Glboom+ and Fraps :(

[phobosdeimos1]

On my computer (2.8GHz Intel Celeron 256MB DDr, Intel Extreme graphics 64MB dynamically shared video memory)

Zdoom works perfectly with fraps and records really smoothly even at high resolution,

however, with Glboom+, it just freezes for about 5 seconds when I press record, then the FPS flashes red for about half a second, then it returns to the normal pre-recording yellow FPS meter.

anyone else have this similar problem?

I've tried lowering the framerate to even 1 FPS, and it just doesn't seem to want to record Glboom+.

[entryway]

Do you compare software zdoom and hardware glboom on your Extreme Graphics?

Read the manual about "-viddump" command line switch or/and try to use "-vidmode 8" with "use_gl_surface 1" in config.

[dew]

entryway said:

Do you compare software zdoom and hardware glboom on your Extreme Graphics?

i laughed

[phobosdeimos1]

dew said:

i laughed

And I don't really get the piss-take, and it sounds like you're talking "Engrish"

Anyway, I tried what you said, and even read up and downloaded those apps for vidumping.

The point is, why is Fraps not even having a half-hearted attempt at recording? Surely, even if I can't record a good quality Glboom+ .avi, it should merely do just that: Record a bad video, but no, it refuses to record whatsoever.

[natt]

phobosdeimos1 said:

The point is, why is Fraps not even having a half-hearted attempt at recording? Surely, even if I can't record a good quality Glboom+ .avi, it should merely do just that: Record a bad video, but no, it refuses to record whatsoever.

I wrote the viddump system in prboom-plus precisely so that people using even the most pathetic computers imaginable could capture smooth videos with no dropped frames and perfect AV sync. I suggest you take advantage of what's available to you rather than complain about fraps.

[Graf Zahl]

phobosdeimos1 said:

And I don't really get the piss-take,

natt said:

I wrote the viddump system in prboom-plus precisely so that people using even the most pathetic computers imaginable could capture smooth videos with no dropped frames and perfect AV sync.

That's why!

The bottom line is that your system is pretty much bottom of the barrel for hardware accelerated Doom ports. All the CPU speed won't help you with a graphics chip that would have been considered slow 10 years ago.

And then you expect a resource hog like Fraps to work on top of that?

[phobosdeimos1]

Graf Zahl said:

That's why!

The bottom line is that your system is pretty much bottom of the barrel for hardware accelerated Doom ports. All the CPU speed won't help you with a graphics chip that would have been considered slow 10 years ago.

And then you expect a resource hog like Fraps to work on top of that?

i don't really know much about hardware, but glboom+ runs extremely smoothly on my comp..

I'm actually able to record it at 25fps on Camstudio, so I don't see why Fraps wouldn't work considering it's alot faster than Camstudio

[Graf Zahl]

No idea. Maybe Fraps doesn't like your graphics card. I have a system much faster than yours and there's no chance I could ever record at 25 fps with it because it slows down the system too much.

[phobosdeimos1]

Graf Zahl said:

No idea. Maybe Fraps doesn't like your graphics card. I have a system much faster than yours and there's no chance I could ever record at 25 fps with it because it slows down the system too much.

Ah fairdoos man, ah I wish I could have one of those custom built gaming computers. My computer seems to be pretty good for dooming and it was my friends old one so I got it for free. The one thing that makes me not want a new PC is the fact that I wouldn't be able to keep XP, as I hate Windows 7.

Would XP work on a powerful new gaming PC?

[Use]

phobosdeimos1 said:

Would XP work on a powerful new gaming PC?

No, it would explode.

Of course it will work, however you'd be limited to DX9. Not ideal, but those are the XP ropes.

[Xaser]

phobosdeimos1 said:

The one thing that makes me not want a new PC is the fact that I wouldn't be able to keep XP, as I hate Windows 7.

Why is this? Is there a specific reason for not wanting to switch (e.g. a compatibility issue with a much-loved program)? Most of the reasons people don't want to switch really stem from silly or paranoid reasons, from what I've seen. Is there anything vital to you that XP provides that Win 7 doesn't? You can turn off all the 'fancy' things like Aero and set up a classic theme, if that's what bugs you.

