no switch labels on the consoles

[andysim]

add me to the labels list =(

 

I found turning on the backlighting makes the labels come back, try it and see.

[Joyride]

Just installed a new Nvidia driver 270.51 beta along with the 1.1.0.7 patch, will report back if still getting it.

[flycats2]

Still no written lables in this patch either for pit knobs & switches in MP, panels are naked. However, when placing cursor over them the description pops up. This bug does not not manifest itself offline, but only in online MP. Backlighting off/on doesn't help here.

 

I'm running NVDIA GTX 260

[CarneyUK]

I have setup as in sig, never had this before until now, happened tonight for the first time with GTX460 and 270.51 drivers (been using both for a week now) and only thing that has changed is updated to 1.1.0.7.

 

If I remember correctly they went off when I went fence in and turned all exterior lights off with LShift + P so could be a lightin problem.

[flycats2]

The knobs & switch labels came on at the point in engine spool-up process when I turned the APU Gen switch on & then the console knob on. But it's not that way offline.

 

Now if I can only figure out why Home+RAlt & Home+RCntl is not spooling up my engines.

Edited April 6, 2011 by flycats2

[Irregular programming]

I had it sporadically during the beta, but now I have it every mission.

 

(offline and online)

[Toastie]

Just to update you on the situation here post patch...

 

The 1.1.0.7 patch made no difference to the label problem.

My wingman has exactly the same graphics card as me and doesn't have this problem (he did briefly but it went away quickly). I matched my in-game graphics options exactly to his, but this too made no difference.

 

I have recently downloaded and clean-installed the Nvidia beta 270.51 drivers for Win7 64 and sadly that has yielded no improvement either.

 

Razvedchik

[oritpro]

The v270.61 Nvidia release didn't help the label problem or the MFD text corruption. The labels disappear just about every time I play, the MFD problem is pretty rare.

 

I am about ready to jettison the Nvidia card and replace it with an ATI.

[oritpro]

I have a few questions for the ED Devs if they don't mind:

 

* Do you have any recommendations on how to minimize/eliminate the disappearing labels issue?

* Any console commands or other configuration that can be tried?

* Can you say whether it's a video driver, GPU hardware, or an issue with the sim that will be corrected in a future patch?

 

I've tried everything I can think of to resolve this problem; changed in game graphic settings, global Nvidia settings, different drivers, etc. I am currently at a crossroad trying to decide whether or not I should replace my Nvidia GPU with an ATI.

 

The thing is, if this is indeed an Nvidia issue I am worried that they might not take it very seriously if only one game is affected by it. Nvidia tends to release driver updates every 4-6 months and that's a long time to wait to see if they're going to fix the problem or not.

 

A co-worker of mine recently purchased A10 and he said that he had the disappearing label problem on his ATI card, but that the latest driver seems to have solved it.

 

I am just looking for some direction here because the problem is driving me a little crazy. :)

[CarneyUK]

I have setup as in sig, never had this before until now, happened tonight for the first time with GTX460 and 270.51 drivers (been using both for a week now) and only thing that has changed is updated to 1.1.0.7.

 

If I remember correctly they went off when I went fence in and turned all exterior lights off with LShift + P so could be a lightin problem.

 

Just an update, only had this the once and never had it again since. :dunno:

[Nate--IRL--]

I have a few questions for the ED Devs if they don't mind:

 

* Do you have any recommendations on how to minimize/eliminate the disappearing labels issue?

* Any console commands or other configuration that can be tried?

* Can you say whether it's a video driver, GPU hardware, or an issue with the sim that will be corrected in a future patch?

 

I've tried everything I can think of to resolve this problem; changed in game graphic settings, global Nvidia settings, different drivers, etc. I am currently at a crossroad trying to decide whether or not I should replace my Nvidia GPU with an ATI.

