So where are these great water effects?

[HUMPERS]

Well, i bought an Asus geforce 4 MX 440 to try to improve graphics in general & in particular the water effects. I can't say i notice any difference to my old card a MSI starforce MX400.
The sea just looks like a mattress with a few dimples on it.I was limited to my choice of card as my M/B could only take a 4x graphics card.I installed the gf4mxdsp zip & changed the display cfg with the lines suggested by Bridon & W. Sieffert but i can't see any noticeable improvement. Can you post a shot of your improved water graphics so i can get an idea of what i'm missing? Cheers Rod H

[bilbo]

Forgive me for sounding arrogant but was that really an upgrade?
Bilbo

[HUMPERS]

Yeah, o.k. fair enough. I suppose it was the cheap way, but should'nt i see a tiny improvement?

[JSkorna]

You should return the card and get your money back. Your MB will support any card out there. How much can you afford?

[link:hifi.avsim.net/activesky|http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg]

[Holliday]

At least once a week someone comes here AFTER buying an MX video card and find out the cards are not made for games. Period. You can find work-arounds for your problems, but the bottom line is you bought your grandma's video card. Research first, then buy.

http://www.edknapp.net/sim/ibanez.gif[link:www.edknapp.net|My Site]

Ne frustra vixisse videar.
Tycho Brahe

[FS2002tipster]

LAST EDITED ON Feb-26-03 AT 03:20AM (EST)[p]>At least once a week someone
>comes here AFTER buying an
>MX video card and find
>out the cards are not
>made for games. Period.
> You can find work-arounds
>for your problems, but the
>bottom line is you bought
>your grandma's video card.
>Research first, then buy.


Errr....what??

Just because the MX cards don't have the same speed as the non-MX versions hardly means they're unsuitable for games. I have the GFF 440MX and it works just fine. Maybe it's not the fastest card on the block, but I have everything expcept autogen at Max (that's on dense) and my sim runs smoothly with GREAT looking graphics. That's with an Athlon xp1800 btw.

To the person who posted the original query, if you're water isn;t actually moving, you haven't got the right driver number in the display.cfg entry that you added. For your card it's normally:

[000010DE:00000171]
DriverValidate2=1

If that's what you have in and the water isn't moving, change the 171 to 172 and, if still no success, 173. It should be one of those.

http://www.flightsim.com/dcforum/User_files/3df785f7187467a2.jpg

http://rtw2003.tripod.com

[flight_path]

>At least once a week someone
>comes here AFTER buying an
>MX video card and find
>out the cards are not
>made for games. Period.
> You can find work-arounds
>for your problems, but the
>bottom line is you bought
>your grandma's video card.
>Research first, then buy.
>

Maybe Ed will be kind enough to list all the cards that are made for gaming. That way it will give the prospective purchaser somewhere to start considering which card may be suitable for them.

I myself, today, looked at an MSI GF4 Ti4600 128mb card, which will cost me the equivalent of a months wages. The salesman, in his eagerness to make a sale says "yep, its for gaming, just what you need", but is it? Its still on the shelf in the shop!

A lot comes down to personal recommendations (from others), the recommendation of salespersons and the purchasers budget. So who do we take the recommendation from? You (the guys using the cards), the sales people (who are more than eager to close a sale), what we read in a review magazine or do we take for granted what the guy next door tells us?

As far as buying 'Grandma's video card goes, we all have one of those. As soon as your present card takes a back seat to a newer and better one on the market, your card is already in Grandma's basket.


Luke

[Holliday]

I can drive nails with my Sig but that doesn't make it a good hammer. MX cards will run video games, but so will on board graphics chips. There not made with gamers in mind. Pick anything else without the "MX" designation. A GeForce 4 of any flavor that isn’t an MX would be fine, as would a recent ATI card. Flight simulator fans are not always gamers. If you want hardcore advice about hardcore performance find real gamers and ask them.
You get exactly what you pay for. If it was cheap, expect performance to match.


http://www.edknapp.net/sim/ibanez.gif[link:www.edknapp.net|My Site]

Ne frustra vixisse videar.
Tycho Brahe

[flight_path]

I agree with you Ed, when you say "You get exactly what you pay for. If it was cheap, expect performance to match". Thats why the MSI GF Ti4600 128mb card I looked at today is still on the shelf. At $810 its too cheap. Thats 'too cheap for me but expensive for others who are in the market for a new card.

It is interesting to note that a couple of years back, some computer manufacturers were putting thier products out on the market as Computers built for the gaming enthusiast, all inclusive with a MX card. The MX card must have been the popular choice of the day. For some manufacturers, it looks like it still is, to some extent.

This is an example of what I have just read on a computer manufacturers website:

2.0GHz AMD Athlon 2400+ processor
512MB PC2100 DDR memory
64MB DDR NVIDIA GeForce4 MX with TV-out graphics card

This is a computer built for the 'family' man, average user and gaming enthusiast.

Is it any wonder that people choose the MX card when they see and read the specifications (like above)whilst browsing for a new computer? or just browsing?

It doesn't matter what is "the best thing since sliced bread" today, because tomorrow it is old and stale.


Luke

[Trev]

I have just bought a Gainward Geforce 4 4200 TI 64mb DDR ram 8x AGP and it runs fine on my 4x AGP mother board. If you read the specs. you will see that a Geforce 4 4200 will run on 1x 2x 4x and 8x AGP mother boards.

Trevor

http://users.actrix.co.nz/trevw/new_zeaC.gif
New Zealand

[Bigshot]

There's only one video card made for playing games the way they were ment to be played. Need I say what that card is?? Nah, no need. Everybody knows which card it is.

