Getting frustrated with bugs... 2005-06-03 - By Joel Blackwell
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Thanks Heath! Maybe it's just the Truespace users that XSI has a
distaste for :) I'm sure we'll get through it, sooner or later.
-Joel
Heath wrote:
> Joel,
>
> I'm with you as a someone who came from the Truespace camp and jumped on
> XSI when the price dropped. I use an uncertified system as well (XP
> Home & Radeon Mobility 9600), and have had maybe 2 crashes since 4.2 was
> released. Both crashes were related to me trying to screw with things
> while the render region was working on something heavy.
>
> I'm also with you in the "everything goes awry" department... I've (as
> recently as 3:30 this past AM) also questioned whether XSI and I are
> compatible or not because it seems like I waste so many hours trying to
> do simple things like texturing a book cover without textures
> stretching... What I've found though is that when I'm trying to do
> something new (displacement for example) that it's best to load up a new
> scene and experiment with a simple cube, simple textures, etc. before I
> try it in my current model. This way I can prove to myself how it is
> supposed to work. When I find success, I have started writing down the
> steps that I took, and it seems to help a little.
>
> I sometimes think that the program is too complicated for my needs, but
> when I think of all of the alternatives, I realize that everything else
> would be just as difficult to learn after coming from Truespace. So,
> hang in there!
>
> Heath
>
> Joel Blackwell wrote:
>
>> Thanks for the additional replies, guys. One of the problems seems to
>> be- if I do exactly what I'm supposed to, XSI works okay. If I
>> deviate, even slightly, everything goes awry. It's a shame because I
>> spend hours in the manuals trying to work out if I've done something
>> wrong, when most of the time that weird thing I saw moments before
>> really was a 'weird thing' after all.
>>
>> When I said most guys have money to throw around, I was more referring
>> to the ability to get the right hardware for the job. Unfortunately,
>> I'll have to build a new rig for XSI, because I need my gamers card so
>> I can stay compatabile with the other programs I have related to game
>> development. It's a shame, but I guess that's the way the cookie
>> crumbles, as they say.
>>
>> Hopefully in the future XSI's small quirks will be ironed out so I can
>> stop cowering in a corner, waiting for my computer to explode after
>> connecting a shader the way I'm not supposed to, or something.
>>
>> -Joel
>>
>>
>> kim aldis wrote:
>>
>>> There's a few things worth mentioning here:
>>>
>>> First, to re-iterate what has already been said here, that Xsi at 4.2 is
>>> extremely stable and I rarely see it crash these days. One issue only
>>> these
>>> past 4 weeks and that I nailed down to a dodgy .mov file in the roto
>>> view.
>>> Changed the roto file and all was dandy.
>>>
>>> Remember that graphics card issues are also related to any kind of
>>> picking
>>> so if you're having problems connecting RT nodes then this is likely
>>> a card
>>> issue. That said, I used the Go FX 5600 for quite some time without any
>>> major issues. I appreciate this isn't the same card but generally
>>> Nvidia is
>>> seen as good for xsi. Generally speaking, though, the best bet is to
>>> always
>>> go latest drivers and to get them from Nvidia.
>>>
>>> Avoid recovering from crashed scenes. There's no guarantee that the
>>> saved
>>> scene is reliable and given the state of Xsi at the point of save it's
>>> highly likely to have some form of corruption. Many people here have
>>> reported instability issues with scenes that have been recovered. Far
>>> better
>>> to adopt a policy of regular saving.
>>>
>>>
>>> Remember that although Xsi is powerful and gives you a great deal of
>>> control
>>> over your work, that control comes with the penalty of complexity
>>> which in
>>> turn gives you greater scope for error.
>>>
>>> And finally, never underestimate the facility that sticky fingers and
>>> unfamiliarity have for making a mess of things without your
>>> realising it.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> kim@(protected)
>>> kim@(protected)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> -- --Original Message-- --
>>>> From: owner-xsi@(protected) [mailto:owner-xsi@(protected)] On
>>>> Behalf Of Joel Blackwell
>>>> Sent: 03 June 2005 13:59
>>>> To: XSI@(protected)
>>>> Subject: Re: Getting frustrated with bugs...
