Definate issue with latest FSUIPC

[John Veldthuis]

Okay, have rebuilt my PC and installed everything from fresh so there is no possible way of outside things affecting it. Have ASX running on a remote PC. Everything works 100% without ASX running no issues. Load ASX weather and as soon as it starts injecting it into FSX, FSX will crash with the following

Problem signature:

Problem Event Name: APPCRASH

Application Name: fsx.exe

Application Version: 10.0.61472.0

Application Timestamp: 475e17d3

Fault Module Name: StackHash_c709

Fault Module Version: 6.0.6000.16386

Fault Module Timestamp: 4549bdc9

Exception Code: c0000374

Exception Offset: 000af1c9

OS Version: 6.0.6000.2.0.0.256.1

Locale ID: 5129

Additional Information 1: c709

Additional Information 2: 0f892d40c3ecb9688ec909cc1e5a061b

Additional Information 3: c2fb

Additional Information 4: 1fc67a5fcf98239a45d2aae228698c39

The reason why I think it is a FSUIPC fault is that everything was working fine with the exact same ASX setup until I installed version 4.2.5.0 of FSUIPC. all the betas before it worked fine. I was about to try out a previous version but I had deleted them when the final came out. The computer crash meant I had to reinstall so that was a chance to find out that.

If I remove FSUIPC.DLL from the modules folder and let ASX run it injects the weather fine and I get no crash. Put it back in and bang straight away.

FSUIPC log up until crash

********* FSUIPC4, Version 4.25 by Pete Dowson *********

Reading options from "G:\Microsoft Flight Simulator X\Modules\FSUIPC4.ini"

User Name="John Veldthuis"

User Addr="xxxx"

FSUIPC4 Key is provided

WideFS7 Key is provided

Running inside FSX on Windows Vista (SimConnect Acc/SP2 Oct07)

Module base=61000000

Wind smoothing fix is fully installed

DebugStatus=255

78 System time = 12:30:42

94 FLT UNC path = "\\TOWER7\MSPLANS\"

94 FS UNC path = "\\TOWER7\G\Microsoft Flight Simulator X\"

1217 LogOptions=00000001

1217 SimConnect_Open succeeded: waiting to check version okay

2886 Running in "Microsoft Flight Simulator X", Version: 10.0.61472.0 (SimConnect: 10.0.61259.0)

2886 Initialising SimConnect data requests now

2886 FSUIPC Menu entry added

2933 G:\Microsoft Flight Simulator X\FLIGHTS\OTHER\FLTSIM.FLT

2933 G:\Microsoft Flight Simulator X\SimObjects\Airplanes\Aircreation_582SL\Aircreation_582SL.AIR

12917 G:\Microsoft Flight Simulator X\SimObjects\Airplanes\feelThere pic 737-300\B737-3A00A.AIR

23104 C:\Users\John Veldthuis\Documents\Flight Simulator X Files\fp_NZAA-NZWN.PLN

44913 System time = 12:31:26, FSX time = 07:30:45 (20:30Z)

45069 Aircraft="feelThere Boeing 737-300 Hooters Air"

45553 Weather Mode now = Custom

Does not matter which aircraft I use they all do the same.

[Pete Dowson]

First an aside. Why do so many folks mis-spell the easy English word "definite" as "definate"? It seems to be happening more and more these days. Has someone spread a bad dictionary around?

Okay, have rebuilt my PC and installed everything from fresh so there is no possible way of outside things affecting it. Have ASX running on a remote PC. Everything works 100% without ASX running no issues. Load ASX weather and as soon as it starts injecting it into FSX, FSX will crash with the following

I run ASX on a remote PC. FSX + ASX + FSUIPC4 have been running here most of the day quite happily. If I could reproduce it I could investigate, but I'm sorry, I can't. And so far you are the only one who can -- I think there are many others using ASX with 4.25.

One thing I do note:

Application Name: fsx.exe

Application Version: 10.0.61472.0

You are using SP2 rather than Acceleration. I've only got one PC with that version. I'll try that tomorrow. I wonder if all of the other testers/users running ASX are also using Acceleration?

The reason why I think it is a FSUIPC fault is that everything was working fine with the exact same ASX setup until I installed version 4.2.5.0 of FSUIPC. all the betas before it worked fine.

Maybe you hadn't previously actually tried the only Beta which worked with full smoothing on SP2? Certainly most of the full smoothing tests have been with Acceleration installed - until 4.241 the SP2, SP1 and RTM versions of FSX didn't have full smoothing enabled, only partial -- and 4.241 was the last Beta before 4.25.

