Pros/Cons PBR Viewer whats your take

[Jase Devin]

32 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

I'm trying different one too and lost as it gets.. But it's kind of fun exploring what they have.

Right, recently I've tried:

Alchemy

Black Dragon

Genesis

CoolVLViewer

Firestorm

Second Life Viewer

 

Alchemy - I liked could get use to I think.

Cool VL I think fps wise and looks maybe too, was best implementation of pbr I saw. But lacked buttons.

These are RLV viewers, cause I have a attachment I made to combat bom monsters and I use rlv to do that(maybe for other reasons too oO).

Firestorm came out not long ago and it was a shocker. I never tried pbr till that happened, I think for many others is the case. The thing was pegged at 100% gpu and so much was broken graphically. It really had me very worried.

Second Life Viewer as limited as it is, works better now, there was an update yesterday or so, and gpu useage is at 50% typically.

So by the time they force this on us, I think will be ok, with a performance hit of like 50%.

But can the low/mid users take a 50% hit..... I don't think so, if they use this socially. So hope the new Spicy Content will bring new users..

Edited Friday at 12:32 AM by Jase Devin

[Ceka Cianci]

9 minutes ago, Jase Devin said:

Right, recently I've tried:

Alchemy

Black Dragon

Genesis

CoolVLViewer

Firestorm

Second Life Viewer

 

Alchemy - I liked could get use to I think.

Cool VL I think fps wise and looks maybe too, was best implementation of pbr I saw. But lacked buttons.

These are RLV viewers, cause I have a attachment I made to combat bom monsters and I use rlv to do that(maybe for other reasons too oO).

Firestorm came out not long ago and it was a shocker. I never tried pbr till that happened, I think for many others is the case. The thing was pegged at 100% gpu and so much was broken graphically. It really had me very worried.

Second Life Viewer as limited as it is, works better now, there was an update yesterday or so, and gpu useage is at 50% typically.

So by the time they force this on us, I think will be ok, with a performance hit of like 50%.

Ya, I tried Black Dragon's newest update. I had thier first PBR version which I think came out maybe little under a year ago.. It ran nice then.. I have a rough time with their earlier versions for some reason..

I'm trying the Alchemy one now and like how it runs. I just need to find everything it has. I really like that it has poser in it as well..

I'll try the other two as well and see how those run. Maybe tomorrow for those.. I want to really test out the Alchemy first though..

Thank you for the information..

[Henri Beauchamp]

8 hours ago, Jase Devin said:

Cool VL I think fps wise and looks maybe too, was best implementation of pbr I saw.

Then you will like even more next (tomorrow's) release: I implemented an auto-exposure mode to work around all the silly over-exposed PBR settings which are sadly spreading over the grid (LL's SL21B parcels settings, for example).

8 hours ago, Jase Devin said:

But lacked buttons.

In fact, you can add your own buttons (and even full fledged features) via its unique Lua scripting feature: the latter allows side bar buttons, a custom overlay bar button, a custom status bar button, custom pie menus, and even custom floaters !

Edited Friday at 08:28 AM by Henri Beauchamp
Typo

[Scylla Rhiadra]

7 hours ago, Ceka Cianci said:

Ya, I tried Black Dragon's newest update. I had thier first PBR version which I think came out maybe little under a year ago.. It ran nice then.. I have a rough time with their earlier versions for some reason..

I'm trying the Alchemy one now and like how it runs. I just need to find everything it has. I really like that it has poser in it as well..

I'll try the other two as well and see how those run. Maybe tomorrow for those.. I want to really test out the Alchemy first though..

Thank you for the information..

Does the newest version (5.1.3?) have mirrors yet, Ceka? The PBR one I've been using is a few months old now.

[Jaylinbridges]

I've been noticing the SL Viewer puts less of a load on my CPU under the same settings and regions, on average, than the new FS PBR release.  Typically CPU load is around 50% with SL Viewer and 90% with FS when in a busy region.  Just a general comment.  I hope future updates from FS can get the loads down closer to most other TPV and SL PRB viewers.

 

 

 

 

 

[Ceka Cianci]

3 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Does the newest version (5.1.3?) have mirrors yet, Ceka? The PBR one I've been using is a few months old now.

I can sort of get them to work, but not sure if I'm good at making them the right way.. Mine end up looking like i'm in a tunnel.

I can't get my mirror to where it is reflecting everything in real time and where it is supposed to be, like it was when I was in firestorm.

They had mirrors in 5.1 also, but I never messed with them.

I'm gonna jump into Alchemy and see if they look different in there.

 

ETA: Just to add, I logged out of black dragon, then went back into black dragon and cannot in any way, select the reflection probe now from the edit tools..

