Quote from marko.sabotin :

Its not a matter of depth perception. Its a matter of not being able to see the next corner because you're so close to the next car all you can see is their rear bumper.

Quote from The Very End :

Have you turned the mirrows on? There also are buttons to look left/right, to get some input where the others are.
I use chase cam and sounds to navigate through the minefield

I'm talking about when following close BEHIND another driver. Mirrors and left/right view dont help much there.

Hello. I'm looking for input from some good drivers here. I'm wondering if anyone can give me some pointers on how to drive competitively and cleanly when racing really close behind another car. My problem is that I cannot stand using 3rd person view because I'm not a huge fan of the remote-control car feeling. I generally use the in-car view or the front bumper view. This makes knowing where I am on the track very difficult. So, how do others manage this situation without just backing way off, or slamming into the guy in front because you can't see the braking point? I love racing really close but this one issue is driving me mad because I end up having to back way off and make either quick risky inside passes or n00bish draft passes on straights. Thanks in advance.
-(AW)88Amped

Quote from franky500 :

Hiya 88Reasons.

Would you kindly open a support ticket, as i cannot see what problem there might be with your server until i know who you are.

There are any number of reasons for possible downtime of your servers. over the last 3 days the downtime would be related to our server changeover. incase you missed the news posts and e-mails here is what has been happening over the last few days:

I would LOVE to open a support ticket! Only, I cant because 500server's main site wont even open. And when it does, there are script errors. But even this only happens 1 in 10 times after waiting at least 2 minutes.

Last edited by 88Reasons, Fri, 17 Apr 2009 19:30. Reason : added screenshot

COME ON, SING IT WITH ME!
I am server-less today I am, server-less today I am I am,
Im a victim of 500 servers once more,
This has happened 2....times before.
And every time they say maintenance, "MAINTENANCE!!"
Cannot be a virus or a bug "OR A BUG!!!"
Server-less today I'm server-less. Server-less today I am I am.....

Quote from rc10racer :

Not sure if this has been said before but you can see what processes are under which svchost.exe, rightclick on any off them then click on Go To Service(s). Don't see the point in all this arguing because if there is ram avalible it will use it but when you use a program which demands alot of ram vista will give it back to the programs which need it most.

Wait...what? I missed an argument somewhere? Ugh, I always miss the good shiznit....

Any1 got a doublefacepalm handy here?

Quote from boosterfire :

Quite true, except that going by the services.msc to see what is controlled and launched by svchost is more annoying than doing it in another program, or in the task manager of Vista. For example, I know that the 'DCOM Server Process Launcher' is a service that uses svchost, but to see that in services.msc, you have to go to the proprieties of the said service, and see that its run path is 'C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost -k DcomLaunch'. While this works, you have to do each service one at a time to see which one uses svchost.

Alternatively, if you use a program like Process Explorer, you're able to see the proprieties of the svchost themselves, not the proprieties of each services behind. This allows you to see much faster what's behind a particular svchost, and while some of them only run a single service, you can see the attached image to see how many are running under a single svchost on my computer.

I agree, however, that messing with the services when you don't know what they're doing probably isn't a good idea. At the very least, you need to search on the internet to see what they're there for, but usually if they were started in the first place, there has to be a reason. It's possible that some services were started a while ago by something that you don't use anymore, but it's probably hard to identify which service isn't in use anymore.

There is certainly nothing wrong with the "Process Explorer" method, I guess particularly in terms of folks who are not used to these sorts of things. But personally as a technician of 10 years, I avoid using any 3rd party programs as much as possible. Mostly because I know my way around well enough to where I'm usually faster that way. But also because (not to scare any1) I have had absolute holy-hell nightmares with 3rd party programs in the past. Particularly when they have to do with system processes, hard drive indexing, anything like that. I just find it alot safer in my case to operate as close and cuddly to the OS as possible. Maybe its just the geek and/or self-masochistic side of me.

