graphics bugs with ATI 4800 series (4850/4870/4890)

[Shadow NX 1]

Judging by the amount of pages this thread has i would love to hear a statement from BIS regarding this.

Who is to blame here, BIS or ATI?

I have a 4870 512MB myself and in some missions especialyl the SP mission "Counterattack" its extremely bad.

My settings are mostly on normal, blur and bloom off, 100% fillrate only nothing too amazing.

Yet in this mission after few mins of playing i get constant blurry textures, lods pop up everywhere and soon i get flickering shadows and soon after polygon spikes that flicker wild around.

If i ALT+TAB it is gone for a while, using -flush command also helps for a few mins.

Using 9.7 drivers from ATI and patch 1.3 from BIS.

Since 1.3 things worsened even, performance seems still bad but now i often have invisible units so i only see heads or weapons walk around for minutes till they pop up part by part.

Fur Mark Stresstest shows no problems with the card.

System:

WinXP SP2

4GB Ram

AMD Phenom X4 9850

ATI HD4870 512MB

Lots of free HD space freshly defragmented.

Most other missiosn work well and missiosn on UTES all work super smooth.

I dunno but i really get the feeling that some buildings create all those problems, either that or soem of the modules.

Wish we were able to unpack the mission to see if it runs better if we remove things.

[Radnik 18]

i'have just tested demo with MSI ATI R4870 1GB (9.7 cat, Win7 64 bit) and noticed smooth gameplay with Video memory set to Very High :confused: , no LOD switching or texture bugs whatsoever.

Now i can use AA on normal and Fillrate set to 125% with good frame rate (35FPS min.), and it performed much better on Win 7 with same h/w rather then on Win XP!.

With ATI Try Tool set 'Texture Quality' and 'MipMap Details' to Perfmanace, with 'Texture Quality' in game set to High it gives quality look.

keep it up BIS and MSI :)

Edited August 7, 2009 by Radnik

[InFireBaptize 0]

Judging by the amount of pages this thread has i would love to hear a statement from BIS regarding this.

Who is to blame here, BIS or ATI?

I have a 4870 512MB myself and in some missions especialyl the SP mission "Counterattack" its extremely bad.

My settings are mostly on normal, blur and bloom off, 100% fillrate only nothing too amazing.

Yet in this mission after few mins of playing i get constant blurry textures, lods pop up everywhere and soon i get flickering shadows and soon after polygon spikes that flicker wild around.

If i ALT+TAB it is gone for a while, using -flush command also helps for a few mins.

Using 9.7 drivers from ATI and patch 1.3 from BIS.

Since 1.3 things worsened even, performance seems still bad but now i often have invisible units so i only see heads or weapons walk around for minutes till they pop up part by part.

Fur Mark Stresstest shows no problems with the card.

System:

WinXP SP2

4GB Ram

AMD Phenom X4 9850

ATI HD4870 512MB

Lots of free HD space freshly defragmented.

Most other missiosn work well and missiosn on UTES all work super smooth.

I dunno but i really get the feeling that some buildings create all those problems, either that or soem of the modules.

Wish we were able to unpack the mission to see if it runs better if we remove things.

i would try win 7

[ShaiCZ 10]

Since 1.3 things worsened even, performance seems still bad but now i often have invisible units so i only see heads or weapons walk around for minutes till they pop up part by part.

Exactly what happens to me after installing 1.03. Before that, I had been receiving all the "usual" graphical bugs (slow-loading textures, silver heads, flickering etc.).

With 1.03, "invisibility" appeared + "flattening" of weapons, i.e. at some moments, rifles in the hands of my squad members loose "plasticity" (3D) and become totally "flat", visible only from an angle (2D).

I have a freshly defragmented disk.

WinXP

3GB Ram

ATI 4850 1GB VaporX (newest drivers)

I am afraid going to Win7 is not a solution. There MUST be something to help WinXP users!?

[HellfireDeLuxe 10]

Hi people,

I have tried to fast read through the 43 pages, picked up the main concern and tried to sort out the details .

My (humble) system :

- E6400 @ 2,4GHz stable

- ATI 3850 AGP 512 mb ddr-3

- RAM 2 GB DDR-2 533

- ASRock 4CoreDual VSTA

- Win XP SP3

Besides the fact, that I have to put most settings on low (AA disabled , anisotropic disabled , post effect disabled) , I usually have FPS > 25 , which makes the game playable. The flickering bug really made it unplayable.

I could get rid of the flickering for let's say 95% of the time. I guess that the 5% are really induced by my systems low specs (ram and ddr-3 vram constraint i would say).

