FEEDBACK: 2.2.03 Update #4 New VR feature - Enabled dithering for VR to reduce banding.

Erroll · Jan 12, 2017

I don't know if this is the cause but since the patch veritcal lines look like trash.

I get terrible shimmer and artifacting. I tried mucking with the settings but nothing works. It is especially bad in stations.. if you look across the pit in a station all the lines will look terrible.

I really wish it looked like it did in the previous version, this has been a real bummer. Never noticed a problem with planets, I sure notice a problem with this.

It looks like I am the only dissatisfied person though. Nobody else seems to have the issue. I wonder if this is part of the other change, to let other settings in during VR.

On a CV1 with a GTX980. Was on VR High, now on VR MED.

dape · Jan 12, 2017

Erroll said:
I don't know if this is the cause but since the patch veritcal lines look like trash.

I get terrible shimmer and artifacting. I tried mucking with the settings but nothing works. It is especially bad in stations.. if you look across the pit in a station all the lines will look terrible.

I really wish it looked like it did in the previous version, this has been a real bummer. Never noticed a problem with planets, I sure notice a problem with this.

It looks like I am the only dissatisfied person though. Nobody else seems to have the issue. I wonder if this is part of the other change, to let other settings in during VR.

On a CV1 with a GTX980. Was on VR High, now on VR MED.

Shimmering in stations has increased a bit for me as well. Other than that everything looks a little bit better. One more reason for me to finally go exploring. I have no more excuses, my ultimate explorer is build

Soon(TM) · Jan 12, 2017

MAIN SEQUENCE said:
100% agree. For me the shimmering is by far the worst thing about playing in VR. For LOLs I tried SS at 2.0 and HMD at 2.0, obviously the FPS was around 5 but there was still shimmering present. Yeah I know. Resolution. Straight lines. Aliasing. Bla bla...

I Found that by turning shadows to low and reflections to minimal it makes it a little better, but the shimmering is still very apparent no matter what you do

[HJ]-RedRaven · Jan 12, 2017

Erroll said:
I don't know if this is the cause but since the patch veritcal lines look like trash.

I get terrible shimmer and artifacting. I tried mucking with the settings but nothing works. It is especially bad in stations.. if you look across the pit in a station all the lines will look terrible.

I really wish it looked like it did in the previous version, this has been a real bummer. Never noticed a problem with planets, I sure notice a problem with this.

It looks like I am the only dissatisfied person though. Nobody else seems to have the issue. I wonder if this is part of the other change, to let other settings in during VR.

On a CV1 with a GTX980. Was on VR High, now on VR MED.

@Erroll - try turning the ASW feature off... with NumLock on, press Ctrl-Numpad 1.
This disables the ASW feature in the CV1.

If that fixes your vertical lines, then ASW was the problem. If not, switch it back on with Ctrl Numpad 4 (ASW auto on/off).

On a 980, I'd drop the following settings to their lowest values;
Reflections to Low,
Blur Off,
Depth of Field Off,
Bloom to Medium,
Ambient Occlusion to Low and
Shadows to Low -

That might buy you enough headroom to run HMD Quality 1.25. Keep Supersampling at 1.0.

marwood82 · Jan 12, 2017

do i need to do anything to activate the new dithering feature or is on automatically?

Wood67 · Jan 12, 2017

marwood82 said:
do i need to do anything to activate the new dithering feature or is on automatically?

Automatic afaik - at least all I did was fire up the game and dithering was there. No new settings in the options that I could see.

Didn't have much time to delve into it as my new PC case was waiting for a full gubbins transplant - as a result my ED Universe is nothing more than a collection of hardware, cables and thermal paste right now!

[HJ]-RedRaven · Jan 12, 2017

marwood82 said:
do i need to do anything to activate the new dithering feature or is on automatically?

No, its on by default.

Yololo69 · Jan 12, 2017

I can see a real improvement with this new default dithering. Around sun, stars, ship you meet during Supercruise, etc. Good FD, I'm glad to see VR improved

Now they should resolve the exit of SuperCruise (to a station, a REZ, etc.), where we have heavy lags, possibly due to textures or object loading, and which stop after 10-15 seconds when the whole scene is in memory (I often close my eyes and do a full 360 degrees before reopening eyes and problem gone.)

Erroll · Jan 12, 2017

[HJ]-RedRaven said:
@Erroll - try turning the ASW feature off

I did experiment with that. When I turn to VR MED I get 90 FPS telling me ASW is off. I still get the effect.

I should note that the issue is with any lines, vertical or horizontal. Its very noticeable in the bay but it is also very noticable in that horizontal bar across the front of the canopy in my Lakon 6.. its like bands of white and black shimmering back and forth across the strut...

