do NOT use the so called "d3d9.dll fix"

Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 9:27 pm

I've been receiving a lot of emails about this, so I thought it important to finally speak out about it. An unofficial 'fix' to performance issues in Fallout: New Vegas has been doing the rounds for the past week as some sort of global solution to all problems. I do not recommend this D3D9 Fix at all, as it causes Fallout: New Vegas to falsely redetect your graphics card as a lower model, and in turn use a lower shader package. It can reduce image quality and cause a range of long-term problems. A much better solution is to use the ToggleEmotions (temo) console command in each Fallout: New Vegas session to temporarily disable facial emotions on NPCs, thereby removing the major source of the slowdowns which may occur in areas where there are several characters. This method will not reduce your image quality or cause other potential problems. This is also a good time to remind everyone that PC gaming does not involve any quick fixes. If you're having performance issues in Fallout: New Vegas or any other game, the correct solution inevitably involves properly optimizing and maintaining your entire PC, along with research and intelligent tweaking of the game, not just grasping at the first quick fix that happens to come along. Additionally, official patches and driver updates resolve many of the legitimate problems, so some patience is also involved.


http://www.tweakguides.com/

just so you know..
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Claire Mclaughlin
 
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Post » Tue Dec 06, 2011 4:10 am

I am fairly sure that is incorrect - but if true, better to see slightly worse models or textures than have lag on medium quality.
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liz barnes
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 10:41 pm

It's been discussed before.
The guy who wrote that really doesn't know what he is talking about.
The fix works extremely well for a large number of us with absolutely no difference in image quality and zero long-term issues.

Overall no reason not to use, and far more convenient than using the console every session.
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Sunny Under
 
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Post » Tue Dec 06, 2011 1:24 am

http://www.tweakguides.com/

just so you know..


What are the long-term problems?

Why is using a lower shader package bad if the visual quality has a pretty much un-noticeable change?
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Channing
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 9:01 pm

What are the long-term problems?

Why is using a lower shader package bad if the visual quality has a pretty much un-noticeable change?



With my low-end Geforce 8600M GT 256 mb the dll has been a miracle for me so far. Much smoother framerates, with more graphics details on than before.

Have been monitoring GPU temp during play and hasn't surpassed 70 degrees Celcius, in my laptop so that's not too hot right?
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Invasion's
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 6:30 pm

Why is using a lower shader package bad if the visual quality has a pretty much un-noticeable change?


Because the guy from tweak guides is talking out his [censored]. The visual quality loss is so tiny it's literally impossible to spot, so chose between that and 5 FPS, not a difficult choice. The reason he doesn't give any specific "long term problems" is because he is just taking a wild guess that there will be. He clearly hasn't bothered to even look at the DLL to see what it does.
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Emzy Baby!
 
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Post » Tue Dec 06, 2011 12:40 am

http://www.tweakguides.com/

just so you know..


Thanks for posting that. I did some investigating on that .dll a few days ago in this topic: http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1130068-d3d9dll-some-things-dont-look-right
Koroush is correct. If you have an ATI card and used the original .dll file then it would have used nvidia shaders which are not entirely compatible with ATI/AMD cards. Since then somebody modified the .dll to spoof an ATI card to load the 'correct' shaders, but I have also read many ATI users say they do not suffer the NPC talking lag so it might not be needed

Basically, the only thing the .dll does is spoof a different video card. When the game loads, it sends a command to the real d3d9.dll to find out the name of the card and from there determines what shaders/video files to load. A file named rendererinfo.txt is then created in your documents\mygames\falloutnv folder containing this information. This .dll runs alongside the real one so when the command is sent, it will respond with a different video card then what you have. In the original .dll, it will spoof an nvidia geforce 7900gs. This has since been modified to be an 8800gts but IT DOESN'T MAKE A DIFFERENCE. A bunch of morons here and elsewhere have been saying "there is a new file out that uses an updated graphics card so you get better facial animation and shaders". Complete and utter bull crap. The rendererinfo.txt files are identical between the two. The exception would be if you have an ATI card and get the ATI version.

Although I initially thought something looked off, I made screenshots and videos in FRAPS of multiple scenes in daylight, night, interior, exterior, heavy HDR, water, and faces. If you use the .dll and use the right one for your video card manufacturer, the good news is that the everything is identical - HDR, lighting, water, etc. Except for the facial animation.... It's more plain and stiff NO MATTER WHAT DLL YOU ARE USING. It's the same as Fallout 3, but apparently in an effort to make the characters less robotic they made subtle changes to the facial animation. Without the .dll you can disable emoions ni the console (like it says on tweakguides) to achieve the exact same thing. But you won't get achievements if you use the console unfortunately. These animations are so subtle though, I don't know why there is an even a performance hit. It's things like eyebrow movement and eyes squinting. When a NPC is talking, my CPU and GPU are vastly under utilized. Hopefully this will be fixed in a patch. (There is also slowdown when fighting somebody that attacks with melee weapons, probably do to the new melee animation)

The only difference between using the .dll and not using it is the driver file that is called. In renderinfo with the .dll it tries to load nv4_disp.dll. This is nvidia's older display driver file and doesn't even exist on my system. Without the .dll it loads the main direct x driver file - nv3dum.dll and for some reason that causes slowdown

