18.5 Broke PhysX

[Isaard]

Like the title says, before the update I had PhysX on and running well, after the update the option is greyed out.

If I go into the Nvidia control panel and change PhysX to run on CPU, Warframe will re-enable the PhysX option in the menu but turning it on has no effect. There are still no PhysX effects in-game.

I have updated to latest drivers and the bug is still there. My main card is a gtx670 with a 440 dedicated to PhysX.

Would love to see a fix for this as the game looks far better with the fancy particles!

EDIT: Original drivers were 361.43, was working fine before patch. Tried updating to 364.47 driver, still no working PhysX in Warfame. Then rolled back to 362.00, still no working PhysX in Warframe. Tested some other PhysX enabled games and confirmed that issue is with Warframe only.

Edited March 9, 2016 by Isaard
more info

[Isaard]

Ok, got a little more info here using the the Nvidia control panel to change PhysX processor.

 

Setting PhysX processor to my 670 makes PhysX work again, but I have a dedicated PhysX card to move some of the load off my 670, this isn't a fix for me.

Setting PhysX processor to my 440 causes the PhysX option to be greyed out in Warframe, this was my original setup that worked no problem before 18.5 patch.

Setting PhysX processor to CPU causes Warframe to re-enable the PhysX option, but the in-game PhysX effects are still missing.

[SKbrau]

your gt 440 and your CPU likely don't meet the minimum requirements any-more for physx computations. 

With a 670, you'd be better off using your 670 as your 440 will bottle neck the other card if it used for physX

http://physxinfo.com/wiki/GPUs_with_PhysX_support

[Panzer_X]

Same issue i posted it in the mega thread

Title: PhysX detection issue

DESCRIPTION: After installing 18.5 and 18.5.1 I noticed that my Phyx were no longer working.They were workign Pre 18.5 and 18.5.1. I checked the settings and the physx option was grayed out in the game. I have an EVGA Nvidia 680 FTW 4gb card as my GPU and an Nvidia 460 SSC 1GB as a dedicated physx card. The patch notes said that the physx were updated so I updated my drivers from 353.30 to 362.00. After this the option remained grayed out. so i did some testing and this is what i found. I attempted to add screen shots of the settings in Nvidia control panel. http://imgur.com/a/uvvom

STEPS TO REPRODUCE: If I set the Physx settings in Nvidia control panel to "Auto-select" the option in the game for physx remains grayed out. If i changed the Physx settings in Nvidia control panel to "GeForce GTX 460" the option in the game for physx remains grayed out. If i changed the Physx settings in Nvidia control panel to "GeForce GTX 460" and check the box for dedicated Physx the option in the game for physx remains grayed out. If I changed the Physx settings in Nvidia control panel to "GeForce GTX 680" i am able to turn on Physx in the game.I was able to test in a capture mission to confirm that when the 680 is set in the Physx settings in Nvidia control panel the particals are displayed in game.

DESIRED OUTCOME: I would like to be able to run my dedicated physx setup as i did before 18.5/18.5.1.

 

[Panzer_X]

39 minutes ago, SKbrau said:

your gt 440 and your CPU likely don't meet the minimum requirements any-more for physx computations. 

With a 670, you'd be better off using your 670 as your 440 will bottle neck the other card if it used for physX

http://physxinfo.com/wiki/GPUs_with_PhysX_support

acording to warframes system req http://www.geforce.com/games-applications/pc-games/warframe/system-requirements the 440 should work as long as you have the 1GB version 

• Nvidia Graphics Card with 1G of video RAM
• Driver Version 310.90 or higher

[Isaard]

59 minutes ago, Panzer_X said:

acording to warframes system req http://www.geforce.com/games-applications/pc-games/warframe/system-requirements the 440 should work as long as you have the 1GB version 

• Nvidia Graphics Card with 1G of video RAM
• Driver Version 310.90 or higher

I do have the 1GB version and according to that PhysX site a 440 is rated 4 out of 5 for dedicated PhysX. Besides, this setup has been running Warframe PhysX for over 2 years without issue, no bottlenecks at all. Processor is AMD 1090T 6 core clocked up to 3.9 Ghz, it barely notices when Warframe is running. But as I said, setting PhysX to CPU still results in Warframe failing to run PhysX at all.

My setup is designed to run PhysX dedicated on my 440 so my 670 is under less load due to PhysX calculations. This setup works perfectly fine for all games, including Warframe up until 18.5 patch.

DE is going to have to fix this because the problem is obviously a result of something they have done, not some issue with mine or anyone else's hardware.

