FFXI on a 24" LED Monitor (graphics related question)Follow

I recently purchased a new computer and a 24" LED monitor to go along with it. I began playing FFXI on the PS2 console, however, did play on PC for a brief period of time a few years ago. I remember having to edit the windows registry to "clean" up the graphics. With this in mind, I browsed the Wiki here on Zam and found some information regarding a general overview, however, not entirely addressing my specific situation (I am sure its out there and of course will keep looking). I thought I would hopefully find some others here that may have be playing on the same size display, that may be kind enough to offer some tips in adjusting things. The most difficult balancing act I had (going by memory) was the UI element size and clarity in contrast to the background. Specifically, I could not get the UI elements to look sharp on this size monitor (had a 24" screen then also). The background, I got to look pretty good and will attempt to get it to look as good as possible with this new system. Again, any tips from those that may have a similar size display would be very much appreciated.

I think it's issues like this that SE plans to address with their Windows revamped UI. They have already given the ability to configure the Overlay, Background, and Menu resolutions separately Sooo Overlay is what size you want the whole window to be (ideally your monitor's native resolution), Background is what resolution you want the 3D engine to run at (crank it up as high as your video card can handle), and the Menu resolution is based on how big you want the fonts to be. I've found that putting the Menu resolution at ~2/3 of the size of Overlay resolution gives me decent results.

Actually any integer multiple will increase the supersampling rate, while non-integer will introduce cross-sampling errors.

So 3x and 4x are superior, just insignificantly and needlessly for their performance impact. If there weren't such a ridiculous performance impact (read: FFXI actually used any modern hardware) then upwards of 8x could still produce a slightly visible difference depending on the pixel averaging method used.

3x and 4x actually lowers AA quality. Try it and you'll see what I mean. I know it should improve it but for some reason it does the opposite. Set the overlay to 640x480 and then the background to 2560x1920 and you'll notice more jaggies not less like you would expect.


Edited, Apr 11th 2012 3:23am by Lobivopis

Then it's definitely an issue with the pixel averaging method.

But going to 640x480 is a bit extreme anyway. Jaggies are a relative thing. I'd like to see some comparisons of 2x, 3x, 4x at a given resolution (background should go up to 8192x8192 on most modern cards, so if you can stand the slideshow...)

Edited, Apr 11th 2012 12:32am by Raelix

If you're running 3x or 4x, you shouldn't want AA anyway.

I could probably re-find those references on how to identify the pixel averaging method based on artifacts.