Unfortunately I don’t have AC, so I’m not familiar with the settings. But in general, the relationship between Game setting and True Drive setting is like preamp and amp. If you turn the setting too low in game, you will not clipping at the top, but you lose a lot of dynamics and a lot of detail at the bottom.
The dynamic between the points in this case is 0.97Nm . Not much, but nothing of the FFB signal is lost at the top. This is case 1 that must be avoided.
The second case to avoid is overdoing the in-game setting. This gives you a lot of dynamics and details in the lower torque band. But at the upper band you lose far too much by clipping. But at our test points, the dynamics increase to 14.77Nm.
The compromise looks like this. A little clipping around the top and a little loss of dynamics and details around the bottom. So the dynamics at our test points still remain at 7.88Nm, but without losing too much through clipping at the top.
For me, an accountant and business economist with 2 right hands (I’m a left hander ), everything technical and mechanical has always been something fascinating. Your explanations give me a wider understanding of feeling FFB. Maybe a stupid question:
At Spa, eau rouge, my car is getting very light. As it would be close to taking off. In fact it already did, when my tyres were cold! A terrible crash, even in simulatio, luckily no harsh impact…
I can feel very good all the different types of curbes, under and oversteering. What interests me is the exact difference between vibrations coming from FFB and from settings generating them. They can add a bit of immersion/sensation.
Now: Where is the point where overdosing torque ruins this ( of course before clipping)?
If there is, can you see this in your analysises?
How does bad FFB looks like?
Can I send you a graph to see how you interpret it, so that I can compare your technical view with my driver view?
You are lucky to understand, between the English and the rough translation into French I don’t quite understand what you are getting at.
You say that if we lower the power too much we end up with clipping, wouldn’t it be rather the opposite?
I have already tried settings with damping and friction, I don’t like very much this feeling of driving in game, I prefer settings as simple and raw as possible, adding filter reconstruction.
Yes, of course too much power will end up in clipping. I was asking @Purple_Red, our engineering genius. I think he could easily be the Adrian Newey of eSports.
Sorry if I mistakenly sent it to you my friend
Yes, suboptimal FFB can be recognized in this way. When the game gives an FFB signal to Motec. This works best with rFactor2, with iRacing it also works (but it’s more complicated) and with ACC it doesn’t work at all.
However, what good FFB means can be very different for each person.
Motec is like a “recording tool”. It is important to understand where it picks up the signal. Because Motec only picks up the signal between the game and the Simucube. This means that ingame settings will be recorded by Motec. But settings in the True Drive software have no effect on Motec.
By the way…
Does anyone have a Motec file from AC?
It is a very good explanation and matches what FFBClip app author (Atle) was describing for maximizing power output while avoiding clipping.
BUT, even him quit applying this principle when switched to DD wheel, it didn’t matter much with so much torque available and based on his and other users (myself included) tests the final results of maximizing game output or servo max torque were the same as long as you don’t go into clipping area and have the same overall gain.
This is also confirmed in this very thread by GD engineers.
As audiophile myself I am completely with you on pre-amp/amp analogy, but I believe in this case the situation is a bit different and more like dealing with digital volume control with bit depth exceeding the actual signal.
Yes and i totaly agree! But Tommi is talking about the “True Drive Overall Strenght” and that is different to the ingame setting. Every Game got something to adjust the Output of the FFB… which is some sort of multiplierer. Rfactor2 got the “Car specific multi”…Iracing got something weird…anyway. For example…At some point on the track the game wants 100%(1)FFB to the right. Now, the Game-Engine multiplies it with your ingame setting, lets set it to 80% ->0.8. So (1 x 0.8) =0.8 (this is our “preamp output value”). The Output of the game will be 80%FFB to right and that value goes to the True Drive Software.
At this point another multipliere acures, the True Drive Overall Strenght. Our SC2 Pro got a max output torque of 25Nm multiplied with the TDOS, lets take 50% -> 0.5. (25Nm x 0.5) =12,5Nm Maximum Output Torque.
The full calculation is: (1 x 0.8) x (25Nm x 0.5)=10Nm
The FFB turns the Wheelbase-shaft with 10Nm.
The strength of the force is called its magnitude. Magnitude is measured in units ranging from 0 (no force) through 10,000 (maximum force for the device, defined for C/C++ and Microsoft Visual Basic as DI_FFNOMINALMAX). A negative value indicates force in the opposite direction. Magnitudes are linear: a force of 10,000 is twice as great as one of 5,000.
