New WindLight Viewer + extended commentary! (75762)
Monday, December 17th, 2007 at 3:29 PM by: Pastrami Linden
Hey Residents. So, in addition to the usual links and bug fix listing, I’m going to use this blog posting to cover the first of three topics I want to address this week…
I’m going to be blogging about three topics of great importance to us (the WindLight Team) and you (the Residents) this week. These are:
* The state, cause, and expected resolution of ATI and Apple problems.
* Aesthetic issues/changes/fixes with WindLight (including avatars looking messed up, overbrightening of textures, etc.)
* Performance and stability- is WindLight a glowing gem of engineering or a buggy, laggy mess? ONLY THE STATS CAN TELL. News at 11.
Before I jump into the first topic, ATI and Apple problems, I want to just list out the bugs fixed in this release, as I think many of you will be quite delighted! (This may be the highest votes-per-bug release we’ve had yet!) The fixes are:
* VWR-3258: WindLight: Performance drops and triangle rendering glitches on some ATI cards with VBO on
* VWR-3590: Using NVidia drivers 169.09 BETA and ATI drivers on vista cause Windlight to render shiny objects as either invisible or transparent
* VWR-3287: WindLight: Tree lighting appears uneven and harsh during certain times
* VWR-3162: WindLight: Objects, avatars, and water sometimes disappear after zooming camera
* VWR-925: WindLight: Enabling Atmospheric Shaders disables shader water on various NVIDIA GPUs
* VWR-3418: WindLight: Intermittent colored screen flashes that sometimes happen with mouse clicks
* Crash on mac when editing appearance
* Bogus “computer does not meet Second Life’s minimum system requirements” warning from Windlight
* Debug setting RenderGlowMinLuminance values are now clamped properly.
Now, onto the notes on ATI and Apple problems. As many of you have noticed, we seem to have an inordinately large number of (or at least persisting) bugs related to certain ATI cards (under Vista, for example), and certain Apple configurations (Leopard, etc.) The reason for these in both cases is tied to the vendors themselves. Here’s the scoop:
ATI
This is the fundamental issue at hand:
ATI’s drivers do not currently support linking of GLSL shaders on x1950 and above and on all ATI cards on Vista.
In layman’s terms, this means a lot of the higher end rendering features that require shaders simply won’t run in those cases. Erg. But, ATI has told us that the new 7.12 drivers coming out this month may very well fix those problems. So be sure to check out ATI’s driver page regularly. In the meantime, rest assured that we’ve both cracked a lot of the bugs and can currently ensure at least the following:
* Sky/cloud shaders DO work and SL runs decently
* Other shaders don’t work (no water, no glow), but that doesn’t affect general SL functionality
* Fallbacks all work now. No transparent shiny.
I know it sucks for the time being, but it’s one of the problems we face with the current matrix of graphics cards (Intel, Nvidia, ATI), shader language support (Cg, GLSL, HLSL), driver versions, and cross-OS support (Win, Mac OS, Linux). Oh, to have one standard to rule them all! 
Apple
The situation with Apple (especially with things like GeForce 8600M and Leopard problems) is a similar one- we’re limited by their support for advanced features in their drivers/software. However, they’ve really stepped up their game recently and we’ve been working with them strongly over the past couple of weeks. Here’s the latest from BigPapi Linden, one of our graphics devs:
“I’ve been having a lot of back and forth with Apple over the last two weeks and it’s already bearing fruit. They found the cause of shaders falling back to software on the 8600M MacBook Pro. Don’t have an ETA as to when a fix for this will make it into a release of theirs, but the problem can also be solved from our end with some shader loading cleanup and streamlining, which I will be doing as soon as Runitai is done with the crysis drivers shader fix. They’re still investigating Leopard issues, but solving the 8600M might have a trickle down effect.”
So that’s the latest there. We did recently solve some of these types of problems (like VWR-3258), but we are a bit tied in a lot of these things by the manufacturers. Good news is we have direct dev relationships with them at this point and you can pretty much be assured we’re solving them as quickly as the latest drivers/updates permit. Oh, to have one standard to rule them all!
And now onto the mundane link dump…
- See the full list of open WindLight bugs.
- See the big list of fixed WindLight bugs!
- Issue tracking/reporting
Come to WindLight office hours! These are at:
- Brampton Linden Stage: 106/166/25
- Tuesdays 8:00am - 9:00am PDT (ongoing)
- Thursdays 1:00pm- 2:00pm PDT (ongoing)
If you miss a session, transcripts are posted here.
Below you’ll find links to important info related to WindLight:
Have a great time lighting your worlds!!
Regards,
Pastrami Linden and the WindLight Team
December 17th, 2007 at 3:31 PM
Yay new windlight! I must say, I was in utter awe when this first came out. Good job Lindens! *Can’t wait for Nimble clouds*
December 17th, 2007 at 3:32 PM
Woa!! Nice Work boys and girls!
thanks for the new update!