For all the people on here that say "it's because of direct x 10/11 and this forces it to run in dirext x 9" - you're absolutely wrong. Stop spreading wrong information and next time investigate what is going on. It's nice to know that the slowdown goes away, but don't you care WHY it goes away instead of blindly using a file somebody else told you to?
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suzan
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 9:59 pm

Because the guy from tweak guides is talking out his [censored]. The visual quality loss is so tiny it's literally impossible to spot, so chose between that and 5 FPS, not a difficult choice. The reason he doesn't give any specific "long term problems" is because he is just taking a wild guess that there will be. He clearly hasn't bothered to even look at the DLL to see what it does.


He is stating a fact if you are using ATI. I'm aware there is an ATI 'version' available now, but if you have an ATI card it will load the following:

nv4_disp.dll
RenderPath : BSSM_SV_2_A
PStarget : ps_2_a
PS2xtarget : ps_2_a
Shader Package : 13

nv4_disp.dll is an nvidia driver and the "A" in the render/PS lines refers to pixel shader 2.0a. ATI is not compatible with 2.0a, they use 2.0b. Shader Package 13 is an nvidia shader package. So no, he is not talking out of his [censored]. Forcing incompatible shaders could cause damage! Again, there is a .dll that spoofs an ATI card now so these items will be correct, but nobody seems to be for certain that ATI owners experience the issue (conflicting reports)

Koroush is a well respected writer of invaluable tweaking guides for various games AND for all the features built into at/nvida graphics card plus what they mean. I would much rather trust him then a community of people saying "GAME IS UNPLAYABLE' "I DEMAND A REFUND" "LAWSUIT!"
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Emily Shackleton
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 4:04 pm

Thanks for posting that. I did some investigating on that .dll a few days ago in this topic: http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1130068-d3d9dll-some-things-dont-look-right
Koroush is correct. If you have an ATI card and used the original .dll file then it would have used nvidia shaders which are not entirely compatible with ATI/AMD cards.


Yeah...and putting diesel in a petrol engine is a bad idea. Does that mean I should go around telling everyone that under no circumstances should you ever use diesel? It goes without saying that if you don't have a nvidia card then you don't use an nvidia fix. That doesn't make his claims any more accurate.

Without the .dll you can disable emoions ni the console (like it says on tweakguides) to achieve the exact same thing.


This does not achieve the exact same thing at all. The DLL does not disable facial expressions. I could prove it with screenshots if you really want but can't really be bothered.
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Hope Greenhaw
 
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Post » Tue Dec 06, 2011 3:43 am

The vast majority of people in the world just blindly do what other people tell them to do... and then are surprised/offended/hurt when it doesn't work out as they expected. Learn to use your brain, people, or go through life as a clueless victim of circumstance.
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Gaelle Courant
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 6:45 pm

The vast majority of people in the world just blindly do what other people tell them to do... and then are surprised/offended/hurt when it doesn't work out as they expected. Learn to use your brain, people, or go through life as a clueless victim of circumstance.


Agreed... like a herd of sheep. Bahhhhh! Like the virigina tech students who thought it was a good idea to stand there for their turn to get shot instead of tackling the guy
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Michelle Smith
 
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Post » Tue Dec 06, 2011 12:10 am

Koroush is a well respected writer of invaluable tweaking guides for various games AND for all the features built into at/nvida graphics card plus what they mean. I would much rather trust him then a community of people saying "GAME IS UNPLAYABLE' "I DEMAND A REFUND" "LAWSUIT!"


Koroush is well respected, he's not Jesus. Just because he said it doesn't make it the gospel truth. Personally I'd much rather trust that I've tried it, it works, and ironically it causes less visual degradation than the fix he suggests as an alternative. If he said, "Don't just use it because you can, it's a fix to a specific problem with a specific card, if you don't have that problem or that card then don't bother" then I'd be on board, but saying that the DLL won't help anyone is just false.
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Mari martnez Martinez
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 5:18 pm

The vast majority of people in the world just blindly do what other people tell them to do... and then are surprised/offended/hurt when it doesn't work out as they expected. Learn to use your brain, people, or go through life as a clueless victim of circumstance.



Agreed... like a herd of sheep. Bahhhhh! Like the virigina tech students who thought it was a good idea to stand there for their turn to get shot instead of tackling the guy


What side of this argument are you on? :P

You realise that this applies to both sides right, whether you are blindly following the people who say the DLL works or blindly following tweakguides who tells you not to use it.
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Angel Torres
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 11:33 pm

Because the guy from tweak guides is talking out his [censored]. The visual quality loss is so tiny it's literally impossible to spot, so chose between that and 5 FPS, not a difficult choice. The reason he doesn't give any specific "long term problems" is because he is just taking a wild guess that there will be. He clearly hasn't bothered to even look at the DLL to see what it does.

Probably because of the DLL "fix" people wre sometimes using to play Fallout on Intel chips. Cant really blame him if this is his way of thinking, but still doesn't make it true for NV.

