Haven't seen night lights for ages... (SOLVED)

[Chuft-Captain]

Hi guys,

I've not been able to see night lights for ages. This is across all installed versions of Celestia from 1.4.1, 1.5.0, svn4382, svn4585.

Graphics version:

graphics-version.jpg

My settings:

graphics-settings.jpg

Default settings:

graphics-defaults.jpg

A while ago I tried to upgrade the drivers for this chipset but it crashed or bluescreened the computer, so had to rollback. I have a feeling that this problem has been around since then.
I'd finally like to solve it, so I was wondering if anyone with experience of this chipset has knows the best settings and/or stable driver version.

I've tried everything I can think of to fix this, but to no avail. Would appreciate any help.

Thanks in advance
CC

[Chuft-Captain]

This is what happens if I reset OpenGL settings to their defaults as above:

earth - where are the lights.jpg

[selden]

I can only repeat the standard recommendation:
use control panel to deinstall old drivers
reboot
install newest drivers using their installer, not using the default Windows install wizard
reboot
test
if the problem persists, report it to Intel.

At least once in the past they responded to such a report, pointing out a specific permanent restriction in their OpenGL support which Celestia now avoids.

[jogad]

Hello

rayures.jpg

I had that problem few times ago but it was not a graphic or graphic driver problem. I made a second planet Mars at the same place with different parameters in order to test Phobos and Deimos orbits.

Perhaps it is not the same problem for you but look at your ssc files to see if they are coherent and all compatible together.

I am not sure but perhaps improper values for atmosphere and clouds respective to the radius of the planet may also cause trouble.

[Chuft-Captain]

Thanks Jogad,

I thought of that, and ruled that out by disabling all extras, and checking .SSC's in the data folder.
I've just been doing a bit of regression testing on this and discovered that 1.3.2 does not have this problem, neither does 1.4.0 version on my machine.
However from 1.4.1 onwards, my machine just won't display night lights. I also have a few other older builds such as the celestia_patched.exe version (this was the original sound patch by Vincent I think). This one also works fine (it's a modified 1.3.2 build).

I suspect that maybe something fundamental changed in the way that night-lights are handled in the code between 1.4.0 and 1.4.1 versions which is in-compatible with my graphics chipset.
I doubt that I'm the only person using this chipset (it's a very common, though old, laptop chipset), yet I haven't heard anyone else complaining of this problem.

Barring fundamental changes to the code as mentioned above, I cannot see any reason it would work in 1.3.2 and 1.4.0, but not the later versions.

Perhaps someone knowledgeable of the code can advise me if any changes were made in this area of the rendering???

Cheers
CC

[bh]

Nightlights for me are not working well either... Depending on the render path they flash or disappear completely... I'm on mac with integrated card so I'll just have to put up with it I reckon.

[chris]

Nightlights for me are not working well either... Depending on the render path they flash or disappear completely... I'm on mac with integrated card so I'll just have to put up with it I reckon.

To the people with night lights troubles: which render path are you using? OpenGL 2.0?

--Chris

[Chuft-Captain]

Nightlights for me are not working well either... Depending on the render path they flash or disappear completely... I'm on mac with integrated card so I'll just have to put up with it I reckon.

To the people with night lights troubles: which render path are you using? OpenGL 2.0?

--Chris

Seems to be a pattern emerging with with these integrated chipsets Chris.

Here's mine:

Vendor: Intel
Renderer: Intel Montara-GM
Version: 1.3.0 - Build 4.14.10.3712
Max simultaneous textures: 4
Max texture size: 2048
Point size range: 0.500000 - 10.000000

Supported Extensions:
GL_ARB_multitexture
GL_ARB_texture_border_clamp
GL_ARB_texture_compression
GL_ARB_texture_cube_map
GL_ARB_texture_env_add
GL_ARB_texture_env_combine
GL_ARB_texture_env_dot3
GL_ARB_texture_env_crossbar
GL_ARB_transpose_matrix
GL_EXT_abgr
GL_EXT_bgra
GL_EXT_blend_color
GL_EXT_blend_func_separate
GL_EXT_blend_minmax
GL_EXT_blend_subtract
GL_EXT_clip_volume_hint
GL_EXT_compiled_vertex_array
GL_EXT_cull_vertex
GL_EXT_fog_coord
GL_EXT_packed_pixels
GL_EXT_packed_pixels_12
GL_EXT_rescale_normal
GL_EXT_secondary_color
GL_EXT_separate_specular_color
GL_EXT_stencil_wrap
GL_EXT_texture_compression_s3tc
GL_EXT_texture_env_add
GL_EXT_texture_env_combine
GL_EXT_texture_filter_anisotropic
GL_3DFX_texture_compression_FXT1
GL_IBM_texture_mirrored_repeat
GL_NV_texgen_reflection
GL_WIN_swap_hint

[Chuft-Captain]

FYI,

The mystery is solved, my night-lights are back! ... so I will share what I think fixed it in case it's useful to others with the same problem on integrated chipsets.

Sometime in the last week I adjusted my Open-GL graphics properties and I believe this has fixed the problem. I can't be 100% sure that this was what fixed it, as it's not the only changes I was making, and I don't know exactly when they returned, but it seems very likely.

My old settings:

graphics-settings.jpg

New settings which appear to have brought back the night-lights:

settings-FIXED-NIGHTLIGHTS.jpg

Incidentally, the shadow cast by Saturn on it's rings had also disappeared, but this has now returned as well.

CC

[BobHegwood]

Very good to know that you finally figured it out there CC.
Hopefully, that information may be of use to others, so GOOD DEAL!

Thanks, Brain-Dead

[bh]

Hmmm... can't get to graphic properties on mac... I've found shifting through the text options also toggles the lights!

[Chuft-Captain]

Hmmm... can't get to graphic properties on mac... I've found shifting through the text options also toggles the lights!

Do you mean that you cannot get to the graphics properties via Celestia? or via the OS.

It's a few years since I used a MAC, but I'm pretty sure there's a way to get at 'em from the OS (I think via the System icon)...

Sorry, not much help probably, but as I said... it's been a few years. Maybe a fellow MAC user can assist you.

CC