Blender Screensaver

Game Engine Game Engine Support and Discussion
1

Hello Again Everybody!

I have somewhat completed the screensaver project that i was working on, and worked around many problems, thanks to the wonderful support from the community here!

However I ran into a problem. I recently found out that when i rename the .exe file to a .scr, the 3d performance drops drastically - from say 60fps to about 2. Or 3. And switches to a shaderless rendering, even if the gpu supports one.

Can you please explain this behavior to me? I know there have been successful screensavers made with the GE, so let me know if i am doing something wrong!

Kudos!
-Whiz
[INDENT][INDENT][INDENT] UPDATE[/INDENT][/INDENT][/INDENT]

I found that the Intel 915GM, 910GML and 915GMS Express Chipset’s disable OpenGL when running screensavers. Which is a bit rubbish to be honest. So after some more searching around the great informationweb, i found a suggestion to change the screensaver file extension from .scr to .sCr. And it works.

2

Hmm… I don’t see why the performance would drop, windows should run it like a regular exe.

3

Well it doesnt.
What it does though is that stops using shaders, even on supported GPUs and drops the framerate to about 1-2 fps. Can anyone provide me with an explanation for this?

I tested it out and i found this behavior on ATi, nVidia and Intel GPUs.

4

Maybe put it with all the required dll’s? And did you click ‘Install’ when you converted ir?

5

Yup Oyaki, i did.

As soon as i rename the xxxxxx.exe to a xxxxxx.scr, the framerate drops significantly - say from 50 fps to 5. Really. I’ve tried this on ATi, nVidia and Intel GPUs, i get the same results. Aside from that, I’ve copied the following into my system32 folder:

avcodec-52.dll
avdevice-52.dll
avformat-52.dll
avutil-50.dll
gnu_gettext.dll
ssKNSAVER.scr <---- that’s the thing
libpng.dll
libtiff.dll
pthreadVC2.dll
SDL.dll
swscale-0.dll
vcomp90.dll
wrap_oal.dll
zlib.dll

ALL of them. Just in case.
And I’ve right clicked on the .SCR and Installed it. Still no change. As soon as i make it into an .scr, the framerate goes booo, and the shaders go off, even on cards supporting them.

Any Ideas, wise people?

6

I put up the .blend just so you can try it out as well.

http://ul.to/j3a4dm

It accepts left mouse to change the camera angle.

Thanks,
Whiz

7

Sounds like its running a lower version of OpenGL, is the console there to look at? Maybe it’s printing out the reason.

Ohhh ohhh… I wonder if System32 has the standard display drivers in it, if it does then it’ll override whatever drivers you have installed and cause the problem you’re describing. Not sure how to solve that though, taking the dlls in question out of System32 might crash ya windows or give you horrible problems in Safe Mode. Hmm. Is there any way you can put your screensaver in a different folder instead?

8

Mm yeah, the console is there, and it says - shaders not supported. That’s all. Any way to increase verbosity?

9 
C:\KNTEST&gt;noinput.exe
Detected GL_ARB_texture_env_combine
Detected GL_ARB_texture_cube_map
Detected GL_ARB_multitexture
Detected GL_ARB_vertex_program
Detected GL_ARB_depth_texture
Detected GL_EXT_separate_specular_color
shaders not supported!

C:\KNTEST&gt;ren noinput.exe noinput.scr

C:\KNTEST&gt;noinput.scr /s
shaders not supported!

C:\KNTEST&gt;

The /s switch makes it start, otherwise it tries to configure.

The lack of GL_xxx_xxx detection in an .scr makes me think that it doesn’t initialize OpenGL properly this way.

Help?

10

HOLY F**K I figured it out!

[

I found that the Intel 915GM, 910GML and 915GMS Express Chipset’s disable OpenGL when running screensavers. Which is a bit rubbish to be honest. So after some more searching around the great informationweb, i found a suggestion to change the screensaver file extension from .scr to .sCr. And it works.
](http://uktsupport.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=11194)

!@#$%^& Intel developers. Keep that in mind kids, and careful with your Intel IGPs.

Thanks for the tips, it is what led me in the right direction to search! =)

11

Is there any way to add options to Blender screensavers? Like if it’s for a racing game, choose which vehicle to follow?

12

Possibly. Why don’t you start a new thread to ask about that?