W2DR Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 ...maybe it's just me. CityScene Orlando installed fine. Files verify OK and the scenery.cfg entry looks right. But.....it just won't load. This is the third try to get KMCO to come up and the Loading Terrain Data slider is stuck at the dreaded 6%. And I mean stuck. As I type this it's been stuck on 6% for 23 minutes. And it does it every time. P3Dv4.4 is responding...CPU is 10-15% and the physical memory usage is going up (very, very slowly). Anybody else seen this or have any ideas?..........Doug Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dannycam6 Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Yes, Mine is doing the same thing Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W2DR Posted January 14, 2019 Author Share Posted January 14, 2019 It finally loaded here after 37 minutes. I gotta go out for a while so I'll try it again in a few hours. Strange things these computers..........Doug Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
richbonneau Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Same here....... I suppose I'll just wait as W2DR did and see what happens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
richbonneau Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Took about 5 minutes to load for me at KORL. Also, my T2G KMCO is missing even though I unchecked the boxes in the configurator. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FreeBird Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 For me it took over 3min to load but I have to load it with a default airplane and then switch to a payware once at the airport. If I load it with payware aircraft it crashes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Urmel81 Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Same here, 6% Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Britjet Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Same here... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W2DR Posted January 14, 2019 Author Share Posted January 14, 2019 Here's the latest: The only add-ons I have installed are all the ORBX products. So: With all ORBX disabled (default P3Dv4.4) the load time is 0 Min. 46 sec. With all ORBX enabled except CityScene Orlando the load time is 7 min. 27 sec. With CityScene Orlando enabled the load time is 23 min. 58 sec. at KMCO and 22 min. 13 sec. at KORL So.....I'm going to leave CityScene Orlando disabled for now. Hopefully there will be some explanation for what's happening here. I really hate to do this as I live 45 minutes from Disney World but I just can't live with these kinds of delays. By the time CityScene Orlando loads I can get in the car, drive away, and be halfway to EPCOT . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Cooper Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Hello, I have asked on your behalf. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W2DR Posted January 14, 2019 Author Share Posted January 14, 2019 Thanks Nick................. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gregmorin Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 I am also having the loading issue. I have inserted this screen clip to see if that helps determine the cause. Greg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tamba765 Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 How does this kind of thing not show up during testing? Pete Locascio Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Cooper Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 I'll leave it for the developer to explain. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 1 minute ago, Tamba765 said: How does this kind of thing not show up during testing? Pete Locascio Please hang tight. I am trying to write up a long explanation. It is going to take some time. Also, make sure that you read the user documentation as it is very important. Also, none of the testers had a problem with load times when the instructions followed in the documentation were followed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Hi Guys, First, the goal of these Cityscenes is to keep all load times under 5 minutes max. I will give you a little background history on things regarding the beta testing of this product. This could get a big long and complicated. So, bear with me. We discovered early on that because of the number of custom buildings in this scenery, load times were quite long. I myself as the developer had 3 test machines and my longest load time was 5 min 30 sec. Others on the beta team had lower and others had much higher. I think the highest was 12 minutes. When your load times hang at the 6% mark, FSX/P3D is trying to load custom object models. Nearly all CityScene objects are native custom models that are unique to the CityScene scenery. Most scenery packages, not just CityScene products, have buildings that are placed in object libraries. This allows them to be shared and reused by any scenery package. The core simulator provides library objects. Orbx provides a very large object library that is shared among lots of products. Just to note, CityScene Orlando does not reference any object libraries. During testing, we had reports that the sim was hanging at the 6% mark anywhere from 6 seconds to about 5 minutes max. So, we spent a good week or so researching the issue to try and understand why some people had quick load times and others were dragging. What we did is to use ProcMon (Process monitor) on P3D V4 and monitor the way scenery was being loaded. We had always thought that the load times at the 6% mark were linear and depended on the amount of custom objects in a CityScene scenery. But, that ended up not being true. Instead, load times appear to grow exponentially depending on the number and size