Either way, it works wonders for me. Now if i could actually save my games without it crashing, I would be a damn happy camper.
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[ becca ]
 
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Post » Tue Dec 06, 2011 2:50 am

For all the people on here that say "it's because of direct x 10/11 and this forces it to run in dirext x 9" - you're absolutely wrong. Stop spreading wrong information and next time investigate what is going on. It's nice to know that the slowdown goes away, but don't you care WHY it goes away instead of blindly using a file somebody else told you to?


That would be me. I'll just direct people to your post.

On another note, I don't give a flying Golden Gecko what it does, it works. With this, and a few other community fixes I'm running this game full bore at 1920x1200 and I'm at 60 FPS 98% of the time.

This "sheep" was happy to follow along and get a better experience for it.

*Baaaahhhh*

Edit: Forgot the ing on fly.
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Eve(G)
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 3:14 pm

I'd say there's only one valid concern in that post, and it's that ATI users shouldn't be using anything that tricks the engine into thinking your have an nVidia card (or the other way around). There shouldn't be any problem with the engine thinking you're running an older series of the same type of card, however. Older games frequently do this simply because they were never updated to recognize newer graphics cards.

"Other potential problems" is tech speak for "I have no idea whether this could cause any problems or not, but I can't prove that it doesn't so I won't support it." As far as visual quality loss, not that I can see, even comparing screenshots of the same location. The 7-series cards support SM3.0, and the engine doesn't even use SM3.0 to begin with, so I see no reason this would be seriously limiting the effects available.

All that said, if you prefer to be 100% safe then you should never be trying fixes like this to begin with.
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Janette Segura
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 5:21 pm

Koroush is a well respected writer of invaluable tweaking guides for various games AND for all the features built into at/nvida graphics card plus what they mean. I would much rather trust him then a community of people saying "GAME IS UNPLAYABLE' "I DEMAND A REFUND" "LAWSUIT!"
No he's talking out his ass. Any ATI card that supports 2.0b also supports the default to 2.0(not revised) shader implementation. The a/b revisions are used for specific point shaders in which a game can call for a particular card. If the game calls for 2.0a, and the card only supports 2.0b, the driver will force 2.0 for compatibility, or it will force to a lower or higher shader version as need be, dynamically by the driver. If the driver can due the thread execution to modify the bad shader call.

However on nvidia cards, trying to force 2.0 shaders, will cause either a direct CTD(no op), or it will force 1.3 shaders.
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Lance Vannortwick
 
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Post » Tue Dec 06, 2011 1:31 am

What side of this argument are you on? :P

You realise that this applies to both sides right, whether you are blindly following the people who say the DLL works or blindly following tweakguides who tells you not to use it.


You have a point there

Bahhhh

I'm using the dll anyways. I just want to know why calling for nvd3dum.dll vs nv4_disp.dll makes such a big difference

There's a file called nv3dumx.dll which is a 64-bit version of the file. Now my guess is that 32-bit games must use the 32-bit version and 64-bit games must use the 64-bit version. But I wonder if messing around with the files will remove the low fps
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Paul Rice
 
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Post » Tue Dec 06, 2011 1:06 am

There's a file called nv3dumx.dll which is a 64-bit version of the file. Now my guess is that 32-bit games must use the 32-bit version and 64-bit games must use the 64-bit version. But I wonder if messing around with the files will remove the low fps
Drivers have to execute in 64bit mode, with 64bit address handlers. The 32bit versions are only there for compatibility, and compatibility between the 64/32bit system.
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des lynam
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 6:05 pm

The tweakguides guy is a moron, I spent months fixing my Fallout 3 install after taking his asinine recommendations seriously.
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Destinyscharm
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 11:53 pm

i have always used tweakguides but now it doesnt matter. everytime i go to change anything in the .ini files it just reverts back after launching the game and changing to read-only everytime. I take it off change it, switches back, i even changed, then switched to read only and still nothing. my changes wont stick. ive changed each file, the fallout.ini even the pref in both the steam folders and the my games folder. amd i midding something

and guess what, that dll "FIX" doesnt do [censored] for me
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Rudy Paint fingers
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 11:20 pm

fallout_default.ini is the only one you should be editing in the game folder.
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Zosia Cetnar
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 9:25 pm

everytime i go to change anything in the .ini files it just reverts back after launching the game and changing to read-only everytime. I take it off change it, switches back, i even changed, then switched to read only and still nothing. my changes wont stick. ive changed each file, the fallout.ini even the pref in both the steam folders and the my games folder. amd i midding something


By Steam folder do you mean game directory by any chance? The Fallout_default.ini in the NV directory is the one to edit.

I had a heck of time with this myself but since using just this one, all my settings stick every time.
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Charlotte Buckley
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 10:15 pm

fallout_default.ini is the only one you should be editing in the game folder.

sooooooo, whats the point of the ones in the my games folder?
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Mistress trades Melissa
 
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Post » Mon Dec 05, 2011 9:29 pm

sooooooo, whats the point of the ones in the my games folder?

It's steam pissing around and trying to add a redundancy layer, and not figuring out where and what should or shouldn't be edited.
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Princess Johnson
 
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