I tell you what you can try: add the line

NoHorribleHack=Yes

to the [General] section of the FSUIPC4.INI file, and try again.

That stops the hooking and blistering I do with SIM1.DLL, and effectively makes 4.25 act just like the Betas prior to 4.241 did on SP2 or before. The Log will indicate you only have partial smoothing, and the wind changes will probably cause some ratcheting on the ASI etc.

Let me know. Meanwhile, tomorrow I'll try to set up ASX linking to my only PC still running FSX + SP2.

Regards

Pete

[John Veldthuis]

First an aside. Why do so many folks mis-spell the easy English word "definite" as "definate"? It seems to be happening more and more these days. Has someone spread a bad dictionary around?

Whoops, Must ensure spell checker is on next time. It usually picks them up.

The reason why I think it is a FSUIPC fault is that everything was working fine with the exact same ASX setup until I installed version 4.2.5.0 of FSUIPC. all the betas before it worked fine.

Maybe you hadn't previously actually tried the only Beta which worked with full smoothing on SP2? Certainly most of the full smoothing tests have been with Acceleration installed - until 4.241 the SP2, SP1 and RTM versions of FSX didn't have full smoothing enabled, only partial -- and 4.241 was the last Beta before 4.25.

I tell you what you can try: add the line

NoHorribleHack=Yes

to the [General] section of the FSUIPC4.INI file, and try again.

Made it worse actually. Did not crash but hung the program so that in the end I had to log out to kill it off. Task Manager did not even stop it.

Yes I am running the SP2 version and I know I did have it fully installed at one point because I remember checking.

I had an idea though and I took the fsuipc.ini file out and made it rebuild itself. I started it up and everything works. I then added my button section back in and tried again and still works. So added the joystick calibration section back and still works.

I am going through the rest adding them back in a bit at a time to find the cause but as I have to shut down and restart the program each time it is taking time. Below is what I still have to check out. Maybe something stands out?

[General]

History=MU39GQN3WVU9MXQ79SL6S

FixControlAccel=No

GraduatedVisibility=No

LowerVisAltitude=0

UpperVisAltitude=0

UpperVisibility=0

MinimumVisibility=0

MaximumVisibilityFewClouds=0

MaximumVisibility=0

MaximumVisibilityOvercast=0

MaximumVisibilityRainy=0

SetVisUpperAlt=No

VisUpperAltLimit=0

ExtendMetarMaxVis=No

OneCloudLayer=No

CloudTurbulence=No

CloudIcing=No

GenerateCirrus=No

SuppressCloudTurbulence=Yes

MaxIce=-4

MinIce=-4

UpperWindGusts=No

SuppressWindTurbulence=Yes

SuppressWindVariance=Yes

WindTurbulence=No

TurbulenceRate=1.0

SuppressAllGusts=Yes

MaxSurfaceWind=0

WindLimitLevel=200

WindDiscardLevel=400

WindAjustAltitude=No

WindAjustAltitudeBy=2000

WindSmoothing=Yes

WindSmoothness=-3

WindSmoothAirborneOnly=Yes

PressureSmoothness=0

TemperatureSmoothness=0

DisconnTrimForAP=No

ZeroElevForAPAlt=No

ThrottleSyncAll=No

WhiteMessages=No

ShowPMcontrols=No

SpoilerIncrement=512

MagicBattery=No

RudderSpikeRemoval=No

ElevatorSpikeRemoval=No

AileronSpikeRemoval=No

ReversedElevatorTrim=No

ClockSync=No

ClockSyncMins=5

ClearWeatherDynamics=No

OwnWeatherChanges=Yes

TimeForSelect=4

LoadFlightMenu=No

LoadPlanMenu=No

PauseAfterCrash=No

ZapSound=firework

ShortAircraftNameOk=No

TCASid=Flight

TCASrange=40

AxisCalibration=No

DirectAxesToCalibs=No

ShowMultilineWindow=Yes

SuppressSingleline=No

SuppressMultilineFS=No

AxisIntercepts=No

WeatherReadFactor=2

WeatherRewriteDelay=10

SimConnectStallTime=1

[AutoSave]

AutoSaveEnabled=No

[GPSout]

GPSoutEnabled=No

Port=

Speed=4800

Interval=1000

PosTo6Decimal=Yes

Sentences=

[WideServer]

WideFSenabled=Yes

AdvertiseService=1

Port=8002

Port2=9002

[Axes]

0=0X,256,D,7,0,0,0

1=0Y,256,D,8,0,0,0

2=1Z,256,D,22,0,0,0

3=1U,256,D,9,0,0,0

4=1V,256,D,10,0,0,0

5=2X,256,D,11,0,0,0

6=2Y,256,D,12,0,0,0

7=2Z,256,D,23,0,0,0

[ClientNames]

1=TOWER5

[John Veldthuis]

Okay I have found the line that certainly turns the crash on. If I change

OwnWeatherChanges=No

to

OwnWeatherChanges=Yes

Then I get the crash. I would assume turning this to No turns off any weather changes that FSUIPC makes to FSXs weather.