One can debate all day whether or not upgrading to Windows 7 from an existing XP installation is worth it, but there's usually no reason to opt for the older version when getting a new system.

[Marnetmar]

phobosdeimos1 said:

Ah fairdoos man, ah I wish I could have one of those custom built gaming computers. My computer seems to be pretty good for dooming and it was my friends old one so I got it for free. The one thing that makes me not want a new PC is the fact that I wouldn't be able to keep XP, as I hate Windows 7.

Would XP work on a powerful new gaming PC?

Windows 7 is a very good operating system, it's nothing like Vista if that's what you're afraid of.

Windows XP would work, but it would actually run slower on the newer hardware (I can't seem to remember the explanation for this, perhaps someone else knows), it's much less secure and is becoming extremely difficult to get a copy of.

[Graf Zahl]

Marnetmar said:

Windows 7 is a very good operating system, it's nothing like Vista if that's what you're afraid of.

The badness of Vista is vastly overrated. My computer has been working fine for almost 4 years now.

[boris]

Graf Zahl said:

No idea. Maybe Fraps doesn't like your graphics card. I have a system much faster than yours and there's no chance I could ever record at 25 fps with it because it slows down the system too much.

I got no such problems, I can record (G)ZDoom and GLBoom-plus at 60 fps in 1920x1200.

[ReFracture]

Graf Zahl said:

The badness of Vista is vastly overrated. My computer has been working fine for almost 4 years now.

The only legitimate complaints were that it was a sluggish on a machine that ran xp smoothly and that the driver support just wasn't that great.

Fast forward to just before 7 came out and that is all a non-issue. My buddies like to refer to Windows 7 as a pay-for Windows Vista service pack. I do not disagree.

But back on topic, natt's solution is what you should use. You could record a nuts3.wad at 60fps at 1920x1080 on a pentium III 866 mhz. Mind you it would take a long time but his solution was meant to get a quality video regardless of wait time.

[entryway]

Mike.Reiner said:

But back on topic, natt's solution is what you should use. You could record a nuts3.wad at 60fps at 1920x1080 on a pentium III 866 mhz.

at 35 fps

[ReFracture]

entryway said:

at 35 fps

Ah, my bad.

[Retog]

At least fraps works with glboom but fraps won't even record in prboom :(

[Gez]

Marnetmar said:

Windows 7 is a very good operating system, it's nothing like Vista if that's what you're afraid of.

It's Vista SP2. Differences with Vista SP1 include:

• Slightly faster boot-up time
  
• Ribbon interface on Paint and other small utilities, because
  
• Calculator now split into three different modes (advanced replaced by separate "scientific" and "programmer" modes)
  
• Quick Launch bar removed, its function is merged into the task bar now
  

In other words, only a few cosmetic changes which people are as likely to loathe as they are to like; and something that personally I do not find very relevant (I use hibernate/wake instead of stop/start pretty much all the time unless rebooting is really required).

[Maes]

Marnetmar said:

Windows XP would work, but it would actually run slower on the newer hardware (I can't seem to remember the explanation for this, perhaps someone else knows), it's much less secure and is becoming extremely difficult to get a copy of.

Pure FUD.

It would only work "slower" if you have the advantages of a 64-bit address space in mind (with more than 4 GB of RAM, ofc), but there are all indications of Windows 7/Vista 32-bit being slower than XP, e.g. in tasks such as file copying. PLus, more crap being loaded by default into RAM and more processes running == slower, no matter how you try painting it. I will never believe that a stock 7/Vista installation can actually beat a stock XP SP3 installation in any significant benchmark. You'll get more or less the same scores, in the best case scenario.

32-bit XP is still very common and accounts for 30% of all OS usage, 64-bit XP OTOH...that's a rare beast, and poorly supported, if ever.

[entryway]

Retog said:

At least fraps works with glboom but fraps won't even record in prboom :(

glboom-plus + software mode + "use GL surfase"

[Retog]

entryway said:

glboom-plus + software mode + "use GL surfase"

What? I'm not sure what you mean.

[wesleyjohnson]

Still running XP here too (recently upgraded from Win98), and would not install Vista if it was offered for free, and probably not Win7 either.
You have to be a limp user to use those without problems. Their setup fights with any hacking on your machine.
Still some Win3.1 users around on some limited industrial applications.

