Alternate pixel center disable NFS Porsche Unleashed

[caps_buster]

On nVidia graphic cards, there is a VERY strong font corruption in EA game NFS Porsche Unleashed, even the latest v3.5 witch runs fine in Windows 2000 / Windows XP:



Same problems with NFS Porsche Unleashed experienced a ATI users, however ATI quickly added DirectX settings to counter this problem:



If you in Direct X compatibility settings _DISABLE_ the Alternate pixel center, the corruption goes away like a miracle on ATI cards.

Now the question is - how to change this for nVidia drivers, so nVidia users can enjoy nice graphic once again in NFS PU?


PS. one user suggested that "That and changing dx7z file with one from nfs:MCO, fixed up tha problems."
http://www.motherboardpoint.com/show...769#post322769
First at all, what is meant by the NFS:MCO (so I know where to get dx7z.dll to try) and second - will it fix this display corruption on nVidia card?
I already saw a patch to the dx7z.dll in order to let it show only 32bit resolutions, so users can choose higher resolutions before they run out of the list, but that it is. The patch is there:
http://www.nfstuning.com/forum/showthread.php?t=722

If you are feeling a little adventurous (and you damn well should be, this is the Xtreme systems forum, so, I would be like kinda expecting that), you can in hex editor (I use XVI32, patch autor recommend HxD - http://mh-nexus.de/en/hxd/ ) find in the file Porsche.exe this: 10 68 E0 01 00 00 68 80 02 (there instances) and this is specification of the game menu resolution and depth. The first 10 is depth - 10 equals 16 bit, changing it to 20 give you 32 bit in menu.
You get a bit better lens flare effects as well, as nicer textures a BIT.

If you really want to push things, then resolution is E0 01 = 1E0 = 480 height, 80 02 = 280 = 640 width. So you can change them to like 800 x 600 or even higher, however the game then crash on DX Z buffer error, as you already tried to render 3D graphic into 800 x 600 or 1024 x 768 screen with Z buffer for only 640 x 480
Head to registers where is register settings Thrash Resolution and value is 640x480 Quess, what that can be... However I did not tried that much, as the fonts is what is bugging me, so... Feel free to crash your Porsche

I do use the 32bit depth patch w/o troubles, tough.

[Jens]

Hi caps_buster,


I am also still playing this great game and enjoying it!
I played it through like 4-5 times already, but it still rocks.

I don't encounter any problems using the german version + official 3.5 patch (non extended). I am running Windows XP SP3 32-bit.

The menu fonts look like they should on my nvidia 8800 GT and FSAA is working well, so the game still looks quite beautiful.

But there is one thing that really bothers me: The interior, especially the gauges, are using low-resolution textures, which means they're absolutely unreadable and ugly-looking.

This is a known bug with CPUs > 1GHz (it's described e.g. here http://www.nfstuning.com/forum/showthread.php?t=404).

This means I have to underclock my CPU, so NFS PU will hopefully display high-res textures for the gauges.

Now that I am running a E8400, I'm absolutely unable to clock it down below 1GHz. I can do 6x200 = 1200 MHz but that's not slow enough obviously If I clock it down further in Windows using SetFSB the system would lock and show a nice BSOD.


So what system do you run the game on? Do you also encounter the "ugly gauges" ?

[caps_buster]

Well, I use old AXP 1,8GHz Barton with FX5600XT crap GFX card, so I would more like to overclock things, not underclock and using 4x AA is not really a option. 5600XT did not have nowhere near the need power to do 4x AA in 1280 x 1024 ...

nVidia 5600XP Detonators 45.28 8x AF:


nVidia 5600XP Detonators 45.28 4x AA:


...sadly, 4x AA in 1280x1024 32bit is on 5600XT not a solution for speed reasons - and I hate blurry AA anyway. I want sharp, straight edges



As for the known damn bug with the textures - well, wait till you CPU is clocked closely to 3GHz With AMD X2 at nearly 3GHz it get to another level - the mipmaps (smaller, more ughlier versions of textures used for more far distant objects) get even one level UP, and the textures are HORRIBLE, man, JUST HORRIBLE. It suxx damn much, I hope someone with knowledge step in and patch the NFS PU to elimiate this crap CPU testing thing.

Originally it was likely to done to use low-res textures on slow CPUs, however the uppoer limit make the function rotate - eg. the faster the CPU, the more crappy textures are set as the highest mipmap level...

So yea, I do have the problem, but it is kinda slight on my now slow machine