// VHR News Update - 2011 Edition Set For February 16th Release
• Work is now completed on the 2011 Edition - It has been a long and sometimes very frustrating process getting the 2011 Edition ready this. With so many updates to be made to the mod delayed the release this year until February 16th, I feel the wait will worth it. Also, version 3 of the 2011 templates has been release featuring various graphic improvements to make them close to the real cars..highpoints include updated from end graphics to both the Toyota and the Ford Fusion. I just want to thank everyone that helped out in the testing for the 2011 mod.

Nice!

One more day, I can't wait to test it out.

Can't wait myself! I hope the single player is in good enough shape for me to run the season alongside the real season. It's not terrible now,
but the cars can't find their way out of the garage on most tracks. I plan on racing the season at 50% laps with 2X tire and fuel.

I keep checking the VHR website every half hour, anxiously awaiting.

I saw this at the VHR forums just now. Posted by Corvette Dave: " I going over Daytona's surface one more time last night and I updated a couple of things in the cockpit that was bugging me, it will be ready later tonight."

Looks like it will be tonight sometime.

It's out, but as expected the VHR site server is jammed up. A least it was when I was downloading it.

I'm downloading the server software right now and SimHQ Motorsports 4 with VHR 2011 will be loaded soon as it finishes.

If you want to wait a bit, I'm uploading the client exe now as a SimHQ download.

Cool I'll be checking that out this evening for sure.

Wow. First download of the server software expanded with an error. Re-downloading. It's a .rar file.

Downloaded and about to install. I can't wait to run some laps.

VHR 2011 server's up with 'Dega.
Setup is from our 2010 'Dega race.
No clue how a 2010 setup works with the 2011 version.

SimHQ Motorsports 4
No password (for now...testing server connections so watch out for the wreckers )

Client download (should be faster than the VHR site)
http://simhq.net/downloads/motorsports/rfactor/SimHQ_2011_VHR/VHR2011_1.0.exe

I've been having fun with this on and off today. At the moment i find the new engine noise irritating but (oddly) bizzarely cool and i'm having jumpy framerates and flickering track textures in places. Judging by the VHR forums i'm not alone in this....but some nice physics tweaks and at least the AI seems better - even if they still can't get out of the pits. (i thought this was supposed to be fixed??) Lighting and shadows seem improved and it's obvious everthing has had a touch up but i'm still unsure if it's for the better. I also have a suspicion we'll be left with a lot of the same annoyances but i think that's more a limitation of rF than the Mod itself.

If any of you are struggling with the stupid default cockpit view then you need to manually change the FOV in the display settings to get it looking 'normal'.

The jury is still out so i'm not uninstalling 2010 just yet, but it's very early days. I'm sure it'll grow on me

PS. Server seems to be working fine, thanks Guod

PPS. The new Daytona is like driving on a billiard table. V.fun

By the time we have our Dega race there will probably be at least one patch out fixing the big stuff. He has been pretty good about incremental updates to VHR.

I came here to post exactly what you just said Blythe. The car engine sound is static sounding. My screen is flickering whether it's in game or watching the replay. The cars not being able to leave the garage and practice with you bothers me the most i think. It really helps with the immersion of a race weekend if they can practice with ya. I think maybe they can take a cue from NR 2003 and just have the cars start on pit lane if possible. I dont see why they need to start in the garage. Anyway, with the sound and flickering I might be running my offline season in the 2010 version. I know this is an early 1.0 version but I'm bummed.

After further testing looks like 2011 is going to be a no-go for me in it's current state. My framerate is terrible with just 1 car on the track. I made sure I mirrored all the settings from 2010 and I get 24 fps all by myself on the track. In 2010 I get a solid 60 with v-sync and 41 cars visible in the settings. I tried all the d3d.dll things from the VHR site and even tried deleting it all together since 2010 didn't have one in its folder. <sigh>

It has left me more than a little perplexed. Maybe I was (unreasonably) expecting something leaps and bounds better... but it feels like a step backwards. 2010 just has a polished feel to it that 2011 lacks. I can't put my finger on what exactly is wrong except to say that is just does not feel right.

Something is screwy guys.

