SCASM lights KILL my fps

[JPetroSS]

Hi guys & I'm sorry if I'm posting this in the wrong forum.

I have a HUGE problem with airports that include SCASM lights.
If I see in my screen any SCASM light, my fps drops dramatically and especially at night, when the rwy lighting is on, I get 1-3 fps!
Well, I don't have the oldest pc in the world, but I never accept fps below 10!
Also, the lights seem to "blend" with each other but too much.

I've included a screenshot of an airport with SCASM lights and how I see it
After I removed the runway lights file, the frames were 20+.

Any Ideas on how I can fix this?

Thanks,

Peter

 

[arno]

Hi,

Which version of FS are you using?

If it is FSX, do you have SP2 installed, the earlier versions had such problems indeed.

 

[JPetroSS]

Hi Arno,

I have FSX with Accelaration installed

 

[arno]

Are you using DX10 preview mode maybe?

 

[JPetroSS]

Are you using DX10 preview mode maybe?

No, sorry for not mentioning.
i only use light bloom, but even without light bloom the frames are still the same.

 

[mmann]

I have had the same terrible performance with airports that have used really old SCASM code. One airport was creating a bit of a hit even in FS9; moved into FSX Acceleration and the FPS were totally unbearable!

Regards, Mike Mann

 

[arno]

Like I mentioned I have seen such problems before. But I have also seen airport with scasm runways for the lights that still perform fine.

 

[JPetroSS]

Is there a good program that can help me sort this out?

Peter

 

[arno]

Not aware of tools for that. Which tools did you use until now?

 

[JPetroSS]

I didn't use no tools up to now, nor do I know how to tweak any SCASM settings.....but I want to give it a try

 

[arno]

Can you show the SCASM code you are using at the moment? Maybe we can suggest some improvements.

 

[Horst18519]

I know this topic is some months old, but I've come across very weird things in my current project which seem to be exactly the same issue like this one.

I use 3 runways, 2 of them displaying just fine. Only the 3rd runway i errand. Its lights appear just like in the screenshot, a bit FS4 style like big white dots (just like the old bigdot command) and it gives me terrible fps.
What I found out: if I rotate the runway only 0.02 degrees it works just fine.
No idea what's happening there, but the exact rotation I need is not possible, only something a bit off.

 

[jvile]

I know this topic is some months old, but I've come across very weird things in my current project which seem to be exactly the same issue like this one.

I use 3 runways, 2 of them displaying just fine. Only the 3rd runway i errand. Its lights appear just like in the screenshot, a bit FS4 style like big white dots (just like the old bigdot command) and it gives me terrible fps.
What I found out: if I rotate the runway only 0.02 degrees it works just fine.
No idea what's happening there, but the exact rotation I need is not possible, only something a bit off.

Thorsten

I have the same problem with my EHAM FSX SP2.

My KATL FSX SP2 worked fine with 2 different runways overlaying the XML runways. When I added 1 runway at EHAM and it caused the FPS to drop below 2 which caused FSX to come to a halt.

I am going to try your 0.02 rotation and see if that helps.

The SCASM code I used work without problems in FSX SP1 but there is something in Acceleration/SP2 it does not always like (based on airport).

One other problem I see with FSX SP2. If A SCASM coded runway is placed in the scenery of the airport (overlaying the XML runway) you have to turn off Aircraft cast shadows in the Display Options (DX9).

The FS2004 AI Planes ported over to FSX become invisible and the only thing that shows are the aircraft lights. Any true FSX modeled AI Plane does not become invisible but not many of those around since AI modelers still use FS2004 model, .air and .cfg files for FSX.

 

[thebeloved]

I'm also facing the same problem with my LIRN-X scenery.

It seems that the SCASM compilated rwy.bgl, that we use to generate lights and PAPI over a groundpoly gmax runway, have the following issues:

1. If used with FSX+SP2, no problem arise, no "big" lights and no frame rate drop

2. If used with FSX+SP2+Acceleration the problem of big lights systematically arise causing frame rate drop. I have noticed another thing: if You disable the scenery containing the rwy.bgl, the default FSX scenery seems to contain STILL the file, showing a double lights over the runway

I try to do some analyses in other scenery finding out that someone uses the BGL_LIGHTS technique with custom PAPI design.

But i point my attention to a scenery (Aerosoft Madrid) containing a file that i decompiled with BglAnalyze.

The instructions are the same of mine, but this file (MAD_RWY.bgl) does not generate the frame rate drop problem neither the big lights, even in FSXA.

Do someone have other findings about this? Is there a problem of the compiler (SCASM in this case)? Maybe is better to do an asm file using the command BGL_NEW_RUNWAY as per bglc SDK?

 

[JPetroSS]

I have this with LIRN-X as well. I get maximum 4 fps at daytime, 1-2 at night and I know that my PC could handle the scenery just fine.
If I remove the file "rwy" then I get 30+ fps with max fsx settings.

I wish we could just use the default FSX lights, but I think that's impossible to happen over a polygon.

 

[hek293]

you can allow default lighting to show through semi-transparent groundpolys, only thing you need to adjust is runway width so that it does not become visible outside your ground polygon edges

 

[thebeloved]

you can allow default lighting to show through semi-transparent groundpolys, only thing you need to adjust is runway width so that it does not become visible outside your ground polygon edges

I know this solution but i don't think is a good one, cause (is my opinion) is not so much efficient regarding precision of placement and final result (weak lights).

My objective is to understand why scasm compiled runway lead to these problems on FSXA and not on FSX-SP2, and how to find a solution for it.

I'm starting to examine the binary structure of those bgl (rwy.bgl and MAD_rwy.bgl) hoping to find something that can lead to a solution for everybody.

I'll glad to fix this problem and share it with all the community.

 

[Horst18519]

I guess noone found out why this happens, but my solution (rotation of the runway, some 0.02° should do the trick) seems to work for my current projects.

 

[thebeloved]

I think i found a clue for this problem.

Everything seems related to the heading of runway in the source file to be compiled by SCASM.

My findings (but i hope someone can do other tests):

Runway heading must be declared in the range 0 to 179

AND

No integer values allowed!!!

So You have to add a smaller rotation to original heading (for example the rwy of Napoli Capodichino is 58 degress. In my source file i declared 58.01 degrees)

This trick (that is a combination of things discovered from other users) seems to restore correct lights functionality and help to regain smoother frame rates in FSX Acceleration.

Hope this helps...let me know if i'm wrong...

 

[Kumara]

Grazie Gianni!

This is an excellent observation: bear with me as I find this trouble now and then and it's a real let down as soon as I spot those solid light bulbs and my FPS drops dramatically...

At the moment I'm trying to fix one of those airport where I have a declared heading for the runway as 208.60 in the SCA decompiled BGL.
Should I alter the heading values to some 28.62 as hinted in this thread? Would that work?
Or should I enter a negative value instead?

Kindly advise.

PS: it works!