Security Update to Second Life viewers: 2008-10-06

One thing you have to bear in mind -- we are all individuals. Not everybody at Linden Lab knows everything that everybody else does. I'm sure there are developers who think that anything below an NVidia 8800 should be considered deprecated, but that's not the official position of the lab; and, when a developer expresses that opinion, don't take it as the word of the lab. However-- we can't support old video cards forever. If you want to try to run on a 16MB Radeon 7000 equivalent (yes, I have done this, although not in many months... and, yes, I have done this with 1.20), you have to expect an extremely low frame rate. There's a lot of range between those two video cards. I get excellent performance from my NVidia 7600 on my Linux box; there are plenty of <$100 video cards that do *very* well with SL.

It would be nice if we could support Second Life on arbitrarily old hardware, but the fact is that it's a demanding 3d application by its very nature.

ORLY? Even as jaded as I am, I wouldn't have expected them to be quite that dismissive of video cards "old enough to be in pre-school". They might prefer not to support anything that can't run CUDA, for example, but I suspect they're more realistic than that.

The big problem is not desktop computers where you can upgrade the video cards, it's laptops, which are (a) a bigger expense to upgrade, and (b) don't have the option of just replacing the video card.

Prospero, I want to compliment LL on the increased communication about software releases that LL's using the forums has enabled. Of course, LL hears more from frustrated folks, but I think the increase in information and interaction is appreciated by most of us. I only wish more folks came to these threads.

Fwiw, I have a pretty good machine, including an 8800, (specs below) and still generally use a 1.19-based Nicholaz client (EC-f). It crashes less often than the released clients. Although I like many of the features of LL's newer clients and do install not only the releases but the occasional RC, I'm willing to trade all that just to avoid crashes. I mention this not as a complaint, but as a datapoint.

CPU: AMD (Unknown model) (2713 MHz)
Memory: 3327 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 8800 GT/PCI/SSE2/3DNOW!
OpenGL Version: 2.1.2
.

Good !...



No need for being "arbitrary"... There is a minimum hardware requirement listed on LL's site, so the only thing you do need to ensure, is that this minimum hardware *can* actually run decently the latest viewers.

Truly "old" hardware is 5 years old or so hardware (5 years is the average time after which your computer will start failing anyway, because most of its parts are designed to last this long only). But 3 years... come on !... and yet, 3 years old computers, while running v1.19.0.5 just fine, are very challenged when running v1.2x (and even at the lowest graphic settings).

I myself got a Linux box with an Athlon XP 3200+ and a 7600GT card, and while it runs 1.19.0.5 at 75fps in a skybox and around 15fps in challenging sims (night clubs and such), v1.2x runs 10-50% slower and worst, its frame rate decreases over time (after one hour or so in a night club, it can drop to 2fps before it finally crashes).

Thing is, that when you issue a new version of the viewer, your residents expect it to run at least as well, and hopefully better than the previous version. This has *not* been the case when Windlight became mainstream, and even though v1.21 is much better than v1.19.1.4 was, it is still not suitable for most "old" computers... On the other hand, v1.19.0.5 still runs fine and is not yet "too deprecated" (I might even port Mono to it), so it can still be used without much penalties in place of v1.2x: it would be nice for LL to officially support v1.19.0.5, which in fact is only supporting the residents who cannot afford buying the latest hardware.

Another solution (probably complex, but perhaps easier for maintenance in the long term than having to maintain two different viewers) would be to port the legacy renderer into v1.2x as an alternative renderer (i.e. allowing to choose between Windlight and the legacy renderer at runtime)...

Henri.

I'd like to know what folks with laptops are to do about this issue. Its not like a lot of people can just go out and buy a new computer, desktop or laptop. What is the answer to this?

This isn't only on older computers. I've got a machine built this past March. E8400 C2D 3.0GHz, Radeon HD3870, 4G of RAM.... it does the same thing. Starts out fine, then I lose frame rate. I also notice at this time that it affects ALL network traffic on my machine, ie: while this is going on, ping times to anything even on my local network (Switched GigE) jump to over 600ms.

