Marine Aquarium...what give?
 

I am using a new 17" PowerBook running the latest version of Panther. Marine Aquarium 2.0.6 makes my fan come on soon after MA starts. Other screen savers don't cause the fan to come on. Anyone else experiencing this or can offer help? I want to use MA but can't have my computer heating up for long periods of time.

Thanks

Hi Unregistered.

What are your settings? MA by default runs flat out, which means as fast as it can, which will indeed call on your fan. Exactly what settings are required to keep the fan from coming on are dependent on the ambient temperature, what sort of other things you have happening on your computer, etc.

1. Limit the frame rate. 30 fps is usually sufficiently smooth, so start there and adjust up to increase smoothness or down to decrease heat.
2. Turn down the shimmer setting. It effects are pretty subtle, so you can even turn it off if you are having trouble getting the fan to stay off.
3. Reduce the number of fish at any one time.
4. Turn off the bubbles and/or bubble sound

On a 17" Powerbook it should be enough to limit the frame rate.


Jim O'Connor

Why not? You really think you'll end up damaging it?

Thanks so much Jim. Just setting the frames to 30 did the trick. WooHoo!

AKcrab,

With the CPU control on Marine Aquarium 2 for Windows, I'm now able to use it as my primary screen saver. Previously I was only running it manually when I wanted to look at it but using a blank screen as my screen saver. Otherwise I'd wake up in the morning and my Windows PC would have locked up from running at 100% CPU for 8 hours.

Morgan doesn't have a Mac. I've not heard any reports that MA for Mac OS will lock up a machine because of constant use.

Yeah, I've never heard of a Mac actually being damaged because of overuse, but it just stands to reason that you don't want your CPU running as hard as it can producing maximum heat with the fan blowing full strength for extended periods of time. Especially when all you're getting out of it is more frames per second... I know it's been debated on gaming forums etc, but if <30fps is good enough for StarWars, Matrix, X2, and LOTR on the big screen, it's got to be good enough for a few fish that are swimming around in the other room. I mean how many of us stare at MA for extended periods evaluatiing their smoothness, and even if you do, that fan has got to be more distracting than an imperceptable jerkiness!

Well, I can see the difference between 30 and 60fps. Most people can.

24fps (used in film) has a certain look, and you'll notice that there's a limit to how fast the camera can pan from left to right before it looks "juddery" and awful. At 24fps, things look filmlike. At 60fps or 80fps, they look real.

The fan sound is annoying.

The heat isn't good for the battery and slightly increases the rate of decay for solid state components.

Having the frame rate unlimited is mostly for "how fast can this machine really go." We may need to consider having limit frame rate set to true and the fps set to 60 by default in future releases in order to reduce tech support calls on the issue.

Do you know how fast the refresh rate is on an Apple powerbook? I know that there is not a traditional scan pattern but there is an upper limit on the speed of the screen to react to changes isn't there? If that speed is 45fps then setting MA for 60 wouldn't make sense would it? What is the refresh rate for an Apple LCD screen?

That I don't know. The Display's System Preference doesn't show a refresh rate for my PowerBook display, nor for my Cinema display.

I found this on the Apple site!

Sometimes the documentation for the display device will state its internal refresh rate. If not, you can try different refresh rates to see which one results in the best animation quality. Most LCD displays have an internal refresh rate of 60 Hz.