BBC sports says it's £25.2m but doesn't say for how many years.

I wonder if Heikki will get the McLaren seat. I think he deserves a good seat after he improved a lot through last season but then again I don't think he would come off looking very good against Hamilton. Which other seats are still open? Only Toyota right?

Quote from KartRacer :

you don't race different class open wheel cars together IRL.

It's happened before. Formula Renault 2000, Formula Renault 1800 and Formula Renault Campus championships used to be together in Germany but I'm not sure if it was all 3 at any point, but definitely 2. I don't remember any real problems, the slower cars just had to be careful in case they were lapped.

EDIT: found a pic.

Last edited by J.B., Mon 10 Dec 2007, 13:25.

Half a meter! I just tried that with my 22" and it feels like someone strapped the screen to my forehead. I feel much more comfortable at about 80-90 cm which probably explains why I think most LCDs have too high resolutions and why I hate programs that don't let me increase the font size.

The lag is because you are using a tuner card with an onboard MPEG-2 encoder. The input signal gets encoded and the PC only gets to see the MPEG-2 stream and the whole encoding process takes a while.

If it's a PCI card it should be possible to disable the encoder and use the raw, instant data. If it's USB it probably won't be possible.

The only software that has acceptable deinterlacing quality for video games is DScaler. So if you don't have a card that works with DScaler you can either get one or for less hassle get one of these instead.

Now what was this "LFS" thing again? Link for Screen?

Speaking of growth I just noticed that Live for Speed finally beats Linux from Scratch to first place in a Google search for lfs. :drink:

Quote from Hallen :

Ah, OK. I see now. No, I wasn't thinking the vertical tube/bar there could twist. It looks like too solid of a piece to be able to twist like that. I was looking for some way that it could move that way without twisting and obviously, that just won't work.

I still don't really understand how that whole system works. It seems that it is only a semi independent suspension. What independent movement it does have is not damped in any way it seems. But, I have already proven that I am not seeing how this system works very well.

Sounds like you got it to me. Roll is completely undamped and I don't know the definition of independant suspension but as far as I can tell any suspension system with a rollbar isn't 100% independant.

As to what this all means for LFS? We'll have to wait and see if there are any significant effects on making settups but the only point of this system I can think of is that you can go hard with the spring to keep the aero rideheight stable and soft with the bar for mechanical grip. So all depends on tyre and aero model really.

I'm not sure why you think the rollbar can't twist? I've added another arrow in the picture to show how it is supposed to twist. It's the vertical bar Tristan was referring to. And I can assure you there are no torsion bars in the rockers. I've looked at the pictures and they are perfectly normal rockers, just as on any other race car.

Quote from Me :

I think FBMW and F3 are the only ones who use it.

Turns out that the Tatuus Formula Renault 2000 (the car the FOX is based on) also uses monoshock front suspension. So maybe FBM isn't the first car of this type in LFS. If the suspension is even modelled to this level of detail that is.

Quote from Hallen :

If there were no other springs, then wouldn't it be like a solid axle (non-independent suspension)? It would only compress and rebound equally on both sides. If there was a deflection up on one side, there would be a corresponding force down on the other side. I think the pivot points where the rods attach to the frame might have some spring or tortion bar attached to them that we can't see. It is just a total guess on my part though. The main spring in the middle would work for both equal deflections and to compensate for downforce (guessing again).

I think the way it works is that the main spring gets compressed whenever the total front axle load increases. But when one wheelload increases while the other wheelload decreases (as in cornering) then the main spring will stay where it is and roll will occur by twisting of the rollbar (marked in green below).

I'm quite sure there are no hidden dampers or springs in the rockers on that car. But in F1 they do in fact use that type arrangement (rotational dampers).

EDIT: Tristan was faster

Quote from three_jump :

there you go deggis

Interesting, didn't realize the FBM was monoshock. What this means is that the spring rate has no effect on the roll rate. So the car can be soft when both wheels are loaded simultaneously and hard when rolling.

Why this is a good thing? Beats me. I think FBMW and F3 are the only ones who use it.

Another strange thing: it looks like the front rollbar is non-adjustable.

EDIT: oh wait, that would be what the spacers on that horizontal bit that the connecting rods are attached to are for.

Last edited by J.B., Thu 6 Dec 2007, 01:06.

Quote from thisnameistaken :

for people with monitors bigger than 100x150p

You could have just clicked on the thumbnail.

Tested for the first time today in Jerez.



Don't they look fine? I didn't even expect the visual difference to be this marked. Grooved tyres really were one of the most stupid F1 ideas ever. But the fact that they were driven for so long even when nobody liked them just makes you wonder what on earth is wrong with the whole governing body of F1.

The idea with the slicks is that they come on in 2009 to increase the tyre grip while at the same time downforce is to be reduced. The net effect being that the ratio of aero vs tyre grip decreases which should be a good thing for racing. Personally I don't think it will be enough if they don't add GP2 style Venturi tunnels (seeing how well GP2 works again makes you wonder WTH they are waiting for) but at least it's going in the right direction.

Quote from Crashgate3 :

I was thinking about the drip-feeding of features you get in MMOs today and wondered if the very fact that it isn't finished yet is keeping LFS active and fun.

Normally in a game, you get a private alpha, a public beta and then the final product, with very little change from that final product once its released, bar the odd patch to fix bugs.