Now, I just purchased a GF4MX440 64mb card. Why, you say. Well, it was dirt cheap, and it's destined for my wife's Dell PIV 1.6gig 512mb SDRam machine running XP Home. She uses her machine for digital photography which also includes digital video editing. The MX440 should handle that just fine. The card is replacing her former GF2MX32mb card. She also uses her machine for Spider Solitare which can be extremely demanding. Especially on the mouse. There's a time and a place for everything.

Alienware PIV 2.53 533mhz; Dragon Full Tower 340 Watt PS; 512mb PC-1066 Ram; Intel D850EMV2 Mobo; ATI Radeon 9700 Pro 128mb; 40 gig Western Digital 7200; Koolmax Cooling; SB Audigy 5.1; 16x/48x DVD-Rom; (FS2k2 Running at 16x12x32 4xAA & 16xAF locked at 22fps.)

[HUMPERS]

Okay boys,okay. i get the message very amusing & helpful too. but I'm skint (English slang for flat broke)
I am going to keep going to work (unloading those ##### B1900's) & save up then go for an upgrade. I'll ask you guys when the time comes as things are always improving/changing.
Meantime if i go for the stuff i'd really like now, its the Divorce Courts for me.
Cheers
Rod

[bilbo]

BTW..in all of this .
You should be seeing reflections on the water and shimmering/moving water with surf crashing near the shores. It's not like I have all that money here myself. I have an old GF2 MX32 and she shows these things fine with 50FPS in the country and 15 on default Meigs load.
Athlon 2000+XP w/256 DDR. I had these effects with the same card and an older Athlon Tbird 1000ghz setup
It's hard to post shots because many of these efects are moving.
Have you been advised about turning on a few setings in FS2002?
So what is your processor and RAM amount?
Bilbo

[HUMPERS]

Well, its an AMD XP 1800 with 512 DDR. Soltek M/B
The sea does move & I can see waves lapping on the shore so maybe i'm getting all i can from the card. Its just that the ocean does'nt look that real to me. Its kind of dimpled & no noticeable waves. The reason i'm dissapointed is several years ago a mate had a sub game & the sea effects were great.So am i expecting too much?

[Bird_Is_My_Copilot]

As everyone else in this thread has said the GForce 4MX series of cards are not that good for gaming.
And as you have posted in this thread the GForce 4TI series of cards is beyond your budget.
Have you looked at the GForce 3TI series of video cards yet?
I just upgraded the onboard GForce 2MX (half way between MX 200 and MX 400,Nforce motherboard,32Mb. shared with system memory)with a Gainward GForce 3TI450 Jumbo Golden Sample 128 Mb.(GF 3TI 200 with factory overclock) video card for right at $100 U.S. and I am very happy with the improvement in visual quality and framerate.
You might be able to find a Gforce 3TI card to fit within your budget.
Hope This Helps
Peace
Mike B

[FS2002tipster]

If myour sea is animated, you have the driver interface working correctly.

The FS2002 seas are far from realistic in terms of waves. You have as much as you're going to get in this version of FS I'm afraid.

http://www.flightsim.com/dcforum/User_files/3df785f7187467a2.jpg

http://rtw2003.tripod.com

[dohcmark8]

LAST EDITED ON Feb-28-03 AT 06:24AM (EST)[p]If a geforce4ti is beyone your budget, look at ATi, the Radeon 8500,9100 (same thing, rebadged) and 9000, they are all faster than gf3ti500 but slower than gf4ti4200, in between, i must say. The 8500/9100 can be forund for $70 online easily, and the 9000 for $100, though i must say the 9000 is slightly slower than the 8500/9100.


flight_path/ALL LISTEN-: THERE is NO reason to get a ti4600 at the moment, why? Because within the next month nvidia will release the mainstream performance versions of the GeforceFX, the NV31 should perform above ti4600 at only $200. If you want a really good card, take a look at the ATi radeon 9500Pro, it's faster than the ti4600 and cheaper, only $200, the standard 9500 sells for $160 and it's still faster than a ti4600 with AA and AF on. If you don't like Ati, pick up a $120 ti4200 as you won't notice much of a performance difference between a ti4200 and ti4600. ATis drivers are now superb, nearing nvidia quality. But please check out this link, and reconsider, don't let your bias get in the way of getting a better product.

9500Pro- [http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1756&p=1]

I'm not trying to sell you a 9500, but if your looking at a ti4600 get a ti4200 and spend the $100 on more ram or something.

[bilbo]

I think that you have it working OK. You don't really see waves with height to them as far as I know. The best physical motion animation that you might notice is a rocking motion with a float plane if you are sitting on the water stopped. You really aren't going to get "Perfect Storm" sized waves if you input the correct meteorological data. I guess that MS considers this to be a "Flight" simulator and not a sea/sailing sim. There is a web site that had some alternate ocean textures that would represent waves that can be changed with the direction of the wind and such. It looked neat but I don't get into doing all the myriad of preperations to setting up the sim so that all of these features are perfect. I just like the flying and oh..yes the plane creating.
Bilbo

[Edd1]

How do you know if your pc is campatible with these newer cards. I presently use GE Force 2 MX 400 64mb Thanks Ed

[JSkorna]

If your MB has an AGP slot any of these will work.

[link:hifi.avsim.net/activesky|http://hifi.avsim.net/activesky/images/wxrebeta.jpg]

[Edd1]

Thank you very much................Edd1

[HUMPERS]

Yes, i think you're right. Its "As real as it gets" for this particular setup.
Thanks everyone for your input.