RCAF_Gunner
Charter Member 2012
After installing Acceleration (SP2) I was getting flashing clouds quite a bit. I have a BFG 8800GT 512MB OC video card. While it may or may not be a video driver issue, none of the nVidia drivers since have solved the problem. Further, I force vSync on which cured a different type of tearing/flashing but not all driver releases seem to successfully retain the setting (for me at least). Anyway, it's one of those annoying things that spoils the illusion that I've wanted to cure for a while.
While "googling" around, I came across this thread at Avsim by Haldar / Mike: http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php...21&page=&topic_id=434059&prev_page=show_topic
I followed his suggestions, with the exception that I went a little further, backed up then deleted both the shaders and shaders10 folders (FSX recreates them), and my cloud flashing is gone. :mixedsmi:
One thing to note is his paths are for XP. Vista puts the files in different locations. Also, some people in the thread report side effects from the tweak but so far I haven't seen any other graphics issues that I hadn't seen before and I don't believe it has affected my frame rates. As long as you remember to make a backup of the original file it should be safe to try.
Cheers,
Rick
While "googling" around, I came across this thread at Avsim by Haldar / Mike: http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php...21&page=&topic_id=434059&prev_page=show_topic
Go to this folder:
FSX\ShadersHLSL\misc
There you will find a file called SwarmCloud.fx. Make a backup copy of this file somewhere. (as always no crying if you don't do this step)
Open the original SwarmCloud.fx in notepad or wordpad and then look down about 20 lines down from the top. You will see this entry:
bool NewMaterialUsage = true;
Change its value from true to false. Make sure to keep the semi-colon.
Save and close the file.
Now, go to C:\documents & settings\<YOUR username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\FSX\
(If you can't get to this folder make sure that "show hidden & system files/folders" is turned on in your windows folder options.)
(This is the XP path by the way, Vista users will have to hunt for their equivlalent in the users folder.)
You will see a folder there called: Shaders.
Either move that folder out of there or delete it. Don't worry, FSX will build a new one the next time you run it. It contains a cache of the compiled shaders. This folder must be removed to ensure that the change you made to the cloud shader file above will be compiled and used on FSX's next run.
That's it. Run FSX and enjoy very solid and reliable clouds! I haven't seen any other bugs or oddities crop up from this change. I've had a few friends who were also experiencing flashing clouds test it as well, one on nvidia, the other on ATI, and their clouds stay perfectly put now.
I followed his suggestions, with the exception that I went a little further, backed up then deleted both the shaders and shaders10 folders (FSX recreates them), and my cloud flashing is gone. :mixedsmi:
One thing to note is his paths are for XP. Vista puts the files in different locations. Also, some people in the thread report side effects from the tweak but so far I haven't seen any other graphics issues that I hadn't seen before and I don't believe it has affected my frame rates. As long as you remember to make a backup of the original file it should be safe to try.
Cheers,
Rick