 

The thing is, if this is indeed an Nvidia issue I am worried that they might not take it very seriously if only one game is affected by it. Nvidia tends to release driver updates every 4-6 months and that's a long time to wait to see if they're going to fix the problem or not.

 

A co-worker of mine recently purchased A10 and he said that he had the disappearing label problem on his ATI card, but that the latest driver seems to have solved it.

 

I am just looking for some direction here because the problem is driving me a little crazy. :)

 

We have tried to reproduce it with little success, it seem to be specific to Nvidia Cards with the 460GTX being particularly prone to the problem. If you could provoke the problem in a very short track, I would like to take a look at the track and the logs files.

 

Nate

[Scratchy]

My config is listed in my signature. I rarely have this happen. Sometimes it happens when I return to airfield for a rearm.

 

The last time this happened it was 'fixed' by turning my console lights up a bit.

[oritpro]

We have tried to reproduce it with little success, it seem to be specific to Nvidia Cards with the 460GTX being particularly prone to the problem. If you could provoke the problem in a very short track, I would like to take a look at the track and the logs files.

 

Nate

 

Which make/model 460GTX did you guys test and what were the clock and memory frequencies set to?

 

The reason I ask is because I am experiencing the issue on an MSI N460GTX Cyclone 768D5/OC and this card ships with slightly higher clock setting than the standard 460GTX. I don't recall the exact freqs but it seemed that they were 25Mhz higher than normal.

 

I'll check the clock settings on my GPU when I get home this evening and put together a track.

 

Also, I don't OC my systems (no reason to), but the GPU was OC'ed at the factory and I am wondering if it has something to do with the label and MFD corruption issues. I can also try clocking it down to see if that helps.

[Nate--IRL--]

I don't have a 460 myself (I have 4890) but I don't believe this is related to clocking. The symptom of labels disappearing is also present when a 32bit system tuns out of memory address space.

 

I believe, for whatever reason, all the Video memory is being consumed and the Labels get dumped. Because this happens in a 64bit system, it is not a memory address issue, something else is causing the Video memory to be consumed.

 

Why the 460 is more prone to this is unknown to me, but I'd suspect the drivers.

 

Nate

[oritpro]

Ok, I repro'd the disappearing label issue and uploaded a track. I also ran GPU-Z and logged stats on my video card while I ran the SIM. The log contains temps, clock speed, and memory usage. It's just a text file but if you open it in notepad make sure wordwrap is off. Both files are in the RAR archive.

 

This was the Hideout mission, and the labels disappeared after I completed start-up and right after I left the hangar.

DisappearingLabels.rar

Edited April 29, 2011 by oritpro

[airdog]

If this is any help, I have found a few things that get the labels to disappear this also is releated to either the HUD fonts disappearing or the MFD fonts disappearing.

Any mission that is set around sunset or sunrise seems to make these anomalies happen.

Anytime I use external views one of the above items will manifest itself.

The above items are a few things that I've noticed that make the bug crop up...there are times that it shows up and I have done none of the above.

[oritpro]

I turned the in-game texture settings down to medium from high and it looks like I save 20-30MB of video memory. If I disable the second monitor that saves another 20-25MB, so I am going to run it like this for awhile to see of it helps.

 

Update:

Turning the in-game texture setting down to medium seems to have helped quite a bit. I've flown 10-missions and haven't experienced the disappearing label problem at all. It was happening during just about every mission when the textures were set to high.

 

I think Nate was right about the video memory being consumed and dumping the labels. Hopefully this will help others that are having the same problem.

Edited April 30, 2011 by oritpro

[oritpro]

V1.1.0.8

 

From the release notes:

 

User Interface

--- SNIP --

- Cockpit panel texture resolution no longer affected by global texture resolution setting in Options.

--- SNIP --

 

Does this have anything to do with the disappearing cockpit labels?

[Nate--IRL--]

V1.1.0.8

 

From the release notes:

 

User Interface

--- SNIP --

- Cockpit panel texture resolution no longer affected by global texture resolution setting in Options.