of object libraries active in the Scenery LIbrary. What P3D is (apparently) doing for every BGL scenery file (going all the way back to FSX) is that it first searches through all active layers in the scenery library and makes a list of BGL files that are object libraries. Then, as it loads regular BGL scenery files, it checks each object in the file to see if it is a library object. If the users system has a lot of "libraries" of objects across their system, each one of these libraries seems to get searched for each object in the BGL file, even though it is pretty clear that a call to perform a library search is not necessary. After discovering this, we realized that by disabling other products in the Scenery Library that are not relative to the Orlando region, the 6% load times dropped down to almost nothing. In fact, on a clean system with only CityScene Orlando, it takes me no more than 6 seconds to get through the 6 second load mark. Because the Orbx libraries are very large and complex (and not used in Orlando), deactivating this layer alone during Orlando flights will have the greatest impact. At this point, we have a short term and long term solution. The short term solution we have identified in your User Guide, which is to disable other layers before flying in Orlando if your load times are excessive. The long term solution I think is going to be to work with LM to find a solution. As scenery products get more detailed with more custom objects in the future, load times are only going to get worse. The load times are longer with CityScene products because they consist of tens of thousands of custom objects. Autogen buildings are not used. During loading process, the simulator should not be checking a standard local object (3D model) against all object libraries it found in the system. What I can tell you is that we would not have released this product, if we did not have a solution for load times. Loading from an SSD vs a hard drive will probably make some difference. But, if your system is hanging at 6% for an extended time, it is because it found ACTIVE object libraries on your system and is checking every CityScene object against them during loading. I hope this makes sense. I will be glad to answer any questions that I can. I believe that products like CityScene are going to be the future of flight simulator scenery. And, P3D is a major player for us here at Orbx. So, my #1 priority in the very near future is to get with LM and see if we can find a solution (it seems like a simple one). If that is not possible, we have a couple of other things to look at that will be less productive but still helpful. In the meantime, you have an option available to you now if you find your load times excessive. That option has worked for every beta tester that needed to shorten their load times. I can tell you that I am as impatient as they come. During testing, I have to load and unload my scenery areas every few minutes. If my load times were even 5 minutes, it would make testing really difficult. We will be here to answer any questions you have. Thanks, Allen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FireRx Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 same is happening here too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FreeBird Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Is this going to be the way of life now with these large file scenery's? I can see turning off scenery that your not using but to turn the ORBX libraries off just for this area to get better loading times is not a solution for me. With a lean scenery config it still takes 4 minutes. The scenery looks great but will be only visited rarely by me and it will only be turned on then. Looking forward to the explanation and the path forward with these kind of sceneries. I see you have posted a explanation so will read. Thanks Josh Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 3 hours ago, FreeBird said: For me it took over 3min to load but I have to load it with a default airplane and then switch to a payware once at the airport. If I load it with payware aircraft it crashes. Are you running P3D V3 or P3D V4 ? If it is not V4, then most likely you are running out of memory with the payware aircraft. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FireRx Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 okay, finally in there. Thanks for the explanation Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gregmorin Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Thank you for the explanation Allen. I will try disabling the Orbx Library as a test. Greg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FreeBird Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 1 minute ago, akriesman said: Are you running P3D V3 or P3D V4 ? If it is not V4, then most likely you are running out of memory with the payware aircraft. Thanks I think that was a one off as it hase'nt happen again. Thanks V4.4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Just now, FreeBird said: Is this going to be the way of life now with these large file scenery's? The answer is yes, until a permanent solution can be found. But, there is hope. I don't know the inner workings of FSX/P3D. But, what we noticed with ProcMon is not something that should be occurring. I believe this is only now becoming an issue as developers are releasing larger, more complex scenery with lots of custom objects (custom objects is the key, not autogen). It comes down to this. If the simulator is loading an object that is local, it should not be checking against the global libraries for a reference match. In theory, it seems like a simple thing to address. But, we won't know for sure until we can get back with LM. