CalcNormals, FrameRates, and PerformanceDrop

cjmaddy · 07-01-2002, 08:37 AM

Sorry, but it's me going on about CalcNormals again !,

I have made a number of references to this in the 'Start Predefined Aquarium?' thread, but not wanting to keep wandering off topic, is it in order to start a new thread ?
If there is no response, this will soon disappear into oblivion, and no one will get bored with my rantings !

Morgan, Feel free to scrap this thread, or put it's contents where you feel they belong .... ( The trash can ?)

Well it may be me. But I find it astonishing that there are some who see no difference at all, when toggling N, even when staring closely. To not like the effect, I could understand, - there are occasions when the lighting effect makes the fins appear to flick, - but to see no difference at all suggests to me an equipment or setting fault, or a visit to the opticians is overdue ! .... ( Just joking, my son is an optician, I'm touting for business ! )
I am only using a 17 in. monitor, and the widescreen version of the program, which means the fish images are quite small. But with most fish - ( the Percula Clown is one of the exceptions ) - I can determine what the setting is without knowing beforehand. There must be someone else out there who can see this. So come on, speak up, let me know I'm not going mad - ( my wife thinks I am ! ... she says I'm becoming a computer geek in my old age. )

There has been much reference to framerates and performance drop, since I started to read the posts on this forum. But most of the time I believe the only thing to have dropped is just the actual number of fps - ( shown when the 'S' key is pressed ) - not a visible drop in the quality of the picture before us. I don't believe there is much visible difference in performance detectable, untill the change in fps becomes great, (ie. falls quite low ) - whilst the visible difference by switching CalcNormals ON is there for all to see ! (if you look carefully) and the drop in fps caused thereby is negligible, making no visible difference. So why not have CalcNormals ON ?

Jim or Morgan, - If I have got this all wrong about fps, can you tell us what to expect at different framerates ? What have we to look for ? What are the visible differences, - beyond say 35 fps ? How do we achieve 100 or more fps, and more to the point do we need to ? What is the optimum ?
I know this subject has been covered before, but it would be nice to have a concise, definitive and authoritative view ! - in the past there has been so much confusion and contradiction.

Some weeks back there were comments about the lack of light play from the water movement, on the fish, compared to that on the gravel base and coral. I see this CalcNormals ON effect as a very small step in that direction. Though more noticeable on some fish than others !

67

feldon34 · 07-01-2002, 10:55 AM

Your eyes stop seeing the difference in smoothness beyond about 80fps.

If your monitor and video card can handle it, you can crank up the refresh rate in DirectX so that, theoretically, you could get 70, 80, or more fps (provided the video card can generate enough frames and your monitor won't melt down).

I'd say the Calculate Normals has different impacts depending on which video card you possess.

cjmaddy · 07-01-2002, 06:30 PM

Morgan,
Surely we are at cross purposes here, - unless I'm mistaken.
Isn't your answer confusing monitor refresh rates with aquarium frame rates ?
Or is my stupidity showing ? ............. I am confused.

67

feldon34 · 07-01-2002, 06:55 PM

On Windows 2000 and XP, you have to force the monitor rate up before you can get any benefit of higher aquarium frame rates which your video card might be capable of.

If you're using Windows 95/98/ME, ignore my comments.

flipper · 07-01-2002, 07:46 PM

i agree w/feldon re: poly normal calcs and fps. the higher the fps, the smaller the delta (movement in 3dspace) between frames, so the eye's perception of the movement "smooths out" like he says.

cjmaddy, i had an old ssytem w/an old video card and a slow cpu not too long ago. i never got more than 25 fps and the aquarium looked great! i couldnt explain after i upgraded whether it was the fps, the OS, the new card's capabilities, the new version of DX, or what, but what feldon says explains it all now

Socrates · 07-02-2002, 12:42 AM

My head hurts now

cjmaddy · 07-02-2002, 08:49 AM

OK! - The nitty-gritty.

98SE/GeForce2 MX200 64MB AGP drv 2311 AA auto V-sink off/17in SONY G200 75Hz/AMD K6-2 500/448MB RAM/

With v1.1Wide, fps = 39/40 CalcNormals OFF, 37/38 CalcNormals ON. (1280x720x16) .... The picture is superb !

Bottom line ! ...... If I get that fps nearer to 80, can the actual picture I see be improved ?
If so, by upgrading what ? ....... (Please don't say everything !)

Thanks everyone for the input. Sorry about your head, Socrates, my brain cell count dropped to 1, years ago !