>>>>
>>>> Thanks to all who've posted responces so far... I appreciate it! It
>>>> was a little daft of me not to post some of the problems I'm having,
>>>> so I'll do so now.
>>>>
>>>> Firstly, I'm running a GeforceFX 5600 (and have run with a number of
>>>> different drivers.. currently the latest) I've had no major issues,
>>>> graphics wise.
>>>>
>>>> Now for some problems: Simple things, like creating two layers for
>>>> a simple shader, and then attaching a texture to each. Then, half
>>>> of the time I can't disconnect the textures at all from the layers
>>>> (mainly a problem for the tree view) and the other half of the time,
>>>> they do disconnect, but not visually, so I can't tell what's
>>>> connected to what until I hit refresh.
>>>>
>>>> Then (usually while trying to disconnect the textures from the first
>>>> problem) If I hit right mouse a few too many times in the tree view,
>>>> XSI crashes. Even though it tells me it successfully saves, when I
>>>> load XSI again and try to recover the scene, it tells me the scene
>>>> is the wrong version (version 420 or something along those lines)
>>>> and then proceeds to tell me it requires version 420. It then
>>>> crashes again.
>>>>
>>>> Here's one from XSIbase...
>>>>
>>>> I loaded in an X format model with textures (not made by myself) and
>>>> found it to have a red tint to it. I adjusted the ambient lighting
>>>> for the materials to grey, and wondered why, even though the
>>>> textures were grey in colour, the model still retained the red tint
>>>> in the 3D view. However, the model rendered exactly as I thought it
>>>> should look (that is, with grey ambience). Long story short- after
>>>> a lot of experimentation, I found the problem to be that the model's
>>>> texture was connected to the diffuse port of the phong shader. I'd
>>>> adjusted the phong's ambience from red to grey, but XSI didn't
>>>> change it fully. If I disconnected the texture and reconnected it
>>>> again, the ambience was set back to red (again) and when I then
>>>> changed it to grey, it fixed the problem.
>>>>
>>>> Very strange, and for those wondering, I checked the scene ambience.
>>>> Really odd things like this keep popping up the more I work in the
>>>> render tree... weird anomalies that keep me busy for hours,
>>>> rummaging through the manual, trying to find out why it's happening.
>>>>
>>>> It's things like those that I encounter all over the place and make
>>>> me wonder if anyone bothered to test XSI at all before releasing
>>>> it. I'm sure that I'm overreacting somewhat at the moment... and
>>>> you guys are right, they're not the biggest problems in the world.
>>>> But, it'd be nice to have someone say, "Hey, we're going to get
>>>> those things fixed, so people don't start comparing XSI to Truespace
>>>> 3!"
>>>>
>>>> -Joel
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Morten Bartholdy wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Joel I do remember you ;) and I'm not sure my answer will
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> be of much
>>>>
>>>>> help, but here goes:
>>>>>
>>>>> I use XSI on lots of different hardware combinations
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> including a few
>>>>
>>>>> consumer gfxcards and though I do run in to the occasional bug or
>>>>> crash,
>>>>> V4.2 appears very stable for my use, which is any flavor of
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> 3D & VFX
>>>>
>>>>> for commercials and feature film alike. So I get around in
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> the app and
>>>>
>>>>> I can't recognize your problems. I know this does not help
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> you much,
>>>>
>>>>> but it leads me to think you are either suffering from a very
>>>>> incompatible gfxcard (you don't say which one), or bad
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> hardware - perhaps memory.
>>>>
>>>>> You say it happens when working with shaders, so what
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> exactly is it you do?
