Quote from biggie :

Believe it or not, I've always been playing LFS without FF. I could hardly imagine turning FF on because you'd have to work harder to turn the wheel and so your reaction time increases.
Personally, I really don't need the feedback through the wheel as I get most of my feeling for the car from the sound. Without sound, I could hardly drive at all (tried it before). I think the implementation of sound in LFS is quite generous in terms of feedback because the tire scrubbing sound gives you a very clear indication of when you're just about to exceed the limit of cohesion.

Totally agree. Not that I come even close to your laptimes, but I don't use FFB ever since but I once tried and I found that it sucked - at least for me of course.

Even a totally loose wheel is hard to turn quickly because of the resistance of the motor which is NEVER as fast as I could turn the wheel. And furthermore all that funny rattling in the wheel distracted me more than giving me any advanced feeling.

I still use my old MS Sidewinder Precision which has no FFB. The wheel I once tried was a Logitech Formula Force GP - I sold it the day after I got it. The feeling just was not realistic at all and for me it's better to have no FFB at all than to have some unrealistic effects.

If you look at the name of the replay you see that his driver name was riLLe when he did that replay. Searching LFSW after riLLe gave me a driver called riLLeeee who is from Sweden.

I really believe that this is him. Why he doesn't use this account to log in to this forum - well, I have no idea...

Quote from sinbad :

Playing devil's advocate here, but is the skin named in such a unique way that there is no chance of anyone unintentionally giving their own skin (which for whatever reason they don't upload to lfsworld) the same name?

This is not too unlikely, actually this happened to me once.

I was using the FZR Gulf skin from resound that's somewhere here in the skins section for download.

Then there was another guy using some Gulf skin too. But the one I used and his own were absolutely unmistakable. The one from resound had the old Gulf color scheme with light blue and light orange. And the other ones had the darker colors that are used by Gulf nowadays. Furthermore the paint scheme was completely different too.

Suddenly this guy started to call me a skin thief and told me to remove the skin. Of course I asked him what was wrong since I got my skin downloaded from here and it did look very different from his own. Then he became very angry, went on accusing me and even started to insult me very hard. He didn't want to stop doing so and at some point I had enough and started to shoot back. In my eyes he was a complete moron that didn't know what he was talking about. And I was correct...

After some time I got the idea that his own skin might have the same filename as the one I was using (shit might happen even with LFSW filename-check I thought) - and that was also correct to some degree. It took me some time to convince this raging idiot to look into his LFS folders what his skin's filename was and while doing so he found out that he still had an old version of his own skin in there that really had the same filename as the one from resound.

So before bashing others everybody should at least have a look at their own LFS folders if they might have something similar left around. Sometimes the people that say that they don't use your skin, while you can clearly see it, are right...

Btw.: the idiot that wrongly accused me didn't even say sorry after all the things he called me for nothing...

And TBH I really don't get it what makes people so mad if others use their skins. I know that people try to identify themselves with their skins and this is even more the case with team-skins. But you people should really calm down about that - you make the skin available for the public yourself by uploading them and there will always be some people that like what they see and use it. If you don't want your skin to be used by others you don't have a choice but to not upload it and share it for example only inside your league or something. I mean, you're not losing any money if others use your skins...

Quote from hamsterr0ttan :

Oh it is P. I have a license but not on this account u se...

You can use your LFS-name and password to login to this forum. Doing so will bring up your license status under your name. This is really helpful if you want to ask questions about something connected to licensed-only content. This way you won't be considered a haxXx0r by anybody...

P.S.: I assume your LFS-name is riLLeeee, right?

Quote from frant!c :

That was my guess as well, but the weird thing is that the testfunction shows that it works beautifully, but LFS wont.

Ill try another game, maybe it'll make a difference

Thanks for the reply !

[edit]
I tried (the uber realistic racing simulator) Flatout...:P Same problem.

What i need is a calibration in windows. The normal control panel version is gone after installing this driver.

I got DXTweak. This shows me that the "raw" input of the pedal is fine, but the DirectInput value is the crazy one...

Somehow pressing apply a couple of times fixed the DirectInput one to comply with the raw value.

Im gonna test for a second.
Yeah she works
Now i can brake and throttle at the same time funfunfun !

Tnx

Wow!