I can't delete it or anything. it didn't even show up in Alchemy when I went  to ctrl alt T to show transparencies..

It shows up in black dragon when I do but it's just there now in the middle of the room unclickable.👿

ETAA: I went into firestorm and seen in the edit tools, that there is an option to select reflection probes..

So I must have missed finding that in the Black Dragon viewer..

 

ETAA: I think I just suck at making mirrors.. I'm going to the beach instead..lol

 

Edited Friday at 11:47 AM by Ceka Cianci

[NiranV Dean]

42 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

I can sort of get them to work, but not sure if I'm good at making them the right way.. Mine end up looking like i'm in a tunnel.

I can't get my mirror to where it is reflecting everything in real time and where it is supposed to be, like it was when I was in firestorm.

They had mirrors in 5.1 also, but I never messed with them.

I'm gonna jump into Alchemy and see if they look different in there.

 

ETA: Just to add, I logged out of black dragon, then went back into black dragon and cannot in any way, select the reflection probe now from the edit tools..

I can't delete it or anything. it didn't even show up in Alchemy when I went  to ctrl alt T to show transparencies..

It shows up in black dragon when I do but it's just there now in the middle of the room unclickable.👿

ETAA: I went into firestorm and seen in the edit tools, that there is an option to select reflection probes..

So I must have missed finding that in the Black Dragon viewer..

 

ETAA: I think I just suck at making mirrors.. I'm going to the beach instead..lol

 

There is an option to select Reflection Probes, with the other options (click the expand options button).

Also BD does NOT have mirrors yet. They just released, if anything they are coming with the next update.

[Ceka Cianci]

20 minutes ago, NiranV Dean said:

There is an option to select Reflection Probes, with the other options (click the expand options button).

Also BD does NOT have mirrors yet. They just released, if anything they are coming with the next update.

Oh ok. I was just going by a video saying how to make them in Black Dragon and he was saying he was on 5.1 I think..

He must have just been on the beta grid maybe or something.. Or doing them in the way they were doing them before they were released and aren't actual mirrors.

Myself, I am very ignorant when it comes to mirrors in SL.. hehehe

This was the video that I had seen.

 

[Thecla]

FYI the need to retoggle "Select Reflection Probes" each time you start your viewer  is annoying but necessary since for routine navigation and object selection they can be a total PITA since they can take up a whole room and be sprinkled lots of places.

[AmeliaJ08]

12 hours ago, Jase Devin said:

Right, recently I've tried:

Alchemy

Black Dragon

Genesis

CoolVLViewer

Firestorm

Second Life Viewer

 

Alchemy - I liked could get use to I think.

Cool VL I think fps wise and looks maybe too, was best implementation of pbr I saw. But lacked buttons.

These are RLV viewers, cause I have a attachment I made to combat bom monsters and I use rlv to do that(maybe for other reasons too oO).

Firestorm came out not long ago and it was a shocker. I never tried pbr till that happened, I think for many others is the case. The thing was pegged at 100% gpu and so much was broken graphically. It really had me very worried.

Second Life Viewer as limited as it is, works better now, there was an update yesterday or so, and gpu useage is at 50% typically.

So by the time they force this on us, I think will be ok, with a performance hit of like 50%.

But can the low/mid users take a 50% hit..... I don't think so, if they use this socially. So hope the new Spicy Content will bring new users..

What hardware are you using?

[Ceka Cianci]

3 hours ago, AmeliaJ08 said:

What hardware are you using?

I had to go back to firestorm from alchemy.. I can't find the phototools in there and  a few other perks that I love.. hehehe

It's hard to switch viewers, I tell ya.. especially if you are limited on the time off you have from work..

I might mess with Alchemy next weekend when I have another 4 days off.. hehehe

I'm also wondering if having these PBR viewers on my SSD USB stick is a good or bad thing. because they seem to still be using the same system folders from my main c drive, which my other earlier versions of these viewers use also..

I might uninstall my older version of firestorm and do a clean reinstall of the PBR version and see if that helps..That might be doing something  for my performance issues in FS.

[Dorientje Woller]

Issue I have with the Alchemy Viewer is that, although I have the non PBR and PBR version installed in separated folders (cache is also stored in separated folders), each time I swap between viewer versions those are been resetted to recommended settings.

[AmeliaJ08]

25 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

I'm also wondering if having these PBR viewers on my SSD USB stick is a good or bad thing. because they seem to still be using the same system folders from my main c drive, which my other earlier versions of these viewers use also..

