A very strange graphical issue

[Kunda 10]

I resolved adding -winxp to the shortcut string

Goodmorning guys!

Love Arma II but i choose to take a break from the game for almost two months.

Yesterday I finally have the right time to invest in the game, dowloaded the latest patch (1.04) and the 191.03 driver for my Nvida Geforce 9800.

So, with a grin on my face i double click on the game's icon and launch ArmaII.

With my horror what i see is not what i saw the last time i run the game. Until yesterday my ArmaII work very well, almost everythings on high and 30 solid FPS (except in some very small area on the map) but now the graphics look all messed out, there's not texture and everything look like... cell shaded!

Here some examples:

Killer7: ArmaII

I try to reinstall the game and put only 1.3 patch but the problem persist.

Please help me because I really want my dose of ArmaII!

Other games on my HD like The Witcher and Empire Total War work really well, especially now with 4 more gb of ram (this is the only difference on my rig made after the long break with the game)

This is my spec:

Intel Quad Core 2.50Ghz

Geforce 9800 1gb

8Gb Ram

Vista Ultimate 64

Edited September 27, 2009 by Kunda

[Tankbuster 1733]

8Gb Ram

Vista Ultimate 64

There's your problem.

[DarkHorse2160 10]

There's your problem.

What do you mean by that? I'm having identical graphics issues to the original poster. I've tried a lot the other supposed NVIDIA fixes (disabeld PhysX, roll back drivers etc.) in other threads here, with no luck. I should be able to run this easily on all Very High settings, but get identical results to the poster's pics on ALL settings.

Are you indicating that it's OS issue? The recommended specs do state that it supports Vista.

Could you, or anyone please provide some more/real info?

Thanks

[Rexxenexx 0]

Are you using beta drivers? The latest WHQL driver is 190.62.

EDIT: nm I see it in the beta drivers. 191.03 "Up to 12% performance increase in ARMA 2". Sounds cool. Did you clean out the old drivers? Tell us if you can see the improvements!

Edited September 27, 2009 by Rexxenexx

[DarkHorse2160 10]

Are you using beta drivers? The latest WHQL driver is 190.62.

It actually shows up as "8.16.11.9062" (dated 8/17/09) once installed , but I just verifed that it is the version back to running now. I have tried rolling back, but with no luck.

---------- Post added at 07:08 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:06 PM ----------

Are you using beta drivers? The latest WHQL driver is 190.62.

EDIT: nm I see it in the beta drivers. 191.03 "Up to 12% performance increase in ARMA 2". Sounds cool. Did you clean out the old drivers? Tell us if you can see the improvements!

Not looking for a performance increase...just looking for ANY performance at all!

Crap plus 12% is STILL crap.

[Bulldogs 10]

Try disabling Hyper Threading in BIOS, Disable Physx in nVidia control Panel and start Arma 2 with -winxp at the end of the shortcut

[Relemar 10]

It actually shows up as "8.16.11.9062" (dated 8/17/09) once installed , but I just verifed that it is the version back to running now. I have tried rolling back, but with no luck.

---------- Post added at 07:08 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:06 PM ----------

Not looking for a performance increase...just looking for ANY performance at all!

Crap plus 12% is STILL crap.

maybe overclocking to the reccomended processor speed might help, did with me..

[Kunda 10]

I resolved adding -winxp to the shortcut string. Simple and fast.

The problem is the 8gb of ram.

[teaboy 11]

it nothing to do with 8gb ram issue! because if it was, then how come that even though i got 2gb ram i get the same graphics issues when i first load up a game? it takes a good 2 mins to load up the texture details properley when i first enter some games on arma 2, especially when i load up a saved game! starting freash game doesnt seem to be effected as much as when starting saved game.

So if i got only 2gb ram then how the hell can it be the 8gb ram problem thats causing it? it cant be can it? cos it not possible unless i actually had 8gb ram! if it is the same problem as with the 8gb ram issue then its obivously not confined to those who have 8gb ram, as it also effecting machines with lower ram. So its obivously some sort of memory issue that effects a lot more machines then just machines with 8gb or more. so i doubt it the same issue as the one with 8gb machines and more likely an additional memory issue that effects machines with far less amount memory too.

Infact my best guess is that its either a graphic card memory issue and not a standard computer ram issue. or since it effects saved games more on mine, then it could be a file curruption issue where when loading up saved games it takes longer for the computer to locate and load the textures for the area in which you last saved the game.

in the mean time i suggest using the -maxmem=2048 in your short cut command line as that seems to help speed up the loading of the textures.

and either way, its not something we ourselfs can fix, as only the developers can resolve this issue, and i suspect it may take awhile to get to the bottom of it.

Edited September 28, 2009 by teaboy

[Kunda 10]

You have a similar problem but not the same. That's because at the beginning my ARMA run fine, the problem start start after i put 4 more Gb of Ram.

[Bulldogs 10]

Yep, they are 2 different issues, but kinda related.