Sounds weird...

I just can't help but wonder what you guys do with your PCs that the MS SW controllers don't work properly - like I already mentioned I never ever had any such problems...

But what you wrote makes me think if a re-install of DirectX might have helped too...??

When the drivers are installed, then you should have access to a custom control panel for the wheel (see attachments).

And if you PM me your email I could send you the original drivers I copied from the CD that comes with the wheel when you buy it new. That's because AFAIK the drivers V. 4.0 usually only contain the drivers for one single controller and the ones you find for download on the net are mostly for the FFB wheel. For example the drivers from my CD are unpacked about 10 MB and the ones from the link provided by dodo.ger are 15 MB. So they might possibly not be the correct ones.

But on the other side the wheel should still work even without the drivers, just with combined pedals.

I use the same wheel for many years now and never ever had such problems.

Did you install the drivers?

And another point is: since this wheel is not manufactured any more for some years now you must have bought it used. So maybe it's just damaged..??

Quote from Cue-Ball :

I'm not the one complaining that the car classes are unbalanced.

So what...????

Do you even read what people write?

What does this have to do with the topic or anything anybody posted in this thread?

Since you are starting to just bash around without any relation to the postings you are answering to, I'd say you're beginning to troll.

Sorry for that, I said I wanted to stay away from here, but couldn't resist as this posting was just too ridiculous. I hope this won't happen again...

Quote from André :

grr, wish to delete most part of your reply, but I can't

LOL Why?

Quote from Cue-Ball :

<put in any quote from Cue-Ball in this thread here>

Sorry, but you are seeing and producing problems where none are present. It's absolutely pointless to discuss a topic with somebody who "invents" problems out of nowhere in the arguments of the others. Me at least is tired of this. I'm outta here, I made my point clear enough for everybody except one who seems to be just unwilling (or uncapable??? ) to understand it - that's got to be enough...

I still forgot to say something.

No matter how much I'd like the classes to be evened out asap, it might still be too early to do it.

The physics in LFS are far from being finished - not that they are some kind of bad in any way now, but there are still some things missing. Ground effects for example are still missing and they will probably mess up all of it again when they are introduced.

So why waste time to even out unfinished physics? I'm not quite sure if it's worth it, but on the other hand it might still take a very long time until everything is implemented and in all that time we would have to live with sub-optimal balanced classes.

Quote from Vain :

Just a small hint for the discussion:
"Even out" means 'comparable laptimes' in this context. No one is trying to suggest to make all cars behave equal. In a lot of replies some of you understood this wrong.
So please, when you use the term "even out" or "make equal" elaborate on what you exactly mean. I think everyone has agreed that comparable laptimes are good, but that equal behaviour of all cars in a league is bad.

Vain

:iagree:

The black stripes on the track are not dirt but rubber. In LFS dirt doesn't get from off track onto the track - neither visually nor physically. And rubber is only visual, it has no effect on grip whatsoever.

But dirt can get on your tyres, massively reducing your grip. This effect cannot be seen on the tyre itself but you can check the dirt on your tyres by pressing F9. The brown bars inside the symbolic tyres represent the amount of dirt on your tyre.

Of course all of this only represents the actual status of LFS. Features about visibility or physical effects of rubber or dirt on track or tyres might change in the future.

*EDIT*

Man, I'm slow...

Hmmm...

I think the effect of the curb-angle should depend on your camber very much.

And yes, I also believe that the curbs have less grip in general. But I'm not 100% sure about that since the loss of grip that I experience on the curbs might also come from my camber being optimised for a flat track and not for a 10° (or whatever) curb-edge.

OK Cue-Ball...

Obviously I wasn't 100% exact in my posting - or maybe you were just trying to read something out of it to prove your own point.

The different cars in ETCC were by no means completely equally competetive on every track (and I didn't say that). For example Monza was absolute Alfa-country, mainly because of their power advantage and the few corners that don't wear tyres as fast as many corners. But even there the difference between Alfa and BMW was not over 1 second (IIRC). But the difference at Monza was the worst of all and this is why racing was still very close most (not all) of the time even with one car having a slight advantage.