[ShazBo]

I got the same issue, it was working pre 18.5 and I'm using the geforce 940m... I tried settin it on auto, cpu and the 940m itself... all the options have Physx Greyed out. It's starting to piss me off.

[Isaard]

Hoping for some word from DE on possible causes or solutions to this issue, it seems to be happening for a lot of people!

[SKbrau]

On 09/03/2016 at 1:06 AM, Panzer_X said:

acording to warframes system req http://www.geforce.com/games-applications/pc-games/warframe/system-requirements the 440 should work as long as you have the 1GB version 

• Nvidia Graphics Card with 1G of video RAM
• Driver Version 310.90 or higher

This update If I'm not mistake uses a MUCH newer phys X library, I.e the one introduce in the 350.XX~ driver range.  (its kinda obvious this page is out of date)

As much of their phyx info is, They quote they have gpus in the 400 core range (they have had this for over 5 years)

On 09/03/2016 at 2:15 AM, Isaard said:

I do have the 1GB version and according to that PhysX site a 440 is rated 4 out of 5 for dedicated PhysX. Besides, this setup has been running Warframe PhysX for over 2 years without issue, no bottlenecks at all. Processor is AMD 1090T 6 core clocked up to 3.9 Ghz, it barely notices when Warframe is running. But as I said, setting PhysX to CPU still results in Warframe failing to run PhysX at all.

My setup is designed to run PhysX dedicated on my 440 so my 670 is under less load due to PhysX calculations. This setup works perfectly fine for all games, including Warframe up until 18.5 patch.

DE is going to have to fix this because the problem is obviously a result of something they have done, not some issue with mine or anyone else's hardware.

Card memory capacity in modern terms is almost irrelevant when coming to PhyX, as its pure calculations. no textures.  Core count and interface width matter much more. 

It is likely that the libraries being used now are too complex for a gt 440.., Cpus come with more GPU cores in their iGPU than the 440 has (under 100)

When I owned a 600 series card (680), my experiences with secondary cards you will take a hit from off loading Phyx calculations to a significantly slower card.

cards tested, 280gtx, GTX 460, gtx 550ti, GTX 580. Can you guess which card allowed my main card (gtx 680) to run at full utilzation without performance impact from the DedPhyX card?  (borderlands 2 tested)

 

it was the 580.  500+ cores, with a 384 bit width, 750Ti's also perform almost identically. increased slightly stronger cores and a narrower 192-bit? width 

 

My point to linking the site was the GTX 670's rating.  5/5 , you would actually like save power just taking the 440 out of the system.

 

AS for no spec change on the PC yet, Simply they likely haven't rated that class of card very important to test for continued compatibility. 

because in reality it is almost 6 generations old. and it isn't even consider a gaming card by Nvidia's current definition, also the next series to lose driver support from Nvidia.

As atleast in the 362.00 drivers Systems that use kepler and fermi cards in the same system force the fermi card to run off the windows graphics driver. this might not be supported by the newest libraries (above info is in 362.00 driver notes)

Sorry to be the Bearer of bad news.

 

[Isaard]

Bearer of bad guesses might be more accurate, this doesn't address the PhysX on CPU option getting Warframe all confused or the fact that no other games have the problem. Unless Warframe is suddenly the bleeding edge of PhysX innovation to the point of creating unheard of compatibility issues that no other modern games encounter?

I've got a response from DE support saying they are aware of the issues and working on a fix, so hopefully we can get back to using our PhysX cards soon.

[BlackVortex]

has anyone of you tried 364.51?

I read somewhere that the previously released version was having physx issues

[SKbrau]

On 12/03/2016 at 5:19 PM, Isaard said:

Bearer of bad guesses might be more accurate, this doesn't address the PhysX on CPU option getting Warframe all confused or the fact that no other games have the problem. Unless Warframe is suddenly the bleeding edge of PhysX innovation to the point of creating unheard of compatibility issues that no other modern games encounter?

I've got a response from DE support saying they are aware of the issues and working on a fix, so hopefully we can get back to using our PhysX cards soon.

As for bleeding edge of PhysX, yup...  There are only two game that I find that use the SDK 3.X.X libraries, those two games are Warframe and Witcher 3.  most games that use pHysX use older SDK 2.