67

Mountainmaster · 07-02-2002, 09:51 AM

cjmaddy,

Your graphics card should be able to do a lot better. My GeForce256 32MB SDR = GeForce 1 (out of production) is doing 85 fps at that resolution with CalcNormals off. I think the CPU is the bottleneck in your setup. That means you would have to upgrade to a motherboard that supports a better CPU.

feldon34 · 07-02-2002, 10:03 AM

Well, the MX 200 is very limiting. I got rid of mine and went to a MX 400 because it choked on Castle Wolfenstein at 1024x768. $5 difference gave me another 25fps in the Aquarium and made Wolfenstein playable.

cjmaddy · 07-03-2002, 08:34 AM

The motherboard/CPU change is not an option at this time. I fitted the current ones myself, so that isn't the problem. I just don't need that degree of upgrade for the type of computing I do. But I think I will consider changing to a MX 400, (another 25fps in the Aquarium sounds attractive), I've just checked the prices at Dabs, they do a generic GeForce2 MX400 64MB AGP RP for £33 + vat, (but are out of stock at the moment) so I will look around for a few days.

I'd still like to hear that there's someone else out there that can see and appreciate the CalcNormals ON improvement!

Thanks for the comments, always nice to hear another view on these matters.

Tiny Turtle · 07-03-2002, 09:00 AM

I'd like to second Morgan's opinion here. You can keep the CPU/mobo, as the video card is definately the limiting factor. MM's GeForce256 should be able to outperform your MX200 regardless of CPU but we'd have to get a couple of cards/chips "up" on the tree for your processor to start hampering the performance.

/Calle

Mountainmaster · 07-03-2002, 10:09 AM

Tiny Turtle,

MM's GeForce256 should be able to outperform your MX200 regardless of CPU

Oops, you are right. I was sure I bought the ultimate low end GeForce at the time, but it seems with the MX200 NVidia managed to come up with one that was even more low end since then.

feldon34 · 07-03-2002, 01:25 PM

Ouch. It's amazing that difference between
GeForce 2 MX200 and
GeForce 2 MX400

One letter/number difference means the difference between a card that came out 3 years ago and a card that came out 1 year ago, speedwise.

I'm also glad I didn't drop the $150 on Fishy's GeForce 2 GTS. My $55 GeForce 2 MX 400 does just fine.

Tiny Turtle · 07-03-2002, 03:50 PM

Sorry 67, guess we're kinda OffTopic here, but please humour us for just a little while longer...

MM, where did you pick that chart up? It's nice, but I've seen other benchmarks where the 4600 blows the 8500 out of the water. Then again, there are other forums, devoted to nothing but such things... (Can't help feeling a curious about how a GF4 Ti4200 would place itself on that chart.)

/Tiny OffTopic

flipper · 07-03-2002, 04:37 PM

T/OT, that's http://www.madonion.com/ 's 3DMark2001 (or SE) online benchmark comparison. It's a cool benchmark. Run it then compare your score against systems with equivalent configurations but different graphics cards.

cjmaddy · 07-03-2002, 04:55 PM

{EDIT:}TT, No no no, .... worry not! - your drift is still about or linked to frame rates and performance ! Let's find out where it came from, all this is helping me decide on an improved video card.

67

cjmaddy · 07-13-2002, 03:56 PM

MX 400 fitted ! ... very nice, but no big changes, - (it was, after all, very very good before!) - I get about 10 more fps in the Aquarium.
I can't help repeating what I have said before .... A change in fps is just that ! - NOT, necessarily, a noticeable change in picture quality .... and I still think a good monitor can make a hell of a difference !

67

Jim Sachs · 07-14-2002, 08:59 AM

CalcNormals is one one the few items in the Aquarium that links performance with CPU speed. Nearly everything else is handled by the graphics card, but the per-frame calculation of vertex normals is done by the CPU.

On very fast machines, turning this feature on or off makes little difference, but on my P2 233 it cuts the frame rate in half.

In this game, it's all about eliminating customer-service email. Virtually no one writes to complain about the lack of CalcNormals, but low frame-rate generates a lot of complaints. Having CalcNormals default to OFF was the simplest solution.

cjmaddy · 07-14-2002, 01:05 PM

Thanks Jim, Point taken !

67

cjmaddy · 11-24-2005, 01:27 PM

Thought it might be nice to revisit this thread again after all these years.

- I've recently made yet another change to my video card, more on impulse than for any other reason, it's now a Gainward GeForce FX5700LE 256MB. The timing of this change coincided with the recent testing of the aquariums. And therefore I've done a fair amount of staring at my two screens!
I wasn't expecting, nor did I see, much difference at first, until I finally got the new card set up with the 'Detect Optimal Frequencies' on the nVidia manual overclocking settings. - Then things almost started to jump off the screen at me!

