Max 2016 + Windows Fall Creators Update + Scene Explorer = Bad playback speed

[Anonymous]

Hello,

my computer has updated to Fall Creators Update yesterday, and ever since, I am observing that having Scene Explorer open in Max 2016 causes extremely poor viewport playback performance. It concerns pretty much any non-trivial scene of mine. As long as Scene Explorer is open, viewport playback becomes a slow slideshow once play button is pressed. When I close Scene Explorer, the viewport animation playback is butter smooth.

Yes, I do know that SE always had some impact on viewport playback speed, but it was usually about 5-30% in Max 2016, that's something I could live with, but after updating to Fall Creators Update, that's a whole another story. With Scene Explorer open, I am getting about 3FPS, and with it closed, I get about 40.

It seems that Microsoft has done some changes to desktop windows manager, which do not go well together with Scene Explorer window code. The issue here is that knowing Autodesk, there will be no more Max 2016 updates and bug fixes, but for me, 2016 is still the only working version.

Does anyone have similar experience?

(PS: Yes, my GPU drivers are up to date)

[Alfred.DeFlaminis]

Hello @Anonymous,

One important thing to keep in mind is that Max 2016 wasn't developed for W10 and W10 is not a supported OS on Max 2016.  People have still gotten it to work but there will be no updates to address any issues on an OS it's not supported for.  That being said, I have a few questions and let's still try to see if together we can fix it so you can get back to working the way you'd like.  I don't have the Fall Creator's update yet so I'm using intuition here until I do, thank you for your patience.  

Questions:

1. Are you using an environment map in the standard max environment?  If you turn it off, does playback go back to normal?
   
   
2. If you put the Scene Explorer on another monitor, does it persist?
   
   
3. is it possible you have multiple scene explorers open?  To check, go to Tools->Manage Local Explorers.  
   
   
4. Does resetting your user settings help at all?  (See my signature for instructions if you are unsure how to do that.)
   
   

Suggestions:

1. The first thing to try is to see if it's working on a new user account on Windows.  Perhaps building a new registry will solve the issue.  It's the easiest possible solution which is why I recommend it first, but I am not sure how likely it is to work. 
   
   
2. The next thing I would do is reinstall 3ds Max.  I almost never recommend this as it's usually not necessary, but in this case it may help.  Or if you want to first, you could try to reinstall just your Visual C++ libraries to save some time.  If you look at the bottom of this article, you'll see an all-in-one installer by MajorGeeks. 
   
   
3. Now it comes down to .Net as the final thing to look into.  If MS made a lot of changes to .Net they could have negative consequences for Max 2016 on W10 and the only solution may be to roll back the update.  Or you might try to roll back or disable .Net 4.7.1 which I think is the .Net version in the Fall Creator's update, but I cannot tell you if that will cause other problems or not.  The link above has a link to the .NET Framework Cleanup Tool User's Guide which may have information you might find useful.  
   
   
4. Worst case scenario if nothing helps and you don't want to use Win7 or Win8 is to try the selection floater instead of using the scene explorer.  Personally I prefer it over the scene explorer, so much faster and easier to use for me.  
   
   

Let's start there, and thanks for letting me know how it goes and the answers to those questions.

Best Regards,

[Alfred.DeFlaminis]

Hello @Anonymous,

I just wanted to follow up here, any progress on this issue?

Best Regards,

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

Hi,

first of all, I would suggest avoiding mentioning that Max 2016 is not supported with W10, as it almost feel like mocking after Autodesk ruined my trust in usability of new Max releases after the Max 2017 debacle

Secondly, I finally found the solution to this issue, which I detailed in this post on W10 forums: https://www.tenforums.com/general-support/96792-fall-creators-update-poor-performance-lagginess-fix....

So if anyone has ran into similar issues, the link above describes how to fix 🙂

Anyway, thank you for your attempt to help, your approach is a fresh breath of air compared to the state of forums support just year ago.

[Alfred.DeFlaminis]

Thanks for posting that @Anonymous.  I understand what you're saying but I do have to mention it because no testing or fixes will ever be made for 2016 on W10 and I want that info out there but I do realize it's never met with the most enthusiasm.  Thanks for your kind words and for being community minded and posting your resolution.  You are appreciated. 

Best Regards,