Maya hardware renderer no longer works! wtf?

Daz

Neither the hardware renderer nor the 'high quality rendering' in the viewport ( displaying spec, bump etc ). I posted this a couple of days ago on cgtalk with no response:

"So, it seems my hardware renderer no longer functions correctly. ( and I really need it to render wireframes ). Whatever I do, it only renders objects as black silhouettes.

Curiously, neither does the realtime viewport 'High Quality Rendering' option work either. It also renders just black silhouetted objects. Even more curiously, in both cases I get the error: 'Warning: Baked textures are being re-evaluated. Please wait.' and yet I have no baked textures in the scene.

I'm using Maya 6.0, and the only thing that's changed since the last time I used the hardware renderer ( i.e when it was working! ) is that now I have a 24" Dell flatscreen monitor, and of course, that can't be the issue.

Any help appreciated. I'm pulling my hair out over this one."

This is weird as hell. Any thoughts? I need to make wireframe renders which as some of you might know is a royal pain in the arse in Maya. My previous method of using the hardware renderer is no longer possible with it not working!

pyromania

Have you tried deleting your 6.0/prefs folder? Backup the directory, then delete it and let maya go back to default settings. If that fixes it you can copy things like your shelves from the backup into the new prefs folder.

You can also do wireframes using the vector renderer. In the render properties set it to Fill Object, single color. Click on Include Edges, then set Edge style to Entire Mesh. That will get you a triangulated render. If you want quads, set all the normals on the mesh to hard, then change the Edge style back to Outlines. I like the vector renderer better because you can do wireframe on shaded. Set the fill color to 4 color or full color.

Daz

Deleting prefs didn't fix it pyro, but damn, I'd always shy'd away from using the vector render before because I had it in my head that it could only render tris. Doh, that is an awesome solution, thankyou sir. ( although still keen to fix my hardware issue if it does ring any bells with anyone! )

Jeff Parrott

Have you updated video divers lately? I doubt that would do it. I don't think I've ever had that error come up. Maybe try creating a new scene and doing what you wanted to do with a cube. It could be something with the shaders or the geometry. I've had to export as an Obj and reimport on occasion.

Toomas

Try reinstalling your video card drivers, the monitor drivers might have fucked something up.

edit: you might try to change your desktop resolution to very standard one like 1024x768 or 640x480 (if you can bare it). If it fixes your problem just find most suitable resolution that works and stick with it.

Daz

I did try with a fresh scene Jeff and no joy, I'll look at a driver rollback and resolution drop when I get home later thanks guys.

malcolm

That reevaluating baked textures junk is displayed every time so just ignore that. Both high quality rendering and hardware render use your video card to draw the scene so like jeffro said it is probably your new video drivers that are not compatible with maya.