Better viewer for Second Life? ((To get MORE Fps))

[Rob Huntsman]

I'm noticing Firestorm, I tend to get 20-60 FPS with my current settings, and my Computer is not worth bragging about.

CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4770 CPU @ 3.40GHz (3392.14 MHz)
Memory: 16324 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows 10 64-bit (Build 17134)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce GT 625/PCIe/SSE2

So then whats the problem I get good FPS?

Well, my issue is people and friends tend to get less FPS than I do getting about 4-10 FPS on a 960 Nvidia GTX given to mesh on the ground where I'm still rocking 20 FPS...... In a situation like this, I usually give them my graphics settings for firestorm, it doesn't fix the issue with firestorm.

So I was wondering. Is there a new and better viewer in town that supports "Newer" Graphic cards?

Edited June 18, 2018 by Haselden

[Lillith Hapmouche]

Are you asking for your friends with the 960 cards or for yourself?

Your GT 625 is a horribly outdated and lame bottleneck for your system. You could easily toss in anything up to a 1080ti, if your power supply is up for the task.

[Qie Niangao]

There are lighter-weight viewers, but not especially better tuned for newer cards than is Firestorm. The mystery here is how you're getting such good performance on that 625. I mean, GPU isn't everything, and your machine is pretty high performance other than that dog of a graphics card, but still you should be getting much worse performance than somebody with a 960 with even reasonable hardware.

And you say "people and friends" in the plural, so it can't be that they all have outdated drivers or their monitors are all plugged into the embedded graphics port or something silly.

The only thing I can think of - and you mention sharing your settings, so this seems unlikely - is that you've disabled all shaders and have a tiny draw distance, while everybody else is running with full shadows and super deep draw distance. Are they really using the same settings, in the same scene, and underperforming your viewer? If so, I guess we'll need more details about their hardware, and how it can be so very broken.

[Theresa Tennyson]

37 minutes ago, Qie Niangao said:

There are lighter-weight viewers, but not especially better tuned for newer cards than is Firestorm. The mystery here is how you're getting such good performance on that 625. I mean, GPU isn't everything, and your machine is pretty high performance other than that dog of a graphics card, but still you should be getting much worse performance than somebody with a 960 with even reasonable hardware.

And you say "people and friends" in the plural, so it can't be that they all have outdated drivers or their monitors are all plugged into the embedded graphics port or something silly.

The only thing I can think of - and you mention sharing your settings, so this seems unlikely - is that you've disabled all shaders and have a tiny draw distance, while everybody else is running with full shadows and super deep draw distance. Are they really using the same settings, in the same scene, and underperforming your viewer? If so, I guess we'll need more details about their hardware, and how it can be so very broken.

One factor that people overlook because it isn't normally set within the viewer is screen resolution. A lot of people with high-end graphics cards also have high-resolution monitors and something has to draw all those pixels.

[Rob Huntsman]

1 hour ago, Lillith Hapmouche said:

Are you asking for your friends with the 960 cards or for yourself?

Your GT 625 is a horribly outdated and lame bottleneck for your system. You could easily toss in anything up to a 1080ti, if your power supply is up for the task.

You know I would buy a 1080 ti, but with all the horrible reviews I hear with peoples FPS. I'm scared to think if the game could possibly run even worse.

For example, I hear people that play on ultra or Low regardless they will get the same FPS on a 1080 TI graphics card is the point I'm trying to make. However, this is with the firestorm viewer, so was curious if they're better ones.

[Rob Huntsman]

1 hour ago, Qie Niangao said:

There are lighter-weight viewers, but not especially better tuned for newer cards than is Firestorm. The mystery here is how you're getting such good performance on that 625. I mean, GPU isn't everything, and your machine is pretty high performance other than that dog of a graphics card, but still you should be getting much worse performance than somebody with a 960 with even reasonable hardware.

And you say "people and friends" in the plural, so it can't be that they all have outdated drivers or their monitors are all plugged into the embedded graphics port or something silly.

The only thing I can think of - and you mention sharing your settings, so this seems unlikely - is that you've disabled all shaders and have a tiny draw distance, while everybody else is running with full shadows and super deep draw distance. Are they really using the same settings, in the same scene, and underperforming your viewer? If so, I guess we'll need more details about their hardware, and how it can be so very broken.

Yeah it's true, like here are my graphics settings. Go ahead and try it out but some odd reason I get better FPS. I wrote this in a note card on instructions how to do it, but for some odd reason, they're not getting the same results I get with firestorm.

First make a preset. Save your current graphics you use for sex & chill in graphics. 

Go to Preferences then to graphics you will see a button at the very bottom. Hit SAVE.

Call that default.

NOW copy this graphic settings.

Performance - LOW
Draw Distance - 280
Max. Particle Count - 0
Maximum Complexity - No limit
Max. # Of no Impostor avatars - 4
Post Process Quality - Low
Avatar Physics - 0.00

Shaders :
 
 Only check Basic Shadows. UNCHECK  the rest.
 