SVCHOST instances are bundled system processes. Ending task on them is NOT a good idea as many of these individual processes have dependencies underneath them. Vista is a big-time resource hog compared to other OSs, due to the fact that each new feature generally adds at least 1 process (with dependencies) to one or more of your SVCHOST instances. If you really want to get to the root (no pun intended) of the problem, then you need to take a look at the individual system processes that make up these SVCHOST instances. You can do this by running services.msc. The list you see is a list of system processes, their current status, their dependencies, and if/how/when they are set to run. Just keep in mind that if you choose to end a process you are also ending all processes that are dependencies. My suggestion is to go to technet.com and look up each of these processes to determine which ones your system can and cannot do without. When in doubt, dont freikin' touch it! I will say that there is one process that you can almost undoubtedly do without, and that is Superfetch. Its a new feature in Vista that is unnecessary and uses quite a bit of your system's resources. I hope this will be of some help to you. Attached is an example of the services.msc list on my machine (XP), but yours should look similar.

Just wanted to update something here. As of today, it appears maddog finally stopped using our team domain name to promote his team. In all fairness, and to be clear, I should reiterate that he does own the domain name its self, as he did pay for it as a favor for our team. So technically he can do with it what he wants, and from the day he left us up until today he was using it to promote his new team. So anyways, just wanted to be sure I was being fair in updating everyone to the fact that the website issue is solved, aside from the fact that our team is out www.asphalt-warriors.com for at least a year.

Whats so funny about it guys is that he is not even GOOD at his acting. He has the same exact language-pattern, uses the same style of insults, uses a demo account to post about an S2 league/team, on which he "claims" to be a member of. When a quick glance at their forums shows clearly that there are only 2 members, 1 of which he talked into leaving OUR TEAM. Can someone do the math here? But look quick, soon as he sees this he'll be making reg's like crazy on his forum. Its the way he operates. LMAO, what a joke. Its almost entertaining....

Hey guys. Just wanted to say I know I've had some issues with a couple of your guys in the past, (I will not name names because its pointless) because they were coming into my team's server and advertising Xfusion's server. But I just got done posting regarding maddog's attempt at a team, and the mayhem/confusion he has caused mine, and realized that he had done some pretty lame crap to you guys too. Now I'm beginning to wonder if those were even really xfusion guys that did that to us, because it was only a couple of weeks prior to maddog joining us. Anyways, that being considered im trying to look up the bans I made on 2 of your supposed members. So any of you guys are welcome to our server at any time. Cheers.
-(AW)88Amped

This guy is trying to screw my team over at the same time. And he even said it verbatim: "My intent is to @*!% your team over to the best of my ability."

He joined our team, bought a domain name, and built a site for us as a "favor". But the he tried to strong-arm me into banning a long-time member of our team because of an argument in our server. I stood my ground, and it all went to crap from there. He now is using the site he created and the domain name he bought with our name to advertise his new "team".(Just go to www.asphalt-warriors.com, go to the forums, and find his post titled "sorry guys") He even left our logos, our info about our FOX league, forms to sign up for the leagues, OUR SERVER DONATION LINK, etc etc. on the site. DO NOT PROVIDE ANY INFORMATION ON THE SITE THAT HE IS SQUATTING ON, THERE IS NO TELLING HOW HE WILL USE IT! Stay far, far away from this creep if you care anything about your team and/or your reputation. That being said, our REAL address is www.asphalt-warriors.webs.com. This guy is in no way associated with our team aside from his own childish fantasies. Its too bad there are people out there like this

Last edited by 88Reasons, Tue, 7 Apr 2009 04:37. Reason : Grammar correction

Quote from SamH :

Get the feeling my post got read but it didn't get heard. Ahh well

Yeh it did man. And I appreciate your cander. I'm just slightly agitated at some of the n00bish behavior/posts lately. People act like we freikin owe them something. For god's sakes people need to man up/grow up for a change and stop acting like children, thats all. At least thats just my opinion.

Quote from SamH :

I'm thinking about editing the post from "moron" to "donkey nuts". That way people might still keep reading that post. The lure of comedy...

88Reasons, I heartily recommend always remembering that when you ban someone from your server and don't give them right to reply immediately, there's a very strong chance that those who feel aggrieved will show up on the forum. The likelihood is that they'll be the ones using the word "moron", and in my experience forum users will immediately recognise it as the heat of upset/anger.

However, if the server admin starts out in that tone, they'll lose all sympathy on the forum because they're immediately (being admins) assumed to be in the position of power. The premise is always that you're probably an admin abusing your powers.

It's clear that you're an accidental admin. You want decent racing and you've found that the best way to achieve it is to run and manage your own server. That's how UKCT started out in LFS, 4 years ago, as TeamCCUK, so I know how you feel and where you're at.