Downloading.
December 17th, 2007 at 3:36 PM
Great Work ,,,=^_^=,,, thank you very much!
December 17th, 2007 at 3:37 PM
Unfortunately the Linux download seems incomplete: 39 MB when it’s usually 50 MB, and bzip2 complains that it is corrupted.
December 17th, 2007 at 3:38 PM
It seems that the copy of the Linux version is incomplete: I’ve downloaded it (41283584Bytes) and I’m getting unexpected end-of-file errors when I try to extract it. Anybody else?
December 17th, 2007 at 3:40 PM
Disabling comments while we fix the Linux issue (need to reserve those valuable 150 spots!
) (Edit) Download fixed!
December 17th, 2007 at 3:55 PM
I was wondering, how is the Dazzle project coming along when will Rez 2b be for beta testing? There are some elements missing from Rez 2a for WindLight
December 17th, 2007 at 3:56 PM
Just noticed my typos. Really should get some sleep soon. I meant Rev 2b sorry.
December 17th, 2007 at 3:57 PM
TY so much for fixing VWR-925 - I’d be interested to know what the issue was but am thrilled it’s fixed (confirmed)
December 17th, 2007 at 3:58 PM
The new Windlight client login screen looks nice, but the viewer crashes when the login is idle for more than 10 seconds and crashes when attempting to login on Windows Vista Ultimate X64
December 17th, 2007 at 3:59 PM
Crashes in the middle of loading the login screen for me. Too bad it’s a required update. -_-
December 17th, 2007 at 4:01 PM
Of course it’s a required update, where would be the point in people continuing to beta test an old client as people will end up submitting bug reports for bugs that may have already been fixed and so will end up confusing the Lindens.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:04 PM
Kevin, what hardware?
December 17th, 2007 at 4:04 PM
No crashes for me, it’s working perfectly.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:10 PM
Having bought an ATI card with my last upgrade, I am considering that one “fix” that determines where the market goes and solves the problem.
Since I use my PC mainly for SL, I shall take out the ATI card that doesn’t work, and put in an nVidia one that does. Unless ATI address this sort of thing then I imagine that they will end up like Betamax.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:10 PM
WoW, I crashed many times on TP. Odd??? Mini map has missing sims and can’t TP to them? But it loads my AV quick and stable. (^_^)
December 17th, 2007 at 4:10 PM
OMG I can’t wait to by my new comp next week!
December 17th, 2007 at 4:13 PM
Sounds good! I’ll be interested to see what the performance numbers are like. I know that, with the standard viewer, I can’t fly smoothly around my home sim without lags and jumps; with the WL viewer I have no trouble.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:15 PM
Smile..still stuck after logg in..cant move..animations like “sit here dont work……but I m able to see more than before
(Grafikx: NVIDIA GeForce 7600GS 512mb
CPU: AMD 2600XP
Board: AsRock K7S8X (SiS Chipsatz)
Cache1024mb
Any Idea that may help?? Greetings from a frustrated german user
December 17th, 2007 at 4:16 PM
Ijunah, what OS?
December 17th, 2007 at 4:16 PM
This release is a disaster for me I am getting 1 fps when i can get logged in it crashes if you don’t hit the log in the MOMENT it shows
had to go back to the reg version
December 17th, 2007 at 4:17 PM
Ack, it’s using the hideous 1.18.6 login screen. So much for being able to quickly type in my password and a new login location. Tab tab tab tab tab. Mrrf.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:17 PM
@Pastrami: I made a JIRA entry for it, don’t want to clutter up the comments with debug issues: http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-3885
December 17th, 2007 at 4:18 PM
OH i forgot
Win xp pro Sp2
Amd athlon 64 x2 6000+
Nvidia Geforce 8800 GTS
3gb dual channel ram
December 17th, 2007 at 4:23 PM
the last step from the texture will not load.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:24 PM
@Pastrami Linden pardon me what do you mean with OS (onlineservice??)
Win Xp home
pardon my bad english
December 17th, 2007 at 4:26 PM
It gets better and better.. Dont use windlight all the time… but if the bugs are fixed then may well do
Ty so much LL keep up the good work 
Kelly x
December 17th, 2007 at 4:29 PM
So, here’s my question. I’m running a Dell Dimension 8110 w/ onboard graphics. No NVidia, etc. Am I gonna have to get a new system to run this thing? If so, will it make my present 5-10 FPS worse? That will be the primary consideration on whether or not I adopt this thing. As much as I love SL, I’m NOT gonna go out and buy a new PC to go in-world for diversion.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:29 PM
my AV will break in the middle sometimes^^
December 17th, 2007 at 4:30 PM
Addendum: I’m running XP.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:31 PM
I keep crashing like 2minutes after i log in with this new version.. what exactly did u fix again?