[John Veldthuis]

Have done some more testing.

I can turn on OwnWeatherChanges=Yes if I don't turn on any of the things below.

On the Winds tab. "Suppress these wind effects" turbulence, gusts, variance

On the Clouds tab. Suppress all Cloud Turbulence.

I can turn on Smooth Wind changes near aircraft and have it set for 3 seconds per knot/degree.

[Bill Casey]

FYI Peter - my testing was done with SP2 not Acceleration. I wasn't however running ASX on a remote machine.

[Pete Dowson]

Made it worse actually. Did not crash but hung the program so that in the end I had to log out to kill it off. Task Manager did not even stop it.

Something extremely odd is going on in your system. All that parameter does is cause the Wind Smoothing system to revert to what it was before I hacked into the SIM1.DLL to find a way to stop the ASI ratcheting.

I had an idea though and I took the fsuipc.ini file out and made it rebuild itself. I started it up and everything works.

Of course, because wind smoothing and all that stuff is defaulted off.

Pete

[Pete Dowson]

Okay I have found the line that certainly turns the crash on. If I change

OwnWeatherChanges=No

to

OwnWeatherChanges=Yes

Then I get the crash. I would assume turning this to No turns off any weather changes that FSUIPC makes to FSXs weather.

It stops the wind smoothing, the spurious layer correction, everything. Of course. That option is featured on the Winds and Visibility page -- you have to enable it to get any smoothing facilities. It is all clearly documented.

None of this helps. We already assumed it was the wind smoothing hacks causing the problem. What concerns me is that with "NoHorribleHack=Yes" the actions going on are EXACTLY as they have been since the smoothing experiments startedweeks ago, yet to say you only got problems since 4.25. It makes no sense to me at all.

Pete

[Pete Dowson]

Have done some more testing.

I can turn on OwnWeatherChanges=Yes if I don't turn on any of the things below.

On the Winds tab. "Suppress these wind effects" turbulence, gusts, variance

On the Clouds tab. Suppress all Cloud Turbulence.

I can turn on Smooth Wind changes near aircraft and have it set for 3 seconds per knot/degree.

Sorry, can you clarify this.

Are you saying you can do what you like, get all the smoothing actions, etc etc, (and WITHOUT "NoHorribleHack"), without a crash provided you don't suppress any of the wind effect options? In other words, when FSUIPC is actually doing more complicated things with the winds it works, but when these random speed and direction changes aare simply by-passed, it doesn't?

Weird.

Is this 3 seconds per knot/degree business relevant?

Please confirm EXACTLY what you are saying here. It could be very important.

Regards

Pete

[Pete Dowson]

Please confirm EXACTLY what you are saying here. It could be very important.

As well as this, please also try 4.251, available in the FSX Downloads announcement above. I doubt if it will change anything, but then I see no reason why 4.25 changed what you had before either, so you never know.

Regards

Pete

[John Veldthuis]

The 3 seconds per Knot/Degree means that sudden wind changes should only happen at 1 degree per 3 seconds as I understand and is what I have seen. This works okay.

However if I turn on any of the suppression stuff, even just say gusts, then I get crashes. Any one of the suppression ones by itself is enough to trigger the crash.

I will grab the newer beta version and give that a try and get back to you.

Oh the other thing is that it works fine with the standard FSX weather. It is only an issue when using ASX.

Okay, Just tried the 4.2.5.1 version and same result. Works okay with FSX internal downloaded weather but crashes with ASX putting weather in.

I have to say that this is a completely fresh install with no add ons except PMDG 744X on the PC and ASX on the remote PC. I installed FSX RTM and SDK, then SP1 and SDK SP1, and then finally SP2 and SDK SP2. All the updates to windows have been done and latest video drivers installed. I got the same results before the re-install just when the final 4.2.5 went out. The betas before that worked 100% fine.

[Pete Dowson]

However if I turn on any of the suppression stuff, even just say gusts, then I get crashes. Any one of the suppression ones by itself is enough to trigger the crash.

That's really odd, because all those suppressions do is bypass little sections of code. They don't ADD anything at all.

