JFK

Hi, today an Amazon mail arrived, asking me to preorder ARMA 2, release date 20th Februray. Sounds good, but we all know Amazon is no official source. ARMA 2 Amazon offer Cheers

Hi, I ordered it at amazon, today they delayed the delivery so i canceled the order and also bought the download version from metaboli. D/L was very fast, install was no problem. I don't think that there are graphical improvements, but performance seems bit more stable. Maybe they only used the "good" trees and bushes?! The new models look good, the vids between missions are also made with "love"... I think the 15 bucks are ok! You don't need a key to install, its like a mod. You get a new shortcut. Didn't test a lot yet, but it runs like charm! Â Need to play a bit now... Cya

Hi, I think it's not the point if the source which is running the script is trusted or not. By signing the script/addon with your private key you make your addon "uinque", as far as a server is verifiying your addon with your public key. So you assure that no changes to the code can be done without loosing the binding to your key. But thx a lot for the addon, we really needed something againt the B***ards!

Second line in article... I couldn't deny myself to post that... Â

Thats the point, you dont have to spawn threads, the library does that for you. Sure you still have to worry about deadlocks an sync probs, but the implementation of threads itself is much easier, as you don't manage the threads, but use tasks instead. The library creates the threads, optimized for the available hardware, does load-balancing between the available processors, has thread-safe container classes which are much more performant than "manually proteceted" containers by e.g. mutexes, and so on... Yes it is portable/runnable on Unix/Linux. Let me qoute a listing of an Intel page about TBB(http://www.threadingbuildingblocks.org/): "For developers, the clear benefits of Threading Building Blocks are: 1. TBB significantly reduces the number of lines of code required to develop multithreaded applications; 2. TBB significantly reduces the programming complexity for developing multithreaded applications (by abstracting many details of thread management); 3. TBB's task manager automatically analyzes the system the software is running on, chooses the optimal number of threads, and performs load balancing that spreads out the work evenly across all processor cores; 4. As a result, TBB threaded applications automatically scale to fully utilize all available processing cores on whatever computer they run on – including future systems that will have many more cores than are available (or affordable) today." Don't get me wrong, I dont have any experience with TBB, I was just reading some tutorials from Intel, and what I've read I can only assume that BIS (or any other dev which has potential of performance gains with multi-threading in his application) should consider TBB. I can remeber a statement of Suma, where he mentioned that the only signinficant performance gain they could get, would be implementing multi-threading. But he can not promise that this will occur. I think with the usage of TBB, a lot of hurdles of the common multi-threading programming (the reasons you have mentioned, deadlocks, sync-probs, overhead caused by too many threads, etc) could be eliminated/disregarded. That's just my little opinion. Cya

I wouldn't say it's easy, but it's easier. You still need to know how to use the classes and methods provided by the library. Furthermore you need to know which pieces of the code can be parallelized. I would say its the first step in making multi-threaded programming easier and accepted by a broader audience of programmers. As far as I've read about TBB, you can achieve quite good performance boosts with just a little rewriting of the code. Hope BIS will use it Â

Hi, you talk about singleplayer? Then you need to select the wounded guy and command him to heal. The command should be under "Action" -> "Heal at Medic" or sth. like that. Cya

Yes it does. Has nothing to do with the architecture. It's "just" a c++ library which can be used to "easily" implement multithreading support to your existing or new code. Any c++ compiler can compile the code. You can use the library to parallelize indepent code segments, loops and so on. Further they added container classes that can be used by parallel threads. All that stuff is quite easy to implement, you only need to add view lines of code. The difference to classic thread programming is, you dont need to care about creating threads, managing data-access of variables and so on... you just create so called "tasks", the library distributes the work to the available processors. I think chances are not bad, BIS could use the library in future patches. Cya

Well its nice to have ~40 fps on top of a hill, without any vegetation. Go to a wood with a lot of grass zoom in your M4 scope and watch your fps counter. Or enter the editor, place a heli near a town and fly over it. Tell me what fps u got, using your settings on MAX, except pp. I had to lower my shader settings, to get the frames needed if i want to increase view distance to 1500. I even screwed terrain and object detail down to normal. No problem, game still looks beautiful, and i have to confirm patch makes it run much better. Nice work BIS, go on that way!!! Â

Did some test with view distance and graphic settings as well as the effects on performance. View distance can now be scaled very well, you see the fog disappear as you pull the slider up. Though i wont set it any higher than 2500m, cause i'm an infantry player. even 1200 is enough for me. Performance of course decreases a bit when setting higher view distance, but as mentioned, it can be scaled quite well. Tried to go down with other settings to have a higher vd, but only setting shaders from high to normal was effective. Visual difference is not that drastic, but gave me 4-5 fps. Post Process performance killer seems to be fixed, though i leave it off. Still takes some frames ( 1-3), but no longer divides the fps count. Overall, very nice patch. Keep up the good work BIS, good luck for the final patch! Â

As promised, I made some shots of the intro movie, while taskmanager shows the handle count. All files are under 100k, so I hope I dont break any forum rules. Dont know why I dont have the handle leak...

I'm using the german version (well, I am german), after 1.05 I did a fresh install and patched direct from 1.00 to 1.05, cause I was using the language mod. Didn't want to frickle around with that stuff, so I uninstalled and deleted all stuff in my documents&settings folder.

Thats really weird... cant confirm that at all, will make a screenshot of my handle count, after intro has run. Another setting i forgot to mention, VPU Recover is disabled, though i doubt its the cause. As you said, no more ideas. Sorry.

