Is SereneScreen at an End?

[kaseki]

Jim:

It occurred to me this morning to look more closely at the imagery when operating MA 3.3 full screen. Grabbing some +2 D. (relative) glasses and a magnifying glass with a high power portion molded in, I studied the edges of scenery elements. I did NOT see any pixelation greater than one pixel on my monitor. (For example, diagonals are single pixel staircases, not 2 x 2 pixel staircases.) While I think it is safe to say that the construction of sea fans, coral, and such is not fractal as they might be in nature, I didn't see what I anticipated, 2 x 2 pixelation. In other words, it doesn't look like the moray could to gum me to death with pixelated jaws. (I did, however, notice that scorpion fish fins seem to be zero thickness.)

I wonder whether the process of MA to [Wine-translated] DX11 to OpenGL rendering is allowing some interpolation to take place that you didn't expect when constructing the original, thereby potentially making 4K rendering sharper than might be predicted.

Presently, rendering is via a Phenom II 965 (four threads) and GeForce 9800 GT. It will be interesting to see what happens with a Ryzen 7 (sixteen threads) and GeForce 1080 Ti. Maximum fish, anyone?

[Jim Sachs]

The polygons will always draw in whatever resolution your screen is set to. They have no inherent resolution of their own. It's the textures on those polygons that will suffer in higher res. However you are right that any modern graphics card should be able to interpolate and blur between pixels. We are so used to motion covering up the sometimes horrendous blockyness and artifacting of MPEG video, that we've learned to forgive a lot.

All in all, the Aquarium is still acceptable at higher res, but could definitely use some updating.

[kaseki]

Thanks. I'll update this topic further, as well as the Linux thread, when I have something new to report. In the meantime, be well.

kas

[uczmeg]

Switched from a dual monitor setup back to a single monitor and needed something to show off my new display. So it seemed a fine time to dust off my copy of MA.

Now running it with 30 fish on my 34" ultra wide monitor (3440 x 1440) and it looks glorious!



Glad to hear we may get future updates and happy to pay again for the hard work. Not sure how long ago I bought my first version, but it's over 10 years ago. (my email history isn't available before then).

Keep up the good work Jim.

[flip]

I think I must be the same. I had to buy a disk from New Zealand and get it posted to Australia.

I am also prepared to pay for any updates.

Keith

[kaseki]

I have in hand a paper copy of an email notice to existing customers dated 18 March 2003 providing a keycode for MA 2. My earliest executable is Aquarium99F.exe dated Sat 20 Jan 2001. Sixteen years!

kas

[fly911]

Jim, I'm looking to buy a new monitor or TV for my 24/7 display. Would the new 4K TVs improve the detail? (Not that it's bad now).
Thanks,
Mike

Originally posted by Jim Sachs:

The polygons will always draw in whatever resolution your screen is set to. They have no inherent resolution of their own. It's the textures on those polygons that will suffer in higher res. However you are right that any modern graphics card should be able to interpolate and blur between pixels. We are so used to motion covering up the sometimes horrendous blockyness and artifacting of MPEG video, that we've learned to forgive a lot.

All in all, the Aquarium is still acceptable at higher res, but could definitely use some updating.  

[Jim Sachs]

I've never actually seen MA on a 4k screen, but others have reported that it looks good. The polygon edges would be smoother, but you might need a microscope to see the difference . The textures might suffer a bit.

By the way, my browser (Edge) seems to be having trouble with the Forum. Every time I try to answer a post, the Forum crashes (at least for me) and I can't get it to come back for several hours.

[feldon34]

This forum software is really old and I'm not surprised it does not work on Edge. I don't suppose Chrome is a possibility?

As for 4K, the Aquarium doesn't care what resolution the texture files are as long as everything lines up. It would be pretty easy to jump from 128x64 to 256x128 and from 128x128 to 256x256 and see an improvement. The hard part is the coral. I wonder if Jim has higher resolution photos of all the coral. If so, it wouldn't be tough to do a 4K version.

[fly911]

I hooked up my computer to my Samsung 65 inch curved 4K UDH TV and ran MA 3 on my Windows 7 laptop. It looked very good. One note is that all 4k TVs are not created equal. This Samsung TV claims (and reviews seem to support) that besides making 4K produced material look great, it also has the technology built in to bring HDTV almost up to Ultra HD quality. I agree as I have another 4K TV in the bedroom and it is obvious that it is lacking in this regard.

[Jim Sachs]

Yep, it looks pretty good.

[kaseki]

My HTPC assembly is complete and operates successfully under Linux Mint 18.1 (with the latest nVidia driver and kernel 4.10.0-20). Stress testing using default processor, memory, and video card clock speeds shows no problems so far. Overclocking will be a future exercise.

Installation of Crossover Linux and thence MA 3.3 and Direct Sound was successful. Video card (Asus GeForce GTX 1080 Ti) is barely warm running MA at 1920 x 1200 @ 60 Hz and does not turn on its fans. It has to be uncomfortably hot (~55C) before the fans turn on in my short experience. The maximum fish count is being used, with bubbles.

I notice that the maximum resolution shown in the Display Settings menu is 1920 x 1200, but for 4K operation without the TV performing the interpolation MA would need to add the standard (I think) resolution of 3840 x 2160. Fly911's results may demonstrate his TV's quality of interpolation. I am testing too far from my LG OLED TV for an HDMI cable, so there will be some delay before I can report 4K results.

[Jim Sachs]

MA does not have any built-in resolutions. It just asks the video card what resolutions are available, lists them, and lets the user choose. if the card responded to the query with 3840x2160 being available, then MA could use it.

[kaseki]

Thanks for that important information. It explains my observation and bodes well for future success with 4K.

[Captain T]

You promised a freshwater screensaver. Are you still doing it? Just asking.

[Captain T]

Are you still doing a freshwater screensaver Jim? Creature packs? Just asking.

[Jim Sachs]

Probably not on the Freshwater. Probably so on the creature packs.

[snorkler]

creature packs???
Sign me up, where do I send the check!

[Captain T]

Thanks Jim.

[Captain T]

I can't wait to see your next update.