University of Hertfordshire

drholmes1003 · Jun 21, 2011

Dear all,

Recently, in University of Hertfordshire we received £250k worth Cruden racing simulator and it seems to use Racer software. So I was given an assignment to find and download a couple of Grand Prix and other tracks, and a few cars, and report back to academics. I seem to struggle to launch Racer on my PC and any associated progs like Pacejka, modeler etc. I would really appreciate some help from website administration and other users on how to start using Racer and all associated software!

Kind regards,
Anton

Knut Omdal Tveito · Jun 21, 2011

That sounds like really nice simulator

Hopefully a moderator can move this thread to the Racer section where you can get more help.

There is also a recently started FAQ thread for Racer here

Dave Stephenson · Jun 21, 2011

Sounds fantastic Anton! I don't know too much about Racer personally but there are plenty of followers around here so you should be able to get some help and answers.

KS95 · Jun 22, 2011

Are there any errors in your Qlog.txt?

drholmes1003 · Jun 22, 2011

Yes. And there are plenty of them as I've been unsuccessfully trying to launch many many times. Here are the latest: Tue Jun 21 16:34:34 (WARN): [racer/2572] QGLContext: extension 'GL_EXT_framebuffer_blit' is not supported; some features may not be implemented.
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (WARN): [racer/2572] WorldRenderer: no ARB_texture_env_combine extension
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (WARN): [racer/2572] WorldRenderer: reverting back to single pass (no multitexture)
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (ERR ): [racer/2572] DCubeMap:LoadImage: OpenGL error (1280): ???????????? ??????? ????????????
Tue Jun 21 16:34:35 (INFO): [racer/2572] Audio: setting speakermode to 2 (stereo, system default is stereo)
Tue Jun 21 16:34:42 (ERR ): [racer/2572] QInfo(data/cars/enzo_red/car.ini); more '}' brackets than '{' near line 663

Let me know if you need to know more QLOGs to suggest a solution.

Harey · Jun 22, 2011

and what are the specs on your PC? these kinds of things could help us, to help you solve the issue at hand.

KS95 · Jun 22, 2011

My guess is ATI or older graphics card, but yes, specs could be helpful!

drholmes1003 · Jun 22, 2011

Pentium(R) Dual-Core CPU T4300 @ 2.1 GHz 2.1 GHz, 3 GB Ram, Graphics Card: Mobile Intel(R) GMA 4500M (Internal). Graphic memory available - 1308 MB. That's what it says. I really suspect that the problem might be that I am trying to run it on a laptop (not a bad one) but still a laptop. Please confirm if the problem is in the specs, so I can ask the uni for a better PC and continue my work on it.

Some1 · Jun 22, 2011

drholmes1003 said:
Pentium(R) Dual-Core CPU T4300 @ 2.1 GHz 2.1 GHz, 3 GB Ram, Graphics Card: Mobile Intel(R) GMA 4500M (Internal). Graphic memory available - 1308 MB. That's what it says. I really suspect that the problem might be that I am trying to run it on a laptop (not a bad one) but still a laptop. Please confirm if the problem is in the specs, so I can ask the uni for a better PC and continue my work on it.

Yes, this is a bad configuration.. especially the video card (or the lack of).

Basically, you need hardware capable of running modern demanding games such as Crysis.

Also, I strongly recommend a NVIDIA graphics card, because Racer is currently developed using one and it has better support for OpenGL.

drholmes1003 · Jun 22, 2011

Thank you Some1! I'll try to get my hands on a more powerful PC.

Until then, can anyone confirm what is required to launch Racer? Basically, here is what I understand has to be done:
1) Download the archive, and unpack it
2) In racer.ini change ATI=0 to ATI=1
3) Open racer.exe and choose Free driving

I also have faced an issue that some downloaded cars may contain slight mistakes. Is it possible? Is it possible to correct them myself or better leave it? What changes have to be done to make Racer recognize recently added tracks and cars, and how to add them at all? Is it just by pasting a folder into right directory?

Thanks everyone for your time!

camsinny · Jun 22, 2011

drholmes1003 said:
Until then, can anyone confirm what is required to launch Racer? Basically, here is what I understand has to be done:
1) Download the archive, and unpack it
2) In racer.ini change ATI=0 to ATI=1
3) Open racer.exe and choose Free driving

I also have faced an issue that some downloaded cars may contain slight mistakes. Is it possible? Is it possible to correct them myself or better leave it? What changes have to be done to make Racer recognize recently added tracks and cars, and how to add them at all? Is it just by pasting a folder into right directory?

Thanks everyone for your time!

To launch Racer you only need to open the racer.exe after downloading and extracting the archive. The ATI=1 fix is only for graphics cards from AMD/ATi as they have some difficulties with the shaders. Free driving will get you into the car quickly though. Digging around in the menu system will be pretty much self-explanatory.
If you've recently downloaded a car or track just paste it into the racer/data/cars or racer/data/tracks directory. Some content may not be compatible with the latest version, in which case it could be better to download the latest stable release (though it's quite old)
There's more on that in the Racer Physics and Technical sub-forum or the WIP FAQ that Knut linked to earlier.

Unfortunately until Racer reaches the next stable release things will be somewhat frustrating or tedious to get working, but hang in there. There's plenty of help around here, just post a question in the Racer Problems & Fixes sub-forum.

Pretty jealous you get to play with some Cruden gear!

drholmes1003 · Jun 23, 2011

Yes, the sim is quite awesome! Furthermore, we are expecting to get some more processors and software for our pitlane, to get live data stream from our sim, we only got the monitors now though.

Thank you very much! I'll find out what is the version we have on the sim and then install it on a more powerful PC to try to get it running.

Just a quick one, what is the additional software I'll need for modelling cars & tracks? Def smth like Pacejka and Bob's Track Modeller? Could anyone list the progs they are using for modelling?

boomer541 · Jun 23, 2011

For modeling cars and tracks the software used can be anyof the following:
Blender - free - my favorite.
Maya - not free afaik
3ds Max - expensive - the best to use but you need the correct version for exporting.
ZMod - free - not used a lot but good for converting formats.

All have tutorials available using Google to find.

KS95 · Jun 23, 2011

Autodesk software is free if you are a student/home-schooled

Zmod 1 is the free version and probably the easiest, but also the most basic.

drholmes1003 · Jun 23, 2011

I think we are having 3ds Max being bought in couple of months, therefore I thought to start modelling tracks. Software for tracks modelling is the same? Or are there better opportunities? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each?

drholmes1003 · Jul 4, 2011

Hey guys! Another question: is there a possibility, in order to avoid whole modelling of a car, just use .CAD files?

Knut Omdal Tveito · Jul 4, 2011

Parametric solids like in Solidworks or Inventor? I export .step files to 3DS and then convert to polygon surfaces. But you still have to map the textures.

drholmes1003 · Jul 4, 2011

Yes, like in Solidworks but only we are using CATIA. Have you ever tried .cat files in 3DS?

Knut Omdal Tveito · Jul 4, 2011

I have tried different file formats but not .cat. Actually now that I think of it (bad memory) I currently use the Inventor import function in 3DS which works really well. You can simply adjust how fine the polygon mesh should be and so on and it gives very good results. If you can do this with Catia format I would strongly recommend it.

Mr Whippy · Jul 4, 2011

Problem is polygon flow isn't always so nice, so you might end up using more polygons to give shape to a form that can be expressed more accurately with less polygons placed more effectively.

I have some manufacturer cad > 3ds meshes for cars and really you are best using them as HQ blueprints to model on top of again, using things like Graphite modelling tools in 3DS Max for example...

Dave