The End Of An Era and what was a wonderful, enlightened virtual world....

[Jase Devin]

6 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

If most FS users have not upgraded and yet the FS support groups have been busy af with those who did, then we seen nothing yet and the support group will not be getting a break for a few months to come. Neither will the forum for that matter. Brace yourself!

I agree, if within the 2 update time frame this doesn't get fixed. This Forum is going to be flooded!!

[Lysistrata Szapira]

My PC is not a potato, but I'm still reluctant to install the latest FS version.   I did install it on my fiance's gaming rig which is as close to top of the line as one can get, and I found it spazzy.   My FPS would be 150 and then drop to 25 in a heartbeat.   This was in a store that sells PBR textures with examples hanging on the walls.  I know I need to tinker with EEP to control the white blowout (very annoying), but those unpredictable frame rates SUCK. 

To me the whole thing is just "ooh pretty shiny" and then "yawn."  I don't need to look in mirrors.  I really don't place much importance on how light reflects off of surfaces.  I think LL borked it in some misguided idea that more people would join SL, and that's NOT going to happen.  People like those kind of graphics in actual GAMES that have beginnings, middle points, and endings, not in a "make your own world" sort of thing. 

If/when FS forces the issue, I'm not sure what I'll do. 

[Charlotte Bartlett]

14 hours ago, Aethelwine said:

I imagine 35,000 are probably using pre-PBR viewers.

I am assuming (silly of me?) that LL does have internal stats on what viewers are connecting.

On a related note:
I am getting night and day performance on loading PBR between the viewers today.  Yesterday less so, so perhaps me.

Firestorm is really struggling to get through grey textures - even if I Teleport within the same parcel my hair/avatar goes back to grey - it's like something is getting "stuck" and the "cache" stutters.   I am non technical so best I can describe it.   Also some PBR builds are just sticking at bright white and not loading in even on restarts, copying the item, rerezzing.   Now I am playing on maxed out settings on purpose, but there is definitely something a little off with the caching/load for me on a Mac on the PBR material pipeline within Firestorm today.

I am also testing right now with LL's viewer (Second Life Release 7.1.9.9620320242 (64bit))
Immediate texture loading and no grey avatars - performance is pretty sharp for me. Frame rate is a little lower than I prefer, but I have maxed our all settings.  Albeit I need to keep testing on Firestorm as most customers use that.

And... yes, yes I do have the pool party lights on!

https://gyazo.com/19609ccf0230c0095fa7f3ee9c41854f

Our customers did fill out the 2023 last year survey on PBR usage in our FB group and again this month now Firestorm is out.
Including those who are having hardware challenges.  Small subset of users of course, but interesting to see.

 

SL version I am testing on now:

Second Life Release 7.1.9.9620320242 (64bit)
Release Notes

You are at 64.0, 91.0, 21.5 in Scarlet Creative located at simhost-0cd3b569a6915351c.agni
SLURL: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Scarlet Creative/64/91/22
(global coordinates 130368.0, 313947.0, 21.5)
Second Life RC LeTigre 2024-06-11.9458617693
Error fetching server release notes URL.

CPU: Apple M1 Max (2400 MHz)
Memory: 65536 MB
OS Version: macOS 13.5.1 Darwin 22.6.0 Darwin Kernel Version 22.6.0: Wed Jul  5 22:22:05 PDT 2023; root:xnu-8796.141.3~6/RELEASE_ARM64_T6000 x86_64
Graphics Card Vendor: Apple
Graphics Card: Apple M1 Max

OpenGL Version: 4.1 Metal - 83.1

Window size: 1707x996
Font Size Adjustment: 96pt
UI Scaling: 1
Draw distance: 64m
Bandwidth: 3000kbit/s
LOD factor: 4
Render quality: 6
Texture memory: 49152MB
Disk cache: Max size 3993.6 MB (18.3% used)
HiDPI display mode: 

J2C Decoder Version: KDU v7.10.4
Audio Driver Version: OpenAL, version 1.1 ALSOFT 1.23.1 / OpenAL Community / OpenAL Soft: OpenAL Soft
Dullahan: 1.14.0.202310131309
  CEF: 118.4.1+g3dd6078+chromium-118.0.5993.54
  Chromium: 118.0.5993.54
LibVLC Version: 3.0.16
Voice Server Version: Not Connected
Packets Lost: 25/20937 (0.1%)
July 16 2024 16:30:52

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

7 minutes ago, Charlotte Bartlett said:

Firestorm is really struggling to get through grey textures - even if I Teleport within the same parcel my hair/avatar goes back to grey - it's like something is getting "stuck" and the "cache" stutters.