Some folks may know, I fully support the "replay or it didn't happen" philosophy. I have to balance that with the no name/shame of individuals policy on the forum. If the hardware is yours, I strongly recommend turning automatic replay saving on, on your server. It'll eat HD space unless you maintain the server, but I've found that as a server administrator, complaints against your admin decisions are almost always very easily resolved by attaching the relevent replay. You generally don't even need to utter a word in defence.. once others on the forum see the OP's behaviour in the replay, the OP will quickly start to BEG for the thread to be deleted. Of course, this only works if your admin decisions are good calls. If they're not, things can and do get ugly on here. I have a feeling your admin calls are solid, though

Well, I guess its a really good thing that I'm not too concerned with "sympathy on the forum" or being assumed to be "an admin abusing his powers". Again, this is why I dont post often, because apparently there's a bunch of emo-children running around with their hearts on their sleeves just waiting to get sliced. I replied to this idiot's post for two reasons, and that was to point out just how stupid he is (Scroll up and see his stats......jesus.....) and to state my general philosophy of this team, and how/why we manage it the way we do. Im not here for sympathy, to give a motivational speech, or to make the ladies cream their panties. Why? Because I suck at it. But I'm one hell of an admin and I know it. And so are the admins on our team. See you in the server ladies.

Quote from SparkyDave :

I agree, after the 1st paragraph (maybe a little over defensive ) 88Reasons has posted an excellent post.

I think its clear that without replay proof theres never going to be any substance to these type of threads.

I think Team AW is getting some press either way
I wonder if you will get larger grids because of it

SD.

Well, thing is that I dont make alot of posts because I see the same crap going on all the time. Some1 makes a post, some1 else replies with something like "well what about this, you didnt say that, what do you mean by this....." etc. And I dont have the patience. So, when I make a post, its well thought out and answers all possible questions/arguments ahead of time. Just makes sense to me. For Christ's sakes all I really wanna do is race. period. Just freikin' RACE. Is that so hard, people? The only reason I started the team was so I could have a server that I could control closely, and ban the morons that make good racing impossible.

This is funny. Race stats for tanami.....

Total stats:Travelled distance:287 MlFuel burnt:187 LtrLaps:103Hosts joined:12Races won:0Second:0Third:1Finished:4Qualifications:1Pole Positions:0Drags / Wins:0 / 0
So I guess this guy is quite the expert in "getting around the track".

Quote from tamani :

I would recommend you all avoid AW server (asphalt warriors).I was on there tonight and the admins had bad attitudes,claiming they ban ppl who THEY crash into.Due to the fact this is a excellent racing game,ive noticed a lot of admins do this if they lack the skills needed to get round the track.Once the admin had "apparently watched the replay" he claimed it was my fault for taking the racing line before him.If i didnt take the line before him i could of stayed on his server,so its not much of a race if you have to move over for admins who dont have enough skill to pass you legally. Shame !!!!

Hey, moron. First of all, dont come with some crap like this without evidence. Second of all, I've been running this team for a long time and we have been extremely careful with who we allow to be admins. Im not perfect, and they are not perfect. We DO make mistakes but we never, EVER ban somebody just because of a racing incident. However, if you feel this has happened, save the freikin replay and post it. Otherwise, your just starting a bunch of crap for no reason.

That being said, I will be the first to admit that we are probably a little more strict on our server than most. But this is what has helped to make this team and server what it is today. People know that when they come to an AW server, there is almost always an admin keeping a close eye on things, and that if there is a trouble-maker, they are banned quickly, and usually for at least a week. Permanant bans are rare, but they do happen. The only things we will typically ban permanantly for are purpousful crashing, hacking/exploiting, constantly begging for restarts, car/track change, constantly starting arguments, or terribly disrespecting a team member/admin.