And if you say this was achieved by weight penalties (which is correct to some degree) then I don't see a reason why this can't be done in LFS. If the FZR outperforms the other GTRs under every circumstance than why not just make its power per weight worse? Or make it better on the other cars? Changing the mass of some cars doesn't seem to be some kind of mission impossible for the devs to me. Changing the power output is the same.

Surely this would be an update that has to reset the hotlaps and stuff. And if the devs overdid it and made the FZR too slow to have any chance at all on any track, well just make another update and reduce it a little. I don't see a problem here. Once you start such a process you will very quickly get an idea how much you must change to achieve the wanted effect.

Of course some people will always complain that their favourite car is not the fastest on their favourite track and at some point the devs need to stop the process of evening out. Otherwise it would become a neverending story. So just make a poll like this one to see what the majority thinks and the devs can see if the situation has improved. And at some point (for example when clearly more than 50% think the classes are evened out enough) they stop it.

I just don't get it why you think this is near impossible? This is just a sim in which everything can be changed to whatever the developer wants it to be. Just add some weight to the FZR and it will be slower in corners and on the straight and it will also wear its tyres faster. Very difficult, huh...??

And what you also don't seem to understand is the reason for this effort. It's just that a race with different cars that have different characteristics is way more interesting - not only to watch but also to race. Most people agree on this point - just live with it. You're quite alone here if you find multi-car-races not a big lot more interesting than single-car-races.

Quote from Cue-Ball :

Nothing is wrong with that if it could actually be done. The problem is, this game is now years old and on it's second "release" and this same debate is still going on.

People have been complaining about the car balancing for as long as I've been playing this game. If it were a simple matter of "give this car more power and give this car less weight" then there would be no problem. But that's not the case. The cars were changed for the last patch and the complaining about balancing got WORSE, not better. The cars will never run equal enough to make everyone happy. Let's say a miracle happens and the devs are able to get all three GTR cars to run within a tenth of a second of one another on, say, Westhill. What happens when you go to Aston? Or to Kyoto? One of the cars is going to be faster than the others and the bitching begins all over again!

With very few exceptions, most race series run all cars with the same powertrain layout. The race series that DO allow cars with different layouts to compete level the field with ballast. If LFS added ballast, that would address the balancing issue, but only for league races. Pick-up races would still end up being uneven.

I think it's unlikely that the cars will ever be even. And if they WERE, instead of people complaining that car X is faster they'd be complaining that Car Y is just as fast, but easier to drive, or that car Z is just as fast, but uses less fuel or less tires or, or, or. There's always something to complain about and you'll never please all the people, so why bother?

Sorry to say that, but you still don't get it.

It's not about making all cars exactly equally fast on any given track. That's just BS and furthermore impossible if they have different characteristics.

It's about making the cars more even so that not a single car dominates under all circumstances. For example let the FZR dominate on tracks with long straights and fast bends and let the FXR dominate the city tracks with tight corners. The same goes for a wet track (which I really hope we will have at some time in the future). An AWD car should just own the RWD cars on a wet track.

A good example is again WTCC. Or even better the ETCC in 2003/2004. In these years it was mainly the Alfas and BMWs fighting for victory with Seat being close behind. The Alfas and BMWs were very different in characteristics. FWD vs. RWD, massive overweight at the front vs. nearly evenly balanced, 6-gear sequential vs. 5-gear H-pattern and the list goes on. The Alfas with slightly faster engines were mostly a bit faster on a single lap, but over the distance their bad weight distribution and the FWD wore out their front-tyres much faster and traction was also always a problem with the FWD cars compared to the BMWs.

But still most of the races were very close between them and in the end the championship in 2003 was decided by a single point between a BMW and an Alfa.

This is what people mean with evening out classes.

Quote from DasBoeseC :

I did not talk about the car.....but about the company.....the car was not 'hurt' but destroyed as you already said.....

I think Mercedes' approach was arrogant and that their punishment was well deserved.....

For more Info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_CLR

CU, Sebastian

PS: Enough OT I think

Errrrmmm...

You ever heard of a thing called a "joke" in your life?

Quote from chp101 :

2 kwijibo - there is no Aston in demo and there is no demo on my hdd

So what is it on your HDD???

Quote from anttt69 :

Thanks for the info guys

It was on ebay but someone else has bought it, damn.

It was sold on ebay without any information about the type of the card????