Witcher seem to use slightly more advance apex system while Warframe launched with the sdk 3.2 Library, thus leading me to believe that this recent update has updated that Library to SDK 3.3.3 

The problem with this is that it might not actually be on DE's end. so they might have to wait until another update fixes an issue or find an option to use legacy libraries without introducing more bugs 

 

Can i Ask what Driver and PhysX version your system is running? (right click your desktop, click on control panel, and then bottom left for system information, under the components tab that will show you your physx file version)

Rolling back Only PhysX aspect of the driver might allow you to use your dedicated card for physX (i'd like to point out that I still don't under stand why you insist on using an archaic card for DedPhysX, when you main card is much better for both rolls) 9.14.x or 9.12.x might work better for you than 9.15.x

EDIT: also looking into features that Warframe is looking to add in (IE. TXAA ) that will also potentially introduce issues on older hard ware such as  400/500 fermi chips (as these technologies are not supported by Nvidia on fermi products) so one might want to be mindful of their in game settings. when such a patch hits.

Edited March 16, 2016 by SKbrau

[Zogrim]

On 3/16/2016 at 4:56 PM, SKbrau said:

As for bleeding edge of PhysX, yup...  There are only two game that I find that use the SDK 3.X.X libraries, those two games are Warframe and Witcher 3.  most games that use pHysX use older SDK 2.

This is not true, actually. Any Unreal Engine 4 or Unity 5 game are using PhysX 3.3, add Frozenbyte based games (Trine, Shadwen), Stingray based games (Helldivers, Warhammer: Vermintide, War of the Vikings), FolgeLight games (PlanetSide 2, H1Z1), new Hitman, Metro 2033/34 Redux, Payday 2, Risen 3, Project Cars, Lords of the Fallen, etc, etc

So, PhysX 3.x is pretty common.

As for the issue, if you look in APEX SDK 1.3.2 release notes for Particles / Turbulence modules, you can find following note:

* Removed support for GPU acceleration on pre-Fermi GPUs.

Maybe something was changed in newer versions too, some stuff that DE overlooked.

But I dunno why you bother at all, PhysX effects in Warframe nowadays are a shadow of what they were before :(

P.S. I have GTX Titan (Kepler one), newest drivers - all is working fine.

Edited March 20, 2016 by Zogrim

[SKbrau]

On 20/03/2016 at 11:02 AM, Zogrim said:

This is not true, actually. Any Unreal Engine 4 or Unity 5 game are using PhysX 3.3, add Frozenbyte based games (Trine, Shadwen), Stingray based games (Helldivers, Warhammer: Vermintide, War of the Vikings), FolgeLight games (PlanetSide 2, H1Z1), new Hitman, Metro 2033/34 Redux, Payday 2, Risen 3, Project Cars, Lords of the Fallen, etc, etc

So, PhysX 3.x is pretty common.

As for the issue, if you look in APEX SDK 1.3.2 release notes for Particles / Turbulence modules, you can find following note:

* Removed support for GPU acceleration on pre-Fermi GPUs.

Maybe something was changed in newer versions too, some stuff that DE overlooked.

But I dunno why you bother at all, PhysX effects in Warframe nowadays are a shadow of what they were before :(

P.S. I have GTX Titan (Kepler one), newest drivers - all is working fine.

there is also the little tid bit within recent drivers atleast since i've noticed it. 

The NV driver forcing Fermi based gpus to run on WDDM while there is a Kepler or newer based Gpu in the system. 

 

NV PhysX compatibilty is a bit gray and lacks granularity.  Fermi cards are still supported by to use PhysX but that assume they are the primary card or there is a fermi primary card.

when 600 series + gets introduced, compatibility gets a bit grey due to contradictory issues. like forcing Fermi to run on WDDM while there is Kepler or newer in the system. 

 

and to my knowledge WDDM does NOT have PhysX support. ( i could be wrong on this as i've not used these drivers in a dogs age.. literally) 

(psst pre-fermi is 2XX-GTX series, GTX-4XX series was first gen fermi)

[Sunder]

GTX 980 - Running Warframe from Steam

Option is greyed out regardless if I set PhysX to Auto, CPU, or the GPU.

However I have noticed if I installed Warframe from the website and run from my desktop instead of from Steam, PhysX was enabled to be switched on. Tessellation wasn't, but meh. I also didn't really notice much difference when the PhysX was turned, "On" so I'm not sure if it actually worked, or if Warframes effects are just really THAT toned down. Last but not least, I've noticed numerous times whenever in Steam when I choose to "Verify Integrity of Game Cache" it always fails to validate all the files and I'm left to download 50-250 or more. Not sure if that has something to do with it or not.

