FSX Framerates

[N324JK]

I'm sure folks have posted all over about this, but I'll admit I haven't taken quite as much time to research the issue as I could. Running FSX Acceleration on a 1GB video card, 8 GB RAM, and a decent dualcore, but still have FPS issues. Friends have suggested running a system defrag, doing a Windows reinstall and/or swapping out the power supply (power supply currently within limits for graphics card, but just barely). I plan on doing the defrag tonight and seeing what effect that has; next step would be to doing a Windows reinstall. Before I go out spending the equivalent of a new computer, are there any other tips for increasing FPS without sacrificing resolution, scenery detail, etc.? I'm not even running on the highest detail levels, but notice the worst performance when there's a lot of cloud generation and with increased amount of traffic settings (and these are at a minimal respectable level now).

Thanks,

[falcon409]

What speed CPU do you have? The rest sounds like more than sufficient to run FSX/Accel. Be aware that this question will elicit every possible perception of what is ideal, what should be possible with your setup and any number of tweaks offered to get you where you need to be. Just remember that rarely does something that works for one person ever work for everyone. Every system is different and while the suggestions may point you in a particular direction, it will ultimately be a combination of these that may or may not work for you.

I run a mediocre system and average 20fps except in heavily populated City areas with most of the sliders maxed or close to it. As far as defragging. . .that's always a good idea. I run one every evening. Power supply is important, however, during a time when my system was waiting for a 750watt PS I was running FSX on the factory installed 250Watt with no problems at all. So take that for what it's worth.

Be sure your drivers are up to date for the card you are running. There are some good setups for various cards, especially the NVidia Series and those can make a significant difference if followed correctly.

Good Luck!:salute:

[N324JK]

Thanks Falcon - off the top of my head I'm not sure what the CPU is (not at that PC right now), but I know it's "supposed" to handle FSX just fine. I just updated the drivers on the video card (it's an NVidia model), and I need to research on how to get the settings maxed out. Understandably everyone will have their own opinion for tips and tricks, but on a machine that's supposed to run FSX just fine I'm still having issues, so I'm open to trying (most) things.

Meant to add that it's Windows Vista 64-bit, but when I run FSX, I always get a message saying "Color scheme changed to Windows Vista Basic," or something to that effect. I'm not sure if that has anything to do with anything, but wanted to include it just in case.

[roger-wilco-66]

Have you tried tweaking the fsx.cfg? You might want to back it up and let Jesus Altuves tool analyze and tweak it:

http://www.venetubo.com/fsx.html

That helped quite a bit on my system, together with the framerate setting = unlimited in FSX and an external frame rate limiter set to 30. I also use the Nvidia NHancer for the graphic card settings.

Cheers,
Mark

PS: I wonder how a larger PSU should help with FSX framerates...

[falcon409]

Thanks Falcon - off the top of my head I'm not sure what the CPU is (not at that PC right now), but I know it's "supposed" to handle FSX just fine. I just updated the drivers on the video card (it's an NVidia model), and I need to research on how to get the settings maxed out. Understandably everyone will have their own opinion for tips and tricks, but on a machine that's supposed to run FSX just fine I'm still having issues, so I'm open to trying (most) things.

Meant to add that it's Windows Vista 64-bit, but when I run FSX, I always get a message saying "Color scheme changed to Windows Vista Basic," or something to that effect. I'm not sure if that has anything to do with anything, but wanted to include it just in case.
CPU is the speed at which your Processor runs. . . usually something like 2.6, 3.0 and so on. Obviously the faster the better.:salute:

[N324JK]

For the PSU issue, and this really gets into electrical engineering stuff, but the theory is that if the sum total of your PC components are drawing more power than what your PSU can put out, you could have a drop in overall performance. Heavy power-use components like graphics cards would suffer first. However, like you and Falcon mentioned, the PSU is rarely my first troubleshooting stop, unless there's literally no other explanation.

I've seen a couple of other posts suggesting setting the FSX FPS to unlimited, so I'll try that also. I'll look up the NHancer tool and see what I can get out of that. And thanks for the link to the config tweaker - if all the other suggestions fail to produce a noticeable difference, I'll try that on.

[N324JK]

CPU is the speed at which your Processor runs. . . usually something like 2.6, 3.0 and so on. Obviously the faster the better.:salute:

Sorry, I meant I don't know what speed my personal CPU is - that's what happens when I don't proofread for clarity.

[Dimus]

My FSX experience up to now tells me that there are two major things that affect performance. Processor speed and correct system/FSX setup. For the first part I OCed my Q6600 from 2.4 to 3.0 and saw major effect. For the second part I followed Nick Needham's guide to the letter and have not done any single tweak since then:

http://www.simforums.com/forums/setting-up-fsx-and-how-to-tune-it_topic29041&SID=27ae13fa-947z-167de348-40729-5062731481.html

[N324JK]

All good suggestions so far - kinda anxious to get home tonight and try these.

[stansdds]

CPU speed is everything with FSX. I used to run a Core2Duo at 3.6 GHz and FSX ran ok. Adding on scenery, weather, and AI traffic programs brought it to its knees, so I popped in a Core2Quad that I was able to overclock to 3.8 GHz. This made FSX run nicely once again. I think if you are not adding on external programs to run weather, scenery and AI flight traffic, a dual core CPU is fine, so long as it is fast and the closer you can get to 4 GHz, the better.