Not sure if this is significant or not, but my dance partner was having this issue on Sunday night, but on Alchemy. (He went so far as to share a pic of me with grey skin -- there's the way to a girl's heart, eh? "Look how awful you look in this pic!")

I mention it on the off chance that this is not just an FS problem.

 

[BilliJo Aldrin]

Twice tonight my graphics card overheated and my computer shut down. I was like wtf? Then I checked the fans, the big one had stopped working. So i unplugged it, threw it in the trash, set up another one, and I'm good to go.

I'll keep running this way until I have to download the PBR viewer. Once I start overheating more than once a session, I'll bite the bullet and buy a new computer.

😂

 

[BriannaLovey]

12 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Not sure if this is significant or not, but my dance partner was having this issue on Sunday night, but on Alchemy. (He went so far as to share a pic of me with grey skin -- there's the way to a girl's heart, eh? "Look how awful you look in this pic!")

I mention it on the off chance that this is not just an FS problem.

 

All viewers that copy LL's latest texture fetching code untouched will have this same problem unless they fix it themselves. Henri explained that LL changed something about the texture fetcher to make it perform worse, and I can't find the link to his post :c

[Extrude Ragu]

25 minutes ago, BilliJo Aldrin said:

Twice tonight my graphics card overheated and my computer shut down. I was like wtf? Then I checked the fans, the big one had stopped working. So i unplugged it, threw it in the trash, set up another one, and I'm good to go.

I'll keep running this way until I have to download the PBR viewer. Once I start overheating more than once a session, I'll bite the bullet and buy a new computer.

😂

 

I am morbidly curious to see what your setup looks like

[Rowan Amore]

4 minutes ago, Extrude Ragu said:

I am morbidly curious to see what your setup looks like

[Scylla Rhiadra]

5 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

[Qie Niangao]

4 hours ago, Dorientje Woller said:

One issue with the Alchemy Viewer and FireStorm Viewer is that they would use the standard (as in LL Viewer) appearance editor.

I don't know what this means. Maybe if I knew what viewer does not use that appearance editor, I'd understand.

(I know after I use the CoolVL Viewer, when I switch back to another viewer, it considers my Outfit "Unknown", something I don't see when switching among all the other viewers. But I'm not sure that's related.)

[Coffee Pancake]

43 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

*sighs*

Now I have retro computer envy.

[Paul Hexem]

3 hours ago, Codex Alpha said:

elitists who will defend the game/software/platform to the death against all newcomers

 

On 7/15/2024 at 2:36 AM, Dune Ravenwood said:

I been very very good at biting my tongue over this PBR fiasco and been an old timer on SL since 2007

 

[Zalificent Corvinus]

3 hours ago, Luna Bliss said:

You would not believe how many people inworld are laughing at the nest of negativity here...

I WOULD, THE ANSWER IS "almost none". as 99% of SecondLifers don't even know there is an official forum, or if they do, they never bother coming here.

And it's not the negativity that the few aware of this place laugh at, it's the stupidity of the Positivity and Futureness Cultists.

 

"Wait what? Some  IDIOT said we need a webcam thing to make our avatars pull silly faces, because he has the worst looking system avatar in SL? Hahhahahahahahahaahahhha! Fool needs a free head from Lelutka!"

"Wait, what? Some IDIIOT claims new Bloatstorm is working fine because their frame rate 'only' dropped from 190 to 110, so it's all good? What about those of us who never see 60 fps? Don't these elitist Cultists understand we don't all own $3000 Super Gaming rigs? Hahahahahahahhahahaha! Fool needs to pull their head out of their backside!"

Edited July 17 by Zalificent Corvinus

[Zalificent Corvinus]

2 hours ago, Charlotte Bartlett said:

even if I Teleport within the same parcel my hair/avatar goes back to grey - it's like something is getting "stuck" and the "cache" stutters.   I am non technical so best I can describe it.  

 

1 hour ago, BriannaLovey said:

All viewers that copy LL's latest texture fetching code untouched will have this same problem unless they fix it themselves.

 

Look, it's simple, for most of SL's history, most viewers fetch textures, store them in the cache, load them into VRAM, and, WHEN the VRAM allocated is FULL, rotate them out, based on PRIORITY.

