Celestia Forums

I've been having problems with celestia rendering specular and bump maps...

I know my computer can render those things because:

1. I have a 244MB videocard.

2. I have 2GB of memory.

3. It has done it before.


My computer is a HP Pavillion dv6000 Running Windows Vista With an
Intel GMA 950 Graphics Card.

Eb,

Please update the graphics drivers to the most recent version available for your graphics hardware. That usually fixes problems like this. Drivers should be freely downloadable from the Website of the company that made your laptop. Generic drivers may also be available on Intel's Web site.

Unfortunately, however, Celestia has always had various problems with Intel graphics chipsets. For some reason Intel often doesn't implement some of the OpenGL routines that Celestia depends on.

Hmmm....

MY PC is an HP Pavillion too. Selden? Are you saying that we should
be updating from Intel too? Probably a stupid question, but I have
NEVER done that before, so I thought I'd ask. I AM updating from
Windows and Nvidia.

Thanks, Bob

Bob,

I would expect that you'd only need to update your Intel graphics drivers if you are in fact using the Intel graphics chipset for a display. In principle, you could hook up multiple displays to your system, since you have both Intel and Nvidia graphics controllers.

However, my understanding is that it's best to change settings in the BIOS to disable the motherboard's onboard graphics when you install additional plugin graphics hardware like your Nvidia card. Apparently Celestia assumes that the computer has only one type of graphics controller. Since your system came from HP with an Nvidia card, I assume they disabled the Intel chipset as part of assembling your computer. But you should verify that.

Hmmm. Now I'm wondering if having two different graphics drivers loaded could be causing the OpenGL highlighting problems you're seeing. You should verify that the Intel chips are disabled by looking in the My Computer properties menu, Hardware tab, Device Manager button, Display adapters entry. When you click on its +, it should expand and list only the Nvidia card. (That's the path to the XP device manager. Hopefully the Vista path isn't too different.) If the Intel chips are listed by the device manager, then they're still active and causing confusion. You'll have to disable them. Shutdown and then boot again. Select the firmware BIOS option before Windows starts. I dunno what HP's BIOS commands would be to disable the on-board Intel graphics.

selden wrote:Bob,

I would expect that you'd only need to update your Intel graphics drivers if you are in fact using the Intel graphics chipset for a display. In principle, you could hook up multiple displays to your system, since you have both Intel and Nvidia graphics controllers.
However, my understanding is that it's best to change settings in

I checked the drivers as you outlined, Selden. I have ONLY the Nvidia
properties under the hardware display drivers you mentioned.

Curiouser and Curiouser... I have also noticed that under OpenGL 2.0
I get NO specularity whatsoever. What happens is that the entire
planet or object becomes brightened over its ENTIRE surface. Via
the OpenGL vertex path, the brightness goes away, but the
specularity issues return. On Mars, for example, the area just to
the south-east of the large four volcanoes gets extremely bright.

If I turn on the OpenGL 2.0 path, the whole planet gets bright, but
there are no specularity issues. Damn... Makes me wish for a nice
Gateway PC with NO graphics capabilities. <grin> I'll post some
more shots as I can get the system rebuilt. I have started from
scratch so that I can examine EVERY texture and add-on prior
to installation.

Boy, I'm sure glad that I have the time for this stuff now.

Thanks - as always - for all your help. If I find an answer, rest
assured that I'll share it with the forum. I just can't believe that
I am the ONLY one having these problems though. Anyone else
have an HP m9047c with Nvidia and Vista? Never mind... No one in
their right mind would have Vista...

See other topic Selden for pictures.

Here

Thanks Brain-Dead

Obviously, This is a REALLY LATE responce. But i fixed it. Apperently, The problem was from the latest intel drivers that i had installed. I was able to fix it by simply reverting back to my old drivers. Ive been using the same old video drivers for about a year now =P