[LouP]

CPU speed seems to be very, very big. I was runing my i7 @ 3,572 or something like that and was OK. I pushed it just a hair to 3,682 and everytyhing seemed to just fall together. I could push it more but everythng is working great now and I don't want to run it too hot. I also played with my RAM timings and that seemed to help also but be careful because even though the tight timings worked in FSX, some other programs did not like it at all. I relaxed the timings a bit and now everyone seems happy. I have 12 gig of 1600 RAM coming in the mail so I am expecting things to get even better soon. BTW, the upgrade price at time of PC purchase for the type RAM I got was $1,000. I paid $119 at Newegg and it looks like better RAM then I would have got for the $1,000. :jump: Just don't giive up. Last piece of advice, don't change too many things at once because when something works (or breaks), you will have a heck of a time figuring out which thing did it (experience here) :icon_lol: OK, I lied, really last piece of advice, when you get it running well, STOP! and go fly.

LouP :icon29:

Ooops, one more thing, turn off that C State thingy and speed something or other in the BIOS.

Really now, over and out

[N324JK]

What speed CPU do you have? The rest sounds like more than sufficient to run FSX/Accel. Be aware that this question will elicit every possible perception of what is ideal, what should be possible with your setup and any number of tweaks offered to get you where you need to be. Just remember that rarely does something that works for one person ever work for everyone. Every system is different and while the suggestions may point you in a particular direction, it will ultimately be a combination of these that may or may not work for you.

I run a mediocre system and average 20fps except in heavily populated City areas with most of the sliders maxed or close to it. As far as defragging. . .that's always a good idea. I run one every evening. Power supply is important, however, during a time when my system was waiting for a 750watt PS I was running FSX on the factory installed 250Watt with no problems at all. So take that for what it's worth.

Be sure your drivers are up to date for the card you are running. There are some good setups for various cards, especially the NVidia Series and those can make a significant difference if followed correctly.

Good Luck!:salute:

So now that I'm finally home, the CPU is a Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q8200 @ 2.33GHz. Does that change any answers? I'm doing what I can software-wise tonight with suggestions related to framerate settings and using NVidia NHancer.

[falcon409]

So now that I'm finally home, the CPU is a Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q8200 @ 2.33GHz. Does that change any answers? I'm doing what I can software-wise tonight with suggestions related to framerate settings and using NVidia NHancer.
Yea the CPU might be a bit slow for everything else you have. I know some CPU's can be overclocked, but if you're unfamiliar with the process then beware that you can end up with a nice paperweight if things go wrong, lol.

Seriously though the CPU is one thing I would look at changing. You can check online to see what the limit is for the board you have. It may be upgradeable to a much faster CPU or you might need a new Motherboard and CPU to accomplish the same thing.

[Walter]

Ok, so I did the FSX.cfg analyzer, and I got some fixes. My one problem is, where do I put the new FSX.cfg?

Thank you,

Walter

[N324JK]

Yea the CPU might be a bit slow for everything else you have. I know some CPU's can be overclocked, but if you're unfamiliar with the process then beware that you can end up with a nice paperweight if things go wrong, lol.

Seriously though the CPU is one thing I would look at changing. You can check online to see what the limit is for the board you have. It may be upgradeable to a much faster CPU or you might need a new Motherboard and CPU to accomplish the same thing.

I was somewhat afraid of that. The good news is that I ran the NHancer tool and changed the framerate limit in FSX to unlimited and that's already helped quite a bit. I may run the fsx.cfg tweak and defrag the hard drive tonight just for a little extra help, but at this point I'm comfortable with the performance without upgrading the CPUs, at least for the time being.

Thanks to everyone for their advice!

[Butcherbird17]

The Q8200 can be overclocked over 3.0, but it only has a 7x multiplier. So i'm not sure if you can get it over 3.5 or 3.6 on air alone and be stable. With that being said, the motherboard that you have might not let you do any overclocking. If this is a store bought (pre-made) comp this may be the case. To know what you have under the hood, go and download CPUZ's and this will tell you everything from the cpu, motherboard and memory.

As for the FSX.cfg that is located (Vista and wins7) here:

C:\Users\YOUR NAME\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\FSX

You will need to have Hidden Files and Folders checked to find it. To do this open Explorer (NOT Internet Explorer) hit the ALT key to bring up the tool bar, then click on Tools/folder options, then click on the View tab and check Show hidden file, folders and drives, then click Apply to close it out.

Joe

[Walter]

THANK YOU!!! :jump:

[sblzei]

I warmly suggest that you take a look in the FSX Tweaks Forum (page 2) to the post titled ~ Thank you Jesus ~ Jesus Altuve, that is. * FSX Important * , by "boxcar".

It may seem complicated at first glance, but it is not (just keep reading to the end).
It worked very good for me for me (to play safe, just back-up your original FSX .cfg file).

Good Luck,

Ezio

[N324JK]

I looked at Jesus Altuve's fsx.cfg tool, and it had some good ideas but required automatic changes (i.e., basically turning off all shadow effects) that I wasn't willing to accept. I understand what a graphics hog shadow rendering can be, but I'm able to run FSX now relatively well without turning off the shadows. At this point, I've done everything I can do software-wise; the next step would be to upgrade the processor, but that's not in the budget right now.

Thanks for the advice though!

[oakfloor]

They say to download the "Framerate limiter" however all I get is a "No hook DDL" found reload the program again, I did 3 times and it will not work. Help please

[falcon409]

I guess, as with everything else, it depends on the individual system, but I found no advantage to the limiter at all.