I am using 2 Gforce 7950’s with 512mb’s each with latest drivers and i have 2gb’s of ram.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:33 PM
working ok - seems a few fps better as well
P4-3.0
6600GT-512
win2000
Nice work team —
December 17th, 2007 at 4:34 PM
sounds like a Gforce prob..same here (the crash bug)
December 17th, 2007 at 4:34 PM
A little clarification on the ATI x1950 issue.
Is that to say, we shouldn’t see ANY glow at all, or that glow falls back to software mode? Same with the water, Should we only be seeing old water?
I’m a bit confused, because on my x1950, everything looks fine.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:37 PM
All TPs Crash with this version, I tried to use the last windlight and can’t login with out getting popup telling me to load this version. This new client has become unusable since I can’t TP or load older version.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:37 PM
I keep crashing in the login screen too, must have something to do wtih the new menu, the progversion apears flawed with “%” instead of an ” ”
My System :
Win XP Pro SP2 (32 Bit)
AMD Athlon 64 FX-57
2 GB RAM Dual Chan.
2 TB HD
2x Nvidia GeForce 7800GTS SLI
ASUS A8N-SLI Premium
Creative X-Fi Platinum
a full System-NFO File can be found under
http://www.schulte-hunsbeck.de/system.nfo
December 17th, 2007 at 4:37 PM
I still see VWR-3258 - no difference than previous time. Win XP/SP2, ATI x1650 AGP Maximized Window.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:39 PM
Thanks!!! Works Great.
System:
Commodore 64 w/RGB color television
5 1/4″ Floppy Disc Drive.
14k Telephone coupler modem.
Okidata Dot Matrix printer.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:40 PM
What happened to the Preferences button onthe login page? That is an important security feature to turn off things like QuickTime BEFORE logging in.
Seems a little faster and better otherwise; please keep up the good work.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:41 PM
Ooops, Typo, of course it is a Geforce 7800 GTX not a GTS, Sorry!
December 17th, 2007 at 4:48 PM
Broken version for me was working fine up until now? XP SP2 1 Meg ram GF ULTRA 6800…. Loved it please bring it back!
December 17th, 2007 at 4:52 PM
I have several questions. Simple questions, really.
Like, “where is my login screen?” I get a 404 file not found at login. It’s not even a particularly good looking 404 file not found page. It’s bland and ugly, really. Not to mention that I can’t sign in.
Another question that creeps into my mind includes “why does my viewer crash 10 seconds in every time?” This gets old very fast, especially when the previous release is no longer a viable alternative.
A third question (stay with me, here) is “when I do get a login page, why is it that…” actually, this is the same as the 2nd question, since I crash if I so much as have the arrogance to touch anything on the screen. Or leave the viewer alone. Or breath. Or smile (which I’m not doing very much anymore).
Please help us out, here. It’s becoming a very frustrating update.
AMD Athlon X2 4800
Windows Vista Business 32bit
GeForce 7800 GT 256MB
ASUS A8N-SLI Premium
2GB DDR RAM
December 17th, 2007 at 4:54 PM
Congratulations on the new version@! I presently run it with my Vista nightmare that really XP is by far a more solid product we all know this. I have found much of my problems are not all SL related at all but the ongoing Nvidea card fighting with Vista algorithims and so on. The one thing I will say with wind I am actually crashing ALOT less.
My computer is less than a month and a half old; however I have alot that when they built it I wish I had built this one myself because it just lacks some things Like the Nvidea card should have been a higher series than 6900 and the computer was brand new so without a doubt I will have to update my graphics card and upgrade memory.
1GB 4000Mhz 320GB Vista GeoForce Nvidea card 6900series Amd athlon
One huge notice since the last update is I know longer can see my skirts when doing an appearance the skirt disappears and it also at times disappears where its not visible to others. This phenomenom may be tied into the shiney issue but whatever it is that is the one area I do hope gets fixed. I also am noticing huge places where people seem to disappear for me or never appear to rez same with ground and flooring I even have pictures of what I see versus what others actually see if you need a visual.
Again have a wonderful holiday.
Tremendous effort
I am Charltina Christensen, Queen and Owner of Gentle Breeze
Deathstalker’s Paine’s Gentle Hearts Touch, Wife of Deathstalker
December 17th, 2007 at 4:57 PM
As usual, the live with it attitude prevails and as I also run nVidia GEForce on a limited income I am S.O.L. good thing I invested money on islands and wont be able to see them assuming I can even log in.
Linden Labs, make things OPTIONAL for those of us who do not care to have these unwanted improvements instead of shoving them down our throats.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:57 PM
Hey Residents! sounded a little wierd, hey customers! would be better
December 17th, 2007 at 4:58 PM
When I attempt to refresh the login screen the new windlight crashes…from help below…also, nvidia drivers from November 6.
