Ati - Vista - OpenGL drivers out

I just got this message from ATI (AMD) support yesterday:

"We are currently aware of OpenGL issues under Vista. Please wait for the next release of the driver due out in the next 2 weeks" (note, I didn't email them about Second Life, this was an unrelated support issue).

Damn links to a dead link.. was hoping to fix this.. looks like I'll be changing to Nvidia..

Thanks for VistaSL! Works great!

yeah it looks like it indeed...

Vista is honestly not that bad, I'm not sure what you're talking about.

With UAC off it's a prettier XP, and in the future it'll definitely have its place. It's just at a position right now where it's simultaneously too late and a bit ahead of its time. Once support builds, it will be very nice.

Does anybody have the file or another link? This is not working...

Lockhart,

First off, thanks for your work on this.

Second, I'm also building the latest source for Vista. I'm building it *in* Vista x64 against the Windows SDK rather than the Platform SDK, which works fine (had to modify a few lines b/c constants were already defined in winuser.h, etc.). I'm compiling against the x86 libs of course...but anyways, after a successful compile, if I replace the .exe in a fresh SecondLife install folder, it will immediately crash in Vista. However, if I set it to compatibility mode for Xp Sp2, it starts up fine (not using your VistaSL mind you) and gets to loading the world and Precaching, and then just fails at that point.

Any suggestions? Should I go back to building against Platform SDK? Are you running w/ compatibility mode set to Xp Sp2 also in your shortcuts? I haven't yet tried to delete everything in AppData yet, so if that's what's causing it to crash in the Precaching stage I'll be pissed =) I'm doing a project at work w/ SecondLife so that's why I'm asking and also trying to get the client to run on Vista (it's the only bloody box in my office w/ a decent video card ).

Just to note....the lines in llimagegl.cpp...i get the same clean startup (and the same clean crash at Precaching) regardless of those lines being commented out.

Thanks bud.

EDIT: Just wanted to add that using your built executable is not an option because my project at work involves altering (and then running) the viewer source...so I'm first just trying to get my built executable running smoothly I think Xp Sp2 compatibility helps because I'm running Vista x64 and it gets all confused as to whether to pull dlls from SysWOW64 or System32 (I believe). What Vista do you have installed? Thanks!

Krillian, I'm interested in your SL Vista x64 build. Lemme know when it is ready. I would like to try it out!

Deleting the cache and settings from the SecondLife folder in AppData did allow the precaching to get along "further" before crapping out, but nevertheless, it still crapped out. Also, I forgot to mention that all of the images (and checkboxes in the preferences section) aren't showing up...so the login screen is quite bare and features only the text boxes and buttons as text....the background is just a tan plain background

I'm starting to think my situation is still related to ATI as well. I don't know all of the lines that Lockhart has changed in regards to that...but I do have those two lines commented out and still getting these crashes at precaching time. I'm going to switch back to Platform SDK and see if I can get at least as far as Lockhart has, as I'm assuming he's compiling against the Platform SDK and not the Windows SDK.

I hope he gets on here soon and explains his build environment setup, I'm getting sick of waiting for this PCI-e x8->x16 converter to show up so I can use this Windows XP box here in my office instead of this Vista x64 box

Peace.

Just FYI, rebuilding against Platform SDK yields the same results for me: Immediate crash w/o compatibility set to XP SP2, and no images w/ crash on precaching when set to compatibility with XP SP2.

Starting to think it's an x64 problem.....

any word on when the new VistaSL client will be out for today's update?

I grabbed the latest First Look source and am gonna compile it on XP SP2 and attempt to run it on Vista, and we'll see what happens If it works, I'll post the executable to be compatible w/ today's maintenance. I dont' think the current VistaSL will be outdated however as its still the stable 1.13.3.2 release.

Really? I could have sworn today was a software update.

Also, are you aware of what's causing the problems? It's not a matter of being compiled on the wrong platform - XP bytecode will run on Vista. The problem is restricted to ATI's OpenGL implementation, which is horrendously, vomit-inducingly awful at best. Just compiling in a different environment won't fix it, you need to also be able to work around the bad OpenGL calls. If you're good with openGL, a good thing to do would be get the vistaSL source and figure out a way to make body meshes shade again, as that's just plain annoying.