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FreeBird Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 I disabled the ORBX libraries and the load time was only 3minutes too 4 minutes with them active. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Thank you guys for understanding. Working out a long-term load time solution is my priority #1 right now, even over any new product development. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FreeBird Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 3 minutes ago, akriesman said: The answer is yes, until a permanent solution can be found. But, there is hope. I don't know the inner workings of FSX/P3D. But, what we noticed with ProcMon is not something that should be occurring. I believe this is only now becoming an issue as developers are releasing larger, more complex scenery with lots of custom objects (custom objects is the key, not autogen). It comes down to this. If the simulator is loading an object that is local, it should not be checking against the global libraries for a reference match. In theory, it seems like a simple thing to address. But, we won't know for sure until we can get back with LM. I also have been looking into this too. It most likely will also cure allot of the unnecessary pauses in our P3D simulators. I hope we find a solution. Thanks again Josh Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Just now, FreeBird said: I disabled the ORBX libraries and the load time was only 3minutes too 4 minutes with them active. yes, that is a solution that should work for everyone right now. CityScene Orlando does not need the Orbx Libraries. But as I mentioned before, this is not a good long term solution that will be resolved one way or another. The key is the 6% mark during loading. I have an SSD on all systems and it takes about 6 seconds to get through this with only CityScene Orlando loaded. Any active product on your system that includes an active object library will increase this time slightly. However, the Orbx Libraries will have the most impact as they are huge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bbking Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 I also have massive loading times. In fact my system hangs at 6%. Question: how do i disable orbx libraries? Kind regards, Bouwe Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
W2DR Posted January 14, 2019 Author Share Posted January 14, 2019 Hey Allen - Thanks for taking the time to put that explanation together. For those of us who don't know a friggin' thing about the inner workings of P3D it really helps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 9 minutes ago, bbking said: I also have massive loading times. In fact my system hangs at 6%. Question: how do i disable orbx libraries? Kind regards, Bouwe Hi, Please see the CityScene Orlando User Guide. This topic is discussed there. The user guides for Orbx products are accessed through FTX Central (now Orbx Central). P3D V4 made this a little more difficult because you can only access the Scenery Library during flight (not pre-flight as with P3D V3). Another good option, which I am now using, is to download a 3rd party freeware Scenery Library manager (just type in "p3d scenery manager" in your search engine). Also, I think one of the beta testers is putting together a document for those that are not quite savvy when it comes to the managing the Scenery Library. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FireRx Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 akriesman, Is there a way down the line to make the scenery just omit the obrx libraries when iaco's ie KORL, KSMO are chosen in P3D. seem cumbersome to remember to turn stuff off anytime you want to fly there. perfect example is if you do a long haul from Barcelona to Orlando in a Heavy airliner.. Just a thought. . Also , is the extended load time apply to just KORL & KMSO or will it affect globally from now on?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sumnersd Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 have same problem,but understand am willing to wait, but also, terminal buildings don't load. Jetways are there along with taxi, and runways. Any thoughts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 1 hour ago, FireRx said: akriesman, Is there a way down the line to make the scenery just omit the obrx libraries when iaco's ie KORL, KSMO are chosen in P3D. seem cumbersome to remember to turn stuff off anytime you want to fly there. perfect example is if you do a long haul from Barcelona to Orlando in a Heavy airliner.. Just a thought. . Also , is the extended load time apply to just KORL & KMSO or will it affect globally from now on?? I don't know of a way that could exactly be done with what is available today. I do know that one of the beta testers mentioned that some simmers use 3rd party library managers (some are free), which turn groups of scenery layers on/off depending on selections made. You might look into this. Load times that hang at 6% are roughly a product of the total number of external library objects that are ACTIVE globally, times the number of custom objects that are defined locally for the region that is loaded. There 2 types of scenery object BGL's: 1 type contains library objects that have no location and are referenced by GUIDs. The other scenery object BGL places objects that are either in an object library reference (through a GUID) or defined locally. Because CityScene Orlando does not provide a large object library itself, Orlando scenery will not affect load times when starting a flight in say....Chicago. But if a developer created a Chicago scenery that has a really complex object library defined, the Chicago scenery would affect Orlando load times based on how big and complex that object library was. This is really hard for me to