Second Life 1.18.6 (75762) Dec 13 2007 16:08:39 (Second Life WindLight)
CPU: AMD (Unknown model) (2799 MHz)
Memory: 2047 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows Vista (Build 6000)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 8800 GTS/PCI/SSE2/3DNOW!
OpenGL Version: 2.1.1
LLMozLib Version: 1.1.0 (Mozilla GRE:1.8.0.12_0000000000)
Viewer Digest: d2ed7558-bab3-a37b-8963-464cfcfd12e0
December 17th, 2007 at 4:59 PM
Wow, lot of great bug fixes!
There seems to be a disagreeable change to the water though. There is now like a fixed and unmoving small scale roughness to it. very noticable from a narroy angle (lokking across the top of the water). You can even see it repeating regularly, like the texture is only a half meter on a side in the water.
If it was there before it wasnt nearly so noticable and I can’t find any settings to change it.
December 17th, 2007 at 5:02 PM
Closing up comments again while we look at the login/early login issues. (Edit - still haven’t tracked down if this is an actual endemic problem, so re-enabling comments for now!)
December 18th, 2007 at 12:06 PM
Crashed very early after flying fast. Crashlog submitted. The login screen is terribly slow. I hope we can get this either speeding up *a lot* or revert to the classic login screen (which I would prefer greatly). Good luck with the bug fixing!
December 18th, 2007 at 12:09 PM
Hmmm* This girl wonders if it is worth looking into even though i caused a bit of chaos yesterday
as a nekko im still curious i just want things to work out but i dont feel important so not sure if i should even try:( loging in agaian:( anyways hope to get a reponse u all have a happy christmas if i dont make it in sl it was nice to meet my avi and u lindens take care tyris
December 18th, 2007 at 12:19 PM
I don’t like the new order in which the GUI elements come up in the viewer. Its now far to slow to get in. Before, the login user/password and connect buttons all came in immediately even if there was a long delay before the web and news elements came up. Now we have to wait too long to get the GUI elements to allow login. Can we go back to the faster display of the eseential parts first?
December 18th, 2007 at 12:23 PM
I should have added I also have the ugly %20’s in the viwwqer name and version information.. and a LOT of wasted black space around the name/password/connecvt sign in area. I am on Vista with Nvidia 512MB FX4500.
December 18th, 2007 at 12:35 PM
Running Mac OS 10.5.1, the log in section of the opening screen doesn’t actually respond; greyed textboxes and a Connect button that doesn’t work.
I’m re-downloading to see it was a duff download.
I also see the %20s that Ai Austin sees.
Interestingly, none of the ‘live grid’ ‘windlight’ text appears; the rest of the screen looks identical to that of the main viewer.
December 18th, 2007 at 12:35 PM
i love GLOW..:) Thank you so much for it.. and very happy christmas to all the hard workers at SL.. if like me you are on call over the christmas period, i hope the calls are good ones.. now i just need decent sculptie application to make the most of GLOW.
December 18th, 2007 at 12:36 PM
The system trees are still not right for me. They were flat and washed out on previous versions, now they are too dark and do not seem to be illuminated from any angle regardless of time of day.
Mac G5 quad, OSX 10.4.9, ATI x1900
December 18th, 2007 at 12:36 PM
I too am seeing the grainy water textures and there’s this white vertical graphic glitch bar on the right side of the screen with the new update.
Tried to make a screen shot but the bar doesn’t show up on the picture.
Neither of these issues were present on the previous version.
I’m running Win XP and Nividia GeForce 7600 GS.
December 18th, 2007 at 12:37 PM
@53 I agree and the preferences button is missing.
December 18th, 2007 at 12:39 PM
There really was no reason to replace the old login form. The old form is perfectly capable of handling logins with the new API, and it’s more reliable because you’re not putting an excessively complex subsystem (the browser) in the critical path… oh well, at least there’s already people working on retrofitting it for open-source clients.
December 18th, 2007 at 12:49 PM
#39: I have the exact same system (Okay, in the attic)-boy am I OLD.
#45: Windlight IS optional.
#53. Same here with the %20s.
For me (XP, ATI X600, 2 GB RAM) it runs smooth, if a little slow, just like the other Windlight viewers before. No crashes yet.
December 18th, 2007 at 12:49 PM
Currently getting 404 when launching the viewer:
The requested URL /hhttps://secure-web18.secondlife.com/app/login/en/
Looks like perhaps a typo on a redirect directive somewhere? A way to reload the page (^R, SHIFT-^R, or F5 maybe) would be nice. Restarting the client did bring up the login screen
For people complaining about the preferences button, on my screen there is Edit->Preferences at the top.
