Frequently Asked Questions

Why cant I fly?

If you look at the altitude you we see the city is at 3600 meters, well past the ability of AV flight without assist . Flying is allowed but you must have some type of flight assist (hud or attachment) or vehicle (something that fits the theme of INSILICO)

Why are we so high?

INSILICO is imagined to be floating thousands of meters above the surface of the earth. In Second Life the same is realized.

In the event of accidentally falling to the surface try to find one of the large signs that are labeled "Click here for a landmark". This will get you back into the city.

Why is it so dark?

RP info: This is a city of the 24th century floating over the now flooded Earth. Since there is no ozone layer to protect the inhabitants from the suns radiation they have large solar panels over the city that block the sunlight and provide power.

What graphic settings should I use?

If your graphics are on low then you won’t be able to see the lighting and detail that most people do. Suggested settings for INSILICO have been posted below

A large portion of the sim has utilized advanced shadows and materials to specific areas. If your machine can handle it please ensure you have ultra settings, advanced lighting models turned on and bump mapping and shiny (materials) set to on.

How do I play this game?

  1. Start by creating an account on the INSILICO Community Site.
  2. After that, find what race you will best fall into.
  3. Add your own details to your character. If you need help defining your character feel free to ask a GM.
  4. Become acquainted with other players. Any OOC location is a great place to do this. You can ask questions and get to know people without the restrictions of RP.
  5. Start playing! It's a good idea to stand back and watch a few times to get a better feel for the interaction, but if you are called on to do something … have fun and roll with it!

A few tips for getting started:

  • Make sure your character will mesh well with the INSILICO story line. Remember INSILICO is set well into the future, but that doesn't open the door to aliens, humanoid animals, mutant ninja turtles, or fast food experiments gone wrong. We try to maintain a realistic story within a realistic setting.
  • Make your home in INSILICO. One way to feel the atmosphere of this great city is to rent an apartment. You are helping to support and perpetuate INSILICO's growth. Inevitably you will wind up spending more time here! See our rentals section.
  • Use some L$ on your character. A detailed profile alone is great in text based RP, however, In Second Life you will need to build a detailed visual character as well. Your clothing, animations, body style and attachments say allot about who your character is. Not only will you be on your way to creating a fun, detailed character … you are also helping to support SL artists and the SL economy!
  • Keep your character optimized. Detach any scripted or high prim count objects that you don't need at the time.
  • Keep your graphics settings optimized. Your Maximum Bandwidth setting should be set below 500. It will help everyone to rez faster. See below for information about optimizing your graphics settings for INSILICO.
  • Be friendly and have fun!

Tips and Tweaks for better Viewer performance

Edit > preferences > Graphics > Run Secondlife in window

Custom:
Bump Mapping and Shiny on / Basic Shaders on / Atmospheric Shaders on

Water detail off

Avatar Impostors on / Hardware Skinning on / Avatar Cloth on

Draw Distance as high as you can, but dropping it save the computer the work of drawing things far from line of sight. Drop particle count to half but can lower even more if you notice FPS drop around particles

Mesh detail Medium / Flexiprims High / Trees Low / Avatars High / Terrain Low / Sky Low

Lighting Detail / Nearby local lights

Hardware Options:
Filtering uncheck / Antialising if you have the power Enable 2x / Enable VBO / Texture Memory 240

Network / Bandwidth:
I am on a cable modem, and it is usually four times faster, than DSL. But, all internet is variable more people online with your ISP (Internet Service Provider} and the slower you go. Usually there is more than one way to connect your computer, to your modem. These are USB and LAN (RJ45) standard eight wire Network cable. * The LAN is always a better idea than the USB *
Also i don’t max the bandwidth, i usually set it down by half for me it seems more stable

If you have a core duo or quad you should go to ADVANCE > RENDERING > RUN MULTIPLE THREADS

To sum up, I wrote this down to help people and to save myself allot of typing :) There are no Guarantees in life. SL depends on many factors , not just its software , not just your computer , not just your internet , its also you the player . Patience is key, it takes time for any computer to download and draw a sim, so if you have arrived at a totally new place, give it time, the longer the better. Also if you try to make your setup do more than it can handle your in for alot of crashing so don’t give up keep tweaking till you have something you can have fun with.

My Hardware:
CPU: Intel Pentium 4 Northwood (3193 MHz) HT Hyperthread
Memory: 2046 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 3 (Build 2600)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 7600 GS/AGP/SSE2
OpenGL Version: 2.1.2

I also maintain the SL partion by Defraging, with the windows Disk Defragmentor, it twice a week minimum …sometimes more.

Maintaining your computer, and makeing sure its running good, also helps alot. use disk cleanup, uninstall old or unused programs, use windows update, and make sure all your other programs are updated , and defrag often. the more often you do it the less it has to do so the shorter it will take.