I too would like input from DE or a fix :(

 

EDIT: Since posting I have went into steam and verified the integrity, 50 files had to be downloaded but it made me download an entire 10.5GB file which was rather odd. Upon completion I went to Nvidia's website, found the latest version of my Drivers, downloaded and performed a CLEAN installation and restarted the computer when all was said and done.

PhysX is still grayed out, so yet again I've tried switching it from CPU, to Auto and GPU. No change in results.

EDIT 2: Having just spoken with "Kickbot" he claims the next hotfix should fix the problem and stated it was likely due to us being logged in on two profiles.

User>AppData>Local>Warframe

Inside this folder you should see two other folders of random characters. Numbers, letters. Hex. Only one of them is the 'real' folder however. To be clear however, Kickbot did not suggest anyone try this fix, only that it could potentially work. He nor I are responsible for anyones screw ups. He stated to look into the "EE.log" file and look to see which Hex folder is actually the real one. The one being used and that deleting the second one could potentially solve this issue. Once again however, upon deleting this second folder....no luck. PhysX is still grayed out, unable to be switched on.

Edited March 21, 2016 by Sunder

[SKbrau]

6 hours ago, Sunder said:

GTX 980 - Running Warframe from Steam

Option is greyed out regardless if I set PhysX to Auto, CPU, or the GPU.

However I have noticed if I installed Warframe from the website and run from my desktop instead of from Steam, PhysX was enabled to be switched on. Tessellation wasn't, but meh. I also didn't really notice much difference when the PhysX was turned, "On" so I'm not sure if it actually worked, or if Warframes effects are just really THAT toned down. Last but not least, I've noticed numerous times whenever in Steam when I choose to "Verify Integrity of Game Cache" it always fails to validate all the files and I'm left to download 50-250 or more. Not sure if that has something to do with it or not.

I too would like input from DE or a fix :(

 

EDIT: Since posting I have went into steam and verified the integrity, 50 files had to be downloaded but it made me download an entire 10.5GB file which was rather odd. Upon completion I went to Nvidia's website, found the latest version of my Drivers, downloaded and performed a CLEAN installation and restarted the computer when all was said and done.

PhysX is still grayed out, so yet again I've tried switching it from CPU, to Auto and GPU. No change in results.

EDIT 2: Having just spoken with "Kickbot" he claims the next hotfix should fix the problem and stated it was likely due to us being logged in on two profiles.

User>AppData>Local>Warframe

Inside this folder you should see two other folders of random characters. Numbers, letters. Hex. Only one of them is the 'real' folder however. To be clear however, Kickbot did not suggest anyone try this fix, only that it could potentially work. He nor I are responsible for anyones screw ups. He stated to look into the "EE.log" file and look to see which Hex folder is actually the real one. The one being used and that deleting the second one could potentially solve this issue. Once again however, upon deleting this second folder....no luck. PhysX is still grayed out, unable to be switched on.

interesting.

 

So you are playing on the steam app..  Have you tried the stand-alone launcher out of curiosity? (conflict between steam files game files and stand alone gamefiles maybe? {thoretical})

I also assume you've got fairly recent drivers? which version of PhysX is enabled?

[Sunder]

16 hours ago, SKbrau said:

interesting.

 

So you are playing on the steam app..  Have you tried the stand-alone launcher out of curiosity? (conflict between steam files game files and stand alone gamefiles maybe? {thoretical})

I also assume you've got fairly recent drivers? which version of PhysX is enabled?

The Steam app when you click "Play game" launches the Warframe launcher, where you see Inaros, see it checking for updates, and then you hit, the bit "Play" at the bottom to start warframe.

I have installed the normal launcher straight onto my desktop as downloaded from Warframe.com

Using the Warframe.com version of Warframe? PhysX is no longer grayed out, can be turned on. However I didn't notice many effects so I'm not sure if it's working or not. Furthermore, after running the Warframe.com version of Warframe, I noticed PhysX was able to be toggled in the Steam version. However upon deletion of it...the Steam version now is back to being grayed out.

As for Drivers? As I mentioned in my post, I literally checked yesterday for the latest Nvidia drivers --in which I performed a clean installation, this also installs the latest version of PhysX.

[SKbrau]

2 hours ago, Sunder said:

The Steam app when you click "Play game" launches the Warframe launcher, where you see Inaros, see it checking for updates, and then you hit, the bit "Play" at the bottom to start warframe.