 Level of Detail (LOD)
 
 Objects & Sculpts LOD - 1.500 or 1.000
 Flexiprims - 0.000
 Trees - 0.125
 Avatars - 0.000
 Terrain - 1.000
 
 Avatar Rendering 
 
 CHECK both Hardware skinning and Avatar clothing.
 
 Now go too Hardware settings.
 
 UNCHECK - Anisotropic Filtering. (Slower when enabled.)
 
 Once this is all done hit SAVE in presets.
 
 Call this low lag.
 
 SWAP between DEFAULT graphics and LOW LAG on top right corner use the monitor to check/swap between the presets.

Your fps should go up by 20-30. DONT try testing it by looking at walls. Look at avatars, and what not compare how well you computer handles around avatars with your current settings to mine.

 

 

[Lillith Hapmouche]

That sort of advice is even worse than your choice of a "GPU". You basically have your Maserati dragged down the road by a mule. Where do you expect those extra FPS to come from?

Why do you seriously want to render a 280m distance full of crap looking chunks, while clunking up your pipes with all the junk rendered due to an uncapped complexity level?
It should be exactly the opposite... turn your draw distance down - WAY down - and limit your maximum complexity to something reasonable like roughly around 200.000. The exact limit will vary based on the whole hardware, not just the GPU. 

Please do everyone a favour and stop passing around those settings.

[Qie Niangao]

Coincidentally I recently changed my settings to be much more aggressive about not rendering complex avatars, in the same vein as your 4 non-Imposter limit, and was pretty astonished at how easily I could navigate through crowded events compared to before. So yeah, I definitely agree that adjusting those graphics settings can make a huge difference. I'm just confused why it wouldn't make the same difference to your friends -- or maybe it would, if they actually imitated your settings. (Theresa makes a very good observation: if those friends are drawing a much larger view, it could more than offset the better settings.)

[KanryDrago]

My partner has been recently trying out the catznip viewer and says she has been able to get acceptable framerates in ultra settings whereas she could only get them in mid settings with firestorm. Your mileage might vary and its only anecdotal and I have no idea what settings she has such as shadows

[Rob Huntsman]

3 hours ago, Lillith Hapmouche said:

That sort of advice is even worse than your choice of a "GPU". You basically have your Maserati dragged down the road by a mule. Where do you expect those extra FPS to come from?

Why do you seriously want to render a 280m distance full of crap looking chunks, while clunking up your pipes with all the junk rendered due to an uncapped complexity level?
It should be exactly the opposite... turn your draw distance down - WAY down - and limit your maximum complexity to something reasonable like roughly around 200.000. The exact limit will vary based on the whole hardware, not just the GPU. 

Please do everyone a favour and stop passing around those settings.

Its so I can have the entire sim rezzed, and not deal with lag latter. However, I give these settings to other friends but they lag out and they got a better graphics card then I do. So found that odd.

My draw distance isn't the problem. If I'm getting 40 FPS with these settings. 20 FPS higher than old, it's CLEARLY better.

[Rob Huntsman]

3 hours ago, Qie Niangao said:

Coincidentally I recently changed my settings to be much more aggressive about not rendering complex avatars, in the same vein as your 4 non-Imposter limit, and was pretty astonished at how easily I could navigate through crowded events compared to before. So yeah, I definitely agree that adjusting those graphics settings can make a huge difference. I'm just confused why it wouldn't make the same difference to your friends -- or maybe it would, if they actually imitated your settings. (Theresa makes a very good observation: if those friends are drawing a much larger view, it could more than offset the better settings.)

They gave me screenshots and tried the exact same settings with a better graphics card. Even the 1080 TI *****s up with my settings. I'll get proof in a sec. And show comparison.

[Lillith Hapmouche]

And get the rest of their hardware and network as well. There's no point in comparing completely different setups and wonder why they perform differently...

[Alwin Alcott]

14 hours ago, Haselden said:

Its so I can have the entire sim rezzed

no you won't, you'll have 4 sims trying to rezz depending where you are ... if that helps lagging less or rezz faster?... think that answer isn't to difficult.

 

[edit] it's even worse... it are 9 sims that try to load.. sqm of 4, but 9 simulators working for you

 

Edited June 19, 2018 by Alwin Alcott

[Fionalein]

Maybe half your screen rezolution? I noticed a significant speed increase when I downsized my viewer windows.

Edited June 18, 2018 by Fionalein

[cykarushb]

>gt 625

well thats your problem, a 4770 could be paired with pretty much anything short of a Titan XP

buy a secondhand 970 and watch that framerate triple

[norajulian]

11 hours ago, Haselden said:

...is not worth bragging about.

I don’t know.. sure seems like you’re doing a pretty good job of bragging to me.  As others have said, FPS depends on hardware -not just settings- and a good graphics card doesn’t necessarily mean anything if you don’t have the muscle to pull it. I’m sure that your “friends” can pop into the tech sub-forum and ask for advice regarding their rigs. 

[LittleMe Jewell]

4 hours ago, Haselden said:

My draw distance isn't the problem. If I'm getting 40 FPS with these settings.

I prefer the better graphic cards.  I have my settings pretty close to maxed and I easily get 60+ FPS almost every where I go.   The only major exception is if I pop into a sim on top of 50 other people like I did yesterday afternoon.  That was like crawling through molasses.