I ask all of my admins to save replays when they ban someone, but its not a rule necessarily. So again, if you have an issue, SAVE THE REPLAY and feel free to post it. I will personally review it, and may unban you because again, like I said, WE ARE HUMAN AND WE DO MAKE MISTAKES. Most of our admins and team members are very respectful drivers, and many of us will even move over and give you a free pass at the last second if we feel that we took the position unfairly. We do that ALL THE TIME. We just expect the same respect in return. As for blue flags, this is probably where we are the most strict. Alot of times we will kick some1 who has blue flag, and is showing no intent to move over and let the leaders pass. But this is never done unless multiple text warnings were posted telling the blue-flagger to move over and let the leaders by. This is just common sense, folks. We have great drivers at our server and have extremely close fights/finishes for the lead, and theres no way in hell we're gonna allow a blue-flagger to ruin a good race. Its just not gonna happen.There are other areas in which we actually are NOT as strict as other servers. For instance, with blocking. BLOCK LIKE HELL, being faster than someone is just one part of the equation, ya gotta be able to get by them as well and thats just a part of racing. If you dont like that, then there are TONS of servers who dont allow it. But personally, if I wanna do slot-car racing i'll go spend 5 bucks at the local fair. But its important to remember that there is a big difference between blocking a position during racing conditions, and blocking during yellow flag conditions. If you hit the wall, or otherwise lose alot of speed then moving in front of an advancing driver is not blocking, its crashing. Anyways, I hope this helps to "clear the air" a little on what our standards are at AW, what we expect, and how we run things. See you in the server. w00t!

Well obviously this guy didnt see it there so my theory was sound.

Quote from mkinnov8 :

http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?t=54018

Take a look at this thread, posts 43 and 44 particularly. Not intending to piss on your fire, but to try and save you some time, it seems there are others working on filling that "void".

Oh ok, well thanks. Ive already gotten pretty deep into my Airio configs setting this up, and its working well so I'll continue just for the hell of it, lol. But certainly, thanks for letting me know. COME BACK, CTRA UF-BR, WE MISS YOU!!!!!!

Hello all. I am a big fan of the CTRA UF-BR server system. Since CTRA is currently down with no known future, I have decided to run UFBRs on my team's server. Our server only has 15 slots, but its better than nothing for all of us UFBR fans out there. Please note that this is in no way an attempt to emulate CTRA, or take advantage of their unfortunate situation. If you plan on trying to make comparisons between our server and the CTRA system, then dont waste your time coming. I am doing this simply because the UFBR server being gone has left a HUGE void in the LFS community in my opinion. I have worked up a quick race rotation, but am open for suggestions. Right now it will run on 10 race rotations. KY2, 4 laps. SO6r, 7 laps. FE1, 7 laps.

I did this kind of quick, honestly just going with the tracks that I enjoy the most in the UFBR. Again, PLEASE let me know what tracks you would like to see, as well as how many laps at those tracks and I will be more than happy to accomadate. Our server name is (AW)AsphaltWarriors. Hope to see you there, and thanks again for your input!

Hello all. I am a big fan of the CTRA UF-BR server system. Since CTRA is currently down with no known future, I have decided to run UFBRs on my team's server. Our server only has 15 slots, but its better than nothing for all of us UFBR fans out there. Please note that this is in no way an attempt to emulate CTRA, or take advantage of their unfortunate situation. If you plan on trying to make comparisons between our server and the CTRA system, then dont waste your time coming. I am doing this simply because the UFBR server being gone has left a HUGE void in the LFS community in my opinion. I have worked up a quick race rotation, but am open for suggestions. Right now it will run on 10 race rotations. KY2, 4 laps. SO6r, 7 laps. FE1, 7 laps.

I did this kind of quick, honestly just going with the tracks that I enjoy the most in the UFBR. Again, PLEASE let me know what tracks you would like to see, as well as how many laps at those tracks and I will be more than happy to accomadate. Our server name is (AW)AsphaltWarriors. Hope to see you there, and thanks again for your input!

Yeah I was wondering how my team-mates go about adding themselves to my team in LFSW. Me, and like 6 other guys are listed on LFSW as being on our team, but I dont even remember how THAT got done and we have tons of members asking about it. Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks!
-88Amped

w00t!

Quote from Thunderhead :

Sorry for going off topic, but does the name "Edgar C. Whisenant" sound familiar to you?

LOL, well I had never heard of him but I looked him up. Seems like he was quite the nut-case to me. For me, my name is indicative of 88 reasons why Dale Earnhardt Jr is my favorite driver, 88 reasons why his step mom is a thief, and 88 reasons he is going to have a championship cup very, very soon. (His car number is 88 in case you did'nt pick up on that)
Stop in to our server some time!