I have installed the normal launcher straight onto my desktop as downloaded from Warframe.com

Using the Warframe.com version of Warframe? PhysX is no longer grayed out, can be turned on. However I didn't notice many effects so I'm not sure if it's working or not. Furthermore, after running the Warframe.com version of Warframe, I noticed PhysX was able to be toggled in the Steam version. However upon deletion of it...the Steam version now is back to being grayed out.

As for Drivers? As I mentioned in my post, I literally checked yesterday for the latest Nvidia drivers --in which I performed a clean installation, this also installs the latest version of PhysX.

Do you own any games that require the latest drivers from Nvidia? (like latest releases etc), or are you Running Windows 10? (if you mentioned this and I missed it like you mentioning the drivers before I apologize) 

If current drivers are absolutely required, would you care to try an older more stable driver and physx software.  i suggest 362.00 and 9.14.xx to begin with.

 

I find it odd that the user with a single Kepler card in their systems are not really having this issue, maxwell and mixed architecture systems seem to take the hit.

got a couple ideas but need more data to be able to gleam anything substantial from it 

[nonscience]

If that can help you, I am runnning warframe on a single GTX670 and I have absolutely no problem with PhysX at all.

Either your secondary card isn't able to support the new PhysX, which seems the most plausible scenario, or Steam somehow mess up something on the way (happens to me with Fallout 4)

[SKbrau]

I'm gunna put it out there, I think This is a Nvidia Bug, not a DE/warframe  bug.

When G-sync became at thing the first few drivers broke dedicated physX while g-sync was enabled. I don't know if this has been fixed as my single card blows through everything this game(and pretty much every game i throw at it so far) can throw at it. So I long ditch my Dedicated card long ago. 

 

maybe this week i can borrow the g/f's 960 and do some mix architecture testing on drivers i know to work with a single Kepler card

[Isaard]

Well I pulled out my 440 and tried running on a single 670 and it still isn't working. I get the PhysX toggle in Warframe but no matter the settings I try there aren't any PhysX effects anymore...

Running 364.51 drivers now, clean installation and still the only game doing this is Warframe.

 

Edited March 24, 2016 by Isaard

[nonscience]

Damn, running on the same card and driver version and it's perfect here.
Personally, I prefer to run Warframe out of Steam because of the awful problems they had at launch. And I admit my motto is "why had a third party program to increase chances of bugs?". I know it's far fetched and makes no real sense but I ran into a problem with Steam and Fallout 4 and I had to just set Fallout .exe to Always Run as Admin to fix it. And this bug happened right after I updated my drivers.
Makes no sense but it may work.
 

[SKbrau]

1 hour ago, Isaard said:

Well I pulled out my 440 and tried running on a single 670 and it still isn't working. I get the PhysX toggle in Warframe but no matter the settings I try there aren't any PhysX effects anymore...

Running 364.51 drivers now, clean installation and still the only game doing this is Warframe.

 

care to try something?

Run DDU

Spoiler

http://www.guru3d.com/files-details/display-driver-uninstaller-download.html

, while the gt 440 is out of the system, and Install 362.00 Drivers,  this driver comes with the latest physX driver. 

the reason why the GT440 has to be out of the system for both DDU and new drive is due to some of the registry entries that come with driver updates. 

 

Depending on your operating system you may need to run another program/app to check your windows registry for errors. however since no other PhysX games you have (did you mention which ones they were?) did this. i don't think this will be necessary in anyway.  

[Isaard]

6 hours ago, SKbrau said:

care to try something?

Run DDU

  Reveal hidden contents

http://www.guru3d.com/files-details/display-driver-uninstaller-download.html

, while the gt 440 is out of the system, and Install 362.00 Drivers,  this driver comes with the latest physX driver. 

the reason why the GT440 has to be out of the system for both DDU and new drive is due to some of the registry entries that come with driver updates. 

 

Depending on your operating system you may need to run another program/app to check your windows registry for errors. however since no other PhysX games you have (did you mention which ones they were?) did this. i don't think this will be necessary in anyway.  

Tried this.

Its sort of working now, PhysX toggle is on and there are some effects in the game now, like the PhysX spray from Volt's Noble Stance unarmed idle animation. But other places still have nothing, like the Nekros Noble Stance idle animation. I used to get a snazzy bunch of PhysX particles before, now its just a N-64 era looking blob of smoke snot... what is going on with this game...

I'm on Win7 and ran CCleaner to check for reg errors, didn't find anything Nvidia or PhysX related though.

Edited March 25, 2016 by Isaard

[Mezhakh]

Yes  362.00  is the stable Driver Version for now. try doing game optimization on Nvdia Geforce Expierence