December 18th, 2007 at 1:15 PM
@ 40 Tycho Beresford Says:
“What happened to the Preferences button on the login page? That is an important security feature to turn off things like QuickTime BEFORE logging in.”
It’s still there, just less visibly so under Edit > Preferences in the upper left hand corner.
So far so good, but I can’t help noticing that the long-awaited (by me at least) VWR-2404 (Lossless texture uploads for sculpt maps not uploading/displaying lossless) that was more or less (well, more “less” than more) fixed in Release Candidate 1.18.6 has not been included in this WindLight version of 1.18.6. Please don’t forget to make this fix part of whatever final release results from RC+WL= latest SL regular client.
I’m also seeing problems with the trees, very dark and no amount of light or fog changes their appearance, i.e. distant prims are pale in the fog but trees stay brightly “fulldark”.
December 18th, 2007 at 1:19 PM
yeah this updates crashes here too..
OS: Vista Business 32bits
Memory: 2GB
GFX: ATI X1600Pro 512MB agp edition
Drivers: 7.11
plus i was running the game with forced admin privleges…
December 18th, 2007 at 1:19 PM
I love windlight but I get problems with graphics going weird on me. I will be fine for about 20 minutes into game play and then all of a sudden my images will spike out. It’s hard to explain but everything gets distorted and warped. What could be causing that?
December 18th, 2007 at 1:28 PM
[...] Offiziell - LL über WindLight [...]
December 18th, 2007 at 1:29 PM
I am warming up to Windlight I think. While I don’t really like the shadowing/lighting of the avatars, the sky and water really looks awesome. That pesky triangle vertex buffer problem happening when I had VBO turned on stopped happening to me in the last update in Windlight. I think some people with certain ATI cards are still experiencing trouble though as stated on JIRA.
http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-3258
Here are my specs.
CPU: AMD (Unknown model) (2002 MHz)
Memory: 2047 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
Graphics Card Vendor: ATI Technologies Inc.
Graphics Card: RADEON 9700 PRO x86/MMX/3DNow!/SSE2
OpenGL Version: 2.0.7058 WinXP Release
LLMozLib Version: 1.1.0 (Mozilla GRE:1.8.0.12_0000000000)
Packets Lost: 1063/29509 (1.0%)
Thanks for your work!
December 18th, 2007 at 1:31 PM
This latest version runs very slowly eventually leading to a crash for me, where the last version was just slow. The last time windlight worked really well (better than the main viewer) was before they took it down to do more work on it.
It does look awesome, and I can’t wait till there’s a version (c’mon apple… give us the hooks to the ATI cards) that runs smooth.
Cheers..
Model Name: MacBook Pro 17″
Model Identifier: MacBookPro2,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2.33 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 4 MB
Memory: 3 GB
Bus Speed: 667 MHz
Boot ROM Version: MBP21.00A5.B07
SMC Version: 1.14f5
Chipset Model: ATY,RadeonX1600
Type: Display
Bus: PCIe
PCIe Lane Width: x16
VRAM (Total): 256 MB
Vendor: ATI (0×1002)
Device ID: 0×71c5
Revision ID: 0×0000
ROM Revision: 113-xxxxxx-158
EFI Driver Version: 01.00.158
December 18th, 2007 at 1:35 PM
The trees seem to be stuck with a lower detail texture, or else the alpha is messed up. Perhaps this is part of the shader changes they made to adapt to the missing GLSL support in recent ATI cards?
December 18th, 2007 at 1:50 PM
Windlight is still the ONLY client that crashes on my machine.
Release Candidate, Havok Beta and Normal client run fine - Windlight client crashes at log-in screen.
iMac, OSX 10.4.11, 2.16 GHz Intel Core Duo, 2 GB 667 DDR2 SDRAM, ATY,RadeonX1600 256 MB VRAM, etc, etc.
December 18th, 2007 at 2:03 PM
Thank you guys !!! VWR-925 fixed… now I can see the world, sea and sky. You make my day
December 18th, 2007 at 2:12 PM
Any way to tell if the Reflective/Refractive water bug is related to the GLSL problem on ATi cards?
Also glow for me has never worked even under XP, it always crashed my viewer.
December 18th, 2007 at 2:20 PM
I wrote a jira report about a really horrendous (though oddly beautiful) atmospheric shader bug on my ATI HD 2600 https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-3893.
I have to ask, though… what was the impetus behind changing the login screen so drastically? I rather *like* having all 4 buttons down there rather than just “connect” and a hyperlink to make a new account. Putting the other two in menus above seems like it’s just splitting what doesn’t need to be split up. I have to admit that I have no idea what you’re going for on this one. Seems to violate Apple’s UI guidelines. The original way was much cleaner.