Honestly... I'm running it with all my settings on Full except shadows on medium and blur is off. This is on my Asus laptop with an ATI 5700 video card, 4 GB ram and an i7-720 processor. The graphic settings are on Auto for Shader Level, Level 3 for Anti Aliasing and windowed. Vsync is off.

On my i7-920 with 6 GB ram, ATI 5870 it runs even smoother than 2010 did at 1920x1080 full frame and same settings.

Checking... Chunx had hell getting his VHR 2010 to look right till he cranked his textures to high or full. Try that if you haven't already.

At risk of me being a one note charley, you guys have rerun DirectX redist? Get it here and try it again.
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=3b170b25-abab-4bc3-ae91-50ceb6d8fa8d

I'm having much more problem with getting a good drivers view. I've adjusted the fore/aft, up/down, field of view is cranked down to 35, the mirrors -- virtual and the big-arse mirror that practically blocks the windshield.

I'm uploading a video I just grabbed. I'll post in here.

It took a while for me to transfer or set all the in-game and in-file settings to the new stand-alone VHR, but I'm not seeing any problems.
I turned the engine sound down quite a bit. Cockpit seems clean and sharp... and no sticky-notes. The shift lights and gauge light color changes that show the shift points are a nice touch.

Framerates may be a slightly lower than the previous version, but I'm seeing rFactor readouts in the upper 180s at least.

On the setup, it may be worth using the default as a starting point. It seems very usable for now. (I didn't try it online yet.)

It took me a while to get my chin off the dashboard but I found a number of 60 works for me (leaving the fore/aft, up/down alone) and I also edited the following in my .plr file:




I love the new sounds and really like the dash.

Here's my test video. It's still processing as I write this so only cheesy 240 is available. 1080 will display once processed. More notes beyond what I wrote earlier in this thread on the YouTube page.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zX0ZMqMbhVM


I read the "15" reference on the VHR intro but I thought it was referring to field of view. Thanks Panther, I'll try that tomorrow.

For those who don't want the rearview mirror (but want to keep the virtual ones) you can remove it by editing the gamedata>vehicles>vhr>cup>upgrades.gen in notepad. (note:each series has it's own upgrade file so you can go into the other folders (AERO, CTS, IROC, NWS) and change them too if you want)

Locate the following line under instance=cockpit

MeshFile=cpitrvmr_cp.gmt CollTarget=False HATTarget=False LODIn=(0.0) LODOut=(5.0) ShadowReceiver=True

and comment out by putting "//" at the start of the line as follows :

// MeshFile=cpitrvmr_cp.gmt CollTarget=False HATTarget=False LODIn=(0.0) LODOut=(5.0) ShadowReceiver=True


This will stop the game loading the mirror mesh but leave the virtual mirrors intact. Should work fine online too.

Thanks for that Darren!

I haven't played around with this yet but it looks like there are different mirrors one can pick.

There's a readme.txt located:
...\VHR2011\GameData\Vehicles\VHR\Optional_Mirrors

I'm set.



First several lines of my PLR graphics settings.

[ Graphic Options ]
Broadcast Overlay="1"
Texture Detail="3"
Vertical FOV Angle="35" // 34=use default, otherwise is the FOV for attached cameras (horiz is calculated based on aspect ratio)
Rearview="1" // 0=Off, 1=Center and Side, 2=Center only, 3=Side only (virtual mirrors only, in-car mirrors are on/off)
Allow Rearview In Swingman="1"
Virtual Rearview In Cockpit="1"
Rearview Width="65.00000"
Rearview Height="25.00000"
Rearview Cull="1" // Whether to cull objects in the rearview based on visgroups in the SCN file
Seat Adjustment Aft="0.10000"
Seat Adjustment Up="0.05600"
Mirror Adjustment Horizontal="0.00000"
Mirror Adjustment Vertical="0.00000"

Another preference mod for the in-codkpit view: "Tach Removal" - removes the big virtual tach gauge (and leaves the gear indicator, fuel, speed). The 2 files go in the Vehicles folder. (Remove the files to uninstall.)
http://vhracing.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=156 title=


Darren: Thanks for the upgrades.gen file info to get rid of the cockpit mirror.
I notice that if you do the same for the line above it, to get rid of the left cockpit mirror, it disables the virtual mirrors.

