What does Maximum Texture Size do? If you would like to watch a video concerning this topic, please visit our Youtube channel.If you pick a "Max Texture Size" that causes the game to fail on launch, then you simply need to navigate to the Aces High settings folder (default location C:\HiTech Creations\HTC\Aces High\settings) and remove the video8.cfg file. The next time you start Aces High, you will be brought back to this screen.
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The maximum texture size effects the visual details of the textures applied to the objects in the game. Unlike video resolution, which sharpens and reduces the jagged appearance of the edges of objects in the game, the texture size effects the details within the object itself. Take note of the differences in the shots to the right using the various texture sizes in the game. So why not default to 2048 texture sizes and not be worried about any other format? First, some video cards simply do not support texture sizes this large. Secondly, the amount of video memory required to deal with 2048x2048 textures is high. Each 2048 texture takes 16MB of video RAM. Think about that for a minute. The performance ramifications are significant due to the raw amount of data required for all the textures in a game. If the video cards ram gets exceeded and has to swap textures often. This is referred to as 'thrashing' and is manifested by stutters, pauses in the game, slow load times (the appearance of white objects), just to name a few Take a look at the differences in 512 and 1024. You will see very little difference. These screen shots were done at 1024x768 resolution. In order to really have any benefit at using 1024 textures, you need to be running 1280x1024 resolution, at the minimum. Generally speaking, you would need a video card, with more than 768MB of video RAM, to be able to use 2048 textures effectively, and only with anti-aliasing disabled as anti-aliasing can quadruple the amount of video ram needed for any given frame to be drawn. |
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 To get to the settings for graphic detail, from the clipboard menu click Options->Graphic Detail.
The Object Detail slider is used to adjust the graphics so that you may have either more object detail and/or better performance from your video card. Ground Detail Range is the range at which detail terrain objects come into view. Gamma is used to adjust the overall lighting displayed by your monitor. Checkbox OptionsDisable other plane skins is used to disable seeing other plane skins. Use this if you are constrained on memory in your computer (i.e. less than 2GB of RAM, for example). Display Horizon is used to show further distances into the horizon or to cut the view a bit shorter. Disabled, it may help provide slightly better video performance for some video cards Disable Weapon Effects will cause weapon effects, such as explosions, smoke, and other visual cues to not display. If your frame rate is taking a severe hit when these effects are played, you can disable them to help retain performance. Disable Vehicle Effects is much like the weapon effects. Disabling dust trails, smoke, and other effects which are not required for balanced game play. Disable these if you find you are suffering low frame rates when they occur.Button Options Pressing the "Advanced" button results in the following page flipping out of the clipboard.  Detailed Water: This option creates a better feeling of depth in the water surface. It has two modes it operates in, depending on the capabilities of the video card. Detailed Terrain: This option is only available to video cards which support Vertex and Pixel Shader version 2.0, or later. It is also advised the video card have a minimum of 256MB of dedicated video RAM. NOTE: Many video cards will claim to support the minimum shader levels, but they may not be able to do so in a real-time environment, such as a game. For example, NVidia 61xx, 62xx, 71xx, or 72xx video cards lack the processing power to run the shaders in real time. If your video performance is very low, for a certain period of time, the game will automatically switch this option off. Turning this option off will gain a great deal of video performance, while sacrificing some of the detailed visual aspects of the terrain. Local Water Reflections: This option depends on both the "Detailed Terrain" and "Detailed Water" options being enabled. It causes reflections to occur off the water. Bump Map Terrain: This option helps provide more depth to the terrain and should be available to all video cards. Object Self Shadow: This option also depends on the video card to support version 2.0, or greater, pixel and vertex shaders. It creates real-time shadows in places, such as the cockpit of the plane. You may also select the self-shadow texture size. This impacts the smoothness of the edges of the shadows. The size is in pixels. Take care, as this will directly impact how much video RAM will be used. A 512x512 pixel shadow texture will require 2MB of video RAM. A 1024x1024 pixel shadow texture would require 8MB of video RAM. Each time you double the size, you quadruple the memory requirement. Smooth Shadow: This option smooths the edges of the shadows. Only available when "Object Self Shadow" is enabled. Shadow on Others: This option allows you to see the dynamic shadows on other planes in the game. Please take note, this option is very video card intensive. Your frame rate will decrease when using this option. Buildings Cast Shadows: This option allows the game to display dynamic shadows on many (not all) of the buildings located on the terrain. Again, this is an option that can lower your game frame rate. NOTE: All the shadow options are very video card intense. Use them at your own discretion, if they are available. They will cause frame rate drops to occur. |
Video Setup Trouble Shooting
If you are trying to start Aces High and having problems such as a D3D or d9dx.dll error, check your computer to make sure you are running DirectX 9.0c or higher. You can use the DXDIAG utility to view and test various aspects of the DirectX system in Windows. To run this, press the "Start" button from the desktop, then select "Run", then type in "DXDIAG", and press the "OK" button.
If you find you need to update DirectX, you can get it from Microsoft's DirectX Center.