You could be right. As of now the viewer software is still at 1.13.3.2...and the First Look was just released yesterday and hasn't changed since. Meh?

Perhaps, read above, I amended my remark.

Also, if there wasn't a software update already, there won't be today. Happens in the morning on Wednesdays.

Actually, it very much does matter which platform it's compiled on, b/c the development environment can be drastically different between XP and Vista (i.e. which SDK, which DLLs it wants to dynamically link to, etc.). The difference becomes larger when you're compiling a Win32 app in an x64 environment and 32-bit and 64-bit DLLs become confused when the application goes to dynamically link.

But to answer your question...yes, I realize the heart of the problem is ATI's opengl implementation. My goal was to simply mimmic Lockhart's progress thus far.

I just compiled in XP and ran it on Vista, and it's absolutely 1:1 with the released binaries and does not require XP SP2 compatibility set, etc. etc. etc. Commenting our the GL call in llimagegl.cpp (as Lockhart did) got past the initial crash, just like the released binaries. Though, the world looked like hell for about 10 seconds, and then crashed (I'm using the latest First Look sources, so it could be b/c of that and the new rendering pipeline).

HOWEVER, when I built the source in the same fashion on Vista, it wouldn't even begin to run, it would immediately crash after I ran the executable. It took putting the executable into XP SP2 compatibility mode in order for it to run at all...and with OR without those lines commented out in llimagegl.cpp, the Vista compiled executable went past the original crash and would begin to load the world...only it would crash out on precaching consistently.

I would like to note that my XP build had the same type of problem as the Vista build where the button images wouldn't load in the login screen...they were just boxes and not nice rounded gradient buttons But the XP build would actually load the world for a few seconds and then crash.

So as you see, there's something very different between my build environment and Lockharts...and it *does* partly have to do w/ which OS we're building in and which SDK we're including. I'm starting to think it's because I'm running Vista x64 as opposed to Vista x86...but that doesn't explain why my XP build wouldn't show the login button graphics and why it would crash after being in the world for a few seconds. The only thing that could be different is that I'm using the February 2007 DirectX SDK and he's probably using the December 2006 SDK. I should probably try using that older SDK (it *really* shoudn't matter at all).

Thanks.

I think most of your issues are based on compiling it on vista x64 and not 32 bit, I've not really had cross-compatibility issues compiling XP code on a vista machine, though I think your problem may be compiling it in MSVS2005? I would imagine (though I may be wrong) that due to the cross-platform nature it may be being compiled in a more cross-platform compiler...

I'm not totally sure, I've just never run across this issue compiling code written in XP on a vista machine, though to be fair I deal with C++ a lot less than .NET languages.

Sure...that's what I'm thinking. Yes I'm building it in VS2005, which it's compatible with...there are build instructions for both VS2003 and VS2005 on their developer wiki site. I'm going to be installing Vista x86 tonight to see if that makes any difference. Else I'm just going to wipe this Vista box and go back to XP w/ it so I can do this project of mine..can't spend all this time just trying to get it to run on Vista

ATI has a new driver out today has anyone tried it yet?

Getting 'em right now.

The release notes specifically state better and more stable OpenGL support, it couldn't hurt to upgrade, really. Anything would be a step up.

Same crash.

VistaSL runs significantly faster, and if you turn off avatar vertex program, your avatar mesh will be shaded again.

yep, I installed the 7.2 drivers on my Vista system, and same thing happens with both the standard client, and first look viewer *in process of writing dirty e-mail to ATI*

Yeah definitely scream like hell at ATI. It's not that hard to implement a specification that's as organized as OpenGL.

I'll install those drivers tomorrow and try my build again, and see what gives.

I really wish Lockhart would respond to this thread with his source and/or his environment setup spec.

From my understanding, ATI and Microsoft are very close.

Chances are the OpenGL implementation is sub-par for a reason.

... and Catalyst 7.2 does in fact crash just as hard as Catalyst 7.1. DO NOT WANT!!@11211!