December 18th, 2007 at 2:22 PM
Gah. The link-thing used the period instead of stopping at the numbers. Try this instead:
https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-3893
December 18th, 2007 at 2:32 PM
I am very glad with the fact that you are following up on the HUGE contrast/wash-out issue. Please keep us informed.
December 18th, 2007 at 2:35 PM
About the aesthetics - please tone down Windlight! It’s way too intense, and for content creators, it changes our colors to colors we never intended!
For instance, during sunrise and sunset, Windlight will turn some plum-colored walls inside a house a garish, intense blood-orange, while turning neighboring walls a rather muddied plum, and plum and blood-orange don’t necessarily look good together! I would never choose to put those colors next to each other in walls. But with Windlight, that’s what it turns into.
In the regular viewer, the walls look normal, and the changes are basically what you would expect, even at different times of the day.
(There will always be the problem, of course, that interior walls change with the sun even if there are no windows in the rooms. But with Windlight, the effect is so overdone, it makes the fact that the sun couldn’t possibly REALLY be affecting windowless interiors jarringly obvious, and the effect is thus more comic-book amateurish.)
Outside, we get things like snow-covered trees that are suddenly bright orange on one side! This only happens in nature during rare atmospheric conditions, yet here in SL, orange snow happens like clockwork!
It’s as if an exaggerated, strong (and mostly orange) filter had been put over everything. Whereas with the regular viewer, the sunrise/sunset color changes are more subtle, and the sun doesn’t change most colors into other colors entirely.
Windlight’s sun is not only overly-dominant, it is also a harsh master, rending non-sun-facing sides on prims too dark in daylight; making avatars gaunt; crisping trees and other details; and making outside daylight scenes (particularly sand) entirely too bright.
Now for fantasy landscapes, Windlight is very good.
It’s cool and striking, in the environment. But it represents only one artist’s style, in essence; and the trade-off is that all the rest of us have to submit all our creations to this one overwhelming – and fairly unrealistic – interpretation.
Imposing a strong style on top of a more neutral and realistic base can be oppressive and limiting, particularly when it washes out any and all original color. This sucks the joy out of color and content creation, when you have to look at all your colors and test what shade of orange they will become, and then have to reject half of them.
I want to still have a full palette of colors to choose from – not be limited to browns and blacks. But this won’t be possible in a world that seems to have lost its ozone and cloud layers entirely!
With the sun dominating everything like this, it’s hard for content creators who would like to choose their own colors and have some assurance they would stay mostly the color intended, or even some variation of the same shade!
I think you could still have a very nice Windlight if you would please just tone it down enough so we can remain artists, too.
coco
December 18th, 2007 at 2:46 PM
i have the crashing on login screen issue too, have submitted a crash log.
my system is:
win xp pro sp2
AMD 64 3200ish
2 gig ram
gforce 8800 gts
i loved windlight and i feel as i have lost a friend..
hehe anway good luck with the project
December 18th, 2007 at 2:49 PM
No crashes at all on my iMac. But the login screen is a disaster, not a good idea to move Prefs and Quit buttons to a menu. Text boxes are a nightmare. And if you display locations, OK when you turn it on, but next login on the title is there, no boxes… Did you really have to change this, with yet more bugs?
Of course, not that I can use it. Although difficult to judge, as the settings are now split, different places, different sliders, different numbers, I think I am equivalent, and see about 10% fps improvement 18 > 20 fps while standing, maybe an extra one walking. That of course is with everything turned down 96 draw, fog 2, particles 1024, because every update so far has worsened performance. If I enable just Basic sliders, fps halves to 10, if I enable Atmospheric, it drops to 0.4 to 0.6, so no shinies for me. 40 fold increase in required computing power, 20 fold of which is the clouds…
iMac G5 iSight 1.9 GHz (last PPC 10 days before unexpected Intel release)
Mac OS X 10.4.11 1Gb RAM
ATi Radeon X600 Pro 128Mb OpenGL 1.5
Card is an OEM board, custom, not swappable, and not listed on ATi site, so all up to Apple I guess.
December 18th, 2007 at 3:04 PM
Looking good. The VWR-3258 fix works well. Thanks!
Now let’s hope that the advanced shaders will work soon on my ATI MOBILITY RADEON 9600.
Keep up the good work, guys! Happy holidays!
December 18th, 2007 at 3:37 PM
Common sounds like fly, land, walk all broken/silent after update (yes i checked the sounds levels) ambient wind sounds ok thought, just feels like a “numb” experience in SL at the mo.
December 18th, 2007 at 3:46 PM
Crash on login, all other sl clients run without issues:
Dell XPS 720
Quad core
4gigs
Nvidia 8800 Ultra
December 18th, 2007 at 4:24 PM
Just a little tip for the ones who can’t login because of the login screen. Use -login ,password> in the command line.