In the first case (8GB RAM) the artifacts appear when you start Arma. This problem has been around since Arma 2 first came out, and it's a problem between Arma 2 and Vista's version of Directx9 (vista uses a different version of directx9, using the -winxp forces it to use XP's version of Directx9)

The second case began after 1.4 and will hopefully be fixed soon in a patch. Although in the mean time I hear that some people have fixed it by lowering their "video memory" setting.

[kklownboy 43]

i....

in the mean time i suggest using the -maxmem=2048 in your short cut command line as that seems to help speed up the loading of the textures.

...

You want to use it like this, -maxmem=2047. You need space for the buffer. And he did fix his issue because it was a 8GB one. Yours is different.

Yours sounds like not enough ram...

[teaboy 11]

You want to use it like this, -maxmem=2047. You need space for the buffer. And he did fix his issue because it was a 8GB one. Yours is different.

Yours sounds like not enough ram...

Minimum required for the game is 1gb i have 2gb. also if it was not enough ram, then it would happen when starting a fresh game and not just when loading saved games. so its not an issue with regards to not having enough ram becuase i do have enough ram. the game runs smoothly on normal to high settings when the textures have loaded, which take best part or 30-60secs when i load saved games. also why doesnt it do it all the time right from the game being installed, instead of starting do it over time? and why it not do it on every saved game? if it is an lack of ram issue, which i dont think it is.

[Rexxenexx 0]

teaboy, what card are you using and what is your settings (in advanced) in arma2?

[teaboy 11]

teaboy, what card are you using and what is your settings (in advanced) in arma2?

currently using 8500GT with latest drivers but hope to upgrade the card in the next few weeks. still even with the 8500GT can play the game with normal to high settings and it runs smoothly without any problems other then the slow texture load when when i load a saved game.

Current settings are as follows.

texture: normal

memory: High

AF: normal

AA: disabled

Terrian: Normal

object detail: Normal

Shadows: very High (any lower i start to get a bit of lag)

Post processing: Disabled (works fine on normal setting too though just prefer it off)

UI Size: Normal

Aspect ratio: custom.

Resolution 1185x720 (83%) can play at 100% on non campaign missions. but i stick to what it is set at.

Veiw distance 2,100.

did some testing last nite, i lowered changed -maxmem2048 to 1024 and it seemed to improve the issue with the texture load. cant understand how it could be lack of memory. seems more memory the game uses the worse the texture load is. because reducing the maxmem to 1024 means the game will only use 1gb of memory and it seems to improve the speed of the texture load by half on the saved games, yet i hardly ever have the texture load issue when starting fresh game or mission.

And as i said apart from the texture load the game runs smoothly with current settings, other than one or two lag spikes every 20 mins which never last more then a second. ive tried overclocking the GPU but that doesnt do anything to solve the texture load either.

Edited September 29, 2009 by teaboy

[Bulldogs 10]

I think it's because in the first case you were telling the game to use 2gb even though you didn't have 2gb available (vista uses 1gb normally so if you have 2gb then your games are likely to only use 1gb)

[teaboy 11]

I think it's because in the first case you were telling the game to use 2gb even though you didn't have 2gb available (vista uses 1gb normally so if you have 2gb then your games are likely to only use 1gb)

thats true. thats why i tried the -maxmem at 1024 on the off chance it improved the texture load, which it did cut the texture loading time by half.

this is however the first game ive come across where you have to specfically tell the game what amount of memory it can use (i.e short cut -maxmem command). so ive never had this issue before due to the amount of memory available to be used by the game or program.

But it still doesnt explain why it only tends to do it when loading up a saved game, and very very rarely does it when you start a game or new mission from scratch. and when it does, its only the odd object that only takes couple of secs to load the texture.

So the question is - why does it do it when i load a saved game? any ideas?

[Bulldogs 10]

I think it's just a case of load priority where it's loading the textures last when loading a save game because it takes into account that you may be under fire when you load so you need certain things loaded first.

[Sniperdoc 0]

Are you indicating that it's OS issue? The recommended specs do state that it supports Vista.

Could you, or anyone please provide some more/real info?

Thanks

Darkhorse,

Read the following thread and all will become clear to you. It doesn't explain really WHY the issue exists, but it does explain how to fix it.

http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=73232

I was running the 186.xx drivers for my GTX280s and had no problem. Once I upgraded to the 190 drivers, I had the exact same problem as the OP and even on the same map (Razor Two I think). I don't think the new 191 drivers resolved the issue. The thread above tells the story well.

Edited September 29, 2009 by Sniperdoc

[teaboy 11]

I think it's just a case of load priority where it's loading the textures last when loading a save game because it takes into account that you may be under fire when you load so you need certain things loaded first.

yeah i can see your logic there. but i never save while under fire or when theres known enemies nearby. i geuss i just going to have to wait see if it gets fixed in later patches. at least it not a game breaking issue and the game runs smoothly, just more annoying then anything else when ure having to wait, when all i want to do is get back into the action. i just hope when i upgrade the graphics card in a few weeks that i dont end up with worser problems that are game breaking, because that would be bloody typical! lol.