New RC & SL Recommended Specifications

I read about the Avatar Rendering Thingy on the blog (whilst himself indoors was occupying the TV with his video games!!) so downloaded the RC to try it. I was using my laptop on the sofa at the time. Admittedly the laptop model is a couple of years old (Intel Chipset Graphics and all that), and I have a pretty crappy internet connection, but it has been chugging on with a draw distance of 96 or so without too many problems.

When I log on, I am presented with a message that my computer no longer meets the specified requirements, and the "recommended" graphics settings are set to low. Obviously, this turns off all the wizzy windlight/dazzle (whatever it's called) stuff, reflective water, sunsets, etc, and makes the ground look like mud.

So, I toddle across the room and download the RC on my desktop. I thought I had quite a good machine. Admittedly a couple of years old, but with as much memory as I could get in there and a fairly new graphics card. On logging in on the desktop, my "recommended" graphics settings are again set to low, although I do meet the requirements.

Of course, I can turn these up again, but am thinking that there must be a reason why SL sets them this way. There was a thread here a few weeks ago asking what draw distance people used, and if I remember correctly, a lot of the replies were in the low end numbers.

Now, I love all that wizzy stuff, and sometimes, just for fun (and this how sad I am) I sit on my garden swing, or in my big old armchair, crank up the draw distance, and look out over the ocean, just for the hell of it. My neighbour currently has snow falling on her plot, and some of it drops just outside my window. The view of the ocean through the snow as the sun sets and it gets dark is just amazing.

SL seems to have become so high tech now that I wonder if it will soon be out of reach to us ordinary folk running 2-3 year old computers. I sort of feel that I am not getting the full experience due to my slightly out-dated hardware, and certainly couldn't justify a new computer every 6 months or so just to keep up, as I am sure many people couldn't. My neighbour told me she has a 6 month old laptop, which with the last RC is now no longer supported.

I don't know if a JIRA is the right place for this, but am sure you guys will know. If so, can we start a thread (if that's what it is) to try and make LL take notice and make SL a bit more user-friendly, with all the wizzy bits, to those of us stuck with older PC's.

Oh, and I tried the AV cost rendering thingy, and came out with 1278. Is that good?

Jen

It's the way of technology my friend.

Look at gaming as a whole.....xbox, playsation...all that stuff...now wii..... if you want the latest and greatest...you have to have the technology that supports. With stand alone games it's a simple matter of buying the entire game, and current game disks, and playing. With PC gaming is a bit more of a crap shoot.......My faince is big into PC games....of the shoot em up variety (which I love too) and he has a fairly souped up Dell laptop that he can play most games on.....or could.....
Cut to 6 months ago..... and most of the newer PC games out he cannot use on his laptop. I can use them on my desktop (which he bought me in 06 for christmas with the express purpose of gaming, cause we both love em)
I had no idea it would support SL initially....but it has done beautifully... Dell XPS410 with 2gig of Ram and nVidia geforce7600 graphics card which has worked supurbly. Didn't plan it though.....and if the day comes when I have to upgrade to continue in SL. I will....simply put.....it's a luxury....it's entertainment....it's choice. Technology advances and we all choose where to spend our $$$ and where not to. For some it's stereo equipment...for others it's gadgets like Blackberries and ipods..... and so on and on and on.

Not to discredit your point....well understood.....but that's just the way it is with computers and graphics. Anyone I know who has a serious interest in computers is constantly updating their stuff. You either commit to the changes and accept that as fact....or you don't. It's not LL's fault......as a business they stand to gain by keeping up with the latest and greatest cause they know dam well the mass majority of folks who enjoy this kind of thing will keep up with the technology.

If the argument comes round to businesses having to keep upgrading to maintain a presence in SL....I say, well.....if it's truly a business then those upgrades are business expenses, so be it.

hell I'm already to run out and get more memory and a different g-card...but knowing my fiance, he'll decide we need brand new computers by next year anyway....he's one of those that 'has' to keep up. LOL

LL is just being conservative.

Go ahead and put the settings back where you like them. As long as your computers continue to actually RUN the software, you may ignore LL's blathering about not meeting minimum requirements.

With my laptop computer, I never got the message that my computer did not meet minimum requirements for SL until the version with Windlight came out.

So I'm guessing that the threshhold for minimum requirements changed with the Windlight viewer. And that the reason for the change was due to the specs needed to run Windlight.