There are things that are seriously broken in this, and they have been broken since 1.19.1. I've crashed or had to re-log more in the past two days than I have in the previous entire week.

ok.. i have justr spent the past 2 hours.. uninstalling and reinstalling over and over and redownloading the upgrade at least 5 times.! i cant get it to install i keep getting retry or abort or ignore on parts towards the end of the install. they wont retry, so i try to ignore them and then it supposedly installs. however when i open up the game, i get the old version showing and it wotn allow me in and keeps saying i need to install the new version. then when i do that .AGAIN, it says the new version is alreayd installed but its not.. and to let it reinstall once again. its a vicious cycle.. and how the heck do i get out of it?? i cant even get in to play the game and i have a brand new computer, so i fit all the requirements! help!!!
Jazzimyn

There are many new computers that won't run SL and other graphics intensive games. You need a good games spec machine not an email machine which is what many cheaper computers are aimed at to capture the cheap end of the market. Do you have some specs to share so others don't buy the same machine?

The most votes JIRA bugfixed done

E.g. a much better smaller cleaner IM interface more close to what was before the voice came. THIS feature alone is worth all the fuzz of DLing and sometimes even compiling a viewer of your own. I started this work whan voice came. There still are some patches i love to make to CV some day with time. I like a mix betwen the old and new. The chat row in near me, or what ever the history window is called today is better that the old chat line,
eg editing the text with arrows work.

How ever the IM windows take WAY to much screen hight, more that a row of text, e.g. 3D space is taken for the (Profile...) button and sometime (Call...) Until you turn the voice feature off again.

So in short a cleaner interface. Then some extra bug fixes don't hurt. The inventory click stuff https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-1828

I hope there soon will be possible to make the UI changes mostly as skinning and keeping skinning out of the binaries, so an viewer update don't destroy all skins. (1.20 was a bit step here but release premature, imho. The skinning have a few small things left to be ready. And thanks for the dark one being default.

I cannot understand how LL can say 'hey these things aint cheap to make', with regard to Clients..... so who is to blame for this? Users not only report the many JIRA issues, also crash loggers etc... we dont make it!

Developers are great guys, innovative, creative but also dreamers (they have to be).. but commercially, they have to stop and think about users. It is the users that supply the life blood (revenues) for developers, if they disgard users on the basis of OS or a 2-3 year old graphics card, then the life blood will begin to dry up. What's more, if after 5 years, they cannot provide a stable platform, their compeditors will over take them, those with a commercial foundation, focusing on stability.

People (users/blood donors) have been shouting over and over, about adding eye candy to the platform being secondary, stability and security should be priority number one. It would appear, that eye candy is the developers dream and a priority. Who was it that thought hiding the tools menu was a good thing? Why did they waste precious time, instigating that 'function'?

Clearly, the vast majority of issues, such as tp failures, chat lag, group chat failure, voice intermittently working, failure to rez objects, inventory not loading, L$ and friends lists not loading, transaction failures, Perm changes on items etc.. are far more important to the very core of this 'game', then spending time hiding menus, giving skin options that no one wants (I may start a poll to find out how many users actually use the Blue skin) etc... That is where the dream must end and commercial reality take hold.

Visionaries and designers are necessary in any business, if it wants to grow. But there has to be a middle step, where the designs are examined , tested and evaluated. Part of that is this or that feasable, is it a needed item, will the customers really like it, is it too expensive to implement right now, etc. It seems ideas fly off the drawing board and aren't put through this evaluation, at least not by qualified marketing people. Maybe the Tao doesn't provide for it.

Part of it is knowing your product, which I'm hoping LL does, but just as important is knowing your customers, which group you are aiming at, and tailoring the product to as wide a number of that group as possible. I really don't think they have that part down yet. Sometimes acting in the interest of the customers first will be in the best interests of the company.

What annoys me about all you naggers is that you keep talking about "us users" as if your opinion represent all of us. I for one do not wish the Linden developers to waste time supporting too old hardware.

How to define "too old hardware" is up to debate, of course, and your opinion about it doesn't necessary match all other users' opinions. Personally, I think a cutoff point of 3 years or so seems like a very sensible limit.

Most laptops are lousy for 3D applications. Buying a cheap laptop or even a too cheap desktop system is not a good idea if you plan to use heavy 3D applications like Second Life. Please don't blame others for your own mistakes and lack of research before buying your hardware.