Wow guod, the way the pavement is stretched out your windshield it looks like your doing 140 in the garage area! LOL

Hey, I need all the speed help I can get!

Curiosity. Please post your drivers view and the first several lines of your graphics section of the PLR file. Like to see what everybody else is using. Thanks.

mine is identical to yours

Although i still need to fugure out why it's chugging along at almost a quarter of my 2010/normal rF framerate....

Betcha its a DirectX thingie. Corvette Dave posted here with a specific D3D file fix...
http://vhracing.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=727#p727

Tried that, didn't make a scrap of difference. (and yes i also have the latest redist )

At first i thought it was the improved tracks so i imported them into 2010 and everything was perfect, then i thought it could be the new cockpit shader but it's not that either. I'm going to try importing the 2011 car models into 2010 and see what happens but there's something in there that's crippling my frame rate. With VHR2010 i can run everything on max and constantly get 250+. Even with half the settings turned down i'm lucky to hit 50 in 2011.

Well nuts. Okay, did you clean load it as a free-standing install? I did on both of mine that seemed to work. Because rFactor is registered I didn't have to register VHR 2011.

Aaaand, now apparently Dave is taking his ball and going home. As posted on Facebook:

VHR Stockcar closing it's doors:

I have had enough of the #%&*$# and whining about a motor sound....or the car drives to easy now... when I lowered the down force in the rear to 0....I guess you will have to find something to play for 2011, I will enjoy the mod playing it offline...time for to move on from the drama.


Edit - apparently he's upset that people are complaining about some of the things he's changed; some of us on FB are trying to talk him back down from "the ledge", so to speak. :P

Yes, I have both 2010 and 2011 as a separate install.

I sincerely hope Dave will reconsider. While (for me at the moment) this is more of a step backwards than forwards. There is no disputing the amount of work involved and the huge amount of pleasure we all gain (and will continue to gain) from his work. Teething troubles are all part and parcel of the development - and for me, working through them is all part of the process.

And when you consider we are essentially getting an entirely new game for free, it's pretty amazing. If anyone had said to me 12 months ago that i would feel this passionate about turning left, i would have thought they were nuts but without Dave's work (alongside a little encouragement from you guys) i would have missed out on a motor racing experience that i have come to love.

Here's hoping things will work out for the best.

[ Graphic Options ]
Broadcast Overlay="0"
Texture Detail="3"
Vertical FOV Angle="65" // 34=use default, otherwise is the FOV for attached cameras (horiz is calculated based on aspect ratio)
Rearview="1" // 0=Off, 1=Center and Side, 2=Center only, 3=Side only (virtual mirrors only, in-car mirrors are on/off)
Allow Rearview In Swingman="0"
Virtual Rearview In Cockpit="1"
Rearview Width="64.00000"
Rearview Height="14.00000"
Rearview Cull="1" // Whether to cull objects in the rearview based on visgroups in the SCN file
Seat Adjustment Aft="-0.00151"
Seat Adjustment Up="0.01840"
Mirror Adjustment Horizontal="0.00000"
Mirror Adjustment Vertical="0.00000"

Seat position is Forward 2, Up 18. I may try changing FOV, but 65 is what I had in rFactor and VHR 2010.

Blythe I was beating my head trying to figure this out. The planets must have aligned just right but here is how it ended. I copied the original d3d.dll that came with the mod back in, then I ran the config and made sure my shaders were set to auto. previously I had forced them to DX9 and it worked!

Why do people do this? If its too much heat then take a break but don't threaten closing down a site unless serious.
BTW, this damn popcorn stand closes tonight at midnight. I've had enough of this crap!
Nobody appreciates it so I'm closing this hellhole down! ENOUGH!!!!














;-)

Thank god for that. I'm fed up with this crappy place with a server that can't even last 10 minutes on a Daytona race

I think it was just shoddy administrating!

SEE! That's what I mean! 9 whole good minutes of Daytona racing till the server host blew up, and that's the thanks I get!

Following your lead, I did a complete reinstall of 2011, set shaders to auto (dunno why this helps but it seems to) and played around with a few combinations of d3d9.dll. I've gained a little bit of performance - still nowhere near what i would expect but i've got something that's playable now. Thanks for the pointer LS

Not that it matters now that we're closing down. Good riddance

Geez, I hope he takes a night to think this over before pulling the plug.

