Problem with GL Extensions

OpenGL OpenGL: User Software
1

I am having a problem with openGL games on my brand new system. With games running on the Quake 3 Arena engine (Castle Wolf. and Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast), there are strange graphical glitches. When images are moving across the screen, mostly when I am using the mouse to look around, the graphics get broken up into horizontal sections that move at slightly different intervals. It isn’t slowdown because it happens at all screen resolutions. It is very hard to explain but I hope I am making sense. It is a relatively subtle problem but I don’t think it should be happening. I found that by turning off GL Extensions, the problem went away, but the performance of the game really suffers. There has to be a better way to fix the problem. On a related note, what are GL Extensions?

My system is a Dell Dimension 4400 with a Visiontek Geforce4 Ti 4600. And I have the lastest Nvidia drivers installed.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

2

OpenGL extensions are basically “enhancements” or extra features that can be enabled if your video card supports it.

Are you SURE you have the latest Nvidia drivers? Because I’m sure Dell will take their sweet time offering upgrades, you should make sure you get the drivers from http://www.nvidia.com

I can’t think of anything else that would be causing problems… does it only happen during online play, or all the time?

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It does happen all of the time and I did get the drivers from Nvidia’s website. It is not a serious glitch, but it is pretty annoying. Thanks for the quick reply though. I think I am going to try and put a different video card in to see if is the video card itself causing the problem. I might not be explaining the glitch very well either. Oh well.

4

Maybe you are talking about tearing? You need to enable v-sync from the control panel for your video card and maybe you can do it in the game itself. Are you running full screen or not? Running in window seems to turn off v-sync.

V-man

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Hi, I have just the same problem ! I have 3 PC home (1,4 GHZ P4 MB abit) - 1 ghz AMD MB Abit - AMD XP 1600+…I have tried a lot of videocards: Gainward GF2 mx200 - Abit GF 3 Ti200 - Gainward G4 mx 440 - Gainward gf2 450

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Sorry for my english, hope you understand it.
As I wrote, I got the same problem. I have tried as I wrote a lot of videocards it same on all of them. I agree Ender21, the graphics get broken up into horizontal sections.
If you have a building in front og you, and you look at the corners, its often draw(made) like a horizonatal line…if you now move the mouse form left to right the line will be broken into horizontal sections.

I also turned off the GL Extensions in RTCW yesterday and the it fixed the problem,…but to day it was back, it didnt help to turn it off.

I have tried with win98, win2000 and XP.

What is it ? I have talked with some people here in Norway, and some of them have it to.

My Direct 3d games also have problems, not with the lines, but if Im playing NHL2002 and move the skater from the center an out to the sides in that part, he is in a way shaking a little bit, then he get to the side and skate straight ahead again everything is OK.

Ender21, please mail me if you find out something ! I will also work on it !

It drives me crazy !!

All the best from Norway,

Erot71@yahoo.no

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Anyone?

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I also have this problem, MOHAA and ea games…anyone know what is going on?

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Anyone have any ideas ?

I know you can get into the config and change the swapinterval, but the game go much slower…

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I’d just like to put in my two cents and say that I am having the same problem with my games. Jedi Knight 2 has those tearing problems and it goes away when you turn off GL Extensions. I haven’t been able to figure out how to stop it yet, I’ll post here when/if I do.

Specs:
GeForce 4 Ti 4600 (newest drivers)
512 ram, Win XP, P4 2.2ghz

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OK FrownyFish, do that !

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my pal says there is a command in the mohaa config file…u can type in 2 clear the problem…havn’t seen him 4 a week but will post it here 2morow when i speak 2 him…he also says that in mohaa they did not include any v-sinc data …apparently the line of code he talks about sorts it!!!

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not being a wize guy but have you guys went to the program manufacture to see if they might have a fix for it…I am pretty sure they might have an anser for you

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jaminxray, yes we should maybe do that !
But its really strage, because its in a lot of games…RTCW, MOH, JEDI…and if you make a small window on your desktop in WINXP and move it fast from left to right you got the SAME problem(the “tearing”) If I set my monitor on 120 HZ its nearly gone but anyway, something is wrong !!!

So should we wrote to Microsoft, Gainward/Abit, or game ?

