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Troubleshooting crashes: Difference between revisions
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By default, FlightGear 2.6+ will assume a certain runtime environment and certain GPU features which may not be suppported by most older cards (e.g. shader support), such as GeForce 6/7 generation hardware and most older hardware (older than say 4-5 years), so that it can be expected that FG will probably not work on such computers "out of the box" and may get terminated by your operating system eventually, i.e. the default startup settings will need to be customized accordingly, to disable all unsupported default features. See [[Hardware Recommendations]] for more details. | By default, FlightGear 2.6+ will assume a certain runtime environment and certain GPU features which may not be suppported by most older cards (e.g. shader support), such as GeForce 6/7 generation hardware and most older hardware (older than say 4-5 years), so that it can be expected that FG will probably not work on such computers "out of the box" and may get terminated by your operating system eventually, i.e. the default startup settings will need to be customized accordingly, to disable all unsupported default features. See [[Hardware Recommendations]] for more details. | ||
In such cases, it is important to start up FlightGear with "minimum settings", and start re-enabling features step by step, to see what settings are supported by your hardware. You may want to raise the FlightGear log level, so that you get to see where the program stops starting/working [http://wiki.flightgear.org/Howto:Improve_framerates#Debugging.2Flog_level]. | In such cases, it is important to start up FlightGear with "minimum settings", and start re-enabling features step by step, to see what settings are supported by your hardware. You may want to raise the FlightGear log level, so that you get to see where the program stops starting/working [http://wiki.flightgear.org/Howto:Improve_framerates#Debugging.2Flog_level], and what it was doing before it got terminated. | ||
This article will detail the steps required to disable most "eye candy" features, so that people can experiment with different settings, and come up with a list of supported settings for their particular hardware. | This article will detail the steps required to disable most "eye candy" features, so that people can experiment with different settings, and come up with a list of supported settings for their particular hardware. | ||
These settings are really just intended to provide a minimal startup profile, with ALL eye candy disabled by default - so that FG doesn't crash due to lack of certain features (OpenGL, shaders etc). In order to change this, you need to really optimize all settings and then start enabling working | These settings are really just intended to provide a minimal startup profile, with ALL eye candy disabled by default - so that FG doesn't crash due to lack of certain features (OpenGL, shaders etc) and you get a "bare settings" FlightGear window. This is not directly intended to get you flying, it's only intended to identify incompatible default settings, so that you can customize your startup settings accordingly. In order to change this, you need to really optimize all settings and then start enabling working features again and again, i.e. trial and error - to see what settings are working, and which don't work. | ||
What all | What all the following settings do, is ensuring that the least complex aircraft and scenery location are picked, so that startup shouldn't fail due to aircraft/scenery at all. The ufo is the least complex aircraft, by default the c172p with a 3D cockpit would be used. | ||
It makes sense to keep using the ufo until you have optimized all settings accordingly and found out what's working and what isn't, i.e. don't even touch the aircraft settings or the location settings (airport, azimuth, offset) until you have really optimized everything else already. | |||
Once you have done that, I'd suggest to look at aircraft with 2D panels - such as the c172p-2dpanel or other simple aircraft (TODO: list of aircraft with 2D panels). | '''Please''', only touch the aircraft/location settings '''after''' having optimized everything else already, and after ensuring that you are getting good frame rates (>= 30 fps). | ||
Basically, if you are not getting frame rates '''much''' higher than 100 fps with the "Level 0" startup profile, then using complex aircraft (777,787) or scenery (KSFO, KLSV etc) will be next to impossible with your system. | |||
Once you have done that, I'd suggest to look at aircraft with 2D panels - such as the c172p-2dpanel or other simple aircraft (TODO: list of aircraft with 2D panels). It is very well possible that you need to find a combination of features and aircraft/locations that your system can handle without killing the FlightGear process. | |||
Keep in mind that using certain features such as the AI traffic system or multiplayer support, will further increase your system's load. | |||
If you need help with the whole process, please get in touch via the FG forums. | If you need help with the whole process, please get in touch via the FG forums. | ||
When doing that, please document the whole process, i.e. including: | When doing that, please fully document the whole process, i.e. including: | ||
* startup settings (and fgfsrc if used) | * startup settings (and fgfsrc if used) | ||
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As can be seen, additional resources can be freed by flying in areas without scenery (ocean tiles), and by using simple aircraft like the ufo. And by using a HUD instead of a 2D/3D cockpit panel. | As can be seen, additional resources can be freed by flying in areas without scenery (ocean tiles), and by using simple aircraft like the ufo. And by using a HUD instead of a 2D/3D cockpit panel. | ||
== Reporting incompatible default settings == | == Reporting incompatible default settings == | ||
Once you have located and identified settings that seem to cause reproducible crashes with your hardware, it would be a good idea to report these settings using the issue tracker, so that these can hopefully be made optional in the upcoming release: http://flightgear-bugs.googlecode.com/ | Once you have located and identified settings that seem to cause reproducible crashes with your hardware, it would be a good idea to report these settings using the issue tracker, so that these can hopefully be made optional in the upcoming release: http://flightgear-bugs.googlecode.com/ | ||