If you are trying to start Aces High and having problems such as a white screen, a crash to desktop or the HTC logo with no clipboard, then try deleting the video8.cfg file from your ../HTC/Aces High/settings directory and restarting Aces High.
When you are presented with the Select Video card dialog, select the lowest resolution and try to run the game again. If you are still unable to run Aces High, check your computer to make sure you are running DirectX 9.0c or higher and make sure that your video and sound card drivers are in good working order.
Take note, using the latest video card drivers from ATI or NVidia could cause problems, depending on the video card model.
As a general rule, for NVidia video cards, only use the latest driver from NVidia's WEB site if you have an FX6000 series or higher video card. For all other NVidia (except laptops) video cards, try the 61.77 drivers from NVidia.
For ATI, if you have an X800 series , or higher, video card, then use the latest drivers from ATI's site. For all other ATI cards, try using the 4.12 Catalyst drivers. Also note, you should avoid the installation of the Catalyst Control Center as it will cost your video card about 10% of its performance.
If you are suffering performance issues in the game, then try reducing the texture size, and/or the video resolution.
If you are completely stumped and need some help, you can email us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
| If you pick a "Video Resolution" setting that causes the game to fail on launch, then you simply need to navigate to the Aces High settings folder (default location C:\Hitech Creations\Aces High\settings) and remove the video8.cfg file. The next time you start Aces High, you will be brought back to this screen. |
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| Video resolution is described in terms of the number of pixels horizontally and vertically which can be displayed on your computer monitor. The first number specifies the count of pixels horizontally. The second number represents the number of pixels available vertically. The pixel is the smallest unit which can be displayed on a video screen. Take a look at the 'period' at the end of this sentence. It is one pixel in size. The number of pixels packed on the screen is what defines the sharpness and/or clarity of images. The images to the right clearly show the difference the video resolution can make. Notice how much clearer and sharper the image is as the resolution increases. Of course, as with any 3D graphics, the higher the resolution, the more work the video card must do. It is quite reasonable for video card performance to decrease as the video resolution is increased. Just looking at the increase in data needed for the raw frame each time it is updated gives us a clue.
As you can see, the amount of data can get rather large. Consider this; every single byte of data must be reviewed by the video card for every frame and you start to see how this can impact the performance of the system. Now that is just the raw frame data. It does not take into account the working frame buffers, the texture space needed to assemble the frame, scratch pad memory for video drivers, or memory for decompressing/compressing textures. As you increase the resolution, you exponentially increase the amount of work the video card must do in order to create a single visual frame. |
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Overall, this is the single most prominent setting effecting the performance of the game. If you find the game runs too slow, then reducing the resolution is the fastest way to get the performance level up. Keep in mind, when using a flat panel LCD monitor, the refresh rates and resolutions are normally fixed. Running the game at that native resolution will alway yeild the best look for the game.
Running the game at resolutions which do not match the resolutiuon of the monitor can result in a blocky looking image, if the screen is filled. Or the image may not take up the full face of the monitor. This will depend on the monitor and how it is configured. Refer to your monitor manufacturer documentation if you must run the game at other than the native resolution. |
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Updating Common Video Card Drivers
Most desktop computers can use the generic drivers from the manufacturers WEB site. Laptops need to be updated from the laptop manufacturer, as they are usually proprietary to the model of laptop.
For NVidia branded video cards
NOTE: The TNT and Riva NVidia video cards will not work with Aces High.
To update drivers for an NVidia card, go to NVidia's.WEB site.
For NVidia video cards GeForce 2, 3, 4, MX, and FX5xxx (replace xxx with the appropriate model number, such as 5200, 5600 and so on) models, we have found the 61.77 version of NVidia's drivers work best. You can tell NVidia's version number in the DXDIAG by looking a the last four numbers of the video driver version, where 6177, would be NVidia version 61.77.
For the FX6xxx line of NVidia video cards, it seems they work fine with NVidia's latest drivers.
For ATI video cards
NOTE: The ATI card must be part of the Radeon family to work with Aces High.
To update drivers for an ATI video card, go to ATI's WEB site.
Regardless of which Radeon card you have, we have found the Catalyst 4.12 drivers work best. There are issues with drivers after this release, so you will need to navigate to ATI's archive section to get this driver.
There are problems with the older ATI drivers (early Catalyst and pre-Catalyst), such as items on the game clipboard appearing as black when they are supposed to be other colors.
The version number in DXDIAG, for ATI drivers, does not coorelate to the Catalyst version number. The DXDIAG version number is ATI's file name for their driver.
Do not install the Catalyst Control Center. It uses excessive CPU cycles and will degrade the performance of you computer system.
Other Video chips/cards
Generally speaking, this is going to be a hit or miss proposition.
New computers from many OEM's use the Intel video chip. This chip is very popular as it is inexpensive and works well enough in Windows.
However, it is not really meant to be used in games. Intel's own list of games that work with these chips is pretty sparse. In order to have any chance at all, you will need to get the latest video drivers, for your chip model, from Intel's WEB site.
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