(have tryed win2k, win 98, winxp, P4, AMD, gf2, gf3 and gf4, every driver…riva tuner, nvmax etc etc…) Could it be a virus ?

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Originally posted by erot71:
But its really strage, because its in a lot of games…RTCW, MOH, JEDI…

Ummm…aren’t all those games based on the Quake3 engine? That would explain the similar behavior…

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Yeah, I understand that but what about this:

“and if you make a small window on your desktop in WINXP and move it fast from left to right you got the SAME problem(the “tearing”) If I set my monitor on 120 HZ its nearly gone but anyway, something is wrong ???!!!”

“in all games…using the mouse to move is jittery…its like im using a ball mouse with a lot of gunk in it. its not smooth like it should be…some games are worse than others but all are noticeable…GTA3 still TEARS like a MoFo. when i mean TEAR…i mean that it gets like 10 FPS it looks like…its absolutely unbearable and completely unplayable…”

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hey, i recently purchased the radeon 7000 ddr, and for some strange and exodic reason, when every i run the half-life opengl engine, at what ever resoulution higher than 640x480 it would run in a window, and i would only see a corner of the window. If i can get any suggestions on what to do. i was running 2k on my machine, then i went to xp, and still the same problem, I would like any suggestions you can give me. If you cant post here, email me at nick_bellamy@hotmail.com
Thanks

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Hi guys.
The problem you are talking about is pretty common. The whole point is that there is an OpenGL extension that disables V-sync, and of course it is supported by nVidia. Whatever setting you might use in your Windows display settings, your game will use the extension if it wants (and it will, since it enables to increase the computed frame rate). If the game uses the Quake3 engine (MOHAA for instance), use the console to set the appropriate variable (I know it does exist, just search in Quake3 related sites) at the appropriate value.
I hope this will help you.

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But why is the thing happen on your desktop to ?

And more:As I have wrote before, this is things I have found out:

In RTCW: If you have GL extension ON, I get FPS over my HZ,HZ set to 60, FPS at 98-99.(Tearing!!)

GL Extension OFF, FPS 60 like my monitor if I set it to 60 HZ.(NO tearing !)

If I set the swapinterval to 1, I dont rembemer but I think the tearing is gone, but the FPS drop very much to 15 fps.

In MAY MAYNE I dont have any problem.

In Direct 3d games like Ghost Recon, NHL2002, World Cup. Its like you have wrote:
“in all games…using the mouse to move is
jittery…its like im using a ball mouse with a lot of gunk in it. its not smooth like it should be…”

If I in NHL2002 skate from one side of the rink(fromleft to right) to the other, this is happning:

first player is smooth - player get dizzy - smooth - dizzy - smooth. (Its not much, but I the player shake a little bit and the name under the player is hard to read then it is dizzy.

In Ghost Recon: then I look around with the mouse(from left to right)every thing i shaking a bit, faster I move more
shaking.

In gamemovies: Then the camera moves fast from left to right every thing get dissy, faster the camera goes=more dizzy.

Use the PC to watch TV: If I see a soccer game on the PC if the camera moves from left to right(high) all the lines and the player get a bit dizzy, slower the camera moves=more smooth.

Very thing on the PC that has something to do with moving things from left to right or right to left isnt good, TEARING in OpenGL and dizzy/shaking Direct3d.

I have tryed with GF2, GF3, GF4 and Hercules. AMD and P4. Win98, W2K and WINXP.

What could it be !!!

Sorry for my english…

Thanks everybody for reply !

20

So glad to see good descriptions of this hard-to-describe problem! It has been driving me crazy! Like everyone here so far, I don’t have the fix, but by tinkering with just about every setting I could find, I’ve somehow made it OK for RTCW and Half-Life, but still crap for QuakeIII and MOHAA.
Funnily enough MOHAA was OK in a window (the dial-up bug) but is tearing again now its been patched. I actually “achieved” the fix in HL while displaying fps, and it dropped from a resolution-independent 70fps before fix, to 59fps perfection afterwards. All this with Radeon 8500 and XP, but I’ve seen the same effect, but not quite so obvious, with Matrox and Win98.
V-sync was set to ON in the GL box throughout, so I guess the games are indeed overriding it somehow. Keep the ideas coming!