As FFBClip author explaining long ago
Even at as low as 10% in game gain multiplier you still have 1000 discrete values for force, actually 2000 as it’s range from -1000 to +1000, plenty for any modern title to express any possible detail in FFB signal.
I was following the principle of maximizing in game gain religiously with consumer wheels where it was really necessary to squeeze full torque out of them, and initially followed the same principle with DD wheels, until we figured out that it doesn’t matter much when you have so much torque to spare.
Anyway, there is no harm of doing it the way you do, but it might be unnecessary complication that in the end yields the same real usage result as by just leaving TD max torque at 100% and controlling gain via in game multiplier.
There are few good reasons for not maxing out torque in TD though
certain titles that can run way over 100% gain and shooting out full 10000 gain value ignoring in game multiplier in crashes or hard contact scenarios (e.g. iRacing), so it’s more of a safety issues. (Kunos titles for instance are free of that problem)
some games like Dirt Rally just do not have overall gain multiplier, only sliders for individual effects, which leaves TD max torque the only place you can control it.
Great discussion. I’m another one that runs 100% TD and about 30-60% in-game depending on sim/car.
It’s not that I don’t want 100% force when it’s appropriate but sims deliver steering weight in strange ways so you have to make them work for you.
For example, some real life cars max out at 13Nm. Then you go into a sim with that car and set TD to 100% and in-game to 50% (SC2P max 25Nm) and the steering will feel ridiculously heavy.
You also have to remember that 30% in-game will result in some range of force at the wheel, like say 20-40%, maybe more, it’s never exactly 30% and it doesn’t ensure it won’t clip, either.
The reason I use 100% in TD is so that I have all of it available so that when “30%” in-game actually delivers 40% (or more) I still have that available at the wheel.
This is another reason that I’ve asked for a Game Force Feedback Strength selector in TD. Just like good audio you need to fade in and balance certain signals sort of like using an audio equalizer.
That’s true, the reason for the whole thing with finding proper headroom to avoid
Calculated Effect Magnitude x Gain going above 10,000 max range and causing clipping.
Isn’t it time to open a new topic? For those among us having a degree in mechanical and/or electrical engineering? Plus those with a doctor in physics and quantum physics?
You could name it:
the critical Simucube owners
or
Granite developed it and we are the ones who understand it better
A Simucube 2 is a piece of hardware and is used (maybe there are other fields the motor is used) for simracing.
Why did I buy it: because I wanted the best product. Did it pay off? Yes:
Spa:
F1 fastest lap, Valteri 1.46.286
RSS Hybrid 21world record 1.40.722
Me: from 1.52.569 to 1.43.418
So let us build groups. The technical challengers and the give a fuck as long as I’m fast fraction. We can meet in a few weeks and discuss what we achieved.
I can already tell you now that I will have a hard time getting to 1.40. On the other hand I am convinced that you will teach Granite a lesson. Who are they? A bunch of “nerds with a strange hobby” while you are the number 1 DD developers on the planet with years of experience.
It’s not fair: these dudes from Finland should better wave the white flag before they get humiliated.
I run my wheelbase at ridiculously low torque compared to you guys - around 8Nm at most, and I don’t think my pro is wasted on me - I went DD for the detail, not the strength.
Sure I may not be reaching “realistic” levels of torque for the cars I drive, but that matters little as I’ve never driven those cars in real life so I don’t have a baseline to measure against. That said pretty much all of the cars I drive regularly are equipped with power steering, so I’m probably not that far off.
Moving from my old Thrustmaster gear (TS-PC) one thing that immediately stood out with DD was that there was little to no internal friction from the gearing and belts needed for torque amplification covering up the fine details. Basically at low torque levels I have all the low level information that’s buried under the cogging and stiffness of the TS-PC, so I’ve never really felt the need to crank it up much.
Yeah, I could have gone for the Sport but then I’d be kicking myself for not going with the Pro when it’s just 200 - 300 euros more expensive. Yeah I could have gone for a CSL DD, or a Moza 9 or whatever, but why when you have the means to go endgame already (Ok there’s the Ultimate and the Bodnars, but they would have been a stretch in budget which would have been better spent on wheels and pedals)
As it stands I’m very happy with my very underutilised and quite possibly wasted Pro - it’s giving me everything I want already, and I’m safe in the knowledge that it can give me a lot more should I feel I need it.
), everything technical and mechanical has always been something fascinating. Your explanations give me a wider understanding of feeling FFB. Maybe a stupid question:
! No, you were right! My mistake… 