When you say you have the viewer on a USB stick do you mean just the executable/files or like... the cache and stuff too? default cache location is C:\Users\<yourusername>\Appdata\Local\Firestorm_x64\. Unless you have changed anything in the preferences the cache will still be there regardless of where the executable is being loaded from.

Your internal SSD (I assume) in your PC (C:) will always be faster than anything connected over USB and ideally everything should be located there, however if you're just loading the executable from a flash drive it won't make a whole lot of difference since all the important cache stuff is probably still being stored on the C drive as you say.

Edited Friday at 04:30 PM by AmeliaJ08

[JeromFranzic]

3 hours ago, AmeliaJ08 said:

What hardware are you using?

I'm on a GTX 1050, and FS isn't as bad for me as this user's experience. That's true whether I'm in Win11 or Linux. Slightly more stable in Linux for me as usual, partly thanks to the lighter overhead of the LXqt desktop.

Usually takes about 30 seconds for a new area to completely load on my end with the latest FS, at 128-256 dd.

I haven't used the latest LL viewer yet. Not a huge fan of it, sometimes I have to TP twice in a given sim as a first arrival often leaves areas invisible. That's annoying... I used to experience that quite a bit with Black Dragon, but not recently.

[BriannaLovey]

9 hours ago, Henri Beauchamp said:

Then you will like even more next (tomorrow's) release: I implemented an auto-exposure mode to work around all the silly over-exposed PBR settings which are sadly spreading over the grid (LL's SL21B parcels settings, for example).

In fact, you can add your own buttons (and even full fledged features) via its unique Lua scripting feature: the latter allows side bar buttons, a custom overlay bar button, a custom status bar button, custom pie menus, and even custom floaters !

Oh my goodness, I didn't even see that part. Maybe scripting Firestorm-like UI widgets for your viewer is a better investment of my time than forking Firestorm.

[Ceka Cianci]

35 minutes ago, AmeliaJ08 said:

When you say you have the viewer on a USB stick do you mean just the executable/files or like... the cache and stuff too? default cache location is C:\Users\<yourusername>\Appdata\Local\Firestorm_x64\. Unless you have changed anything in the preferences the cache will still be there regardless of where the executable is being loaded from.

Your internal SSD (I assume) in your PC (C:) will always be faster than anything connected over USB and ideally everything should be located there, however if you're just loading the executable from a flash drive it won't make a whole lot of difference since all the important cache stuff is probably still being stored on the C drive as you say.

What i have is  My C : drive is an Internal SSD drive and my E: drive is a Sata Drive, I believe is what they are called, which I normally send my viewers when they ask for which drive I would like to install on, to my E: drive..

Then I have my F: drive which is my external SSD stick, which has a terabyte that I've been installing the PBR viewers to..

I'm gonna uninstall both of the firestorm viewers and save my settings and chats and then do a clean install of the FS PBR and see if that helps with my performance any, since the older version and the newer version seem to be sharing the C : drive files.

Because I have all my same settings and chatlogs in my PBR version that are also in the previous FS version. I just want to make sure there isn't something bogging down  because of them sharing the same thing is all.

I'll probably still put the PBR version back on the SSD external stick, because it's probably faster than the sata drive, from what people tell me..

I just really love ❤️ my firestorm and want to try everything to keep using it.. hehehe

[discussionbot]

4 hours ago, Thecla said:

FYI the need to retoggle "Select Reflection Probes" each time you start your viewer  is annoying but necessary

I'm guessing this is currently in the top menus? I wonder if they can turn it into a toggle button on the customisable toolbar spaces to make it less painful.

[BriannaLovey]

50 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

What i have is  My C : drive is an Internal SSD drive and my E: drive is a Sata Drive, I believe is what they are called, which I normally send my viewers when they ask for which drive I would like to install on, to my E: drive..

Then I have my F: drive which is my external SSD stick, which has a terabyte that I've been installing the PBR viewers to..

I'm gonna uninstall both of the firestorm viewers and save my settings and chats and then do a clean install of the FS PBR and see if that helps with my performance any, since the older version and the newer version seem to be sharing the C : drive files.

Because I have all my same settings and chatlogs in my PBR version that are also in the previous FS version. I just want to make sure there isn't something bogging down  because of them sharing the same thing is all.

I'll probably still put the PBR version back on the SSD external stick, because it's probably faster than the sata drive, from what people tell me..

I just really love ❤️ my firestorm and want to try everything to keep using it.. hehehe

The viewer's speed isn't going to be influenced as much by the install location as much as it will be influenced by the cache location. The cache is where most reading and writing happens during viewer runtime, so it is best to keep your cache on a SSD. Since your C:\ drive is a SSD, you don't need to change anything.

[Jase Devin]

5 hours ago, AmeliaJ08 said:

What hardware are you using?

