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Old 10-10-2008, 06:22 PM   #1
Ex_Brit
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Fish a little jerky

This is a brilliant creation, my compliments.

I'm experiencing a little bit of jerkiness in the fish movement.

I've tried so far all fish, all random fish, no bubbles (that only cancelled their sound, not the visual) and no music - still a little jerky.
The screensaver seemed to use a fair amount of CPU resources as my temp sensors showed a marked increase.

Windows version Vista Ultimate SP1 x86
Memory RAM 4gb (Windows sees 3300mb)
Graphics Card/Chipset nVidia GeForce 7600GS (actually PNY Verto - same deal)
Monitor and Resolution Viewsonic VX2240W 22" LCD at 1680 x 1050
Peter
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Old 10-10-2008, 06:54 PM   #2
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There are several things you could try. I'm not sure which type of "jerkyness" you are experiencing, so I'll just try to cover them all. If it's due to a low frame rate, you could try to increase it by switching to a 16-bit resolution. You have a fairly high-end card, so I doubt if that's your problem.

You could also increase the program's "time-slice" by using the down-arrow to decrease the "Sleep()" time for each frame. When it get down to zero or -1, other programs might have trouble getting enough clock-cycles to run.

If overhead from another task is grabbing too much of the Aquarium's share of resources, you can increase the Priority by hitting the Q key. This currently just increses it one step, as my program really shouldn't steal too many clock cycles from more important ones.
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Old 10-10-2008, 07:04 PM   #3
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Strangely it seems to act that way only if I right-click the .scr and "Install", but if I just "Test" it seems to work fine.

I'll play around with it some more tomorrow. I'm kind of tired right now.

Great work Jim.

Just noticed how many bounces you got to your email, wow, they don't know what they are missing...!
Peter
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Old 10-10-2008, 07:27 PM   #4
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A 7600GS is actually quite far from a high-end card (It's roughly 25% slower than a 7600GT though the names are so similar). Could you try and lower the resolution to 1440x900 (I know it's not the native resolution so it will be a bit blurry) and see if the jekyness persists. What number of FPS are you seeing right now?
Thanks to Morgan, Tiny Snapshots is up and running again with "Tiny Järvafält" as the latest addition – Go have a look and tell me what you think.

"We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried, most people were silent.
I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and to impress him takes on his multi-armed form and says,
'Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.'
I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.
" /Robert Oppenheimer on witnessing the first thermonuclear detonation in history.
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Old 10-10-2008, 07:33 PM   #5
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I would also check the driver version you are using. There might be a newer driver available for your card that might help.

The culprit might either be low resources or outdated video drivers.
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Old 10-10-2008, 10:45 PM   #6
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Make sure you aren't using a stripped down oem driver or something. Get the latest driver straight off of nvidia.com. That's the first thing I would check. Since MA3 also uses the audio, I'd say it's not a bad idea to make sure you have latest audio drivers too.
Bat rays? We don't need no stinking bat rays!
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Old 10-11-2008, 05:53 AM   #7
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I have all the latest drivers, both video and audio. This beta is different from a normal screensaver in that it isn't a .exe installation file. If I right-click "Test" it's fine with around 120fps, but if I right-click "Install" then the jerkiness happens @ 22-35fps. Jim's tip for increasing the time slice seems to help a bit in that stiuation but doesn't cure it.
It doesn't stay installed by the way. Next time I want it I have to go to where I stored it and start over.

I'm not going to even go there with the reduced resolution, with my eyesight that is not a possibility, sorry.
Peter
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Old 10-11-2008, 06:24 AM   #8
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you can put the screen saver and playlist in X:\Windows\System32 and it will stay "installed" in your drop down menu for choosing the screensaver. Your computer should be able to run this saver w/o any problems. I would make sure you are uninstalling previous versions of drivers before installing the newer versions. Also make sure you're using WHQL approved drivers, as beta, or other releases may have issues still unresolved.
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Old 10-11-2008, 06:46 AM   #9
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Playlist? Please explain. I'm not using anything beta so that's not an issue.
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Old 10-11-2008, 06:49 AM   #10
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Remember this IS NOT a final product, only a Beta to test for problems. It has a finite expiration date, a week I think. If you are not very familiar with Windows and folders and so on, do not go to tons of troubles trying to install it as you will need another version shortly.

The final release that goes on sale will have an installer included that will place the program properly on your system.
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Old 10-11-2008, 07:23 AM   #11
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Of course, I understand that. I wasn't trying to make a bit deal out of it, but Jim did want feedback.
I'm sure all will be fine with the final product.
Peter
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Old 10-11-2008, 10:38 AM   #12
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When you run the program, it creates a file called "Playlist.lst" in the same directory where the Aquarium is. If you add your own music, it gets put into this list. The final version will probably keep this info in the Registry instead of a separate file.
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Old 10-11-2008, 10:45 AM   #13
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Aha, thanks for explaining that.
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