- (Ok, slight exaggeration!)

I consider that I have moved on some since this thread was started, (with regard to both video cards, and CPUs), and the image quality I now get is reaching that point where diminishing returns really starts to bite. But I still find that even with higher fps, and the improvements that all my various changes have made, the difference that calc normals makes seems to be even more obvious.

A more surprising conclusion that I have now arrived at, is that whilst my Sony 17" Flatscreen CRT is very very good! - My ViewSonic VP171s LCD flat panel, - is even better! - I have the ViewSonic carefully setup to balance with the picture on the Sony, and on axis, they are indistinguishable except that the ViewSonic is sharper. *** After using the ViewSonic flat panel for over a year, I would now say that the only advantage with CRTs is the wider viewing angle, and they are cheaper! - Usually.

Bottom line! ....
I can only describe the overall effect on the fish in the aquarium, as tangible! - and calc normals 'On', is still IMO, an absolute must!
With the higher spec of current computers, compared to a few years ago, what earthly reason is there now to not use it ?

... I will now get down off my soapbox!

*** (The 1280 x 1024 LCD does of course require an anamorphic factor of 0.9300 in place of 1.000 to correct for stretching).

07-01-2002, 08:37 AM	#1
cjmaddy Registered Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Lancashire, UK Posts: 7,854	CalcNormals, FrameRates, and PerformanceDrop Sorry, but it's me going on about CalcNormals again !, I have made a number of references to this in the 'Start Predefined Aquarium?' thread, but not wanting to keep wandering off topic, is it in order to start a new thread ? If there is no response, this will soon disappear into oblivion, and no one will get bored with my rantings ! Morgan, Feel free to scrap this thread, or put it's contents where you feel they belong .... ( The trash can ?) Well it may be me. But I find it astonishing that there are some who see no difference at all, when toggling N, even when staring closely. To not like the effect, I could understand, - there are occasions when the lighting effect makes the fins appear to flick, - but to see no difference at all suggests to me an equipment or setting fault, or a visit to the opticians is overdue ! .... ( Just joking, my son is an optician, I'm touting for business ! ) I am only using a 17 in. monitor, and the widescreen version of the program, which means the fish images are quite small. But with most fish - ( the Percula Clown is one of the exceptions ) - I can determine what the setting is without knowing beforehand. There must be someone else out there who can see this. So come on, speak up, let me know I'm not going mad - ( my wife thinks I am ! ... she says I'm becoming a computer geek in my old age. ) There has been much reference to framerates and performance drop, since I started to read the posts on this forum. But most of the time I believe the only thing to have dropped is just the actual number of fps - ( shown when the 'S' key is pressed ) - not a visible drop in the quality of the picture before us. I don't believe there is much visible difference in performance detectable, untill the change in fps becomes great, (ie. falls quite low ) - whilst the visible difference by switching CalcNormals ON is there for all to see ! (if you look carefully) and the drop in fps caused thereby is negligible, making no visible difference. So why not have CalcNormals ON ? Jim or Morgan, - If I have got this all wrong about fps, can you tell us what to expect at different framerates ? What have we to look for ? What are the visible differences, - beyond say 35 fps ? How do we achieve 100 or more fps, and more to the point do we need to ? What is the optimum ? I know this subject has been covered before, but it would be nice to have a concise, definitive and authoritative view ! - in the past there has been so much confusion and contradiction. Some weeks back there were comments about the lack of light play from the water movement, on the fish, compared to that on the gravel base and coral. I see this CalcNormals ON effect as a very small step in that direction. Though more noticeable on some fish than others ! 67

07-01-2002, 10:55 AM	#2
feldon34 Forum Administrator Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: Rock Hill, SC Posts: 10,938	Your eyes stop seeing the difference in smoothness beyond about 80fps. If your monitor and video card can handle it, you can crank up the refresh rate in DirectX so that, theoretically, you could get 70, 80, or more fps (provided the video card can generate enough frames and your monitor won't melt down). I'd say the Calculate Normals has different impacts depending on which video card you possess. "Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed. Everything else is public relations." - George Orwell "If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." - Emma Goldman

07-01-2002, 06:30 PM	#3
cjmaddy Registered Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Lancashire, UK Posts: 7,854	CalcNormals, FrameRates, and PerformanceDrop Morgan, Surely we are at cross purposes here, - unless I'm mistaken. Isn't your answer confusing monitor refresh rates with aquarium frame rates ? Or is my stupidity showing ? ............. I am confused. 67

07-01-2002, 06:55 PM	#4
feldon34 Forum Administrator Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: Rock Hill, SC Posts: 10,938	On Windows 2000 and XP, you have to force the monitor rate up before you can get any benefit of higher aquarium frame rates which your video card might be capable of. If you're using Windows 95/98/ME, ignore my comments. "Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed. Everything else is public relations." - George Orwell "If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." - Emma Goldman

07-02-2002, 12:42 AM	#6
Socrates Sage Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: West Hills, CA Posts: 1,529	My head hurts now Bat rays? We don't need no stinking bat rays!