I will post the details of how i came to this conclusion later but now at work I only post the workaround which really improved my (and hope that it might improve others) experience.

In brief:

- Check ur nonlocalvram in arma2.cfg

- if you divide the figure by 1024^2 you get it in Megabytes.

- If it's 1024 or 2048 , check ur memory size setting in the video options , put it to default . If you still experience flickering read further , may be you will understand something new and might find a trick that works for you.

- If the value is <1024 , put 2048*(1024^2) = 2147483648 instead

- go into arma video settings , chose default memory size , if that was not the case already.

- shutdown arma again .

- check ur cfg file again , arma probably set the value back to the a lesser amount , put it back to 2147483648 .

- put the read-only flag on the cfg file, in order to avoid that arma2 sets back the value.

- start arma , dont go into the vid settings (I explain why below) , go to your 'favorite' flickering artefact bug mission and try. Hope u get rid of it like I did.

A few explainations:

- I had not time to test if it makes a difference to put the nonlocalvram to 512 , 1024 or 2048 or even more .

- from 512 on , I guess that it improves.

- I could assume 2048 is the higher limit.

- I think that high and very high limit the use to 256 , 512 MB and that default uses the figure in the cfg file. may be very high (512) is a max anyway , back to point one -> "I had not time to test...."

- I don't know, but I guess this is also limited by the available system RAM .

- I wished I had 4GB (so the nonlocalvram really has 2GB for it's usage) of system ram to try out and hope to get rid of the remaing 5% of flickering occuring now and then but not really blocking the game as it eventually autoresolves now.

- I have not tested yet, if the read only flag is set on the cfg file, it makes a change if u go into the video options or not before or during playing. In doubt i recommend to not go there and straight go to play . If u want to change a parameter , put the flag back to writable, change the param in arma , leave arma, put back nonlocalvram to 2147483648 in the cfg file and set the file back to r/o again. I will test this ASAP.

-for AGP users like myself , if you don't have high , very high and default in your video memory settings within arma2, you have to set the AGP aperture size to at least 256mb in your BIOS (the max on my system , although Thrott seems to have 512). Then high , very high and default will be available in the video settings of arma , otherwise this workaround can't work.

- There was also something with Catalyst A.I enabled/disabled , I will check at home, but this is not the heart of the solution for me.

-And 2 things for Thrott : you wrote about GART version , is it updatable within the BIOS or independently of the BIOS (wonder how this would work) or is it part of the ATI card drivers and so through the AGP hotfixes ?

The other thing is that OC'ing the card in catalyst did worsen the overall performance for me, so I run stock clocks on my 3850. Just facts , no theory for me behind it (although overheating might be an issue or that the memory bus (as we are speaking about vram issues) is overwhelmed .... no dont hit me , please :D )

Hope you can decode what I wrote and that someone will have an overall improvment of this otherwise fantastic game.

A last question to BI developers (although as a developer myself I usually am and do not feel responsible for first-level support ) : How is the nonlocalvram used in arma2, how is it detected , on AGP? on PCIe? Is it possible to have a little explaination about this parameter or a link to another thread which explains the details ? thanks in advance , and keep on the otherwise great work.

HellfireDeluxe

Edit 1: I see that this has been already suggested by Daniel M but only applying to localvram , a param I didn't play around with ( i play with nonlocalvram) as it states 512MB and that seemed right to me. But the read-only , or/and not going to vid settings things could really make the difference because arma has to use the figures out of the cfg files and not the ones it detects.

Edit 2: I have done this with patch 1.02 , I was not able to test with 1.03 by now.

Edited August 7, 2009 by HellfireDeLuxe

[Viral.BadKarma 10]

I think the redistributable only overwrties the files it came with whereas the M$ site checks and doesn't make any changes, this is so game manufacturers can assure that you have the correct DX files installed. DX games are programmed to use a certain version of the DX release I believe so installing a later version will not make the game use any later files as it will have pointers to the 'February DX9 Redist (or whatever) rather than the 'July DX9 Redist' etc.

The game engine has an issue with the way it is addressing memory, it is a problem when it fills and does not clear the used space and tries to overwrite frames which causes corruption. Due to the way memory is addressed and only seems to appear on 'some' systems it would seem that it is a tricky little bugger to rectify thus BI have not entertained a fix or discussed what they could be doing. I think we are all going to have to live with it, those who are unable to work around, buy new cards etc. should look at returning the game if they are able or seeking a refund directly with BI (which they would ignore).

That's my say.

Well said

[thr0tt 12]

-for AGP users like myself , if you don't have high , very high and default in your video memory settings within arma2, you have to set the AGP aperture size to at least 256mb in your BIOS (the max on my system , although Thrott seems to have 512). Then high , very high and default will be available in the video settings of arma , otherwise this workaround can't work.