Is there a way to enable multithreading without Ati Tray Tools? Cant find a setting in CCC. Used to enable it with my old X850xt with Omega-Drivers and ATT. Cant imagine that the different cpu is the cause.

Hi Dwarden, System: A8N-E S939, AMD X2 4200+, 2 GB Kingston DDR, Ati x1950xtx (Catalyst 7.3), X-Fi Music, 250 GB Samsumg RAID0 Settings: 1280x1024 on 19'' CRT, All high except AA normal, PP low, Viewdistance=1200m Driver settings: AA, AF = application controlled Highquality AF = enabled Mipmap level = high quality Catalyst AI = standard V-Sync off, unless application specifies Adaptive AA off OS: WinXp 32 bit, SP2 I have absolutly no clue whats the difference to those who have the problem. Already tried if its a certain setting, like Adaptive AA, which i have turned off, cause its eating too much performance. As mentioned, i tested about 20 minutes in a campaign mission. Maybe that was not enough. I'm just a bit too busy at the moment, to do some hardcore test. Have to finish my diploma thesis till next wednesday, and theres still a lot of work to do. Â

Hi guys, i can't confirm the handle leak. Tested a campaign mission in windowed mode, task manager always on top, played 18 minutes as commander of more than 12 AIs, AI fights were going on. Handle count stayed constant at a value of 264. Dont have a clue whats different with my system , but i dont wanna complain about it  . Can make some screenshot of it later on, if someone wants a "proof". Cya

Thx Dwarden for merging, I was a bit too slow to finish my post. Wanted to mention, the setup of the driver seems a bit buggy. Tried two times with the same result. I chose "Custom Setup" during the setup-process... right after clicking next, the setup (of the driver) crashed. All other parts (CCC, WDM) installed fine though. But after reboot there was no driver installed. The third install i tried with express-mode, which i usually never do, cause i wanna choose what to install. Everthing went fine. Just be warned, if you try custom-mode, it might happen that the setup crashes. Â P.S.: Before installing 7.3, I uninstalled 7.2 using good old cat-uninstaller, so driver relicts can't be the reason for the crash. Edit: Concerning Handle count, just gave it a short test with the convoy mission. Handles were constant at a value of 264. After dying an restarting, the value increased a bit, but not drastically. Though i just played about 10 mins, so i dont know if the problem can already be realized at such a short time. Nevertheless i never really had problems with older drivers, no slow down in performance or even missing textures. Only had that once in mp game after entering the mission. But after the textures were loaded (1-2 secs), everything was fine.

Hi Ati-Users, Catalyst 7.3 is finally released. Directlink to WinXP 32bit version. If you're running Vista or XP64, choose the approriate version here. Didnt have the time to test it yet, so lets hope it will give us bit more frames. Cya

Hi, I think Suma is talking about the handles of ArmA, not the total amount of all handles that are running on your system. Go to task-manager -> View -> Choose columns, and add the column "Handles". Sorry if the exact values are a bit different, im german, so i translated the menus a bit freely. Cya

Hi, SM 2.0 = Shader Model 2. Forget about that card, no way to handle it. It only supports shader 1.4 i think. I was using an Ati x850xt 256MB video ram (supports SM2). After 1.05 i could only play on normal settings, shadows off in a resolution of 1024x768. A few weeks ago i decided to uprade to an X1950xtx 512 MB RAM, and i have to say it rocks. See my sig for details. Regarding CPU and RAM you should be ok, more memory wouldn't hurt, but does not need to be. Hope that helps, cya

Me too. Its not (yet) perfect, but its a really nice feature. Same with grass. After 1.05 i can absolutly live with the solution. Sometimes HDR flickers too much, when watching directly on a wood or so. But i think BIS will fix that sooner or later. Keep on good work, game is awesome!!! Cya

Hi, maybe u didnt activate it in the bios? As far as i know, HTT can be deactivated in the bios. So tell us which motherboard, respectivly BIOS u have, or have a look in the bios for HTT support.

This does happen, and quite frequently. Â Especially if you're trying to take one out with an M136. Can confirm that. Just played Dolores mission and had to take out some tanks with M136. They didnt blow, but after the second hit, the crew disembarked. Too bad, they didnt see the flash of my M4! Â

Hi, I really dont have a clue about 3D programming, never did that, but the shaders are programmed by the developers. Though i absolutly dont know whats possible within the specifications of DX9. But a google search for "dx9 shader programming" gave a lot of literature. So if you're interested, take a look at that: Real-Time Shader Programming or another one: Learn-Vertex-Shader-Programming-DirectX Hope that helps Cya

Hi all, i'm wondering if the improved AI can be another reason for worse performance, maybe the improved behavior costs too much cpu time? With my actual settings, the intro movie starts with 60 frames and never drops below 25, even in towns with soldiers walking. I mean those are no movies, its rendered like the game. Another thing i've noticed while playing the campaign map 'Beaten Dog', in the beginning i have 20+ frames, a lot of KI is around. As soon as i open up menu and still got the rendered scene in the background, my fraps rushes up to 40+. I assume the AI wont be calculated at that time, though the graphics are still rendered. This doesnt happen in other scenes, while playing around with settings and just hide the option-screen to see the changes. Nevertheless, in towns the performance isnt the best (15-20 fps), no matter how much AI is around. Also it's no explanation for bad online performance most people have. Just a thought, feel free to comment. Cya