explain. But, you have to understand the concept, before you can determine which products will affect load times. We know the Orbx Libraries are large right now. So, they will have a big impact. Also, let me say this is all conjecture at this point. I am pretty certain of what is going on because of the ProcMon results that we saw. It clearly showed that global object libraries were being accessed in some way for each local scenery object load (object placments). And, for Orlando, this process was happening over 10,000 times for a single load. If only the base FSX/P3D libraries are active (they are always active), this load is very fast. But every product that adds an object library to the system will slow down products that have a lot of custom models, even though those products don't reference any library objects. Just remember this....based on what we saw anyway Load time = global object libraries X local scenery objects or in long form 6% load time = total complexity of object models defined anywhere in world times the total complexity of the scenery objects local to current flight area. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FreeBird Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 I use a Scenery manager and created a Orlando scenery CFG with only default scenery's and Orlando activated and it loaded in 1:55 seconds. It only stayed on 6% for a few seconds. This is a good compromise. Ill only be using this scenery for sightseeing and not so much as a destination. Looks like good helicopter territory. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 6 minutes ago, FreeBird said: I use a Scenery manager and created a Orlando scenery CFG with only default scenery's and Orlando activated and it loaded in 1:55 seconds. It only stayed on 6% for a few seconds. This is good compromise. Ill only be using this scenery for sightseeing and not so much as a destination. Looks like good helicopter territory. Yes. 1:55 is much closer to what I would expect. Just about everyone should be able to get it under 3 minutes I would think. To be honest, these CityScene products are not really designed as a point-to-point destination over a long haul. While the frame rates are still good because of the technology used, the current simulators (FSX based) have trouble with loading large, complex scenery packages when aircraft is traveling at a higher speed. This is where the well known "Blurries" come, in which have been around forever in our FSX based hobby. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
downscc Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 My problem wasn't the load times but fractional frame rates and long frames during which aircraft (PMDG B747-8i) lost control. Approaching the coast the terrain was blurry, so I pause and used terrain texture refresh. This solved that problem but whenever the view was towards Orlando city proper, the frame rates would plummet and it reminded me of flying the Lear in MSFS circa 1989. The plan is to start removing options, such as residential buildings, to see where I can find a happy place to use this pretty cool product. My system is 8700K 4.8GHz OC dual 1080Ti SLI so I should be able to handle anything within reason... this product for now is a little unreasonable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sabretooth78 Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 "6% load time" is about 15 minutes for me; this is from an SSD, with the residential buildings turned off in the settings but with basically my entire scenery library loading (less conflicting layers) - obviously not something I do regularly unless I'm trying to break test something. With a pared down scenery library (basically base (default + Vector + meshes) + destination + arrival) it's just under 10 minutes. Subtract ORBX libraries and it's about a minute and a half. This is still including a handful of other developers' library layers (such as FlyTampa, etc.). Obviously though as stated, there's no sense in loading it at all for airliner flights into and out of KMCO. I don't have any plans of violating the no-fly zone and buzzing Mickey with the NGX. That said, the product page says the ORBX libraries are a prerequisite; perhaps that should be revised? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akriesman Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 19 minutes ago, Sabretooth78 said: That said, the product page says the ORBX libraries are a prerequisite; perhaps that should be revised? Good point. The Orbx Libraries should be the first thing disabled when using this scenery as they are very large, detailed and complex. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlosqr Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Hi I also confirm the stuck at 6% but at the end it does load For me I suffer frame rates. I have Gold Coast and Barcelona and work a lot better, but the explanation is above, though I think this should be told before as a warning so people decide to buy or not I have a question My ground textures fight to take place near the airport. I have P3D v4.4 fresh whole install and I have KMCO by Taxi2gate. I have unticked the KMCO two options in the control panel but I still can see that when flying next to the airport the texture change to Orbx brownish and then change to T2G green ones and so on. Should any bgl's in T2G be put to off? and then tick the airport terrain photo imagery the control panel? Regards, Carlos Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawrence aldrich Posted January 14, 2019 Share Posted January 14, 2019 Probably a dumb question, but how come cityscape Portland (for example) is exempt from this type of problem? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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