There are really weird people out there...illepall

Oh come on people...

Even when being instructed this guy is not able to unpack a zip-file...????????

Sorry, but this goes beyond my understanding. I even instructed old people without any knowledge of computers (via telephone) to successfully install drivers and/or set up their internet connection and stuff like that. If you can tell right from left, unzipping and starting an unzipped program can in no way be too difficult when you are instructed. No need to be any kind of "computer geek" for that. Just an IQ of over 10 is needed...

Hmmm...

I always found that one of the biggest advantages of having a racesim without real cars is that you can balance different cars with different characteristics to be as competetive to each other as possible without having to look for any real performances. Just look at the WTCC. RWD and FWD cars with different weight distributions and stuff, and they are all regulated to be very close performance-wise. And if one of them peaks out it will soon be regulated by weight penalties or even adjusted regulations for a special car. And in the end I find WTCC to be among the most exciting motorsports to be broadcasted on TV. Just because of the competition of different concepts on an equal level.

So why not make use of the "un-real" cars we have in LFS and make them competetive to each other while still being very different in characteristics? This can only result in highly interesting and exciting races.

This is a task that is not done very easily and it might take several steps of adjustments by the devs. But thinking of the possible results it's worth the effort, IMHO of course.

Since you have already destroyed your warranty you and as the button is more or less useless now you could as well open the wheel and solder in a new button. Because I don't own a DFP I'm not really sure about the kind of buttons used inside of it, but usually they are all the same in any kind of input devices. You normally have the same ones in mice too. They look like the one I attached as an image. You can buy these buttons in any electronics-store.

Just one thing you have to take care about:

The height of these buttons is not always exactly the same. So before you buy a new one you should solder out the old one and take it with you for comparison. Even very little differences in height could lead to the button being pressed all the time or being pressed too easily so that every little pressure to the wheel housing could trigger it.

If the difference is really very little you can use some fine sandpaper (is this the correct word??? ) to take away a bit of the button.

All of this is only possible if the wheel of the DFP can be opened of course - dunno about that.


*EDIT* OK - if the suggestion of kamkorPL is possible I'd advise you to do so too...

Quote from symsworld :

i wouldnt believe the mx 7700 card would suck as it is in the new 7000 series, it would be more like a everyday use card but if your looking for something with a bit more kick i would highly recomend the Nvida 6600Gt 256 that is one majorly powerful card

It wouldn't suck, right - but only because it doesn't exist...

This was said already before in this thread.

Furthermore the mx-chips from nVidia did not always contain silicon derived from the series they were entitled to be. For example the GeForce 4 mx was nothing but a slightly higher clocked GeForce 2 - not even 3!!

And: nowadays the 6600 GT is no more "majorly" powerful. And it never was, because when it was released it was already only the mid-range of nVidia chips. Now it even is the mid-range of an old chip-series.

Maybe you should at least read the thread before posting about things you don't have a clue about...

IMHO everything proposed in this thread is more or less unrealistic. Sorry, but that's what I think...

IMHO we will have to live with wreckers.

I can't think of a good way to punish them without it being abused.

The main problem I see is that most misbehaviour (this is all except driving in the wrong direction) cannot be detected automatically and it just isn't possible to watch over all servers all the time. And it also seems impossible to me that somebody reviews all replays sent to a central ban-list to see if bad driving is included. And there would also still be different opinions about what is wrecking and what is an accident - who should decide this for everybody?

A license system would only punish the fair driving newbies. Why shouldn't they drive with experienced drivers? I can see no reason for that.

Like I already said driving in the wrong direction is the only misbehaviour that can be detected automatically without a doubt. So let this one be detected and punished with bans of increasing length for every time. Anything else - well let vote-bans rule or let the admins do it themselves.


And one thing about vote-bans. When I first started to race online I got very, very, very pissed about wreckers and senseless drivers. This was very much worse with GTR. So I often tried to vote those guys off. But even that sometimes led to nothing but pain. People were unwilling to kick/ban the most imaginable obvious wreckers. But then the wrecker started a vote against me and I was voted off immediately. I think you can imagine me being pissed even more, but this was not a single incident, that happened to me several times. So I nearly completely stopped to ever vote. And I surely don't vote if I didn't see the driver concerned wrecking with my own eyes.