07-01-2002, 07:46 PM	#5
flipper Registered Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Texas Posts: 60	i agree w/feldon re: poly normal calcs and fps. the higher the fps, the smaller the delta (movement in 3dspace) between frames, so the eye's perception of the movement "smooths out" like he says. cjmaddy, i had an old ssytem w/an old video card and a slow cpu not too long ago. i never got more than 25 fps and the aquarium looked great! i couldnt explain after i upgraded whether it was the fps, the OS, the new card's capabilities, the new version of DX, or what, but what feldon says explains it all now

07-02-2002, 08:49 AM	#7
cjmaddy Registered Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Lancashire, UK Posts: 7,854	OK! - The nitty-gritty. 98SE/GeForce2 MX200 64MB AGP drv 2311 AA auto V-sink off/17in SONY G200 75Hz/AMD K6-2 500/448MB RAM/ With v1.1Wide, fps = 39/40 CalcNormals OFF, 37/38 CalcNormals ON. (1280x720x16) .... The picture is superb ! Bottom line ! ...... If I get that fps nearer to 80, can the actual picture I see be improved ? If so, by upgrading what ? ....... (Please don't say everything !) Thanks everyone for the input. Sorry about your head, Socrates, my brain cell count dropped to 1, years ago ! 67

07-02-2002, 09:51 AM	#8
Mountainmaster Liopleurodon Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: 3rd planet Posts: 314	cjmaddy, Your graphics card should be able to do a lot better. My GeForce256 32MB SDR = GeForce 1 (out of production) is doing 85 fps at that resolution with CalcNormals off. I think the CPU is the bottleneck in your setup. That means you would have to upgrade to a motherboard that supports a better CPU.

07-02-2002, 10:03 AM	#9
feldon34 Forum Administrator Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: Rock Hill, SC Posts: 10,938	Well, the MX 200 is very limiting. I got rid of mine and went to a MX 400 because it choked on Castle Wolfenstein at 1024x768. $5 difference gave me another 25fps in the Aquarium and made Wolfenstein playable. "Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed. Everything else is public relations." - George Orwell "If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." - Emma Goldman

07-03-2002, 08:34 AM	#10
cjmaddy Registered Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Lancashire, UK Posts: 7,854	The motherboard/CPU change is not an option at this time. I fitted the current ones myself, so that isn't the problem. I just don't need that degree of upgrade for the type of computing I do. But I think I will consider changing to a MX 400, (another 25fps in the Aquarium sounds attractive), I've just checked the prices at Dabs, they do a generic GeForce2 MX400 64MB AGP RP for £33 + vat, (but are out of stock at the moment) so I will look around for a few days. I'd still like to hear that there's someone else out there that can see and appreciate the CalcNormals ON improvement! Thanks for the comments, always nice to hear another view on these matters.

07-03-2002, 09:00 AM	#11
Tiny Turtle is pleased Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: Stockholm, Sweden Posts: 7,365	I'd like to second Morgan's opinion here. You can keep the CPU/mobo, as the video card is definately the limiting factor. MM's GeForce256 should be able to outperform your MX200 regardless of CPU but we'd have to get a couple of cards/chips "up" on the tree for your processor to start hampering the performance. /Calle Thanks to Morgan, Tiny Snapshots is up and running again with "Tiny Järvafält" as the latest addition – Go have a look and tell me what you think. "We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried, most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and to impress him takes on his multi-armed form and says, 'Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.' I suppose we all thought that, one way or another." /Robert Oppenheimer on witnessing the first thermonuclear detonation in history.

07-03-2002, 01:25 PM	#13
feldon34 Forum Administrator Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: Rock Hill, SC Posts: 10,938	Ouch. It's amazing that difference between GeForce 2 MX200 and GeForce 2 MX400 One letter/number difference means the difference between a card that came out 3 years ago and a card that came out 1 year ago, speedwise. I'm also glad I didn't drop the $150 on Fishy's GeForce 2 GTS. My $55 GeForce 2 MX 400 does just fine. "Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed. Everything else is public relations." - George Orwell "If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." - Emma Goldman Last edited by feldon34; 07-03-2002 at 01:28 PM.

