PBR Viewers Flickering Black
needs info
T
Tsunade Aonifall
Viewers Tested:
Alchemy Beta 7.1.9.2501 (64bit)
Second Life Release 7.1.10.10800445603 (64bit)
Firestorm 7.1.11 (76720) Nov 9 2024 02:03:12 (64bit / AVX2)
All 3 of these viewers all exhibit the same issue where, if anything even a little graphically intensive starts to occur (busy sims, a second viewer is opened, this sort of thing), the viewers quickly start to flicker black across the entire viewers window, minus the windows surround and titlebar.
I am currently using Firestorm 6.6.17 (70368) Dec 10 2023 18:36:33 (64bit / SSE2) as it is the latest pre-PBR viewer as my daily driver because it and any other pre-PBR viewers I try do not exhibit this issue.
I don't exhibit any issues with other programs/games that I've been able to determine and you can see from the specs below I should have no problem with the requirements for PBR viewers. This issue seems to be exclusively the domain of the PBR renderer for SL as it is viewer agnostic.
I have completely re-installed Windows twice both on Windows 11 23H2 and 24H2 updates, I have run memtest86 for hours with zero errors and I have borrowed my partners GPU and PSU all to no effect. I have taken videos of the issues in each browser and obtained the logs for each, however I'm unable to upload them to the ticket as the videos are too big and the logs are zipped up and that filetype is apparently unsupported so I've put them in my onedrive and attached the links below, if you'd like be to upload them elsewhere, just say where and I'll re-upload them.
Firestorm Logs: https://1drv.ms/u/s!Argy6Q-UWl9Bpqdw0-q0kaa1AuAdvw?e=IrV7OQ
Firestorm Video: https://1drv.ms/v/s!Argy6Q-UWl9BpqdsUNzCSdoVTKEh6w?e=mJDdli
Alchemy Video: https://1drv.ms/v/s!Argy6Q-UWl9BpqdtJcjY_gITIV70ow?e=lpmwn3
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Atlas Linden
needs info
AAngel Braveheart
I see this often too, especially at events where huge random black shapes pass over the sky
Atlas Linden
Hi AAngel,
Is it this you're seeing? https://feedback.secondlife.com/bug-reports/p/pbr-moon-clips-with-skydome
Atlas Linden
under review
Atlas Linden
Hi Tsunade,
Thanks for all the provided info!
Can you confirm if this issue occurs on other graphics quality settings? Low or mid,etc. This can help nail down if there is a specific graphics setting that is causing this.
Can you also try changing to a basic avatar to see if that resolves it? Via the Avatar>Complete Avatars menu (or Develop>Avatar>Character Tests>Test Male)
And finally, does this issue occur at other locations?
T
Tsunade Aonifall
Hi Atlas!
For the record, all testing from here onwards (unless stated otherwise) will be on Second Life Release 7.1.11.11750364439 (64bit).
I can confirm this happens regardless of the location. Just as soon as things start to get taxing, it'll begin to flicker until the viewer is restarted.
I've attached two videos below, the first of the viewer on the low graphics preset (with advanced graphics settings visible) and the second on it's lowest again (along with anisotropic filtering disabled as this is still enabled in the low preset and I didn't notice first time) using the Test Male avatar from the develop menu. I've also attached the logs which should include those attempts as well.
Low+TestAvatar: https://1drv.ms/v/s!Argy6Q-UWl9BpqhJoZs8xa9M6zTqNA?e=7pZMvy
Low+Test Logs: https://1drv.ms/u/s!Argy6Q-UWl9BpqhL4H2WMHco99mNdw?e=M3Y5nR
The flickering is less intense on the lower settings but that's honestly consistent with my experience so far, the more graphically intense the scene, the worse the effect.
If you need any other information, just shout. :)
Atlas Linden
Thanks for checking, Tsunade!
Some other things to try:
- Does toggling Vsync resolve the issue?
- Are you using any Nvidia Adaptive Frame rate settings? And do these settings have any affect on your issue?
- Is your GPU overheating at all while using SL?
- It's likely that this is hardware specific. Are you able to test on another monitor or use a different monitor cable?
T
Tsunade Aonifall
So, after some testing I can confirm the following things.
Vsync has no discernible affect off or on regardless of the settings changed below in the next section.
I've never configured any nVidia adaptive frame rate settings that I'm aware of but I investigated regardless, first by checking the nvidia control panel. Inside I found that the settings for "Power Management Mode" had been set to "Prefer Maximum Performance" instead of the default "Use Global Setting (Normal) and the "Threaded optimization" setting had been set to On instead of the default "Use Global Setting (Auto)". Reverting these changes (still no clue how they were made, my last full re-install was only a few weeks ago) does seem to have raised the threshold for how far I need to tax the machine to trigger the flicker, but not eliminated it. I did try re-enabling each one on their own before re-enabling both in case one stood out as an indicator, but having just either enabled on their own yielded the same results as if they were both off. Re-enabling both of them made it easier to trigger the flickering again, for future testing I'll leave these settings set to "Use Global" unless advised otherwise. I was not able to locate any settings in either the control panel or new nvidia app relating to adaptive frame rate.
I left my viewer logged in for a while and found the temperature of the GPU rested just under 60C and when pushed, didn't seem to increase much beyond. Additionally, the usage seemed to hover at 50% (which seems a little low) unless alt+tabbed out at which point it dropped to 12-15% which is expected.
I have two monitors, both of which are Gigabyte G32QC running at 2560x1440 at 165Hz on a DisplayPort and both with GSYNC support which, according to the new nvidia app is enabled on both. (I also have a valve index connected to a HDMI port which sometimes registers as a monitor in bios or a webcam and a dummy HDMI connector for use with sunshine/moonlight game streaming since displayport monitors stop registering if they're off, for the sake of these tests, these were both disconnected in full) I tried unplugging and testing with each one individual but this doesn't seem to have had any affect.
Atlas Linden
Hi Tsunade,
Thanks again for your response and testing. A quick search online for that specific monitor you've mentioned does appear to have some flickering problems found with other games.
Does disabling GSYNC resolve the issue?
Further troubleshooting may be required to be done with support for this specific issue before we can consider this a viewer bug.
Please contact support here: https://support.secondlife.com/
This report will be set to Needs Info for the time being.
T
Tsunade Aonifall
Just to add, I did also find and test the "ExtraFPS" build listed below. Unfortuantely, with the exact same results.
Second Life Release 7.1.11.11750364439 (64bit)
T
Tsunade Aonifall
I got the notice that a pair of Lindens and someone else came by my sim and my orb went a little nuts. I've just removed the land bans (though I doubt that affected lindens) and also added the three names to the orb if you need to make subsequent visits. I assume you found the location from the videos in the ticket. :)