What's happened to anti-aliasing?

Has anyone else noticed that somewhere in the welter of 1.7 updates anti-aliasing seems to have been globally disabled?

I have my Nvidia 6800 Ultra 256 set up so anti-aliasing is 'software controlled'. I.E. individual applications control whether anti-aliasing is required or not.
Obviously most do require it and the card responds appropriately.
Pre-1.7 the SL client anti-aliased. Now it doesn't and I'm seeing (now textures actually load...) horrible jaggy edges to everything and textures with high contrast edges in them have gone all 'cartoony'.

I'm wondering if LL hasn't disabled AA in order to obtain a rendering speed boost in 1.7?
Any thoughts?

Whatever, I'm reluctant to change my Nvida control panel settings, for much the same reason I'm reluctant to reduce my SL client graphics settings - why should I?
1.6 worked fine with the current settings, 1.7 is supposed to be an improvement, not a step backwards. If 1.7 can't deliver what 1.6 did, it's not worth the very considerable trouble it's caused so far.

The software AA filtering in SL is pretty anemic at the best of times. With that 6800, crank up the AA and AF in the Nvida control panel as it goes way beyond what SL will do and see what all that extra money went for.

Well I know I can do that, but I was getting (pre-update) nice smooth edges and realistic textures. Now I'm getting horrible jaggies and cartoon like textures.

I'm really wondering why the 'new improved' version of SL has so noticabely degraded the visual experience? I mean if every upgrade does this - aren't we going the wrong way?

When the Forumati all decide things are as good as they are going to get (say a month or so at the present rate of progress) I'll probably alter my old settings to plaster over the cracks in the new version, but until then I'm damned if I'm changing my settings so LL can wash their hands of the whole issue.

And what I'm saying is the pathetic AA filtering that SL does is nothing compared to what that 6800 Ultra is capable of. You have a Ferrari yet you complain about a feature that makes that Ferrari run like a Yugo with a flat tire. 90% of the players on SL can see no appreciable difference whether that feature in SL in on or off and you have a card that can do 10x times what the game can do yet you are stomping your feet over it. Pfffft, I'd tell you to take a long walk off a short pier if I worked for LL tech support.

On the other hand I would suggest going over all your settings and making sure an update didn't change anything. With my 6800 Ultra, AA appears to be working just fine, pitiful as it is, when set to software controlled and turned on in preferences. It looks spectacular when I crank it up though so I set it manually.

First pic is straight SL as it comes out of the faucett, no AA filtering at all. The second one is with software controlled AA, pretty weak but there is a slight difference. This is the best I have ever gotten with software AA settings. The last one is why you pays your money for a 6800 Ultra. It has AA and AF turned all the way up and Vert-sync on and it doesn't affect frame rate all that much.

As a MAME user, I tend to view graphic capabilities and effects as part of the software rather than as part of hardware, since hardware (especially where video cards are concerned) is VERY nonstandard. Unfortunately, MAME's 3D programs actually move slower than SL because they try to make their emulation as strict as possible, and avoid use of video cards.

But if AA is gone for good from the SL client, once again nonstandardness rears its ugly head and forces us to conform to the status quo.

I do hope it comes back.