No..no problem georob...I've spent (literally) hours testing different configurations and settings both within and outside of EECH. I even ran a PCI-latency program and was tweaking with it for a couple hours before I realized that I have a PCI-express video card (6800) and apparently PCI-latency tweakers don't work with those types of cards..hehe.. So any benefit was merely placebo effect..and frankly I didn't see much benefit anyway.

BTW - I see the G2 server is up and running today..I managed to join the Lebanon campaign for an hour or so with no problems and flew around blowing stuff up. Good fun..except it was night in the campaign so I couldn't get many good screenshots for the review..

BeachAV8R

Did you see any other maps that opened for you Beach?

I tried the other night, for my review in Flight Journal, and Lebanon was the only one that would
let me join of the 4 I saw listed. Night came CRASHING down for me as well.

Odd transition, I thought someone shot my eyes out!

Well..I played Lebanon earlier today..but when I went to rejoin it this evening (10 hours later)..I couldn't get in..it just hung at the "requesting data" prompt or whatever. So instead I joined the Korea theater..which DID work.. Flew for a bit on that one and it was dawn at least... I guess I need to stop flying though and start writing...

BeachAV8R

That was the message I received on 2 of 4 last time, one was odd, and got in the 4th.

Tonight, however, I was able to see all 4, a Taiwan skirmish in addition to the 3 campaigns, just fine.
Will have to swoop around in one or two.

Oh, yeah, writing?

Pff-fft! My deadline is Monday, and you know what they say about the last minute...

Performance testing:
EECH2 framerates seem to be a problem on anything but high(er) end configs, at least at higher res and AA/AF turned up.
I did quite some EECH1 vs EECH2 vs Lockon performance testing yesterday.
Results were (on my rig) quite surprising.
I admit not having the fastest system on the block, a mere AMD64 3500+ / GF 6800GT - XP.
However it does run LockOn nicely (occasional LO hangs/OS lock not taking into account:)) with acceptable framerates with the same settings as those tested with EECH1 and 2.
Some (summary of) results I came up with:
1600X1200 2AA/8AF Vsync off: EECH1-modded: 30-60 fps - EECH2: 4-23 fps
To get anywhere near acceptable framerate for EECH2 I had to set the resolution back to 1152X864 and still only got 15-30 fps (again 2AA/8AF Vsync off).
This can be my system/driver combo, but I somehow doubt it.
Any other title is playable on this setup, but EECH2 only barely.
It does come down to the fact that on a not-so-fast PC EECH1@16X12 looks at least as good or better than EECH2@lower res.
Maybe some of you can verify these framerates, but if confirmed I guess EECH2 might have a performance (gfx engine) issue.
I could not really reproduce the F8-F12 - back to F1 framerate reset as it, after a few seconds, resorts back to 'normal-slow' framerates on my machine when back to in-cockpit views.
I hope I am mistaken, but to me it sometimes seems EECH2 has 2 graphics engines on top of each other, (part of) the old EECH1-DX7, as well as a new DX9 engine surplanted on it.
I think a lot can still be improved (taking e.g. even lockon, a system stresser, as an example).
At this time it is clear to me: EECH1-modded is still a dream come true.

Can't comment yet..I'm writing the review.. I can say that I can get some pretty odd variations from hour to hour..day to day... I've spent a lot of time testing and changing settings but the results can sometimes make you scratch your head...

What are you using for measurement? The in-game FPS counter may not be that reliable, as far as I remember... Fraps was more consistent.

I only used the eech.ini 'dfr=1' setting.
I know that in e.g. EECH1 fps counter can (on occasion) go up to even 500 fps!, but in EECH2 my fps seem quite consistent with what I perceive visually (i.e. quite 'choppy', most of the time, at higher res and/or AA settings).
Anyway, this type of 'testing' is indeed only indicative and no rocket science.
It is however VERY clear EECH2 has problems with the new gfx engine, EECH1-modded on my rig is responsive and a joy (not even stuttering).

Last night my FPS counter in-game was around 600+ when it used to reside at 60. Not sure what that was all about, as I haven't changed anything that I know of.

Considering its heritage, you shouldn't be suprised if that was the case.

While it indeed uses much of the EECH code, I can with 100% certainty say that the end-result for the actual rendering pipeline for at least the terrain and the (main) helicopters is completely new to EE2. There are however likely code-paths in EE2 inherited from EECH that are more suitable for the old rendering pipeline than the new one.

That said, it seem silly that you should dip to 4fps using your rig on EE2, when I don't think it was even possible to go that low on a P3-500 (or slower) with a TNT2 on EECH. Five+ years ago.

Yep Tamlin,
I'm pretty sure there IS something wrong.
Never had those fps for any sim (except FSX).
May be my settings or particular setup.
Difficult to point the finger, but I am sure EECH2 is taxing the gfx card more than EECH1
(not necessarily a bad thing of course).
I am sure a beefier rig can handle it better, it does scale with (lower/higher) resolutions and AA quite well.

Considering it's not only using but requiring both pixel and vertex shader (see the directory EE2Data/Maps/Shaders) I think it'd surprise us both if it wasn't using more of the card. :-)


Actually, I have a pretty good system, and now even I have experienced "hickups" - every 500 or 1000ms I think (no, my disks aren't using PIO mode :-) ). I'm starting to wonder if this is an nvidia-specific thing (there are... issues), or if the G2 crew did something seriously wicked. Currently I'm leaning towards the former, but can't say anything for certain.

I'd love to see some comparable (or even not) NVIDIA and ATI card's users give some input here.

Also, not entirely unrelated, I read somewhere that at least nvidia had serious problems on dual core CPU's. One way to limit the game to one core (note: it's not functional if you use taskmanager and do it after the game is started - it must be done before the game is started!) is to start a command prompt. Then, using Task Manager you set CPU affinity to just one CPU for that command prompt process, and after that start the game from that command prompt (any process started from it inherits its setting in this area).

Example, start a command prompt. CD to the EE2 "cohokum" directory". Press Ctrl+Shift+Esc to start TaskMgr. Assuming you only have a single console window (the one you started) go to the tab Processes. Select cmd.exe. Right-click (or use shift+F10, same thing) and select "Set Affinity...". Select just one CPU. Back to the console window, just type "ee2.exe" followed by return. I don't know if will help anyone, but it's worth mentioning.