CPU: 13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-13600KF (3494.4 MHz)
Memory: 65376 MB (Used: 2498 MB)
Concurrency: 20
OS Version: Microsoft Windows 11 64-bit (Build 22631.3737)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070/PCIe/SSE2
Graphics Card Memory: 8192 MB

[Ceka Cianci]

1 minute ago, BriannaLovey said:

The viewer's speed isn't going to be influenced as much by the install location as much as it will be influenced by the cache location. The cache is where most reading and writing happens during viewer runtime, so it is best to keep your cache on a SSD. Since your C:\ drive is a SSD, you don't need to change anything.

My biggest curiosity was if both the older and the newer versions sharing the same system files from the C : SSD drive would impact anything?

I know it used to be a thing where we had to uninstall in  the older days and do a clean, before installing a newer version.. I just wonder if it has any impact with two versions dipping into the same place.

[Jase Devin]

10 hours ago, Henri Beauchamp said:

Then you will like even more next (tomorrow's) release: I implemented an auto-exposure mode to work around all the silly over-exposed PBR settings which are sadly spreading over the grid (LL's SL21B parcels settings, for example).

In fact, you can add your own buttons (and even full fledged features) via its unique Lua scripting feature: the latter allows side bar buttons, a custom overlay bar button, a custom status bar button, custom pie menus, and even custom floaters !

I will try the Lua scripting feature thank you.

Reasons I liked and things that stand out about CoolVL

CoolVL my EEP's didn't look as bad as the rest.

CoolVl you can pretty much turn off the pbr features and have basically a 6xxx version again, and the performance hit was very little.

I was thinking that when this is forced update, and people start to look for alternatives to try and keep some performance and still be in the game that CoolVL will be the viewer of choice.

[BriannaLovey]

Just now, Ceka Cianci said:

My biggest curiosity was if both the older and the newer versions sharing the same system files from the C : SSD drive would impact anything?

I know it used to be a thing where we had to uninstall in  the older days and do a clean, before installing a newer version.. I just wonder if it has any impact with two versions dipping into the same place.

One thing that would definitely be impacted is your graphics settings. Since the last 2 versions of Firestorm use different rendering engines, the settings will be completely different One viewer will have settings that the other doesn't have, and vice versa. I am not sure how Firestorm handles this internally. If you want to back them up, you can back up the user_settings folder in your Firestorm AppData directory.

[BriannaLovey]

1 minute ago, Jase Devin said:

I will try the Lua scripting feature thank you.

Reasons I liked and things that stand out about CoolVL

CoolVL my EEP's didn't look as bad as the rest.

CoolVl you can pretty much turn off the pbr features and have basically a 6xxx version again, and the performance hit was very little.

I was thinking that when this is forced update, and people start to look for alternatives to try and keep some performance and still be in the game that CoolVL will be the viewer of choice.

Same here. I've been using it ever since PBR was announced because of the dual rendering engine, and recommending it to any of my friends who also can't run PBR viewers.

[Modulated]

8 minutes ago, Jase Devin said:

CPU: 13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-13600KF (3494.4 MHz)
Memory: 65376 MB (Used: 2498 MB)
Concurrency: 20
OS Version: Microsoft Windows 11 64-bit (Build 22631.3737)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070/PCIe/SSE2
Graphics Card Memory: 8192 MB

There is more than enough hardware there to chew through PBR, it is likely configuration .

[Jase Devin]

12 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

My biggest curiosity was if both the older and the newer versions sharing the same system files from the C : SSD drive would impact anything?

I know it used to be a thing where we had to uninstall in  the older days and do a clean, before installing a newer version.. I just wonder if it has any impact with two versions dipping into the same place.

I actually run a Ram Disk which every know it all in this forum thinks is overkill or just crazy.

Can be found here https://sourceforge.net/projects/imdisk-toolkit/

But I go to crowded places and if you watch the behavior of SL then you will see why.

First Cache - Sl is constantly writing to cache, as new AV's enter the region its downloading and WRITING to the disk.

Second windows pagefile - when you run out of memory it writes to the pagefile (disk).

So what ends up happening is all is ok for a while in a crowded place, then about 30 min into it your memory gets filed and writes to page file, and while its writing to page file its writing to disk cache as well. This is a double whammy, at that point you cant pan around and fps drop a bit and things start to stutter.

This is on my older laptop, i also run on my main machine, but the older laptop really benefits a lot from this, you can see the difference in this benchmark, left is ramdisk. https://gyazo.com/2363c2e8935c6ce95ca8f79d8bc642ce

So if you are able write to disk cache 15x faster it helps heaps!