How do you get the extra info windows that Pumbaa has in the screenshot below? Are they mods to download
or just need to be activated in game?

It's the rfdynhud plugin:

http://www.ctdp.net/rfdynhud.html

It has caused a few people performance issues and/or runtime errors but many run it with no problems.

Thanks Blythe!

Looks like he calmed down. From Facebook this morning:

*- Important Update: People installing the rfactor version / Server Rentals- There was a small error in the Sprint cup's rfm file...the starting car number is different from the stand alone which is causing online mismatches - Please see Forum topic for fix.


http://vhracing.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=169+title%3D

Update is available now. Just about to give it a try. Thanks for the heads up panther

Waiting for update2 before I act. Good to see he has calmed down and is addressing issues promptly. It's not like he really expected a flawless V1 release did he?

Just gave the update a quick try and so far i'm pretty happy with the changes. Engine noise is much improved, kind of a mix between the 2010 and 2011. It's more raspy but without being as overpowering as before. Physics is back to being a little more edgy - again, halfway inbetween the two but it feels nice.

Best of all i also gained a few extra FPS, nothing stellar but it all helps and things seem to feel smoother. I only loaded it up for a quick test before bed and ended up having a great 50 laps with the AI - not often you can say that

Did you do an uninstall then fresh of 1.0 then 2.0 or just update your current 1.0 install?

Just installed it over the top. The file on the site is just a patch. Aparantly the full new installer will be up sometime during the week.

10-4!

Another update in the works. Just spotted this on the VHR Site:

// VHR News Update - 3.0 Upgrade Coming Friday February 25th

• 3.0 Upgrade - Fixes the issues found in regards to frame loss and overall game "glitchiness" found in the 2011 Mod. Along with some other fixes the Cup drafting package will be reverted back to the 1.0 style. I want to point out that is not the testers fault, the issues would not have been found if it wasn't released to all of you guys. I will have the installers all redone and uploaded for Monday, I would advise to copy your player folder in the current 2011 version and delete it from your hard drive and get ready to start out fresh.

<guod flushes current server install down the sewer>

I'll bring it back first week in March for the Dega race.

In rFactor, when cars retire from a race they return to their garage locations. If cars start on pitlane and not in an actual garage spot, then they sit in their pit stall when they retire. This wrecks the pitstop experience for those still racing, so it is important that all oval tracks for rFactor be designed with garage locations.

Which version of VHR 2011 are we to race? 1.0 or 3.0? I want to download the correct version.

The correct version won't be available until February 25th. It'll be VHR 2011 with Update 3.

"VHR News Update - 3.0 Upgrade Coming Thursday March 3rd Saturday March 5th"
Here's hoping it doesn't get pushed back too many more times. (The delay is understandable.)

VHR 2011 v3.0 is available now at the VHR site. Runs smooth as silk here, but waiting for results from others.

For Talladega the default setup is a good starting point. (It does need some obvious changes but handling seems OK.)

woo-hoo! D/L'ing now. After that "short-track" DTM race at Norisring, I feel in a NASCAR mood!

A.I. still can't find their way out of the wet paper bag.

Feels great so far and smooth as silk for me too

VHR 2011 is fun....audibly and graphically very pleasing. However, I do not like having my nose on the dashboard. What do I configure, and where is the configurable statement, that would permit me to drive less like a bug on the inside of the windshield.

Change the FOV to 50 on the in game display setting. That should give you the 'default' view

Hello Mr. Blythe. I have read in earlier threads that the field of vision should be adjusted to '50' along with some other edits (guod ref.) to a configuration or .ini file. But please understand, I am a WOG. I do not fully comprehend UK English. Where is the .ini file located (folder/subfolder/..)? I have been scampering about the game directory as though I was seeking a wise man in America. Where do I locate the '50'?

You can change your FOV settings inside the game, in the display settings menu. No need to edit an ini file.

Thank you. I went to the 'Display' menu in the setup options in the game. In my instance, preference, I adjusted the FOV to '65'. No more blisters on my nose and I can now see the dashboard.