- There was also something with Catalyst A.I enabled/disabled , I will check at home, but this is not the heart of the solution for me.

-And 2 things for Thrott : you wrote about GART version , is it updatable within the BIOS or independently of the BIOS (wonder how this would work) or is it part of the ATI card drivers and so through the AGP hotfixes ?

The other thing is that OC'ing the card in catalyst did worsen the overall performance for me, so I run stock clocks on my 3850. Just facts , no theory for me behind it (although overheating might be an issue or that the memory bus (as we are speaking about vram issues) is overwhelmed .... no dont hit me , please :D )

Hope you can decode what I wrote and that someone will have an overall improvment of this otherwise fantastic game.

A last question to BI developers (although as a developer myself I usually am and do not feel responsible for first-level support ) : How is the nonlocalvram used in arma2, how is it detected , on AGP? on PCIe? Is it possible to have a little explaination about this parameter or a link to another thread which explains the details ? thanks in advance , and keep on the otherwise great work.

HellfireDeluxe

Hi HellfireDeluxe,

Ok, the AGP aperture settings in the BIOS for us measly AGP users directly relates to the Nonlocalvram in the arma2.cfg and also appears to effect when the corruption occurs. For me, as you stated, I have the option to increase mine in the BIOS to 512MB, this means I don't actually get the issue anymore but it is not ideal which is why I keep champoining this issue.

Playing with the ATI AI had no difference in performance or stability for me, this is now set to standard.

GART is the control for the OS to commicate from the mobo to your AGP card, this a system driver that will come with your motherboard drivers, the motherboard i use is only stable when using 3.7.7 whereas there is a 4.4 or higher about. I managed to frig the system to use the later version but again this was a red herring.

Hope that helps.

[Kozlovsky 10]

experiencing poor performance and graphic glitches on my HD4870. =\\ game in it current state is merely unplayable (for me).

hope Bohemia guys will do something with this.

(1.03, last drivers, dx)

Also the option "disable that glitchy dynamic LOD" as air is necessary to game (imho)

[HellfireDeLuxe 10]

Hi again,

yes , it definitely helps to increase the nonlocalvram in this case (AGP card), but in the end i found some heavy sceneries which brought in some artefacts again. I guess that may be the limit really sits on my aperture size and whatever i input as nonlocalvram stays down to 256mb (and if i could put 512 mb in my BIOS it would then already be a win). I am fed up to make some systematic tests in order to verify this. I wanted to go for the win 7 solution but I guess that won't help either, and if i got it right i will not find any working AGP drivers for the 3850 .

Luckily it seems that only the campaign is so demanding , I did have pretty no artifact in sp missions or mp (domination , evo blue, PvP).

Good luck anyway to everybody.

HellfireDeluxe

[Shadow NX 1]

i would try win 7

Been there, done that :p

Gain is pretty minimal saddly.

Weird thing is the stock drivers that came with 7 somehow ran ArmA2 best.

So, dunno maybe i reinstall all again but personally i did so amyn things in the last years to play a BIS game smooth so this time im bit lazy and hope BIS just delivers a patch that actually improves things ( like last patches did ).

This last one ( 1.3 ) is more like some of the middle OFP and ArmA patches that often seemed a bit too experimental.

Persoanlyl i just want a good performance on the whole island and not perfectly russing missions everywhere but in urban area i get a completely different performance.

Not to mention that id love the custom faces bug ( transparent face ) to be fixed that exist since ArmA1.

Edited August 8, 2009 by Shadow NX

[RunslikeCrap 10]

what driver works best with ARMA2?

[InFireBaptize 0]

Been there, done that :p

Gain is pretty minimal saddly.

Weird thing is the stock drivers that came with 7 somehow ran ArmA2 best.

So, dunno maybe i reinstall all again but personally i did so amyn things in the last years to play a BIS game smooth so this time im bit lazy and hope BIS just delivers a patch that actually improves things ( like last patches did ).

This last one ( 1.3 ) is more like some of the middle OFP and ArmA patches that often seemed a bit too experimental.

Persoanlyl i just want a good performance on the whole island and not perfectly russing missions everywhere but in urban area i get a completely different performance.

Not to mention that id love the custom faces bug ( transparent face ) to be fixed that exist since ArmA1.

have you tried the Ati tray tools. I tried it this morning. I was unable to overclock without pixel distortion in the game using the CCC but when tried the ATT above i was able to overclock the same with no distortion what so ever! but you have to disable CCC from the system tray. Give it a try, could it be may be that your card is bad! Do you still get the same results when you lower your in game settings? try to restore your ccc to its default settings, only put the AI to advance. It really boggles my mind that i can run this game fine with ATI 4830!