--- SNIP --

 

Does this have anything to do with the disappearing cockpit labels?

 

No, not directly, the Labels disappearing is a symptom of lack of memory (Either VRAM or RAM) for DCS.

 

Nate

[Toastie]

No Joy...

 

I have now set all of my settings to low or medium and have set the cockpit resolution to 256, yet the game still chews up an average peak of 762 of my 768MB of GDDR5 VRAM, resulting in the loss of these labels. If indeed this is the real cause...

 

If it is, it begs a few questions:

 

1) Why does my friend, who has exactly the same graphics card as me not get these disappearing labels (on the same settings)?

 

2) Why does turning the console lighting up return the console labels to existence without affecting other graphical performance (ie causing MFCD or HUD labels to disappear instead due to lack of VRAM)?

 

3) Is there a way of cycling or refreshing the MFCDs and HUD in-game to return the labels when they disappear?

 

4) Will there be any action taken to address the game's VRAM usage for users who don't have graphics cards with more than 1GB of VRAM?

 

Thanks,

 

Razvedchik

 

 

Q9300, 8GB RAM, Asus GTX 460 TOP 768MB, Win7 64, TrackIR5, X52 Pro

[Nate--IRL--]

I have now set all of my settings to low or medium and have set the cockpit resolution to 256, yet the game still chews up an average peak of 762 of my 768MB of GDDR5 VRAM, resulting in the loss of these labels. If indeed this is the real cause...

 

If it is, it begs a few questions:

 

1) Why does my friend, who has exactly the same graphics card as me not get these disappearing labels (on the same settings)?

 

2) Why does turning the console lighting up return the console labels to existence without affecting other graphical performance (ie causing MFCD or HUD labels to disappear instead due to lack of VRAM)?

 

3) Is there a way of cycling or refreshing the MFCDs and HUD in-game to return the labels when they disappear?

 

4) Will there be any action taken to address the game's VRAM usage for users who don't have graphics cards with more than 1GB of VRAM?

 

Thanks,

 

Razvedchik

 

 

Q9300, 8GB RAM, Asus GTX 460 TOP 768MB, Win7 64, TrackIR5, X52 Pro

 

I would hate to sound glib, but I just don't know. I have tried exhaustively to get to the source of these problems and ED is aware of them, but we have not had any luck so far in replicating them. All I can ask is the you submit your logs after it happens.

 

Nate

[oritpro]

I would hate to sound glib, but I just don't know. I have tried exhaustively to get to the source of these problems and ED is aware of them, but we have not had any luck so far in replicating them. All I can ask is the you submit your logs after it happens.

 

Nate

 

I can reproduce the issue at will, or at least I could until v1108. It's pretty simple if you have two or more monitors:

 

* Max out all texture related graphics settings.

* Ensure A10C is set to desktop mode (not full screen), max resolution.

* Start a mission.

* Set auto pilot.

* Run Windows media player, play a clip.

* Repeat above if necessary.

 

The above steps are just a way to reproduce it quickly, I don't normally run media player or anything else in the background during normal play; in which case the problem is intermittent. The idea is to run apps that consume video memory.

 

Also, I have two monitors active but only one is used for A10C, I am not displaying MFD's or anything like that on the second monitor.

 

I've only spent about a half-hour on v1108 so far, so I'll know in a day or two if the problem is still there.

[Toastie]

I can reproduce the issue at will, or at least I could until v1108. It's pretty simple if you have two or more monitors:

 

* Max out all texture related graphics settings.

* Ensure A10C is set to desktop mode (not full screen), max resolution.

* Start a mission.

* Set auto pilot.

* Run Windows media player, play a clip.

* Repeat above if necessary.

 

The above steps are just a way to reproduce it quickly, I don't normally run media player or anything else in the background during normal play; in which case the problem is intermittent. The idea is to run apps that consume video memory.

