Firestorm

Second Life® Viewer Comparison

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Just 3 viewers. More about my curiosity about AYAstorm than a real PSA.

I am surprised how much slower AYAstorm is than Firestorm. I did notice AYAstorm includes OpenSIM support. Maybe that slows it down, but I doubt it. I tried to get AI to give me some idea of how much OS support might slow the render/FPS. That was pretty much a dead end. What little I could get from AI suggests what I already surmised, it is the render pipeline accounting for the difference. But there is no solid evidence that is the case.

Note, this test is not useful for comparison to earlier tests, at least for the Ground Level test. I have changed my front yard. Adding trees and grass and stuff has changed the render cost. The green Room (now orange), Nelsonia, Arapaima, and Warehouse 21 tests should be comparable.

I put some effort into making sure the Graphics settings are the same for all the tests.

AYAstrom Render
AYAstrom r31.2 – Render Test

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Second Life Technology Report – June 2026

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This is a busy month with Pride celebrations and SL23B. Lots to see and do.

Official SL Platform Updates

  • June 8, 2026: Linden Lab announced fee adjustments, including reduced land tier prices for many Private region types (effective June 15), lower minimum L$ purchase fees, changes to LindeX transaction fees, and increased Premium membership subscription fees (effective for new/renewed subs from July 8). These aim to make land more affordable while expanding membership value.
  • Ongoing: SL23B celebrations (June 18–July 19) highlighted platform aspects through “Meet the Lindens” sessions, including discussions on engineering challenges like performance/rendering, OpenGL-to-modern API transitions, region crossings, WebRTC voice, and upcoming Lua scripting.
SL23B - Funky Monkey Temple
SL23B – Funky Monkey Temple

Simulator / Grid Updates

  • June 12 & 25: Simulator releases with routine maintenance and rolling restarts.
  • Grid Stability: Multiple rolling restarts. L$ transaction issues around June 25–26 (investigated and fixed). World Map region name display issues in some TPVs addressed.

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Second Life® Technology Updates Summary: May 2026

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Another month passes. There are several updates this month. Voice is the big one, for those that use voice. For the SL Viewer, you need to be on a version 26.1 or newer. Firestorm users need to be on 7.2.4 or newer.

Some of this month’s changes show where things are going.

SL Viewer 26.2 - May 2028
SL Viewer 26.2 – May 2026

Official SL Platform Updates

WebRTC Voice Service Full Grid Deployment

May 5: Linden Lab completed the rollout of the WebRTC voice service across the entire main grid (Agni). Previously available on ~25% of regions via RC channels, this shift ends reliance on the third-party Vivox service. Linden Lab can now directly maintain and enhance voice capabilities, with future potential for features like voice-to-text. Users were advised to use compatible viewers (official 26.1 or later, or updated third-party viewers) to avoid voice issues.

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Second Life® Technology Report – April 2026

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Tech-focused summary for April 1–30, 2026
Here is the update on last months activity in Second Life.

Official SL Platform Updates

  • April 1, 2026: Voice service disruption reported (connection issues and audio drops). Incident tied to ongoing WebRTC transition testing; highlighted need for full rollout improvements.
  • April 25, 2026: Unscheduled inventory maintenance affected login, rezzing, avatar display, and inventory access. Issue resolved same day; users advised to clear cache. – NOTE: If you are not having issues, don’t. I went through the outage and recovered without clearing my cache.
  • Throughout April: Continued WebRTC Voice testing on RC channels with maintenance sessions (e.g., April 22). Full grid rollout announced for May 5.
New Second Life Tech
My New Home Computer… NOT

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Second Life® New Tech Summary – February 2026

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Reporting Period: February 1–28, 2026

I only quickly read through what the AI generated. I’ll add some info and context here and there from what I’ve seen. I think the AI did a pretty good job this time.

The Stone Computer
I am encouraging my friend to upgrade their computer…

Official SL Platform Updates

  • No new major platform feature announcements, scripting enhancements, rendering overhauls (e.g., glTF/PBR expansions beyond prior), LUA integrations, or avatar rigging updates were reported in official channels for February 2026.
  • The most recent simulator release referenced is from late January 2026 (2026-01-28.21455867889), with no new deploys noted in February.

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Second Life: Avatar Shape Files

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Keep Your Shape When You Switch Heads and Bodies

How to avoid shape disasters and simplify your Second Life® avatar customization.

This problem shows up in the Second Life (SL) forums all the time: someone buys a new mesh head, wears the shape that comes with it, and instantly destroys the body shape they spent hours dialing in.

Their perfect peach butt goes flat, or their tight athletic shape inflates into something like two blimps colliding..

Second Life Shapes

Whatever your style, having to rebuild your look after buying a new head or body is annoying and tedious, so let us simplify that.

To get you there quickly, this guide contains the simple, one-time “do this and you are done” approach and deeper technical detail if you enjoy tweaking under the hood.

I use the Firestorm Viewer, as most SL residents do (~75%), and this tutorial assumes you are using Firestorm too.

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