----- David said: --------
I'd rather Fractint was using *nix-style memory management. ;-) Supposedly you can tell Fractint to do this. The docs say:
"If you are running background disk-video fractals under Windows 3, and you don't have a lot of real memory (over 2Mb), you might find it best to force Fractint to use real disk for disk-video modes. (Force this by using a .pif file with extended memory and expanded memory set to zero.) Try this if your disk goes crazy when generating background images, which are supposedly using extended or expanded memory. This problem can occur because, to multi-task, sometimes Windows must page an application's expanded or extended memory to disk, in big chunks. Fractint's own cached disk access may be faster in such cases." I haven't tried this in Win XP. (Actually, see my next email where I describe creating a 12,000 x 12,000 pixel Disk Video image. Fractint chose to use my hard disk without my specifying this.) On the Memory tab of the Property sheet of Fractint's PIF file in Win XP there are settings for extended and expanded memory. I see that they can be set to "None" instead of the default "Auto." A Program Information Files (PIF) file is automatically created when a DOS program is run the first time. On my Win XP system Fractint's PIF file is named "Shortcut to FRACTINT.EXE". A PIF file's "Type" is shown in the "Details" format of the File Explorer's file list as: "Shortcut to MS-DOS Program." To access the "Memory" Property sheet right click the PIF file, choose Properties and click the Memory tab. The docs warn that certain fractal's algorithms (Lorenz and "IFS") place pixels into widely separated locations in the output image. If you use Disk Video with these fractals they say that this may stress your hard disk with the unusual write pattern because of the more frequent than normal head motion. If Fractint will be using your hard disk the Fractint 20.0 docs say: "Currently Fractint gives you a warning message but lets you proceed. You can end the calculation with <Esc> if you think your hard disk is getting too strenuous a workout." However, I don't remember getting a warning. Here is some further info from the docs about which Fractal types can reduce the efficiency of the 'Disk' Video scheme: "While you are using a disk-video mode, your screen will display text information indicating whether memory or your disk drive is being used, and what portion of the "screen" is being read from or written to. A "Cache size" figure is also displayed. 64K is the maximum cache size. If you see a number less than this, it means that you don't have a lot of memory free, and that performance will be less than optimum. With a very low cache size such as 4 or 6k, performance gets considerably worse in cases using solid guessing, boundary tracing, plasma, or anything else which paints the screen non-linearly." David, if you do try this, (setting Fractint's PIF file to have extended memory and expanded memory set to "None" while creating a 'Disk' Video image to force using your hard disk) please post your results on this list serve. Thanks, Hal Lane ######################### # hallane@earthlink.net <mailto:hallane@earthlink.net> # #########################
-----Original Message----- From: fractint-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:fractint-bounces@mailman.xmission.com]On Behalf Of david Sent: Friday, August 07, 2009 5:04 AM To: Fractint and General Fractals Discussion Subject: Re: [Fractint] Stitching together images for the Fractal contest
Hal Lane wrote:
One of the default output sizes for images in Fractint for Windows beta 5 (*not* WinFract) is 8192 x 8192. I have successfully created images of that size. It can likely create even larger sizes without problems, since it uses Windows-style memory management.
I wouldn't consider that a reason to think it can create larger sizes without problems. I have a Windows XP machine at the office, 2GB of memory, yet Internet Explorer (which is a part of Windows that has been around a long while and fairly well-shaken down) starts to act weird and freeze when its memory consumption reaches 600+MB ...
I'd rather Fractint was using *nix-style memory management. ;-)
-- David gnome@hawaii.rr.com authenticity, honesty, community
_______________________________________________ Fractint mailing list Fractint@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fractint