 

Also, I have two monitors active but only one is used for A10C, I am not displaying MFD's or anything like that on the second monitor.

 

I've only spent about a half-hour on v1108 so far, so I'll know in a day or two if the problem is still there.

 

This got me thinking abit about non-game-related factors. I use Aero in my Win7 64 and that gives the GPU a little to think about. I also have two monitors (which I should have mentioned previously, sorry) - one 24" and one 19". I normally use the 19" monitor to display my MFCDs.

 

Using GPU-Z to log VRAM usage, I tried a number of different combinations of monitor/aero usage to see if the console labels stay or disappear (I didn't test for HUD or MFCD labels on this occasion, as they normally take much longer to go).

 

It wasn't a very scientific test, but I tried to remain consistent across all iterations. The normal 'cause' of the labels going for me is switching to an external view and then back into the cockpit again.

 

All tests were carried out using the stock 'Weapons Training.miz' in the current game version with latest nvidia driver 270.61 on my PC (specs below). Here are the results:

 

Aero + 2 Monitors + High Detail = Labels gone (peak VRAM usage 766MB)

Aero + 1 Monitor + High Detail = Labels gone (peak VRAM usage 766MB)

No Aero + 1 Monitor + High Detail = Labels gone (peak VRAM usage 762MB)

No Aero + 2 Monitor + High Detail = Labels gone (peak VRAM usage 766MB)

No Aero + 2 Monitor + Medium Detail = Labels gone (peak VRAM usage 764MB)

No Aero + 2 Monitor + Low Detail = Labels remain (peak VRAM usage 763MB)

No Aero + 1 Monitor + Low Detail = Labels remain (peak VRAM usage 626MB)

 

In the tests, I took off, flew around a bit, shot up some innocent civilians' houses and other buildings in the base area. I toggled the F2 periodically and back to F1, it didn't always cause the labels to disappear first time, even on higher detail levels, but in those levels it always happened at some point during the flight.

 

In the two cases where the labels just wouldn't budge, Aero was not running and detail was set to Low, the comparative VRAM usage can be reasonably attributed to the extra monitor displaying the MFCDs.

 

I won't get to carried away with analysing those results here. Maybe you can draw your own conclusions from them.

 

Regards,

 

Razvedchik

 

Q9300, 8GB RAM, Asus GTX 460 TOP 768MB, Win7 64, TrackIR5, X52 Pro, dual monitor (24"+19")

 

Edit: I know it's a different beast entirely, but with the same rig DCS: Blackshark's peak VRAM usage is 663MB on full high settings with 1024px resolution cockpit... just saying.

Edited June 11, 2011 by Razvedchik
additional observation

[mckee14]

i run a Gigabyte GTX-460 OC 1GB, and have the disappearing labels as well. never had it until 1.07, now i have it happen more often with 1.08.

 

it's not a biggie for me, as i just alt+tab do desktop and back, which brings the labels up again.

 

the big question is - is this due to "real" memory usage? (read: are the files stored in the VRAM necessary, and are they too large?)

or is this because of programming issues?

 

i only run 1 monitor on 1680 x 1050, run DCS from a SSD, with a i7 processor and 12GB RAM. if high settings use 762 mb on some elses grafics card, why should it need more than the 1 GB i have in my system?

 

for me, it seems DCS is just filling up VRAM as long as there is some more VRAM, and if there is no more VRAM it starts to "overwrite" older entries. and there is where the problem lies i guess...

[Toastie]

Hi,

 

I recently installed patch 1.1.0.9 after a break from the sim. There's no change to my rig. There's good news and bad news in 1.1.0.9:

 

Thus far I have yet to experience side console label loss in the hour or so flying since patching.

 

On my most recent flight (the stock 'free flight from runway') I lost the HUD labels (figures and letters), but the lines and reticles remained. This appeared to occur not long after I alt-tabbed out and back into the game.

 

I will provide further updates in due course.

 

Razvedchik