[shahin 10]

hi..i use german version 1.00.57..i cant use ant patch..it dosnt work and says no arma2 install in ur pc or something like this....a have trouble in fsp...xp pack2..3.4 4 meg catch...ati4850...4 gig ram....i just have 12 frame in secound..1024.768.all of other opthins is normal...and visibility 2klm...help me..all of my driver is update..

---------- Post added at 08:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:20 PM ----------

u mean that we defult ati overdirve and use anti alising in 8x? i have 4850 1 gig,,,4 ram..3,4 cpu 4 meg catch,,,,fsp 14

---------- Post added at 08:29 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:27 PM ----------

have you tried the Ati tray tools. I tried it this morning. I was unable to overclock without pixel distortion in the game using the CCC but when tried the ATT above i was able to overclock the same with no distortion what so ever! but you have to disable CCC from the system tray. Give it a try, could it be may be that your card is bad! Do you still get the same results when you lower your in game settings? try to restore your ccc to its default settings, only put the AI to advance. It really boggles my mind that i can run this game fine with ATI 4830!

u mean that we defult ati overdirev and set antialisnig in 8x? 4850 1 gig..4 meg ram..cpu 3.4 4 meg catch..fsp 14...:(...driver all update

[InFireBaptize 0]

hi..i use german version 1.00.57..i cant use ant patch..it dosnt work and says no arma2 install in ur pc or something like this....a have trouble in fsp...xp pack2..3.4 4 meg catch...ati4850...4 gig ram....i just have 12 frame in secound..1024.768.all of other opthins is normal...and visibility 2klm...help me..all of my driver is update..

---------- Post added at 08:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:20 PM ----------

u mean that we defult ati overdirve and use anti alising in 8x? i have 4850 1 gig,,,4 ram..3,4 cpu 4 meg catch,,,,fsp 14

---------- Post added at 08:29 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:27 PM ----------

u mean that we defult ati overdirev and set antialisnig in 8x? 4850 1 gig..4 meg ram..cpu 3.4 4 meg catch..fsp 14...:(...driver all update

no, leave all CCC "catalyst" 3D on default "use application settings" except enable AI to advance. Change settings within the game. imo Ati tray tools works better.

[shahin 10]

no, leave all CCC "catalyst" 3D on default "use application settings" except enable AI to advance. Change settings within the game. imo Ati tray tools works better.

ok..i will do it..whats ur idea about my sytem...is it not good? or mid..becuz my fsp az around 14 ...1024..and all setting is normal..visibilsity 2 klm..4850 1 gig..3,4 4 meg catch...xp pack 2..4 gig ram..:cool:

[InFireBaptize 0]

ok..i will do it..whats ur idea about my sytem...is it not good? or mid..becuz my fsp az around 14 ...1024..and all setting is normal..visibilsity 2 klm..4850 1 gig..3,4 4 meg catch...xp pack 2..4 gig ram..:cool:

what is your CPU? is it xp 32 or 64 bit. You have a better graphic card than mine, i get from 25-50fps but with my GPU and CPU over clocked. Have you just upgraded your video card?

[keefygeorge 10]

After hours and hours and days and days of testing and re configuring ive managed to stop 90% of my performance issues.

First i tested Win 7 64. Average 25 to max 75 fps

Vista 64 service pack 2 Average 30 to max 75 fps

XP 32 service pack 3 Average 60 to max 311 fps

I was unable force of vsync with win 7 and vista using ATT. But under XP i can disable vsync with CCC without any problems.

XP by far offered me the best performance.

I was experiencing random CTD's and bad performance intil i installed sp3.

My specs;

AMD X4 940, 3.6GHz OC,

GA MA790FX UD5P,

4Gb DDR2 800,

HIS HD 4870 X2 with 8.9 cats,

OS: XP 32 SP3

My settings;

Everything set to very high.

Post processing disabled - causes to much blur for my liking.

Disabled AA. Doesnt seem to add much visually but steals huge fps.

Both resolutions set to 1280, 1024.

On these settings i get an average 50 - 80 fps and up to 311 if i look at the sky.

I think its linked to OS. Especially 64 bit OS.

Install the latest service pack and try running the Direct X.exe in the arma 2 game directory.

I had all the probs listed but now im running smooth as.

Hi! There is a severe graphics bug thats happening to me. I allready searched the forum for anything similar but found nothing. So I hope it may get fixed in a patch because it makes this great game pretty much unplayable for me.