>>>>
>>>>> Do you tweak parameters on existing ones or write your own?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Granted -
>>>>
>>>>> tweaking shaders with the renderregion active causes hangups or
>>>>> crashes now and then, but although annoying, nothing I would call
>>>>> serious flaws. The only times I have experienced repeated
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> crashes or
>>>>
>>>>> the like, was when I was beating what ought to be a dead horse, and
>>>>> was too tired to think of reasonable workarounds or even a better
>>>>> solution. In my experience (having taught 3D at several
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> schools in my
>>>>
>>>>> country) those that keep running into trouble with the app
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> often keep
>>>>
>>>>> using it in ways that may provoke certain weaknesses in the
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> sw. I am
>>>>
>>>>> not saying that is what you do - I am only trying to give
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> you pointers regarding how to work on fixing your specific problem.
>>>>
>>>>> When you say no-one seems to care about your problems, bear in mind
>>>>> that if it is a gfxcard issue, it could be fixed for an amount
>>>>> equalling a few hours work for many professionals on this,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> and though
>>>>
>>>>> I understand your pain, and appreciate that you may not be in a
>>>>> position to aquire a certified card, you may need to
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> understand why others might not be bothered.
>>>>
>>>>> You might get more help from some of all the good guys
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> residing here
>>>>
>>>>> if you provide a bit more specific info about the nature of your
>>>>> predicament. I am no hardware expert, but I have used XSI
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> on several
>>>>
>>>>> consumer cards including even an old GeForce 2 GTS, and apart from
>>>>> performance and OGL accuracy they are not much different from
>>>>> Wildcats, Fire or nVidia FX cards for average daily use, so
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I am curious to know which card you are using.
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Best regards
>>>>>
>>>>> Morten Bartholdy
>>>>> 3D & VFX Artist
>>>>> Denmark
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> -- -- Original Message -- --
>>>>> From: "Joel Blackwell" <joel@(protected)>
>>>>> To: <XSI@(protected)>
>>>>> Sent: Friday, June 03, 2005 12:39 PM
>>>>> Subject: Getting frustrated with bugs...
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> I'm considering selling XSI, mainly because I'm finding it hard to
>>>>>> learn the program, due to the fact I run into a bug every
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> few minutes
>>>>
>>>>>> when working with shaders. Every time I post about the
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> problems (on a
>>>>
>>>>>> forum), someone pipes up and tells me something like, "You
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> must have
>>>>
>>>>>> missed something." or, "The problem must be with your
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> graphics card."
>>>>
>>>>>> Perhaps either one of those could be true, since I'm not using a
>>>>>> certified card, and I'm no XSI know-it-all. However, no
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> one seems to
>>>>
>>>>>> care if the problem could actually be worth looking to. My
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> posts just
>>>>
>>>>>> disappear into nothingness, never to be seen again. Seemingly, my
>>>>>> only solution I have is- risk paying some money for a
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> certified card
>>>>
>>>>>> (which is beyond my price range at the moment) that may not fix
>>>>>> the problems I've been seeing anyway.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> This is obviously a great community for people who work in a
>>>>>> professional environment, and have money to throw around
>>>>>> everywhere for proper support and the hardware to suit a professional
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> pipeline.
>>>>
>>>>>> But, for people like myself, XSI seems more and more the poorer
>>>>>> program to go with. Softimage may be doing everything they can to
>>>>>> increase their userbase, but the program just isn't
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> designed for the average person...
>>>>
>>>>>> and right now, I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. I mean,
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> why develop
>>>>
>>>>>> a program for certified (non-gamer) cards, and then aim the
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> program at
>>>>
>>>>>> mod makers for games? It just doesn't make any sense.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> That aside, does anyone have some advice for me? Last time
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I posted
>>>>
>>>>>> on this mailing list everyone tried to kill me as the marauding
>>>>>> invader from the land of Truespace (if anyone remembers
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> that fiasco).
>>>>
>>>>>> This time, I'm hopeful that won't happen again, and someone
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> will help
>>>>
>>>>>> me get this program working as it should. Or, the
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Softimage crew will
>>>>
>>>>>> actually note down some bugs to be fixed, so I don't have
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> to sell XSI
>>>>
>>>>>> and move onto something that works.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Thanks.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> -Joel
>>>>>> ---
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>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
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>>>>
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>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>
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