Prior to .03 I was running VR High, it looked great and I did not have these artifacts to the same degree.

[HJ]-RedRaven said:
Reflections to Low,
Blur Off,
Depth of Field Off,
Bloom to Medium,
Ambient Occlusion to Low and
Shadows to Low -

That might buy you enough headroom to run HMD Quality 1.25. Keep Supersampling at 1.0.

I will give it a shot, thanks..

milligna · Jan 13, 2017

Dithering works great, massive difference in space and it looks better than ever. Slight shimmering returning, mainly on the thin lines entering and exiting the station. Otherwise, great improvement -- a real treat.

=AVG=Boomer · Jan 13, 2017

Just to add my two cents, I took a couple week break from Elite and when I loaded in yesterday I was shocked. I thought maybe it was that I haven't been in VR for a few days but man, everything look better than I remembered. The skybox looks better and I feel that I can read the text a lot easier than before. So, I think this update has really improved the VR experience (even though it was great to begin with)! On a different note, I still use the oculus debug tool at 2.0, does anyone else prefer the debug tool to the game's pixel density?

dogbite · Jan 13, 2017

=AVG=Boomer said:
Just to add my two cents, I took a couple week break from Elite and when I loaded in yesterday I was shocked. I thought maybe it was that I haven't been in VR for a few days but man, everything look better than I remembered. The skybox looks better and I feel that I can read the text a lot easier than before. So, I think this update has really improved the VR experience (even though it was great to begin with)! On a different note, I still use the oculus debug tool at 2.0, does anyone else prefer the debug tool to the game's pixel density?

I prefer the debug tool as it allows me to set 1.4 and seems a slight bit sharper and smoother, to me.

[HJ]-RedRaven · Jan 14, 2017

=AVG=Boomer said:
Just to add my two cents, I took a couple week break from Elite and when I loaded in yesterday I was shocked. I thought maybe it was that I haven't been in VR for a few days but man, everything look better than I remembered. The skybox looks better and I feel that I can read the text a lot easier than before. So, I think this update has really improved the VR experience (even though it was great to begin with)! On a different note, I still use the oculus debug tool at 2.0, does anyone else prefer the debug tool to the game's pixel density?

There is no difference between the Oculus Debug Tool and the ED HMD Quality setting - they are the same Rift feature.

@dogbite - yes, I agree, I wish the HMD Quality had a few more options... although its probably a text line in an ED settings file somewhere. I wonder if drkaii can set any value, or only those given by the ED HMD Quality menu? Might ask that in his ED Profiler thread.

AstroCreep · Jan 14, 2017

[HJ]-RedRaven said:
There is no difference between the Oculus Debug Tool and the ED HMD Quality setting - they are the same Rift feature.

Yes but in the debug tool you can go up in increments of .1, in game it's .25 increments IIRC so you're missing potentially better values.

Garalor · Jan 14, 2017

Hi,
can you guys help me to clarify something?

I have a rift,
system grafik is an r9 390x

until now i just startet Elite, with elite SteamVR auto starts.
I played.

Grafik settings where on ultra.

did i missed any special feature?
I m reading about supersampling up to 2.0 but i dont get how to enable this.

Can you give me any advice?
Thx

SirNotAppearing · Jan 14, 2017

[HJ]-RedRaven said:
There is no difference between the Oculus Debug Tool and the ED HMD Quality setting - they are the same Rift feature.

@dogbite - yes, I agree, I wish the HMD Quality had a few more options... although its probably a text line in an ED settings file somewhere. I wonder if drkaii can set any value, or only those given by the ED HMD Quality menu? Might ask that in his ED Profiler thread.

I have a Vive, but I wanted to throw my 2 cents in here anyways. For some reason I find that using the "rendertargetmultiplier" setting in the vive config files to change SS seems to have a notable increase in performance compared to using the HMD quality slider in game. Not sure if that translates to the Rift as well, though. Has anyone else noticed this? For reference I have a 2600 i7 at 4.2, 16GB and a 970 OC'ed.

ilgello · Jan 28, 2017

Finally had time to test it and it's a game changer for me, I stopped playing because of the banding and the poor color of the Galaxy backgrounds, this is really a huge improvement!

Chaz · Jan 29, 2017

Yep, I concur, it's much improved the banding for me too. In fact I hardly notice it now.

Amidala · Apr 2, 2017

Sorry for hijacking a VR thread, but I do have some color banding on my normal monitor too.

It looks exactly like the sceenshots provided in this thread.
Anyone knows if it is possible to enable dithering for a standard displayport screen?

Raptoyd · Apr 2, 2017

Been playing around on the Beta for the past 9 weeks and decided to back on Horizons last night and yikes it was back. What happened to the dithering?