Yet may laptop computer runs Second Life about the same as it ever did. Of course, I keep the Windlight "atmospheric shading" off.

So if your laptop ran SL just fine pre-Windlight, my guess would be that it will run the Windlight viewer exactly the same as your pre-Windlight viewer, if you turn off the Windlight settings (atmospheric shading).

In fact, if you check "avatar impostering," your laptop may run Second Life even better down, despite suddenly falling below minimum specifications.

I get the impression from the forum that, regardless of computer specifications, most people are content to run Second Life with the Windlight "atmospheric shading" off. So you're not missing much.

You konw, it's funny.

My friend wasn't able to run SL at all because he had some unknown card... His friend gave him an NVIDIA GForce 4 series with 64 MB of memory... and it's choppy, but it runs. He's happier than ever about it too... Now keep in mind that this is the same one that has the windlight features and havok4 physics. (He had to DL that one) and he can run it perfectly ok... well, it's really choppy sometimes but he's still happy he can walk around, play in it, it renders things just fine, and life is good. Now he can't get all the ripple effects and stuff, but like I said, it works.

So that means if you have a top card or a really old card, it should still work so that you can play it. I mean... LL is looking out for all the one's with low-end cards and old computers. Plus they can't just make that stuff happen, the card needs to be able to proccess it and teh fact is that lower cards just can't.

I mean, try buying a new game from the store with those graphics and it WON'T work AT ALL... ir barely rendering stuff.

Us asking LL to keep it working is kind of like us asking Sony to make their PS3 games work on a PS1 or 2 because we can't/don't want to buy a PS3. So LL is being nice. They could just say "screw it." and make it so that you can't run it on low anymore... I'd hate that.

I'm willing to go get a new card.

I love the scenery as well.

Oh wait. What is the avitar rendering thing? Everytime I try to run the RC it crashes for some reasaon.

Thanks guys. On the laptop, the only options I can select are Bump Map & Shiney. The basic shaders is greyed out, even if I nudge the slider right up. The only other one I can select is the Avatar Impostering, so now everything looks like mud! Plus this morning I got a message saying by battery was at the end of its useful life and needed replacing. Ho Hum!

Whilst himself was shooting aliens, I costed up a new PC, and a new MAC, for comparison. Of course, I know that there is probably a big difference between what I think I want and what I really actually need, but both came out at around £1500. Of course, I could probably get that down a bit - do I really need a 750 GB hard drive, etc, etc?? I used to work with an IT guy who said you should always buy the biggest, fastest, wizziest computer you could afford to give you a chance to stay ahead for a while, but I can't really justify a new one as the old one is working fine. Ho Hum.

/me wanders off wondering how to explain dropping old PC out of first floor window!

I doubt we wil need new computers every 6 months, but evey 2-3 years yes is believeable, my machine is about 2 years now and I can't run SL at max settings anymore, but then again, I expected this coming and have started planning the replacement machine so I should have half the bits well before it's actually needed in 6 months time or so. The old machine then goes into the cupboard and the PC befopre that goes to relatives or a friend.

Hmm... I spent like... 1100 dollars ($) on my desktop and that was with printer, speakers, and a monitor, two extra gigs of RAM, and a 500 GB hard drive. The PC itself was like... 500 $. So.... See if you can find a 500 gig SATA drive for 100$ (Sorry, I can really only go by US currancy). IF you buy a desktop alone for 1000, then it should be brilliant and include 4 gigs of RAM.

I always try to over shoot when going with computers and stuff. I thought I needed 2 gigs, so I got 4 just incase. I needed like a GeForce 6800 to run SL better... so I got a GeForce 9600 GT. It really wasn't that much either. 169 dollars. Haven't tried it yet though. So I'd say overshoot a bit if you can. You don't have to shoot TOO far though... what kind of stuff did you put on the computer to make it 1500 which I think is almost twice as much in US dollars.

Can I see the specs for it if that's ok?

It seems for Europeans, computers are horendously expense compared to the rest of the world either that or wages are horedously low. In Oz, a loaf of bread is about $2AUS from the corner store so I can buy a brand new minimum spec PC with monitor etc for $800 or 400 loaves of bread, to run SL minimum I would spend 600 loaves of bread but a good machine would cost 1000 loaves of bread or $2000AUS, I spent around $1200 on pars to build mine myself 2 years ago.