Possibly it makes it worse for you because by not including a little more computation in the regular frame loop it is going infinitesimally fasterbut it really is an infinitesimal difference, possibly 100-200 more CPU instructions out of many hundreds of thousands. It makes no sense to me at all.

I got the same results before the re-install just when the final 4.2.5 went out. The betas before that worked 100% fine.

Only the very last Beta had the full wind smoothing in for SP2. All of the others were the same but acting as though "NoHorribleHack=Yes" was set. The action of that parameter is to cut out the hack which wasn't previously being performed on SP2 and before.

I'm perplexed. Sorry.

Pete

[Pete Dowson]

I'm perplexed. Sorry.

One thing occurs to me. When you are doing these tests, are you always starting with FSX in the same place, or close, when ASX is initialising the weather? Could it possibly be something in the ASX data itself which is acting as the trigger, something which possibly was different when you were testing the earlier Betas?

Could you try tests where you move your aircraft a long way from your normal starting position before starting up ASX? Maybe even a sampling of different locations throughout the World?

If you do find a difference, perhaps you could save a copy of the ASX weather which causes the problem, ZIP it up and send it to me at petedowson@btconnect.com.

Obviously, if you get the same results no matter where you are, it is unlikely to be down to anything specific in the weather data. I might be clutching at straws here, but I have nothing else to clutch at.

Regards

Pete

[John Veldthuis]

I'm perplexed. Sorry.

One thing occurs to me. When you are doing these tests, are you always starting with FSX in the same place, or close, when ASX is initialising the weather? Could it possibly be something in the ASX data itself which is acting as the trigger, something which possibly was different when you were testing the earlier Betas?

Could you try tests where you move your aircraft a long way from your normal starting position before starting up ASX? Maybe even a sampling of different locations throughout the World?

Pete

I have tried it starting at NZAA, KLAX, KSFO and get the same result every time.The way I start it up is to load up ASX on the remote machine and let it get the weather, select the flight plan I am going to use and load that and transfer over the theme from ASX. Once complete I go and start FSX, select the aircraft, flight planner and select same plan again, Set date/time, fuel and weight and then click Fly Now. FSX loads up and if any of the selections noted are active it starts to display the green line saying ASX is starting its weather update and then promptly crashes.

If I have none of them turned on I can let it load the weather and all is fine and it will run for ages but if I go into FSUIPC and turn one on after about 20-40 seconds I get a crash.

[Pete Dowson]

I have tried it starting at NZAA, KLAX, KSFO and get the same result every time.The way I start it up is to load up ASX on the remote machine and let it get the weather, select the flight plan I am going to use and load that and transfer over the theme from ASX. Once complete I go and start FSX, select the aircraft, flight planner and select same plan again, Set date/time, fuel and weight and then click Fly Now. FSX loads up and if any of the selections noted are active it starts to display the green line saying ASX is starting its weather update and then promptly crashes.If I have none of them turned on I can let it load the weather and all is fine and it will run for ages but if I go into FSUIPC and turn one on after about 20-40 seconds I get a crash.

Well, I can't reproduce any problem, and so far no one else has reported anything similar at all. Admittedly I never use any FS plans or feed plans into ASX. It isn't something I even know anything about I'm afraid. Maybe you could try it "plain", just in case it is related more to that side of things?

Meanwhile, it really makes no sense at all that any of the suppressions cause a problem, as all they do is bypass small bits of code computing changes to the winds -- and if turbulence, gusts and variance are not present in the aircraft's wind or cloud layer in the first place, the exact same path through the code is taken -- i.e. "suppress turbulence" (etc) is the same as "there is no turbulence" (etc) as far as FSUIPC is concerned. You can see why "it does not compute".

So, sorry, I've no way of knowing what is wrong on your system at all. I can only recommend that you don't suppress any of those features. I don't think you will need to on the versions I am working on now in any case -- 4.251 has a better turbulence emulation, improved again in 4.252 which I shall upload later tonight, and 4.252 has the gust and variance emulation working nicely too. There will be further changes as I work on the "realism" aspect of these, but I think you should find that they are eminently usable already.

If I do get further similar reports to yours we may have a chance of narrowing it down by comparing things in more detail. Until then, apologies for leaving this in abeyance.

Regards

Pete

[Bill Casey]

ASX SP3 Beta was released to the public last night, John might like to try that and see if it makes a difference. Note that the advice is to use wind smoothing in FSUIPC and not ASX if using both. One thing I have discovered in trying to recreate John's prob is that ASX is more prone to crash if launched outside of ASX rather than using the "launch FSX" button inside ASX, that might be worth trying although when I had those crashes it was xengine that crashed rather than FS itself.