1

2

3

4

5

6

So ... I got this strange layers everywhere in the game. The higher the settings the more it appears. Its also caused by areas with many objects. Looking on the ground makes it disappear. And they even drop shadows as you can see in picture 2. It might also interest you that I had several blue screens when I tried to change settings in the moment these things appeared. No blue screens when they were not visible.

My System:

Windows XP SP2

Intel Core 2 Duo 2.93Ghz

ATI Radeon HD 4850

4GB Memory

[DedoAglar 10]

Hi All

My Machine:

Windows Vista 64

Intel Q9650 Quad Core 3.0

Sapphire 4870 toxic 1GB

8 GB ddr2 1066 OCZ reaper

MB Asus Rampage Formula

Installed latest video Drivers

Installed all the patches for the game.

As i touch the graphic settings, all the skins go away so i can only see the models without any skin.

I don't know how to resolve, please help.

Thanks

PS: how to make a screenshot so i can make you to watch ? O.o

Edited August 9, 2009 by DedoAglar
errors

[shahin 10]

what is your CPU? is it xp 32 or 64 bit. You have a better graphic card than mine, i get from 25-50fps but with my GPU and CPU over clocked. Have you just upgraded your video card?

xp 32...no overclock just for card graphic..all my dirver update..cpu 3.4 intel//dual core....4 meg catch

---------- Post added at 10:22 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:10 AM ----------

hi all...xp32 bit..,. pack 2....cpu intel dual core 3.4 4 meg catch..ati 4850 1 gig...no overclock...resulation 1024 all setting in normal visibility 2klm...i have mid fsp abut 15 and sometime 9 fsp.....is any suggestion to help me?..german version 1.00..all dirver update

Edited August 9, 2009 by shahin

[SheepDip82 10]

I have an ATi 4850 Toxic and since patch 1.03 I've been getting graphical glitching like in this thread

I've rolled back to 1.02 and it works flawlessly :(

[shahin 10]

hi all...xp32 bit..,. pack 2....cpu intel dual core 3.4 4 meg catch..ati 4850 1 gig...no overclock...resulation 1024 all setting in normal visibility 2klm...i have mid fsp abut 15 and sometime 9 fsp.....is any suggestion to help me?..german version 1.00..all dirver update

[bve85 10]

I have had problems running Arma2 at my system.

My specs= 3,2g X4 955 black edition, 4 gig ram, two ati 4870 1gb, windows xp professional 32 bit.

Running my cards crossfire made my screen have the sunflickering all the time.

Playing with 1 card made artifacts specially in cities.

I dicided to install windows 7 64bit version.

Also by having that installing direct x 11.

All i can say is.... WOW !

The difference is HUGE !

Game looks perfect, no artifacts, great FPS everywhere.

My cards are running crossfire perfectly

So, people who are still having problems, downloading and installing windows 7 with perhaps direct x 11 is a great try!

It solved all my problems

[randir14 10]

I have had problems running Arma2 at my system.

My specs= 3,2g X4 955 black edition, 4 gig ram, two ati 4870 1gb, windows xp professional 32 bit.

Running my cards crossfire made my screen have the sunflickering all the time.

Playing with 1 card made artifacts specially in cities.

I dicided to install windows 7 64bit version.

Also by having that installing direct x 11.

All i can say is.... WOW !

The difference is HUGE !

Game looks perfect, no artifacts, great FPS everywhere.

My cards are running crossfire perfectly

So, people who are still having problems, downloading and installing windows 7 with perhaps direct x 11 is a great try!

It solved all my problems

Now that you mention it I just noticed Windows 7 did an automatic update with DX11 and the new version of AMD dual core optimizer. I'm getting way better performance now, even when playing online Chernogorsk with a bunch of AI doesn't run bad anymore.

[noradbase 10]

Hi, I have the same visual anomaly mentioned, most noticeable in city levels. I tried lowering the texture and all that stuff and it still happens, although in country levels it's usually alright.

Is there any fix beyond win7 since I don't have access to it, and don't feel like changing my operating system just for one visual bug.

Also, is this bug being tracked by the devs at all, anybody know?

I have dual core 2.93, 4 gigs ddr3, ati 512 4850, and arma2 with 1.03 patch. WinXP

[noradbase 10]

Alright quick update, I tried uninstalling, reinstalling and only upgrading to 1.02 patch instead of the latest and still had the same issue. I tried just to play through it and deal with it, however it eventually blue screened and the computer restarted.

Is there any word of when this is going to be resolved if it is being dealt with at all? Is there an official bug submission site or tracker or anything for this? As of now the game is essentially unplayable for me, I only bought it a day ago so maybe I could try to return it.