. Of course, I have been dumbing down lots of parts, but the poly count is still too high to attempt an export. Any thoughts?

 

[Alexis]

From my personal experience, models of that magnitude pose no problems to the FSX and P3D engine.

The actual problem lies in draw calls which need to be carefully balanced.

Two examples are our Phantom, weighing 600k polygons and the upcoming Nimitz sitting at 1.2 million.

The Nimitz performs much better than the Phantom, the reason being draw calls where there is a huge difference (90 vs 600). Similarly, the F-14A Tomcat seems to be in the 400k triangle range (not 100% sure), but at 900+ calls the Phantom and most other planes outperform it.

Bottom line:
+polygons don't seem to make a difference
+watch the draw calls
+watch the textures. It is easy to take 1GB of texture memory but hard to get rid of

 

[lionheart]

Gauges poorly made that use high amounts of memory are bad. Tons of giant textures (4096) are bad. Several are ok, like 3 or 4. But 20? Bad. Then you also need to use 256bit Bitmaps on gauge textures in XML gauges.

But performance in poly counts, I havent bumped into that. Seems they do pretty well from what I find. I have had 'one' complaint from one customer that his computer could barely run one of my planes and he blamed it on the mesh.

Have you tested it yet in the sim? I would like to know how it does. Try it, give it a test.

I think I remember someone saying they had a plane with just under one million. Like 950K, if I remember correctly.

Great times to be in with such numbers of polygons available. I remember the FS2004 days... 64K and thats for both the interior and exterior models, lololol... Thank you Lord!!!

 

[=rk=]

Polygon saturation is most apparent at a large airport with active AI and until you've tested a model in that environment, you won't know. Alex can confidently say his model is likely to not visit a commercial airport, granted, it is likely to be placed into scenarios with multiple AI vehicles and other players. In an online session, the computer must render all the 600k Phantoms, this is why some FSX developers included multiplayer versions.