07-03-2002, 03:50 PM	#14
Tiny Turtle is pleased Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: Stockholm, Sweden Posts: 7,365	Sorry 67, guess we're kinda OffTopic here, but please humour us for just a little while longer... MM, where did you pick that chart up? It's nice, but I've seen other benchmarks where the 4600 blows the 8500 out of the water. Then again, there are other forums, devoted to nothing but such things... (Can't help feeling a curious about how a GF4 Ti4200 would place itself on that chart.) /Tiny OffTopic Thanks to Morgan, Tiny Snapshots is up and running again with "Tiny Järvafält" as the latest addition – Go have a look and tell me what you think. "We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried, most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and to impress him takes on his multi-armed form and says, 'Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.' I suppose we all thought that, one way or another." /Robert Oppenheimer on witnessing the first thermonuclear detonation in history.

07-03-2002, 04:37 PM	#15
flipper Registered Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Texas Posts: 60	T/OT, that's http://www.madonion.com/ 's 3DMark2001 (or SE) online benchmark comparison. It's a cool benchmark. Run it then compare your score against systems with equivalent configurations but different graphics cards.

07-03-2002, 04:55 PM	#16
cjmaddy Registered Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Lancashire, UK Posts: 7,854	{EDIT:}TT, No no no, .... worry not! - your drift is still about or linked to frame rates and performance ! Let's find out where it came from, all this is helping me decide on an improved video card. 67 Last edited by feldon34; 07-05-2002 at 08:09 PM.

07-13-2002, 03:56 PM	#17
cjmaddy Registered Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Lancashire, UK Posts: 7,854	MX 400 fitted ! ... very nice, but no big changes, - (it was, after all, very very good before!) - I get about 10 more fps in the Aquarium. I can't help repeating what I have said before .... A change in fps is just that ! - NOT, necessarily, a noticeable change in picture quality .... and I still think a good monitor can make a hell of a difference ! 67 Last edited by cjmaddy; 07-13-2002 at 04:06 PM.

07-14-2002, 08:59 AM	#18
Jim Sachs Developer Join Date: Dec 2000 Location: Southern Oregon Posts: 9,771	CalcNormals is one one the few items in the Aquarium that links performance with CPU speed. Nearly everything else is handled by the graphics card, but the per-frame calculation of vertex normals is done by the CPU. On very fast machines, turning this feature on or off makes little difference, but on my P2 233 it cuts the frame rate in half. In this game, it's all about eliminating customer-service email. Virtually no one writes to complain about the lack of CalcNormals, but low frame-rate generates a lot of complaints. Having CalcNormals default to OFF was the simplest solution. Jim Sachs Creator of SereneScreen Aquarium

07-14-2002, 01:05 PM	#19
cjmaddy Registered Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Lancashire, UK Posts: 7,854	Thanks Jim, Point taken ! 67

11-24-2005, 01:27 PM	#20
cjmaddy Registered Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Lancashire, UK Posts: 7,854	Thought it might be nice to revisit this thread again after all these years. - I've recently made yet another change to my video card, more on impulse than for any other reason, it's now a Gainward GeForce FX5700LE 256MB. The timing of this change coincided with the recent testing of the aquariums. And therefore I've done a fair amount of staring at my two screens! I wasn't expecting, nor did I see, much difference at first, until I finally got the new card set up with the 'Detect Optimal Frequencies' on the nVidia manual overclocking settings. - Then things almost started to jump off the screen at me! - (Ok, slight exaggeration!) I consider that I have moved on some since this thread was started, (with regard to both video cards, and CPUs), and the image quality I now get is reaching that point where diminishing returns really starts to bite. But I still find that even with higher fps, and the improvements that all my various changes have made, the difference that calc normals makes seems to be even more obvious. A more surprising conclusion that I have now arrived at, is that whilst my Sony 17" Flatscreen CRT is very very good! - My ViewSonic VP171s LCD flat panel, - is even better! - I have the ViewSonic carefully setup to balance with the picture on the Sony, and on axis, they are indistinguishable except that the ViewSonic is sharper. *** After using the ViewSonic flat panel for over a year, I would now say that the only advantage with CRTs is the wider viewing angle, and they are cheaper! - Usually. Bottom line! .... I can only describe the overall effect on the fish in the aquarium, as tangible! - and calc normals 'On', is still IMO, an absolute must! With the higher spec of current computers, compared to a few years ago, what earthly reason is there now to not use it ? ... I will now get down off my soapbox! *** (The 1280 x 1024 LCD does of course require an anamorphic factor of 0.9300 in place of 1.000 to correct for stretching).