Since your avatar is generally one of the FIRST things you'll see, anywhere, it's a PRIORIITY, and it's textures STAY in VRAM.

 

But in addition to their busted ass performance destroying PBR nonsense, LL have decided to hit us with a NEW texture fetch system, based on FIFO, First In, First Out, because LL's Fail-Devs apparently have no clue how anything in SL actually works for actual users.

 

The first textures loaded into VRAM are your avatar, so when you TP anywhere, and the VRAM starts to cycle, your avatar's textures are the first ones flushed out. That incoming set of four 2048  textures for the PBR nose ring on the Futureness Cultist Fashonista 123 m away takes priority over your three 1024 skin bom bakes.

 

[Zalificent Corvinus]

39 minutes ago, Coffee Pancake said:

*sighs*

Now I have retro computer envy.

Over an IBM PS/2 Clunker? Hahahahahaha!

 

[Love Zhaoying]

4 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

5 hours ago, Luna Bliss said:

This place is a nest of negativity...lol.

Dear Goddess, make it stop.

I'm having zero problems and nearly all people I know inworld are having zero problems or minimally affected.

Expand  

It's a cult.

Depends on the Goddess, I think!

[Love Zhaoying]

4 hours ago, Codex Alpha said:

It's a very common phenomena on smaller platforms, where there will be a group of elitists who will defend the game/software/platform to the death against all newcomers and criticisms, and can really be a force of toxicity that can keep a place from growing. It's documented and even included in modern "Community Manager" courses. LL platforms suffer from this immensely, and even if we cannot fairly equate correlation to causation - my observances being on their platforms has the same behaviour - to their massive detriment (in part) - and goes all the way up to the top.

Ever say anything positive? I'll wait.

[Love Zhaoying]

1 hour ago, Coffee Pancake said:

1 hour ago, Rowan Amore said:

Expand  

*sighs*

Now I have retro computer envy.

That beats the old, "I've got the strangest boner right now."

[BriannaLovey]

2 hours ago, BilliJo Aldrin said:

Twice tonight my graphics card overheated and my computer shut down. I was like wtf? Then I checked the fans, the big one had stopped working. So i unplugged it, threw it in the trash, set up another one, and I'm good to go.

I'll keep running this way until I have to download the PBR viewer. Once I start overheating more than once a session, I'll bite the bullet and buy a new computer.

😂

 

This happened with one of mine once, but I just bought a server-grade case fan, connected it to the motherboard, then zip-tied it onto the GPU heatsink. No cooling problems so far.

[Love Zhaoying]

15 minutes ago, BriannaLovey said:

This happened with one of mine once, but I just bought a server-grade case fan, connected it to the motherboard, then zip-tied it onto the GPU heatsink. No cooling problems so far.

My last PC's GPU card fell off its mount, I found out when the fan made horrible noises. Zip-tied it back to the case!

[Dorientje Woller]

2 hours ago, Qie Niangao said:

I don't know what this means. Maybe if I knew what viewer does not use that appearance editor, I'd understand.

(I know after I use the CoolVL Viewer, when I switch back to another viewer, it considers my Outfit "Unknown", something I don't see when switching among all the other viewers. But I'm not sure that's related.)

The "appearance editor" in the Alchemy PBR & FireStorm PBR viewer are now simply sliders with the values. No longer, as it is with the LL PBR Viewer and before the updates, tiles with sliders underneath and some minimal indication what you're doing.

[Arduenn Schwartzman]

4 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

That beats the old, "I've got the strangest boner right now."

*looks up from his teletyper*

"What is this 'PBR' you speak of?"

[Midnoot]

4 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

That beats the old, "I've got the strangest boner right now."

I hate that people have replied to this post , which in return , has forced me to see. I understand that you think having a raging 🍆 in public is ok , but it's not . 

[JacksonBollock]

22 minutes ago, Midnoot said:

I hate that people have replied to this post , which in return , has forced me to see. I understand that you think having a raging 🍆 in public is ok , but it's not . 

So what about the non-raging variety??

Either way, I'm not sure anyone thinks they're ok.

In fact from the age of 14 they are what I was told the 17 times table, and imagining your gran in the bath, were designed to stop.

Edited July 17 by JacksonBollock

[Scylla Rhiadra]

Men are so frickin' weird about their things.