With LFS however, we are all forced to play the evolving alpha as that's the only one available. It's in essence similar to the setup MMOs have in that they keep thinking up and releasing extra content as a way of keeping players interested and playing.

Now I'm not in any way suggesting the devs are doing this deliberately just to keep hold of an audience, but I can't help but think if the whole development process of S1 and S2 hadn't happened and S3 was suddenly thrust upon us it wouldn't have proved anywhere near as popular 5 years or so on as LFS has.

Don't get me wrong, I *love* the fact that we can get excited about a new patch every few months it just struck me how different it is to something like GTR2 for example.

Yeah good points. I think it's a great business model because it's just human nature that we enjoy looking forward to new things and improvements all the time. I mean some of us have been around since many years and still get exited about every patch. If the perfect S3 ha been released in 2002 I'm sure most would have stopped playing by now for lack of freshness.

I guess what really makes it work is the general quality of the releases. If LFS was as buggy as pretty much 99% of all other games out there then we might see ourselves as paying beta testers but instead we really are closer to MMO players, as you said, except that we pay a lot less.

I'm guessing it will go like this:

-if you try to shift with your foot flat on the power the gear won't change.

-in cars with sequential boxes you will need to lift off to shift up

-in cars with H-boxes you will need to lift off and press clutch to shift up

-both lifting and clutching can be done by driving helps but will result in slightly slower shifts than a perfect manual shift

But I don't really see where clutch temperature comes into play. Maybe just to stop the manual clutchers from being ultra aggressive?

EDIT: Hang on, maybe it's to stop the unrealistic machine gun downchanging!

Last edited by J.B., Mon 3 Dec 2007, 23:07.

Quote from ste_ :

I kinda wonder if this is a precursor to LFS becoming BMW Racing Simulator or something. Scawen's always come across as LFS being his project and he'll work on what he wants at his own pace and make a game from love, but perhaps the realities of his lofty goals are becoming more obvious (ie: it's an awful lot of work) and maybe he's going to sell out to BMW.

But having thought that out loud, would that be a bad thing? We'd have all the cars and tracks we currently have, Scawen could get a staff to direct to achieve his vision, work done would increase, we'd get a whole bunch of BMW's to drive, more tracks, and LFS would hit the market proper (ie: be published and available in shops to buy).

Maybe it's just the whisky talking, but I can't help thinking like this..

I wouldn't read too much into fact that it's BMW again. I think the F1 was more an Intel thing and this is more a V1 Championship/Fortec Motorsport thing.

BTW does anyone know more about the V1 Championship? Is it mainly about TV entertainment or is a a serious attempt at finding new ways to get people into professional racing? Are Fortec involved in the project or were they just payed to do Scawen's test day?

Because LFS is a racing simulator, not a trackday simulator.

Great video! This must be yet another sim racing first: a real racing team gives a developer of a sim a proper test in a proper racing car!

And I'm glad Scawen wasn't too shy to take the car by the horns. 100 laps including some crash damage, I was expecting a handful of rolling pace laps. This can only help make LFS even better in the future.

If driver cleaner + driver reinstall doesn't work then GPU is dying.

If colours are important then don't get a 22". They all use TN panels which are inferior to IPS and PVA panels, which you'll find in the larger screens. What I do like about the 22" is that they are very fast for games and that at 1680 x 1050 they have less pixels per inch than the 24" screens which is better for font sizes/eye strain. That's why I would prefer 22" and 27" to 24".

I wouldn't worry about the performance problems you mention. Nowadays most screens use much better resizing techniques than they used to which means that for gaming there is no problem in using a non native res if necessary.

And don't bother looking at any screens at the store. The way they are hooked up makes it impossible to judge a screen there. Best order from an online shop that won't complain if you send it back in case you don't like it.

Just finished watching, good races. Schumacher and di Grassi seemed to be the strongest overall but di Grassi got messed up by Piquet in race 1 and Schumacher got punted by Camilo in race 2. At the end everything came Schumi's way, as ever, although I would have preferred to see di Grassi win. I can't deny that Schumacher was impressive though. And Piquet seems to be a prick.

Race 1 is on racing underground. Let's hope race 2 will show up later.

EDIT: both races are up!

Why the hell isn't there ever any proper coverage of this event? What are they thinking? Many of the best F1 drivers in equal machinery, nah, I don't think anybody would want to see that?

Instead we have to watch Ferrari road cars breaking down on a football pitch!

Quote from BenjiMC :

I was watching heat 2 on Eurosport but wasn't sure what it was.

Wha? When was that on?

Yeah, I think that was the car I had in mind. Looks like I was wrong about the tyres but it still shows how pointless it is to compete for records when the only restriction is that the guy who attempts the record has to declare the car "road legal", whatever that means.

Generated heat is noticed by noise made trying to get rid of it and by the need for a PSU that is way overpowered compared to what all the other components of the PC need.

If you have a fast dual core CPU then you are right about being able to decode HD on the CPU. However there are much cheaper cards that can decode HD on single core machines so I do think this feature should be on the fasest cards as well.

I can't deny the performance increase of course but maybe Intel would be able to make a 6 Ghz octa-core if they were allowed to use 500W for it. It's the whole package that counts.

I didn't say the 3870 was better than the 8800 GT. I said it's a bit slower and has more features.

And cards that cost 600€, create 200 W of heat and can't decode HD videos were rubbish when they came out and are rubbish now. If you want to compare them to the CPU industry then the new cards are the ones that should have been out a year ago.