64-bit Version Test

I haven't done anything about the viewport flicker. Is it very bad? Can you describe in more detail? How long does it last? Does it happen once or more times? What kind of color do you see?

I would not say it is very bad, just not good.

IMHO, it appears to possibly be a case of a screen redraw without buffering when focus is changed between viewport(s) and each of the other windows (other windows such as visual_tools etc).


It does appear to stop after the focus as been made between the windows.

I will find time later to make a quick vid to show the issue.

Hi IStonia, All,
after following Steve's instructions things already work quite nicely on my 64bit win7 machine! There's no flicker (old Nvdia GTX 275 card)and I could for the first time display millions of polygons on screen. Awesome! With the first version I could not save .obj's but that's gone with the second version. Also with that first version I saw HUD-defects my old 32 bit Laptop (haven't checked with the second test release).

I gave it a first glance by reaching 3.14 million of polygons and 6.4GB RAM usage. Nice.
However, it crashed when I attempted to load one of my VWS scenes.

Code: [Select]

System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
   at DigitalFossil.Character.DrawFrame(FrameDerived frame, Boolean drawMaterialWithTransparent)
   at DigitalFossil.Character.DrawFrame(FrameDerived frame, Boolean drawMaterialWithTransparent)
   at DigitalFossil.Character.RenderBegin()
   at DigitalFossil.Character.Render()
   at DigitalFossil.BaseGraphicWindow.RenderObjectsInOrder(ArrayList charactersToRender, Boolean solid, Boolean transparent)
   at DigitalFossil.BaseGraphicWindow.RenderObjectsInOrder(Boolean solid, Boolean transparent)
   at DigitalFossil.AnimationDesign.AnimationDesignGraphicWindow.RenderObjects()
   at DigitalFossil.AnimationDesign.AnimationDesignGraphicWindow.Render()
   at DigitalFossil.BaseGraphicWindow.Render3DEnvironment()
   at DigitalFossil.BaseGraphicWindow.FullRenderDetail(Boolean forced)Something with instances. This scene has a bunch of them.

I didn't notice any flickering yet.

I think the new x64 version wipes the material library clean. I had several custom materials defined, but now have none.

Hi rubberduck,

I didn't notice any flickering yet.

What graphics card / drivers do you have? What screen resolution are you using?

What about Nvil start up time?
On my setup (which is quite quick with a fast SSD), the last 32bit Nvil took 5 seconds to load. The 64bit version now take over 9 seconds. That may not sound a long time, but my system/OS will cold boot in under 8 seconds. So for a modeling application to take longer to load than my PC cold booting is excessive. (other apps, such as Wings/blender take 1 second to load).

I gave it a first glance by reaching 3.14 million of polygons and 6.4GB RAM usage. Nice.
However, it crashed when I attempted to load one of my VWS scenes.

Code: [Select]

System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
   at DigitalFossil.Character.DrawFrame(FrameDerived frame, Boolean drawMaterialWithTransparent)
   at DigitalFossil.Character.DrawFrame(FrameDerived frame, Boolean drawMaterialWithTransparent)
   at DigitalFossil.Character.RenderBegin()
   at DigitalFossil.Character.Render()
   at DigitalFossil.BaseGraphicWindow.RenderObjectsInOrder(ArrayList charactersToRender, Boolean solid, Boolean transparent)
   at DigitalFossil.BaseGraphicWindow.RenderObjectsInOrder(Boolean solid, Boolean transparent)
   at DigitalFossil.AnimationDesign.AnimationDesignGraphicWindow.RenderObjects()
   at DigitalFossil.AnimationDesign.AnimationDesignGraphicWindow.Render()
   at DigitalFossil.BaseGraphicWindow.Render3DEnvironment()
   at DigitalFossil.BaseGraphicWindow.FullRenderDetail(Boolean forced)Something with instances. This scene has a bunch of them.

I didn't notice any flickering yet.

I think the new x64 version wipes the material library clean. I had several custom materials defined, but now have none.

Can you send me the file?

Also with that first version I saw HUD-defects my old 32 bit Laptop (haven't checked with the second test release).

I now checked - the HUD with the second test release shows fine on xp32 and (generally)the text gets rendered much clearer than before.

Can you send me the file?

Yes, but where should I send it? info@digitalfossils.com?

Hi rubberduck,

I didn't notice any flickering yet.

What graphics card / drivers do you have? What screen resolution are you using?

Okay, I get a short blink in two cases (once per NVil session):
1. If I press ALT for the first time during the session. I use ALT for Maya-like navigation.
2. If I change viewport rendering for the first time during the session (for example: from wireframe+shaded to shaded).
But I didn't have time to test it thoroughly. So it's possible that flickering might happen on other occasions or repeat itself.
The card I'm using is GTX660Ti 3GB.

What about Nvil start up time?
On my setup (which is quite quick with a fast SSD), the last 32bit Nvil took 5 seconds to load. The 64bit version now take over 9 seconds. That may not sound a long time, but my system/OS will cold boot in under 8 seconds. So for a modeling application to take longer to load than my PC cold booting is excessive. (other apps, such as Wings/blender take 1 second to load).

It takes about 14 seconds to load 64-bit NVil on my rig (32-bit version loads in about 9 seconds). The rig is very fast and NVil sits on SSD.
For comparison - both, Blender and Silo, start in one second.

Yes, just send it to that address.

I have checked that the slow loading is due to the gui constructing. I'll look into that and see if it can be improved.

Okay, scene sent.

There's a lot of flickering when opening the material editor for the first time during the session.

Hi IStonia

Managed to get 64 bit NVil running after installing SlimDX but it won't load any of my previous NVil files and won't create any primitives(tried cube and sphere but nothing appears in the viewport).

Cheers
Mal

Ok, this update has fixed the file loading bug reported by rubberduck.

http://www.digitalfossils.com/Download/NVil-Jan-03-14.rar
Prerequisites : A need to download/install end user runtime(for slimDX) http://slimdx.org/download.php (the .net 2 download)

Hi IStonia

Managed to get 64 bit NVil running after installing SlimDX but it won't load any of my previous NVil files and won't create any primitives(tried cube and sphere but nothing appears in the viewport).

Cheers
Mal

Mal, can you make a video so I may have some idea what may go wrong? Also please try the latest update and see if it works.

 I now see the flickering when pressing F5 to enter Fullscreen. All overlays like the HUD but also the Axis symbol on the right blink rapidly for about 1-2 seconds until Fullscreen is established. I also notice long startup-times - up to 12 seconds (Jan 02 version on win7 64). An earlier 32 bit version needs 7 seconds on the same machine. I think it would look more attractive/professional when the whole initialization process was somehow hidden. So that one looked at the splashscreen (could someone please fix the transparency of that Logo image?) and maybe some neutral background graphic until everything is prepared. A compoarable logic could get applied to switching to fullscreen.
On startup one currently can follow the whole process - how a a quad viewport layout gets created at small scale first, then those viewports resize to the screen resolution, again later user preferences get read and the program figures to switch to a maximized viewport etc... On my machine the program "forgets" a minimized version of Smart Tips, although this panel is set to "never show" in View/Tool Helper Options (this is also the case in earlier 32 bit builds). Not a big issue but maybe there's potential for some cleanup.

In the 64 bit version I also see some shader-stair-stepping problems.

Ok, this update has fixed the file loading bug reported by rubberduck.

Super. Thank you!

In the 64 bit version I also see some shader-stair-stepping problems.

I saw this visual problem happen plenty of times in 32-bit version. Can be easier observed when an object is subdivided or is relatively high poly. It's caused by lights in the scene (Light Tool).