It helps me to bypass the login screen
December 18th, 2007 at 4:25 PM
Argh blog ate part of the commandline:
-login firstname lastname password
December 18th, 2007 at 4:55 PM
We were using Windlight for machinima production on 4 computers with very few problems until 12/18. New required download has crashed them all. We can’t log in. Screen stays for about 5-10 seconds and crashes. Just clicking on the password area crashes the systems. All computers are high end with Nvidia 8800GTS cards, latest software. If we load previous version, we can log in, but are required to load new version. Standard SL client works fine on all systems.
December 18th, 2007 at 4:56 PM
I had many problems with this version, could hardly move. I clicked suggested configuration and everything was switched off, I had a little colour on some objects, but generally everything was black or a very light blue without any shading on anything, shapes of objects remained, that was it.
Machine Name: Power Mac G5
Machine Model: PowerMac7,3
CPU Type: PowerPC G5 (3.1)
Number Of CPUs: 2
CPU Speed: 2.7 GHz
L2 Cache (per CPU): 512 KB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 1.35 GHz
Boot ROM Version: 5.2.4f1
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT DDL:
Chipset Model: GeForce 6800 GT
Type: Display
Bus: AGP
Slot: SLOT-1
VRAM (Total): 256 MB
Vendor: nVIDIA (0×10de)
Device ID: 0×0045
Revision ID: 0×00a1
ROM Revision: 2120
December 18th, 2007 at 4:59 PM
Login no problem, stability is fine with no crashes yet, graphics do look awesome, although I must admit it takes some tweaking to get things looking easy on the eyes for me.
Is it just me, or has anyone else seen the Camera Controls appear on the login screen before logging in? - This happens on every login, and I don’t even have camera controls set to appear on screen in-world - very strange.
Running Vista X64 ultimate and it runs much better and faster than on XP with awesome frame times, even with high draw distances - Getting Vista to run is just a matter of the right combination of hardware and drivers I think.
Can’t say I can too much for the new login screen - really need access to preferences BEFORE logging in.
CPU: Intel Core 2 Series Processor (2395 MHz)
Memory: 4094 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows Vista (Build 6000)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 8800 GTS/PCI/SSE2
December 18th, 2007 at 5:00 PM
First I agree with the previous post about the preferances button being on login page. I think this is very important to have there.
Other than that I really doint crash that much. Maybe once or twice in a 6 hour period. Great client and I LOVE how things look with it!!
CPU: Intel Pentium 4 (Unknown model) (3192 MHz)
Memory: 3071 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 8600 GTS/PCI/SSE2
December 18th, 2007 at 5:05 PM
I don’t get the pretty water effects, still. Geforce 8800GT 169.21 or 169.02. I don’t see why VWR-925 is now closed. But keep trying!
December 18th, 2007 at 5:20 PM
VWR-3258 NOT fixed; still get vertex rendering errors (ATI X800XT, Windows XP). The triangle render glitches seem less extreme; however, they’re still present. And disabling vertex buffer objects isn’t an acceptable or even usable fix, as it causes a serious drop in framerate (by as much as 75%).
December 18th, 2007 at 5:21 PM
Login Problems with new version? Vortex #82 has the solution! Thx. To clarify: Right click on Windlight icon. On target line go past -set SystemLanguage en-us and enter: -login firstname lastname password. Next time you log on you will bypass log in screen. But fixing the bug would be much better.
December 18th, 2007 at 5:31 PM
Hey all. We’re going to be pushing out a newer viewer ASAP. We had grabbed most of our “1.18.6 RC” code from early on in that branch- this new one should include much more updated code.
Plus, for those of you concerned about Preferences at login, just go to edit->preferences. Still there!
December 18th, 2007 at 5:41 PM
Thanks for the continued work with WindLight Pastrami. Echoing earlier comments, the login screen is extremely cumbersome and slaps 30 seconds before I’m even able to click CONNECT.
Appreciate the work nonetheless.
December 18th, 2007 at 5:45 PM
okies… thanks for all the work of you and your team Pastrami
December 18th, 2007 at 6:41 PM
Great Work!
The last fix yesterday got me back on line with windlight!
The new Windlight loads textures allot quicker even in laggy full sims.
Its performance is notably more efficient in loading objects and the use of physics is stable.
My inventory and AV has loaded reliably over that last clients.
I do hope future developments will retain performance.
Great effort and much appreciated!
Thank You!
,,,=^_^=,,,
December 18th, 2007 at 7:28 PM
Constant:
*”%20″ problem in version number on login form,
*0.5 fps with Atmospheric Shaders on (10-15 fps off),
*Only terrain in MiniMap–objects not visible,
Intermitant:
*Crash to desktop while moving camera view,
*Crash during friends’ TP request.
