Pethaps a good compromise would be to get some 10k rpm SATA drives and install them in a RAID setup. That would be a lot cheaper, and as you say, the drop in performance over a SCSI arrangement might not even be noticeable. Poninless paying an extra

Though Raid don

It's all very confusing - most reports say that a RAID setup will give faster access times, but in practice you say that your system seems better off without a RAID setup. It does seem logical that a RAID 0 installation will get data faster than a non RAID system, but the proof of the pudding is in the eating of course, as you imply. FS9 seems a law unto itself, performance-wise.Martin

>It's all very confusing - most reports say that a RAID setup>will give faster access times, but in practice you say that>your system seems better off without a RAID setup. It does>seem logical that a RAID 0 installation will get data faster>than a non RAID system, but the proof of the pudding is in the>eating of course, as you imply. FS9 seems a law unto itself,>performance-wise.>MartinMartin the Access time go up with RAID. Read and write times are shortened though in some benchmarks at least. In other mysteriously doesn

Hmmmm.... What if I didn't have a RAID option then, but installed the OS (Windows XP Pro) on Disc 1 and FS9.1 on disc 2? Both drives would then be working during flights. Maybe I'd get better end results that way? As I say, I don't intend to load any other applications onto this PC, other than FS9, so it will have all the resources to itself. I'm not even going to put internet access on it (so no meed for anti-virus software) - I can use my other, broadband enabled PC for that and copy over FS files with my firewire connection as needed. Thanks again for the suggestions so far!Martin

A well balanced, and well set-up system is perfectly feasable for FS9. I have fairly modest components by todays latest standards, but can effortlessly run FS9 once away from very heavy airports (Simfliers, Heathrow Pro, etc...).My system is based around an Athlon XP3000+ Barton, 1.5gb PC2700 DDR (yes I know, I should upgrade to PC3200, but, for the price involved, I'd see more performance from a better video card! One day I'll get around to it!!), GeForce FX5900XT 128mb, Abit AN7 mobo w/ Nforce sound system, two Western Digital UDMA 133 hard drives (1x 120gb, 1x 80gb), running Win XP Pro/SP2.With this system I will get 30fps consistantly with 4x AA/8x Aniso, once airborne. If flying from a smaller airport or airbase, I rarely drop below 20fps. Only thte larger and heavier airports (Heathrow Pro, etc) will bring it down to flicker into single digits! I keep AI traffic (Project AI - all available packages) set to 80% as much more and the sim itself has tremendous difficulty in handling AI properly....you get the disappearing aircraft, constant go-arounds, nowhere to park once you land scenarios, etc.....I use either real-world updating weather or preset a weather, and by using Chris Willis' Lo FPS clouds (DXT3), I don't suffer from too much fps fluctuation when the weather gets nasty, and it all still looks good!! European mesh has been replaced by the Abacus/FS Genesis mesh and that is set to high resolution, textures etc are at high/massive, extended terrain, and auto-gen set to max....So, my sim is pretty well maxed out except for selected areas which it's own engine can't handle (AI!!), and I stil get excellent performance with superb visuals! I use a range of freeware and payware aircraft, from the Real Air Spitfire, through the IFDG/PSS Airbus's, Posky 747/757's, Kittyhawk and PMDG 737's, Altitude Concorde, to the Vistaliners/Eric Cantu 727, and my own pieced-together, but very nice, KC-135!!So, running with a fairly well tuned Windows, FS9 on a seperate drive to Windows, and a fairly modest, but still potent system (Doom 3, Half Life 2, and Call of Duty run brilliantly!!), it's quite possible to FS9 very well indeed. I guess that real, all-out balls-to-the-wall, 100fps no matter what or where kind of system is still a couple of years away, but it's really not needed - there's not many games around at the moment that play as smoothly as FS9 can at only 20fps, and I find that much over 30fps in FS9 isn't noticeable anyway.... :)

I must admit that my present PC runs FS9 pretty well too. But there is plenty of room for improvement, for example in (third party) aircraft texture loading times (liveries painted in 32-bit can take several seconds to load), FS Genesis scenery loading, and scenery add-ons, like VFR London scenery (which, even with zero traffic, knocks my frame rates down to 6-7fps). I also get little 'catches', in which the screen freezes for a fraction of a second, even though frame rates are apparently fine. I've seen this reported many times, but not sure of the cause.Normally, I set my fsp to max at between 30 & 36, and I get that easily, even with traffic at 99% (big dive to about 12fps at busy airports of course). I use replacement cloud textures, from the AVSIM library, and even when I fly with heavy black clouds, my frame rates don't go below 20fps. My PMDG 737s load perfectly...If I continue, I may talk myself out of investing in a new PC altogether! M.

Ok i got the ultimate fs pc inmindAthlon 64 FX552GB PC32002 74GB 10,000RPM HD3 Samsung 19" LCD 1600X Res.NVidia 6800GT OC 256MBSound Blaster Card. You pick, im not big in sound cards.Bet you could fly through FS in that. :-wave

I'd go with the X850-PE instead of the 6800GT and 2GB is really overkill and might limit overclockability - better go with two 512MB sticks :)

is less better in this case?

Considering you got an A64 may very well be. 1 gig sticks is not good at all in overclocking. single sided 256 sticks are superior in that regard 512 a bit worse and 1 gig dramatically much worse.If you don

>Considering you got an A64 may very well be. 1 gig sticks is>not good at all in overclocking. single sided 256 sticks are>superior in that regard 512 a bit worse and 1 gig dramatically>much worse.>>If you don

Even the ultimate machine will struggle if you throw everything at it. Mine does okay with everything ticked or maxed (except AI 85% because 100% is too much) and mip map at 4. Anti aliasing set on card so off in FS2004. The two LCDs give a massive viewing area and look great for the PMDG 737 VC. Other bits and pieces are on the third LCD.Happy Christmas

It's all very well saying whats the best setup, but can you actually BUY it ? I ordered mine from my local shop at the beginning of Sept. Xmas is now here and still we can't get hold of an AMD64 3500+ Winchester or the X800xt PE. It's driving me nuts. I got so frustrated I told him to bugger the expense and go for the 3800. Can't get that either. Merry Xmas.

Well, the Winchesters are still quite new... For the display adapters though, it's been a season of vapourware! The X800s were announced in nr.12 of my 26 annual magazine issues... Maybe this situation signified good news for Nvidia? Nevertheless and AFAIK, this misery should soon be over as Ati focused on PCIe instead of the good ol' AGP. At least that's what 'my sources' told me... Good luck and kind regards Jaap PS: If you're in Europe, there's an outfit in Germany (alternate.de) which has them on stock... Including the Winchester 3500!