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I think I have found a small "bug" in font rendere

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za0:
Hey people,

I had the problem with FPS. Now, I have discovered something strange:
ACCOURDING TO THIS THREAD: http://ufo.myexp.de/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=536

I switched down resolution to 400x300 and I suddenly had 20fps. for sure that resolution is sh.t, BUT it works ALMOST. The point is, I cannot read the FONTs in OPTIONs very well. I also CANNOT read smaller fonts. I tried other resolutions and I think, you can make a connection between the details of the fonts and the performance. In main menu there is nothing special, no complex polygones, so why the heck I do have only 4fps even if textures are LOW? It is impossible, that SUDDENLY my FPS boots up, when fonts are almost unreadable, because they look like a cluster of pixels - so font renderer has less to do. The answer is: there is something WRONG with your FONT RENDERER! Accourding to this thesis I 'd like to add, that I also get crashes, every time I start a new game and wait few seconds. The last message(s) in console are

--- Code: ---
Changing to Singleplayer
Global data loaded - size 5525840 bytes
Activate stage intro
...aircraft inited
Text has zero width (f_small)
SDL audio device shut down.
recursive shutdown
Error: ...could not generate font surface

--- End code ---

they end with

--- Quote ---
Error: ...could not generate font surface

--- End quote ---


I think you developers can check that very easy just by resizing fonts to size like used in 640x480 but on a actuall resolution (screen resolution) of 400x300 or less. Maybe you test it on machines with not that much graphic power for expl. like sis-chips (like i have). Or you build a test screen. If you get low fps even on 400x300 my thesis is proofed. You have to check your font render algorythem.

Best regards,
za0

ubequitz:
za0, there are likely some problems here.

The crash at low resolutions ("Error: ...could not generate font surface")  and the slow-downs turn out to be two unrelated issues (the font surface bug is fixed in SVN: see http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=1563540&group_id=157793&atid=805242).

The leading theory about in-game slow-downs (random pauses with jerky mouse movements and choppy sound) involves the font system... however a prolonged low FPS, as in your case, is more likely to be due to video card driver (3D/opengl) issues.

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