CPU: PowerPC 7450 (1666 MHz)
Memory: 1536 MB
OS Version: Darwin 8.11.0 Darwin Kernel Version 8.11.0: Wed Oct 10 18:26:00 PDT 2007; root:xnu-792.24.17~1/RELEASE_PPC Power Macintosh
Graphics Card Vendor: ATI Technologies Inc.
Graphics Card: ATI Radeon 9600 XT 128 MB OpenGL Engine
OpenGL Version: 1.5 ATI-1.4.18
LLMozLib Version: 1.1.0 (Mozilla GRE:1.8.0.12_0000000000)
Packets Lost: 95/2983 (3.2%)
December 18th, 2007 at 7:31 PM
On my laptop (ATI Mobility Radeon X300), the clouds and great streaks of the sky render as bright yellow. This doesn’t seem to be what is supposed to be happening.
December 18th, 2007 at 8:18 PM
Hi
Thanks for making such a long post ^^
I seem to have little problems with extra crashes, compared to the other viewers.
Windows XP
AMD Athlon ™ 64 dual
2.20 GHz
2.00 GB
NVIDEA GeForce 7600 GS
The only problem WL gives here, is not showing all avatars, about one in every 10 remains invisible, I just see their name floating.
@75 I agree on the lights beeing overdone in WL, but luckily Pastrami will be covering the issue in one of the next blogs!
The skies are amazing btw, ive set my clouds and sky to be pinkish and move all the time it looks amazing!
December 18th, 2007 at 8:59 PM
Pastrami -
Changed video card from an AMD x1300 256 to an nVidia GF8800GT 512. While framerate is vastly improved, I still cannot get reflective water. I set it to the second plague or valdez, looks like old water on surface, but undewater is colored. So its half-way working Machine specs
CPU: Intel Pentium 4 (Unknown model) (3211 MHz)
Memory: 3199 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows Vista (Build 6000)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 8800 GT/PCI/SSE2
OpenGL Version: 2.1.2
LLMozLib Version: 1.1.0 (Mozilla GRE:1.8.0.12_0000000000)
Packets Lost: 32/81241 (0.0%)
Viewer Digest: d2ed7558-bab3-a37b-8963-464cfcfd12e0
Driver version 62.92.12.0.1 according to the install CD (eVGA) and the properties menu. Should I upgrade drivers? I am seeing on the forums that NVIDIA forceware of the newer versions has issues that prevent running the client. Advice?
December 18th, 2007 at 9:41 PM
I’m thrilled that VWR-925 is fixed (YAY) but my bigger concern is very slow loading of textures and sculpted prims - even when FPS are decent (they’re only about 10% lower than in the main viewer for me). Sculpted attachments (hair, boots, etc.) can sometimes just stay unrezzed for many minutes, even with few avatars in the vicinity.
Doing things like shopping - waiting for the vendor textures to rez - is prohibitively slow. It feels like it did a year ago when the first First Look was introduced and rendering priority was backwards.
Not sure if there is a general Jira entry on slow rezzing of textures and sculpties…but it not, I’ll create.
December 18th, 2007 at 10:00 PM
Having zero problems with the new client.
Gillian, before you blame the rez lag on Windlight. Keep in mind when you install a new version of the windlight client, your texture cache is automatically cleared out. Also your preferences may revert to default, like your maximum bandwidth will go back to 500. Make sure you set that back to what you normally have it as (1500) and textures will load up much quicker.
I have noticed the main login pages looks totally different. The drop down menus at the top are present (Windows version) which normally isn’t shown till I’m logged in. much less cluttered.
I haven’t noticed the invisible avatar problem anymore, yay!
System:
Athlon 64 x2 4800+ (2.5ghz dual core)
2Gb RAM dual channel
GeForce 6800 GS 256m PCIe x16
Windows XP Pro SP2
December 18th, 2007 at 10:51 PM
Really like the preferences option back at login so we can crank back settings or clear cache if having problems getting in
December 18th, 2007 at 10:52 PM
[...] wurde im blog von LindenLabs der neue Windlight Viewer vorgestellt, mit den neusten bugfixes, die fehler bei dem apple viewer und diversen ati karten [...]
December 18th, 2007 at 11:29 PM
75173 was the most stable client I ever had - and 75762 now crashed regularly…
CPU: Intel Core 2 Series Processor (2666 MHz)
Memory: 3071 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 8600 GT/PCI/SSE2
December 18th, 2007 at 11:54 PM
thanks for fixing the shiny problem on ATi cards, although water doesn’t work the new windlight is now atleast useable, thanks for the bug fix!
i noticed earlier comments about people complaining thier system can’t run WL and how they wouldn’t be able to get on etc, well, the WL client still has the option to use the old sky setup so theres no problem there. my 3 year old computer can run WL on high settings so am not sure how people can’t run it :/