 

4 hours ago, Haselden said:

so I can have the entire sim rezzed, and not deal with lag latter.

Depending on the textures used, you may or may not actually reduce later lag by trying to rez the entire sim all the time.

[Callum Meriman]

9 hours ago, Haselden said:

SWAP between DEFAULT graphics and LOW LAG on top right corner use the monitor to check/swap between the presets.

Your fps should go up by 20-30. DONT try testing it by looking at walls. Look at avatars, and what not compare how well you computer handles around avatars with your current settings to mine.

Yeah, nah.

See, my 1070 video card can easily handly Ultra performance with shadows at 100fps. Reducing those settings doesn't give me extra because the bottle neck is always my CPU, not the video card.

You see a 20-30 FPS improvement because your video card is a potato. Using a better video card would give you those 20-30FPS in ultra, but no more then 20-30 FPS, because your CPU would then be the bottle neck too.

tl;dr - If you see an FPS performance boost in lowest then your video card is a potato
          If you don't see an FPS performance boost in lowest then your CPU is the bottleneck

 

Edited June 19, 2018 by Callum Meriman

[Rob Huntsman]

10 hours ago, Lillith Hapmouche said:

And get the rest of their hardware and network as well. There's no point in comparing completely different setups and wonder why they perform differently...

Sorry this took so long.. Apparently she had to go to work. BUT HERES WHAT i'm talking about.

My FPS. - 

((Friends)) with 1050 graphics card. - https://gyazo.com/40c8b2cbf014c55cac46fc1f8c0fb726

[Rob Huntsman]

6 hours ago, norajulian said:

I don’t know.. sure seems like you’re doing a pretty good job of bragging to me.  As others have said, FPS depends on hardware -not just settings- and a good graphics card doesn’t necessarily mean anything if you don’t have the muscle to pull it. I’m sure that your “friends” can pop into the tech sub-forum and ask for advice regarding their rigs. 

I'm debunking this right now. Why is a 6-year-old graphic card, beating a Nvidia GeForce 1050 in terms of FPS... If you don't believe me. Go ahead go to the exact same landmark try my settings and take a screenshot. I'm Trying to understand how bad graphic cards are performing better, then a 1050. LM - http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Venna Resort/204/224/30

[Callum Meriman]

38 minutes ago, Haselden said:

Why is a 6-year-old graphic card, beating a Nvidia GeForce 1050 in terms of FPS

Maybe this will give you a hint:

Background always runs slower.

[Solar Legion]

Where to even begin .... Same OS? Check. Not a discrepancy. RAM: Slightly different. Not enough to matter. CPU? Quite different. Discrepancy noted. Driver version? Different as well. Discrepancy. Ditto for OpenGL Version. Hmm, what's this, Window size is utterly missing for one and is fairly large on the other? Well that actually does have an impact.

Others ave already weighed in and explained the variables and reasons to you - you refuse to listen and insist that there must be something else at play.

That location and angle alone are fairly object heavy and considering some of the symptoms ....I took a look with my normal settings (Ultra with the draw distance set to something actually sensible) and got only slightly better FPS there than I do running around my former pet's island. That particular place only tanks FPS thanks to the types of objects present as well as poor optimization (on the object creator's part mind). I get a similar drop on my home sim when looking out over either of my neighbor's plots for the exact same reason (poorly optimized content).

TL;DR - Listen to the other posters, they're right.

[Rob Huntsman]

32 minutes ago, Callum Meriman said:

Maybe this will give you a hint:

Background always runs slower.

what you mean and how do you change?

 

Edit: Like are you saying she was tabbed when she took screen shot? Its prob because of the software gyazo uses, nonetheless even that doesnt explain why I'l getting almost triple her FPS with 6 year old card.

Here since they're gone I decided to do that as well.

Edited June 19, 2018 by Haselden

[norajulian]

3 hours ago, Haselden said:

I'm debunking this right now. Why is a 6-year-old graphic card, beating a Nvidia GeForce 1050 in terms of FPS... If you don't believe me. Go ahead go to the exact same landmark try my settings and take a screenshot.

Woah, calm down there, Paul Harmon. You're far more concerned about your own settings than these friends of yours who don't.. really seem to care enough to pop in here to add their two cents. It's not about believing - you can win the schlong contest if you want to win it - I'll let you! What you decide regarding this situation (that has blown out of context faster than my Uncle George at a soccer game) is totally up to you. I guess this means you win! Your jurassic graphics win the House Cup! 

Again, though - if you're looking for tech arguments - pop into that forum instead. I'm sure you'll get some nibbles. 

[Candice LittleBoots]

I'm not taking sides but I was curious so, as requested, I went to this place and took the same (similar) pic with the same (rather unusual) set of settings in the off-chance it may help someone.

This was on a ASUS ROG gaming laptop with 1920x1080

CPU : INTEL CORE I7-8750H
RAM : 16GB DDR4
HDD : 1 TB 5400 RPM + 256 GB SSD M.2 PCI-E
DISPLAY : 17.3" FHD AG
VGA : GEFORCE GTX 1060 6GB GDDR5
OS : WINDOWS 10