[Pete Dowson]

ASX SP3 Beta was released to the public last night, John might like to try that and see if it makes a difference.

Ah, thanks for the heads up. I shall update my copy.

One thing I have discovered in trying to recreate John's prob is that ASX is more prone to crash if launched outside of ASX rather than using the "launch FSX" button inside ASX, that might be worth trying although when I had those crashes it was xengine that crashed rather than FS itself.

That must be a different problem. FSX crashing only with FSUIPC4 options set just "so" must be down to me somehow, but I am unable to repro it or understand it. If you are getting ASX crashing that most certainly needs reporting to HiFi Simulations.

Regards

Pete

[Bill Casey]

That must be a different problem. FSX crashing only with FSUIPC4 options set just "so" must be down to me somehow, but I am unable to repro it or understand it. If you are getting ASX crashing that most certainly needs reporting to HiFi Simulations.

Yes, I made Jim aware of it a week or so ago but I mentioned it here just as piece of general info since everything seems more stable if FSX is launched from within ASX.

[Pete Dowson]

Yes, I made Jim aware of it a week or so ago but I mentioned it here just as piece of general info since everything seems more stable if FSX is launched from within ASX.

Okay, thanks. This would presumably be where ASX is running on the same PC as FSX?

John and I both have ASX on a separate networked PC, and I usually don't start ASX till FSX is not only started, but ready for cockpit preparation. That way I know ASX will give me the weather for my chosen start location.

Best Regards

Pete

[John Veldthuis]

Okay thanks, Will grab the ASX SP3 tonight when I get home from my meeting. I tried smoothing both on/off in ASX and also some other changes but no result. Will redo everything with the SP3 version.

Will also try loading FSX 1st and then letting ASX run as well.

[Pete Dowson]

Will also try loading FSX 1st and then letting ASX run as well.

What do you normally do then? Maybe I can't reproduce the crash because I am doing things in the wrong order? I know you said you ran ASX on a separate PC. Do you usually get it fully running and waiting for FSX first? Maybe the problem is related to the FSX/FSUIPC4 initialisation phases only? Possibly I've not been testing that part in the same way.

Please let me know and I'll re-run the testing on my one and only FSX SP2 PC.

Regards

Pete

[Bill Casey]

Pete

Yes the advice with ASX is to load that first, let it do it's stuff downloading and setting itself up, and then launch FSX. I've always done it that way then, as I mentioned, things tend to be a bit more stable if one uses the "launch FSX" button inside ASX. Now this, to answer your quessie earlier, I do on the same PC. I have no idea if any of this applies with a remote PC because I've never run that setup. Jim S at ASX may be able to furnish you with the techie side of this when he's back from hols.

[Pete Dowson]

Yes the advice with ASX is to load that first, let it do it's stuff downloading and setting itself up, and then launch FSX. I've always done it that way then, as I mentioned, things tend to be a bit more stable if one uses the "launch FSX" button inside ASX. Now this, to answer your quessie earlier, I do on the same PC.

I think if you are running ASX on the same PC as FSX that all makes complete sense. It really is better, in my opinion, the other way around, though, when ASX is safely over on another PC not getting squeezed by FSX's instaible appetite for processor and memory! ;-)

Regards

Pete

[John Veldthuis]

Will also try loading FSX 1st and then letting ASX run as well.

What do you normally do then? Maybe I can't reproduce the crash because I am doing things in the wrong order? I know you said you ran ASX on a separate PC. Do you usually get it fully running and waiting for FSX first? Maybe the problem is related to the FSX/FSUIPC4 initialisation phases only? Possibly I've not been testing that part in the same way.

Please let me know and I'll re-run the testing on my one and only FSX SP2 PC.

Regards

Pete

I normally load ASX on the remote PC and let it grab its weather. Once it is done I load the flight plan into ASX so that it knows where I am going from/to and can grab the VatSim data as well for the online flight. I then let it transfer its theme over and once it is complete only then do I start FSX up, select the plane, load the flight plan, set date/time, fuel, weight and then click fly. The crash would happen just after the first green bar starts to scroll across the screen.

Good news is that I installed the 4.2.5.2 FSUIPC.dll and the ASX SP3 beta and this combo seems to have fixed the issue. I can again turn on all the suppression check boxes with no crashes. It certainly had some issue with ASX as it was okay with the internal FSX weather downloads.

Anyway whatever it was seemed to be cured for the present.

[Pete Dowson]

Anyway whatever it was seemed to be cured for the present.

Okay, good. Though it is a little worrying when something like this goes unexplained. You never know when it might come back to bite you!

Regards

Pete