Why don't you show some gratitude to the excellent voluntary efforts of the other viewer developers, instead of nagging on the Lindens to support your special needs? It makes sense for a corporate entity that tries to make a profit to focus on the mainstream/majority needs, and it makes sense for enthusiast voluntary developers to try to find a niche market where there's little competition and fulfill that need. Be happy that Linden released the viewer as open source to make this possible.

Sometimes your opinions doesn't match with the majority, and sometimes you are not the most important person in the world. You've just got to deal with that. Hopefully a bit more gracefully than some people in this thread.

I am using a 4 year old computer with the following specs:

CPU: AMD K7 (Unknown model) (2200 MHz)
Memory: 2048 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 6800/AGP/SSE/3DNOW!
OpenGL Version: 2.1.2
LLMozLib Version: [LLMediaImplLLMozLib] - 2.01.18666 (Mozilla GRE version 1.8.1.13_0000000000)
Packets Lost: 76/187559 (0.0%)


I downloaded and am running the newest update with zero (0) problems. I have very few crashes, most of them are ISP related. So how much of this is related to individual hardware and set up?

Sure if I get in crowds of over 30 or in areas with massive amounts of particles I have slowdowns. But in talking to people with better systems than I have, they do too.

I have a five year old laptop with 512 MB RAM and an ATI mobility 9700, and a four year old desktop with an ATI X600 and 4 GB RAM. Both run SL just fine. Not every old(ish) hardware has problems with SL. (I do believe both graphics cards are somewhat alike, it's just the RAM and the non-updateable driver that causes slowness in the laptop)

The nicholaz viewer seems to work quite well. The link earlier to Cool Viewer links to Nicholaz's blog and some other alternative browsers.

Nicholaz hasn't patched his viewers as of yet, he apparently is taking a wait and see approach. The Cool Viewers have been patched, both WL and non WL. I'm usung the 1.19 non WL with my X300 card and it runs great. In fact it seems a bit quicker than the Nicholaz BEw I was using.

There's a list here, though I can't vouch for it being accurate or complete: http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Alternate_viewers

Been running SL for more then a year using a ATI Radeon X1300. Since this last update non of the available vieuwers will let me be logged in for more then 2 minutes before everything freezes...even my CPU (need to manual reset it) if I don't abort fast enough.
I tried 4 different viewers. And reinstalled a variety of recent x1300 drivers -including the latest of cause- that worked well for anything BUT SL.

In the 2 minutes I do have, to fly and chat and do everything, it's clear it should be able to just run normally.

:/

I suggest trying to run 1.20 SL in a Window on Macintosh to keep search functions working. The current viewer has some issues here with Fullscreen that I believe are patched in the 1.21 RC.

http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-6000

I am afraid you are missing an important part: Laptops, I want to stay in contact with both my friends and my customers while I am not at home. And during these situations I don't care too much about the latest special effects.

I find it hard to believe that the number of people with similar interests is that small.

Well if you had brought a laptop with a 7600 then you would be fine, but you sacrificed graphics capability for the luxury of portability.
When PC Towers and Laptops are the same price for same specifications this arguement might become valid, till then, there's always plain email and phones to keep in touch.

When I try to update to the new version, I get the following error message:

"Installer integrity check has failed. Common causes include incomplete download and damaged media. Contact the installer's author to obtain a new copy."

Because I can't install the new update, I can't connect. I'd be grateful for any help anyone can give me.

So the advice of that Linden is just ignorant?


Building Gnome is easier than building SL.

I have spent weeks with that: Fixing a bug and implementing a little feature was done in about a day. But getting something that does built was the work of two weeks. And I completely failed with 1.20.

Sure, I have little practice in coding. But it is still more than most users (which have none at all). So unfortunately it is not simple enough at the moment to use the source instead of some precompiled binaries.

Ouch.



Unfortunately dune to the natures of my SL activies anonymity is way to important.
(If anyone is too curious have a look at my changes to the wiki).

And staying in contact with customers though email is just not practical.

Well if it's a "Tool of your Trade" then all the more reason to plan to replace it every couple of years, it's a tax deductable expense then anyway