[Graf Zahl]

Maes said:

PLus, more crap being loaded by default into RAM and more processes running == slower,

Sorry, that's nonsense.
More 'crap' being loaded into RAM, presuming you got sufficient of it, would rather make the system faster rather than slower because less HD access is needed.

Unused RAM is a waste of perfectly good resources so if some performance meter shows 90% free RAM, something is going wrong.

As for more processes, as long as they sit at 0% CPU time - meaning they are waiting for some external signal - it doesn't really matter. And most system processes do.

[Maes]

Graf Zahl said:

More 'crap' being loaded into RAM, presuming you got sufficient of it, would rather make the system faster rather than slower because less HD access is needed.

Sorry, that's nonsense.

More executable crap being loaded into memory (not just passive data) that eventually gets its own CPU time, would rather make the system slower rather than faster because, well, more CPU time would be used just to keep all those "idle" processes and services going. If HD access is involved too (like it too often is), that just makes things worse.

But don't take my word for it. As always, I invite you to do your own research, and take a look at the table of processes of a fresh XP installation vs the one of Vista or 7. And no, it has nothing to do with SuperFetch, precaching, preloading or whatever: even if you disable that, there is still more crap (processes) even when idling, and those definitively don't come for free.

Doomworld: The only place where you have to debate that less stuff to do is not necessarily, well, less stuff to do. But then again I've heard someone claiming that a faster GPU serves no purpose whatsoever, too...so this is the BIG LEAGUES, baby ;-)

[DaniJ]

This is a topic that can't really even be debated without bringing in the technical details and mechanics of the underlying implementation of threads and kernel level scheduling strategies on specific platforms.

However, from a high-level and somewhat naive outlook: using more RAM should generally result in better performance if used correctly.

[Graf Zahl]

Well...

counting processes on my currently running Win7 with no application open: 22
counting processes of stuff that's not part of the system: 10

So, there's 12 system related processes running right now. The rest is drivers I installed or background processes for software I use.
Hardly an issue.
My old Vista system had a lot more active processes, including several svchost.exe's (which don't seem to exist in Win7) so something must have been improved since then.

XP's process list also wasn't shorter.

[Maes]

DaniJ said:

However, from a high-level and somewhat naive outlook: using more RAM should generally result in better performance if used correctly.

Certainly, if you use it to hold things that you actually do need, instead of swapping out to disk all the time. It has always been like this, with every OS conceivable to mankind, and AFAIK being able to use more RAM isn't some kind of great novelty that only the NEW and ENHANCED technology of Vista/7 brought us. (N.B.: this isn't about 64-bit vs 32-bit address spaces, nor the 3GB barrier of IBM-PC compatible architectures in 32-bit mode).

However, using more RAM just to accomodate for software bloat isn't quite the same thing, and certainly is not a sign of being more efficient or more performing.

[Graf Zahl]

Can you tell what part is software bloat and what part is data caching for efficiency?

I can't, but since executable code is normally only a small fraction of memory use - the system libraries are even shared between processes - most must be some kind of data.

[Maes]

Graf Zahl said:

Can you tell what part is software bloat and what part is data caching for efficiency?

Not without a profiler, but this sort of caching (services, shared libraries etc.) could be and was performed even under Windows XP, even if, admittedly, by a crude caching mechanism: you could only select "optimized for user programs" or "optimized for background services", and some apps had preloaders, e.g. MS Office, Java, etc.

The "SuperFetch" mechanism of Vista/7 OTOH uses speculative loading of what you might need. Maybe it can also be "potty trained" on the long run depending on your app usage patterns (you can even add such a functionality to XP, with e.g. EBooster), but by itself such a mechanism is not a guarantee of getting lightspeed boosts, plus it may interfere with disk usage and cause cache pollution exactly because stuff is being loaded speculatively, even when you'd rather they didn't. At least with tools such as EBooster you have some control over the caching strategy and you can even manually intervene and delete/exclude stuff from caching.

I'd take a system that uses just 10% of its total RAM but stays completely idle, only to use resources when I tell it and for what I tell it, rather than one that has a compulsive horror vacui and "must" be kept filled at all times. But maybe I'm just a dinosaur and I'm hard to buy in into all this newfangled stuff.